THE FOUR BROTHERS:^ 295 



than we could expect to find here, it makes a 

 scene that I have often wished to have trans- 

 ferred to canvas. Our way, now we are passed 

 Seatoller, is over that single-arched bridge to 

 the right ; the road you see passing under that 

 flourishing plantation will take us to Seathwaite. 



AMICUS. Here is a new aspect of scenery and 

 a milder air; I could now imagine myself in 

 one of the mountain valleys of Greece. Those 

 old and large hollies, which are so abundantly 

 scattered over the hill-side on our right, are not 

 unlike the evergreen oak, the ilex, or the more 

 stately oak, the vallania ; and that spacious dry 

 bed of a torrent, which you say you never before 

 saw dry, is exactly like a fiumara of the same 

 region : and that clump of trees before us, which 

 you call " The Four Brothers," reminds me in 

 its funereal hue of a mass of cypress. The dark 

 hue of these trees surprises me, exceeding that 

 even of the cypress. Are they ordinary yews ? 



PISCATOR. It was chiefly to show you these 

 yews that I wished you to come here ; not but 

 that Seathwaite has other circumstances im- 

 parting an interest to it. Let us dismount, and 

 fasten our horses to this old holly tree. Now 

 unfold your map ; you see that we are here in 

 u 4 



