nd
out, as I followed it, from bays of shadow into promontories of afternoon
sun. This was a pass like that of Killiecrankie; a deep turning gully in
the hills, with the Tarn making a wonderful hoarse uproar far below, and
craggy summits standing in the sunshine high above. A thin fringe of ash-
trees ran about the hill-tops, like ivy on a ruin; but on the lower
slopes, and far up every glen, the Spanish chestnut-trees stood each four-
square to heaven under its tented foliage. Some were planted, each on
its own terrace no larger than a bed; some, trusting in their roots,
found strength to grow and prosper and be straight and large upon the
rapid slopes of the valley; others, where there was a margin to the
river, stood marshalled in a line and mighty like cedars of Lebanon. Yet
even where they grew most thickly they were not to be thought of as a
wood, but as a herd of stalwart individuals; and the dome of each tree
stood forth separate and large, and as it were a little hill, from among
the domes of its companions. They gave forth a faint sweet perfume which
pervaded the air of the afternoon; autumn had put tints of gold and
tarnish in the green; and the sun so shone through and kindled the broad
foliage, that each chestnut was relieved against another, not in shadow,
but in light. A humble sketcher here laid down his pencil in despair.

I wish I could convey a notion of the growth of these noble trees; of how
they strike out boughs like the oak, and trail sprays of drooping foliage
like the willow; of how they stand on upright fluted columns like the
pillars of a church; or like the olive, from the most shattered bole can
put out smooth and youthful shoots, and begin a new life upon the ruins
of the old. Thus they partake of the nature of many different trees; and
even their prickly top-knots, seen near at hand against the sky, have a
certain palm-like air that impresses the imagination. But their
individuality, although compounded of so many elements, is but the richer
and the more original. And to look down upon a level filled with these
knolls of foliage, or to see a clan of old unconquerable chestnuts
cluster 'like herded elephants' upon the spur of a mountain, is to rise
to higher thoughts of the powers that are in Nature.

Between Modestine's laggard humour and the beauty of the scene, we made
little progress all that afternoon; and at last finding the sun, although
still far from setting, was already