Page:Types of Scenery and Their Influence on Literature.djvu/48

 scenery which has made for itself so notable a place in the history of English poetry should present, when first seen, some special charm of attractive beauty. And doubtless many have shared the disappointment so well expressed by Wordsworth and by Washington Irving, who nevertheless had the advantage of being shown over the Border country by its great minstrel himself. But with the instinct of a true poet, Wordsworth soon recovered from his first surprise, and divined the inner spirit of the landscape. Nowhere has that spirit been more felicitously expressed than in his second poem on Yarrow. Contrasting his first anticipation with what he found to be the reality, he addressed the vale:—

Thou, that didst appear so fair To fond imagination, Dost rival in the light of day Her delicate creation: Meek loveliness is round thee spread, A softness still and holy; The grace of forest charms decayed And pastoral melancholy.

On the influence of the upland scenery of southern Scotland upon the genius of Scott I must not enter. He spent his boyhood within sight of these hills, he made them his chief home throughout life, and when, shattered in health and fortunes, he returned from Italy, it was among these hills, and in hearing of the murmur of the Tweed, that he wished to die. No one can read the 'Lay of the Last Minstrel,' or 'Marmion,' without coming under the spell of the Border scenery. Among the descriptive sketches of landscape in the Waverley Novels, none are more lovingly and