CHAPTEK IX 



BINDON HILL 



I OFTEN doubt whether there can be such another 

 hill as Bindon in these islands; I at least have 

 never found it. In foreign lands there are famous 

 hiUs, and health-giving hills — Alesia, Epipolai, or the 

 Acropolis ; but I feel sure that they cannot offer 

 such store of delights, for mind and body too, as 

 Bindon does. Tropical hills may be gorgeous and 

 overpowering, but they are often, to say the least of 

 it, uncomfortable. Under the shadow of Bindon I 

 am just now reading Darwin's Voyage Bound the 

 World, and have been crossing the Andes with him, 

 and trying to penetrate by perilous paths into the 

 mountainous recesses of Tahiti. I have been led to 

 fancy that if the Beagle could but have sailed into 

 the little cove that lies under Bindon's flank, as 

 into a newly-discovered harbour, and have landed 

 the great naturalist to take a walk and explore the 

 overhanging down, he would have carried away such 

 recollections of insects, plants, birds, views, geological 



