150 AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND. 



still ; but tell me, do you think it is only for greed of trouts thafc 

 your great and sensitive man lingers long, intently stooping 

 over dark pools in the spray of the mountain torrents, or steal 

 ing softly a way through the bending rushes, or kneeling lowly 

 on the darkest verdure of the shaded meadow 1 What else ? 

 I know not what he thinks, but of this I am assured : while his 

 mind is most intent upon his trivial sport, his heart and soul 

 will be far more absorbent of the rugged strength, the diffuse, 

 impetuous brilliance, the indefinite gliding grace, or the peace 

 ful twilight loveliness, of the scenes around him, than if he went 

 out searching, labouring directly for it as for bread and fame. 

 The greater part of the Isle of Wight is more dreary, deso 

 late, bare, and monotonous, than any equal extent of land you 

 probably ever saw in America would be, rather, if it were 

 not that you are rarely out of sight of the sea ; and no land 

 scape, of which that is a part, ever can be without variety and 

 ever-changing interest. It is, in fact, down-land in the interior, 

 exactly like that I described in Wiltshire, and sometimes 

 breaking down into such bright dells as I there told of. But 

 on the south shore it is rocky, craggy ; and after you have 

 walked through a rather dull country, though pleasing on the 

 whole, for hours after landing, you come gradually to where 

 the majesty of vastness, peculiar to the downs and the ocean, 

 alternates or mingles with dark, picturesque, rugged ravines, 

 chasms, and water-gaps, sublime rock-masses, and soft, warm, 

 smiling, inviting dells and dingles ; and, withal, there is a 

 strange and fascinating enrichment of half-tropical foliage, so 

 deep, graceful, and luxuriant, as I never saw before any where 

 in the world. All this district is thickly inhabited, and yet so 

 well covered with verdure, or often so tastefully appropriate 

 quiet, cosy, ungenteel, yet elegant are the cottages, that they 

 often add to, rather than insult and destroy, the natural charm 

 of their neighbourhood. I am sorry to say, that among the 



