Scotland Described: A Series of Topographical Sketches

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Alexander Murray, 1866 - 448 pages

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Page 351 - Thou know'st it well, —nor fen, nor sedge, Pollute the pure lake's crystal edge ; Abrupt and sheer, the mountains sink At once upon the level brink ; And just a trace of silver sand Marks where the water meets the land. Far in the mirror, bright and blue, Each hill's huge outline you may view...
Page 247 - Where, as to shame the temples deck'd By skill of earthly architect, Nature herself, it seem'd would raise A Minster to her Maker's praise ! Not for a meaner use ascend Her columns, or her arches bend ; Nor of a theme less solemn tells That mighty surge that ebbs and swells, And still, between each awful pause, From the high vault an answer draws, In varied tone prolong'd and high, That mocks the organ's melody.
Page 317 - Far o'er the unfathomable glade, All twinkling with the dewdrop sheen, The brier-rose fell in streamers green, And creeping shrubs, of thousand dyes, Waved in the west-wind's summer sighs.
Page 317 - Each purple peak, each flinty spire, Was bathed in floods of living fire. But not a setting beam could glow Within the dark ravines below, Where twined the path in shadow hid, Round many a rocky pyramid, Shooting abruptly from the dell Its thunder-splinter'd pinnacle ; Round many an insulated mass, The native bulwarks of the pass, Huge as the tower which builders vain Presumptuous piled on Shinar's plain. The rocky summits, split and rent, Form'd turret, dome, or battlement, Or seem'd fantastically...
Page 318 - In all her length far winding lay, With promontory, creek, and bay, And islands that, empurpled bright, Floated amid the livelier light, And mountains, that like giants stand, To sentinel enchanted land.
Page 317 - With boughs that quaked at every breath, Grey birch and aspen wept beneath ; Aloft, the ash and warrior oak Cast anchor in the rifted rock ; And higher yet the pine-tree hung His shatter'd trunk, and frequent flung, Where seemed the cliffs to meet on high, His boughs athwart the narrowed sky.
Page 332 - And these grey rocks; that household lawn; Those trees, a veil just half withdrawn; This fall of water that doth make A murmur near the silent lake...
Page 341 - When the broken arches are black in night, And each shafted oriel glimmers white ; When the cold light's uncertain shower Streams on the ruin'd central tower; When buttress and buttress, alternately, Seem framed of ebon and ivory; When silver edges the imagery, And the scrolls that teach thee to live and die...
Page 317 - Boon Nature scatter'd, free and wild, Each plant or flower, the mountain's child. Here eglantine embalm'd the air, Hawthorn and hazel mingled there ; The primrose pale, and violet flower, Found in each cliff a narrow bower...
Page 341 - If thou would'st view fair Melrose aright, Go visit it by the pale moonlight; For the gay beams of lightsome day Gild, but to flout, the ruins grey.

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