第18章 ANOCH(2)

Of the hills,which our journey offered to the view on either side,we did not take the height,nor did we see any that astonished us with their loftiness.Towards the summit of one,there was a white spot,which I should have called a naked rock,but the guides,who had better eyes,and were acquainted with the phenomena of the country,declared it to be snow.It had already lasted to the end of August,and was likely to maintain its contest with the sun,till it should be reinforced by winter.

The height of mountains philosophically considered is properly computed from the surface of the next sea;but as it affects the eye or imagination of the passenger,as it makes either a spectacle or an obstruction,it must be reckoned from the place where the rise begins to make a considerable angle with the plain.In extensive continents the land may,by gradual elevation,attain great height,without any other appearance than that of a plane gently inclined,and if a hill placed upon such raised ground be described,as having its altitude equal to the whole space above the sea,the representation will be fallacious.

These mountains may be properly enough measured from the inland base;for it is not much above the sea.As we advanced at evening towards the western coast,I did not observe the declivity to be greater than is necessary for the discharge of the inland waters.

We passed many rivers and rivulets,which commonly ran with a clear shallow stream over a hard pebbly bottom.These channels,which seem so much wider than the water that they convey would naturally require,are formed by the violence of wintry floods,produced by the accumulation of innumerable streams that fall in rainy weather from the hills,and bursting away with resistless impetuosity,make themselves a passage proportionate to their mass.

Such capricious and temporary waters cannot be expected to produce many fish.The rapidity of the wintry deluge sweeps them away,and the scantiness of the summer stream would hardly sustain them above the ground.This is the reason why in fording the northern rivers,no fishes are seen,as in England,wandering in the water.

Of the hills many may be called with Homer's Ida 'abundant in springs',but few can deserve the epithet which he bestows upon Pelion by 'waving their leaves.'They exhibit very little variety;being almost wholly covered with dark heath,and even that seems to be checked in its growth.What is not heath is nakedness,a little diversified by now and then a stream rushing down the steep.An eye accustomed to flowery pastures and waving harvests is astonished and repelled by this wide extent of hopeless sterility.

The appearance is that of matter incapable of form or usefulness,dismissed by nature from her care and disinherited of her favours,left in its original elemental state,or quickened only with one sullen power of useless vegetation.