274 SEPTEMBER. 



centrated lightning, darkness and thunder ; or the 

 sweeter features of living, rushing streams, spicy 

 odours of flower and shrub, fresh spirit-elating 

 breezes sounding through the dark pine grove ; the 

 ever-varying lights and shadows, and aerial hues ; 

 the wide prospects, and, above all, the simple 

 inhabitants ! 



We delight to think of the people of mountainous 

 regions ; we please our imaginations with their pic- 

 turesque and quiet abodes ; with their peaceful 

 secluded lives, striking and unvarying costumes* 

 and primitive manners. 



We involuntarily give to the mountaineer heroic 

 and elevated qualities. He lives amongst noble 

 objects and must imbibe some of their nobility ; he 

 lives amongst the elements of poetry, and must be 

 poetical ; he lives where his fellow-beings are far, 

 far separated from their kind, and surrounded by 

 the sternness and perils of savage nature; his social 

 affections must therefore be proportionably concen- 

 trated, his home-ties lively and strong ; but, more 

 than all, he lives within the barriers, the strong- 

 holds, the very last refuge which Nature herself has 

 reared to preserve alive liberty in the earth, to 

 preserve to man his highest hopes, his noblest 

 emotions, his dearest treasures, his faith, his free- 

 dom, his hearth and his home. How glorious do 

 those mountain-ridges appear when we look upon 

 them as the unconquerable abodes of free hearts ; 

 as the stern, heaven-built walls from which the few, 

 the feeble, the persecuted, the despised, the helpless 



