n we are shut out from any poem in the spread
landscape. We begin to peep and botanise, we take an interest in birds
and insects, we find many things beautiful in miniature. The reader
will recollect the little summer scene in _Wuthering Heights_[11]--the
one warm scene, perhaps, in all that powerful, miserable novel--and
the great feature that is made therein by grasses and flowers and a
little sunshine: this is in the spirit of which I now speak. And,
lastly, we can go indoors; interiors are sometimes as beautiful, often
more picturesque, than the shows of the open air, and they have that
quality of shelter of which I shall presently have more to say.

With all this in mind, I have often been tempted to put forth the
paradox that any place is good enough to live a life in, while it is
only in a few, and those highly favoured, that we can pass a few hours
agreeably. For, if we only stay long enough, we become at home in the
neighbourhood. Reminiscences spring up, like flowers, about
uninteresting corners. We forget to some degree the superior
loveliness of other places, and fall into a tolerant and sympathetic
spirit which is its own reward and justification. Looking back the
other day on some recollections of my own, I was astonished to find
how much I owed to such a residence; six weeks in one unpleasant
country-side had done more, it seemed, to quicken and educate my
sensibilities than many years in places that jumped more nearly with
my inclination.

The country to which I refer was a level and treeless plateau, over
which the winds cut like a whip. For miles on miles it was the same. A
river, indeed, fell into the sea near the town where I resided; but
the valley of the river was shallow and bald, for as far up as ever I
had the heart to follow it. There were roads, certainly, but roads
that had no beauty or interest; for, as there was no timber, and but
little irregularity of surface, you saw your whole walk exposed to you
from the beginning: there was nothing left to fancy, nothing to
expect, nothing to see by the wayside, save here and there an
unhomely-looking homestead, and here and there a solitary, spectacled
stone-breaker;[12] and you were only accompanied, as you went doggedly
forward by the gaunt telegraph-posts and the hum of the resonant wires
in the keen sea-wind. To one who has learned to know their song in
warm pleasant places by the Mediterranean, it seemed to taunt the
country, and make it still