Page:Types of Scenery and Their Influence on Literature.djvu/26

 broad depression between the southern border of the Highland mountains and the great tract of high pastoral land in the southern counties. Another considerable area of them intervenes between these southern uplands and the flanks of the Cheviot Hills. A further contrast to the English type is to be seen in the broken character of the surface. There are no extensive level flats like those of the English midlands, nor any continuous bands of gentle ridge like those of the English downs. The ground is separated into detached districts by ranges of hills, which sometimes even become sufficiently high and broad to deserve the name of uplands. A third characteristic arises from the great diversity of geological structure, and especially the intercalation of abundant volcanic rocks among the other formations. As a consequence of this intermingling of hard and durable materials with others more easily abraded, the topography is diversified by endless crags and hills rising picturesquely out of the surrounding lower country and often crowned with ancient castles or ruined peels.

Such a disposition of the elements of the landscape is accompanied with a much greater diversity in the mantle of vegetation than is seen among the English lowlands. The surrounding uplands and hills, for the most part bare of trees, are clothed with pasture, save where they support a covering of heathy herbage or dark peat-moss. The lower grounds have in large measure been brought under cultivation, but still retain tracts of moorland, haunted by lapwing and curlew. Though the ancient natural wood has disappeared,