ii2 LANDSCAPE AND LITERATURE 



the severest climate, have impressed their individual 

 characters upon the landscapes. Thus, in the north- 

 west, where the simplest grouping of rocks is to be 

 seen, masses of horizontal dark-red sandstone have been 

 carved into the huge pyramids that form so singular 

 a feature in the scenery of Ross and Sutherland 

 (p. 71). In the central and south-western counties, 

 gleaming white cones show where the quartzites rise 

 to the surface. In the eastern Grampians, high craggy 

 moors, encircled with stupendous corries and precipices, 

 mark the sites of the bosses of granite. Among the 

 Western Isles, dark splintered crests and pinnacles 

 point out the position of the gabbros. Perhaps the 

 most rugged ground is to be seen among the mica- 

 schists, which combine a wonderful array of pointed 

 peak and notched ridge, with tumultuous masses of 

 craggy declivity. 



In the eastern Grampians, the mountains include 

 broad tracts of undulating moorland, which, though 

 lying along the summits of the chain, are level enough 

 to be capable of conversion into racecourses. These 

 hills are separated from the sea by a tract of lowland, 

 and lie thus entirely inland. On the west side of the 

 Highlands, however, the ground between the straths 

 and glens mounts upward into narrow ridges, not in- 

 frequently sharpened into knife-edged crests, while the 

 whole aspect of the landscape is rugged, rocky, and 

 bare. Land and sea appear there to be inextricably 

 intermingled. Islands, peninsulas, and promontories 

 are penetrated or surrounded by sounds and sea-lochs, 

 in such a curious way that even in what might be 

 thought to be the very heart of the country, the tides of 



