226 Summer Studies of Birds and Books CHAP. 



strata, and fresh air, as would have made his usu- 

 ally sedate page eloquent of pleasure never to be 

 forgotten. 



Those who now sail, or rather steam, into this 

 deep and tranquil cove are in the summer season 

 to be numbered by thousands. They come from all 

 the watering-places near at hand, they come and eat 

 and stroll and depart, and, fortunately for me, they 

 rarely discover Bindon. For Bindon rears his crest 

 some five hundred and fifty feet above the sea at his 

 base, and is not very easy of access from the steamers' 

 landing-place. I do not think that I myself truly 

 discovered him the first time I came here, even 

 under the tuition of a valued friend who had known 

 him from boyhood ; I trod his whole length more than 

 once, but my diary shows me that I did not under- 

 stand him. For ten successive years I have never 

 once missed him altogether ; and now when his well- 

 known form comes in sight from the window of the 

 train, I feel youth still stirring in me with strong 

 desire to mount upon his grassy back. 



I cannot paint Bindon, and indeed I think he 

 does not readily suggest beauties to the artist's eye. 

 I have twice walked his whole length in company 

 with a young artist, who saw nothing on either occa- 

 sion to delay him. Turner has drawn the steep cliffs 

 with which his western end strikes down into the 

 cove, but they are not the chief objects in the 



