Journals of Dorothy Wordsworth, Vol. 2 (of 2)Wordsworth, Dorothy
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Journals of Dorothy Wordsworth, Vol. 2 (of 2)
Wordsworth, Dorothy
Authors, English -- 19th century -- Diaries; Wordsworth, Dorothy, 1771-1855 -- Diaries; Wordsworth, William, 1770-1850 -- Family
After having gone for some time under a bare hill, we were told to leave
the car at some cottages, and pass through a little gate near a brook
which crossed the road. We walked upwards at least three quarters of a
mile in the hot sun, with the stream on our right, both sides of which
to a considerable height were planted with firs and larches
intermingled--children of poor Burns's song; for his sake we wished that
they had been the natural trees of Scotland, birches, ashes,
mountain-ashes, etc.; however, sixty or seventy years hence they will be
no unworthy monument to his memory. At present, nothing can be uglier
than the whole chasm of the hill-side with its formal walks. I do not
mean to condemn them, for, for aught I know, they are as well managed as
they could be; but it is not easy to see the use of a pleasure-path
leading to nothing, up a steep and naked hill in the midst of an
unlovely tract of country, though by the side of a tumbling stream of
clear water. It does not surely deserve the name of a pleasure-path. It
is three miles from the Duke of Athol's house, and I do not believe that
one person living within five miles of the place would wish to go twice
to it. The falls are high, the rocks and stones fretted and gnawed by
the water. I do not wonder at the pleasure which Burns received from
this stream; I believe we should have been much pleased if we had come
upon it as he did. At the bottom of the hill we took up our car, and,
turning back, joined the man who was to be our guide.
Crossed the Garry, and went along a moor without any road but straggling
cart-tracks. Soon began to ascend a high hill, and the ground grew so
rough--road there was none--that we were obliged to walk most of the
way. Ascended to a considerable height, and commanded an extensive
prospect bounded by lofty mountains, and having crossed the top of the
fell we parted with our guide, being in sight of the vale into which we
were to descend, and to pursue upwards till we should come to Loch
Rannoch, a lake, as described to us, bedded in a forest of Scotch pines.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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