294 OCTOBER. 



have added to their native charms a thousand 

 delightful associations. Ariosto, Tasso, Spenser, 

 Shakspeare, and Milton, have sanctified them to 

 the hearts of all generations. What a world of 

 magnificent creations comes swarming upon the 

 memory as we wander in woods ! The gallant 

 knights and beautiful dames, the magical castles 

 and hippogriflfs of the Orlando ; the enchanted 

 forest, the Armida and Erminia of the Gerusa- 

 lemma Liherata; "Fair Una with her milk-white 

 lamb," and all the satyrs, Archimages, the fair 

 Florimels and false Duessas of the Faery Queene ; 

 Ariel and Caliban, Jaques and his motley fool in 

 Arden, the fairies of the Midsummer-Night's Dream, 

 Oberon, Titania, and that pleasantest of all mischief- 

 makers, ineffable Puck, the noble spirits of the 

 immortal Comus. With such company, woods are 

 to us any thing but solitudes they are populous 

 and inexhaustible worlds, where creatures that 

 mock the grasp but not the mind, a matchless 

 phantasmagoria, flit before us ; alternately make 

 us merry with their pleasant follies, delight us with 

 their romantic grandeur and beauty, and elevate 

 our hearts with their sublime sentiments. What 

 wisdom do we learn in the world that they do not 

 teach us better? What music do we hear like that 

 which bursts from the pipes of the universal Pan, 

 or comes from some viewless source with the 

 JEolian melodies of Faery-land ? Whatever woods 

 have been to all ages, to all descriptions of superior 

 mind, to all the sages and poets of the past world, 



