1 86 STRA Y FEA THERS FROM MANY BIRDS. 



the stream is insensibly lost in some wide patch of boggy 

 ground, the grandeur of the scene is complete. Resting 

 after his healthy exertions, the traveller is rewarded by 

 the magnificent prospect around him ; soothed by the 

 strange silence of the wilderness, only broken by the hum 

 of bees amongst the heather, and the cries of birds ; with 

 nothing to disturb the harmony of his thoughts, or break 

 the thread of his meditations. Looking heavenwards 

 the snow-white fleecy clouds are drifting slowly across 

 the intense blue sky ; far below, fields and farmsteads, 

 woods and copses, streams and villages dot the land- 

 scape, and the calm stillness of the scene around him 

 impresses him with its solemn glorious sublimity. The 

 peat is seared with rough trenches, worn in the soft soil 

 by the water which rapidly accumulates in wet weather, 

 to dash down the mountain sides in torrents. The 

 firmer ground is thick with heath, bilberry, crowberry, 

 and clusterberry ; and here and there with patches of 

 cranberry and cloudberry all more or less full of fruit, 

 on which Ring Ousels and Grouse are eagerly feeding. 

 Bird life is plentiful even in this upland solitude. 

 Peewits reel and dash about in erratic course ; screaming 

 Curlews career through the air alarmed at the presence 

 of a human being ; whilst a few Golden Plovers pipe 

 mournfully from the marshes. But the sun is rapidly 

 approaching the western horizon, and the distant banks 

 of cloud already begin to burn and glow with sunset 



