INFLUENCE OF LOWLAND SCENERY 83 



To the same cause may be traced that appreciation 

 of the poetry of the sea so noticeable in our litera- 

 ture. 



We may now inquire how far the placid scenery of 

 these eastern lowlands may have had an influence on 

 the literary progress of the nation. It is of course 

 chiefly among the poets that traces of such an 

 influence may be expected to be discoverable. Not 

 until comparatively late times did prose-writers deal 

 with scenery, save as a mere background for the 

 human incidents which they had to describe. It is 

 impossible, within the prescribed limits of a single 

 lecture, to follow the gradual development of an 

 appreciation of landscape among the writers who have 

 lived on these English lowlands. The simple child- 

 like delight in Nature, so characteristic of Chaucer, 

 and the influence of cultivated scenery, so conspicuous 

 in him, are readily traceable among his successors. 

 Shakespeare throughout his plays presents us with 

 not a few reminiscences of his youth among the 

 Warwickshire woodlands. In Milton we see how 

 the placid rural quiet of the Colne valley inspired 

 the two finest lyrics in the English tongue. For a 

 century after Milton's time, poetry in this country 

 ceased to have any living hold on outer nature, but 

 became with each generation more polished and 

 artificial. When at last a reaction set in, the impulse 

 that led to the most momentous revolution that has 

 marked the history of English poetry came in large 

 measure from the writings of three poets, each of 

 whom drew his inspiration from lowland scenery. 

 As illustrations therefore of the part played by this 



