HEATHER BELLS IN SCOTTISH SCENERY. 



That such wild grandeur should have an influence 

 upon those whom it constantly surrounds is a natural 

 sequence. This pervading influence is delightfully im- 

 pressed by Ruskin in the following passage from "Two 

 Paths:" 



"You will find upon reflection that all the highest 

 points of the Scottish character are connected with 

 impressions derived straight from the natural scenery 

 of their country. No nation has ever before shown, in 

 the general tone of its language in the general cur- 

 rent of its literature so constant a habit of hallowing 

 its passions and confirming its principles by direct asso- 

 ciation with the charm or power of nature. The 

 writings of Scott and Burns and yet more, of far 

 greater poets than Burns, who gave Scotland her tradi- 

 tional ballads furnish you in almost every stanza 

 almost in every line with examples of this association 

 of natural scenery with the passions ; but an instance 

 of its farther connection with moral principle struck 

 me forcibly just at the time when I was most lamenting 

 the absence of art among the people. In one of the 

 loveliest districts of Scotland, where the peat cottages 

 are darkest, just at the western foot of that great mass 

 of the Grampians which encircles the sources of the 

 Spey and the Dee, the main road which traverses the 

 chain winds round the foot of a broken rock called 

 Crag or Craig Ellachie. There is nothing remarkable 

 in either its height or form ; it is darkened with a few 

 scattered pines and touched along its summit with a 

 flush of Heather; but it constitutes a kind of head- 

 land, or leading promontory, in the group of hills to 

 which it belongs a sort of initial letter of the moun- 



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