Volume 3 - Electric Scotland

KYLE RICH. 441
of the passage, causing the side screens to meet and re-
cede under ever-changing forms, is productive of con-
siderable variety. The hills on this side are an inter-
mixture of bold rocks with green pastures, and with
scattered wood and coppice, of birch, oak, and alder. All
the forms are grand and broad ; nothing trifling or frit-
tered appears, as is too much the case in this class of
mountain scenery. As at Loch Cateran also, the eye
sweeps at once from the water's edge to the summit of
the mountain ; the altitude of which is every where beau-
tifully indicated by the successive diminution of the trees
and other forms, and by the increasing grey of the air-
tint as we pursue the objects from the sea to the outline
on the sky. A noon-day sun produces an exquisite dis-
position of light and shadow ;
tinging the summits of the
woods and trees, and glittering on the grassy protuber-
ances; while the deep hollows, sheltered by projecting
rocks and precipices from its rays, are involved in shade
or displayed in all the softness of reflected and modified
light. Profound and shadowy ravines, rude, broken,
and diversified by rocks, mark the passage of waters that
are scarcely seen till they have reached the shore; their
banks being sprinkled with wood, which, dense below,
gradually diminishes in ascending, till a single tree is
at last seen perched high aloft, the last out-post of the
rude forest. These declivities often terminate in the sea
by precipices, in which the oak and the birch are seen
starting from every crevice; sometimes nearly trailing
their leaves and branches in the water which they
overhang, rnd almost deceiving us into the feeling that
we are navigating a fresh-water lake ; a deception main-
tained by the manner in which the land closes in on all
sides.
If this species of beauty, this strange mixture of rural
and maritime objects, diminishes as we approach the