CONTRASTS OF SCENERY. 45 



men have any conception of as contained within the boundaries of 

 their own "inviolate isle." Romantic scenery, remarks Mr. Walter 

 White, must not be looked for on the Lincolnshire coast. In all the 

 journey from the Wash till you s*ee the land of Yorkshire, beyond the 

 Humber, not an inch of cliff will your eyes discover. Monotonous is 

 the prospect of 



" A level waste, a rounding gray " 



of sand-hills, which vary but slightly in height, and bristle with 

 marum. "But tame though it be," continues our authority,* "the 

 scene derives interest from its peculiarity. Strange perspective effects 

 appear in those irregular hills : yonder they run out and form a low 

 dark, purple headland, against which the pale green and yellow 

 of a nearer tongue look bright by contrast. Here for a few furlongs 

 the range rises gray, cold, and monotonous; there it has a warmth of 

 colour relieved by deep shadows, that change their tint during the 

 hours that accompany the sun while he begins and ends his day. 

 Sitting on the summit of those dry hills, you will remark the con- 

 trasted landscape : on the one side, the level pasture land, league 

 after league of grassy green, sprinkled with villages, farms, churches, 

 and schools, where work and worship will find exercise through 

 ages yet to come ; on the other, league after league of tawny sand, 

 sloping gently outwards to meet the great sea that ever foams or 

 ripples thereupon. On the one hand, a living scene bounded by the 

 distant wolds ; on the other, a desert, sea and shore alike solitary, 

 bounded only by the overarching sky. More thoughts come crowd- 

 ing into the mind in presence of such a scene than are easy to 

 express." 



* Walter White, " Eastern England," ii. 13, 14. 



