i28 LANDSCAPE AND LITERATURE 



It is curious to remember that three of the poets 

 whom I have singled out as illustrations of the in- 

 fluence of our lowland, upland, and highland scenery 

 upon our literature have held up the geologist to 

 ridicule. Cowper put that votary of science into the 

 pillory among the irreligious crowd, about whose ears 

 the poet loved to ' crack the satiric thong.' x Words- 

 worth treated the geological enthusiast with withering 

 scorn. 2 Scott, with characteristic good humour, only 

 poked fun at him. 3 It was reserved for a poet of 

 our own day to look below the technical jargon of 

 the schools, and to descry something of this wealth 



1 Some drill and bore 

 The solid earth, and from the strata there 

 Extract a register, by which we learn, 

 That He who made it, and revealed its date 

 To Moses, was mistaken in its age. 



— The Task, bk. iii. 150. 



2 You may trace him oft 

 By scars which his activity has left 



Beside our roads and pathways, though, thank Heaven, 

 This covert nook reports not of his hand — 

 He who with pocket-hammer smites the edge 

 Of luckless rock or prominent stone, disguised 

 In weather-stains or crusted o'er by Nature 

 With her first growths, detaching by the stroke 

 A chip or splinter — to resolve his doubts : 

 And, with that ready answer satisfied, 

 The substance classes by some barbarous name, 

 And hurries on ; or from the fragments picks 

 His specimen, if but haply interveined 

 With sparkling mineral, or should crystal cube 

 Lurk in its cells — and thinks himself enriched, 

 Wealthier, and doubtless wiser, than before ! 



The Excursion, bk. iii. 



2 St. Ronan's Well, chap. ii. The passage is quoted postea p. 166. 



