VII. 



B O O I^ S , 



It is not necessary that an object should be intrinsi- 

 cally beautiful, like a collection of water, to add a pleas- 

 ing feature to the landscape. Though rocks, consid- 

 ered apart from nature, are unsightly objeds, yet no 

 scenery can be complete without them. To a prospect, 

 they afford a variety which it would be difficult to. ob- 

 tain from any other objects. Without them there is a 

 want of those sudden transitions from the smooth to 

 the rough, from the level to the precipitous, from the 

 beautiful to the wild, and from the tame to the expres- 

 sive, which are essential to a perfect landscape. It is 

 only among rocks that the evergreen ferns — those beau- 

 tiful accompaniments of a rustic retreat — are found 

 growing abundantly. There is no more beautiful sight 

 than a series of almost perpendicular rocks, covered on 

 all sides by ferns, with their peculiarly graceful foliage, 

 and here and there a rill trickling down their sides, and 

 forming channels through the evergreen mosses. The 

 solitary glens formed by these rocks could not be imi- 

 tated by any thing else ; and their jutting precipices 

 afford prospects unequalled by the gentle elevations in 

 a rolling landscape. In a country where rocks are 



