12 



POPULAR HISTORY OP LICHENS. 



counties, — mountains, rivers, lakes, — spread like a carpet at 

 his feet. But his hopes in the majority of cases are too likely 

 to prove delusive : he probably sees nothing but " mists on 

 the brae," for every traveller in the Scotch Highlands knows 

 full well how apt he is to be disappointed in his expectations 

 by the mists and storms of its moist and treacherous cli- 

 mate. To him the black heaths, time-stained boulders, and 

 bristling crags are only so many obstacles to the attainment 

 of his aim. Instead of beauty, he finds only desolation in 

 the scene ; and under a sense of disappointment, overcome 

 by a feeling of loneliness and gloom, he is perhaps too prone 

 to have recourse to artificial stimulants of a questionable 

 character. But under the same circumstances, the naturalist 

 requires no other stimulus than the sight of the natural ob- 

 jects which encompass and strew his path. Sis eye never 

 dims, — his energies never flag, — his spirit never wearies, so 

 long as he can find, on every rock or tree, 



" Ten thousand forms minute 

 Of velvet moss or lichen, torn from rock 

 Or rifted oak." 



He looks upon every mis-shapen boulder as a treasury of 

 Lecanoras, Lecideas, and Umbilicarias ; in each he reads 

 valuable lessons on the characters and geographical range of 

 Lichens ; he may be said literally to find " sermons in 



