376 COSMOS. 



the stillness of night, in the purity of the sky, and in the starry 

 radiance of the vault of heaven ; he hears from afar the rush 

 of the mountain torrent, as it pursues its foaming course 

 swollen with the trunks of oaks that have been borne along 

 by its turbid waters."* The sublime description of the 

 sylvan loneliness of Parnassus, with its sombre, thickly- 

 wooded and rocky valleys, Contrasts with the joyous pictures 

 of the many-fountained poplar groves in the Ph-aeacian island 

 of Scheria, and especially of the land of the Cyclops, " where 

 meadows waving with luxuriant and succulent grass encircle 

 the hills of unpruned vines. "f Pindar, in a dithyrambus in 

 praise of spring, recited at Athens, sings of " the earth 

 covered with new-born flowers, when, in the Argive Nemaea, 

 the first opening shoot of the palm announces the coming of 

 balmy spring." Then he sings of Etna as "the pillar of 

 heaven, the fosterer of enduring snow;" but he quickly turns 

 away from these terrific forms of inanimate nature, to celebrate 

 Hiero of Syracuse, and the victorious combats of the Greeks 

 with the mighty race of the Persians. 



We must not forget that Grecian scenery presents the 

 peculiar charm of an intimate association of land and sea, of 

 shores adorned with vegetation, or picturesquely girt round 

 by rocks gleaming in the light of aerial tints, and of an ocean 

 beautiful in the play of the ever-changing brightness of its 

 deep- toned moving waves. 



Although to other nations, sea and land, in the different 

 pursuits of life to which they give rise, appeared as two sepa- 

 rate spheres of nature, the Greeks not only those who in- 

 habited the islands, but also those occupying the southern 

 portion of the continent enjoyed, almost everywhere, the 

 aspect of the richness and sublime grandeur imparted to the 

 scenery by the contact and mutual influence of the two ele- 



* Ilias, viii. 555-559; iv. 452-455; xi. 115-119. Compare also the 

 crowded but animated description of the animal world, which precedes 

 the review of the army, ii. 458-475. 



f Od., xix. 431--445; vi.290; ix. 115-199. Compare also "the ver- 

 dant overshadowing of the grove" near Calypso's grotto, " where even an 

 immortal would linger with admiration, rejoicing in the beautiful view," 

 v. 55-73; the breaking of the surf on the shores of the Phseacian 

 Islands, v. 400-442; and the gardens of Alcinous, vii. 113-130. On 

 the vernal dithyrambus of Pindar, see Bo'ckh, Pindari Opera, t. ii, 

 pt. ii. p. 575-579. 



