The dogmatic absoluteness of such a statement is its own ruin. We have already seen that Gray had at least three predecessors, Dalton, Amory, and Brown, in his recognition of the beauty of the Lake Region, and many a new tour was sought out by later lovers of the picturesque. But Gray’s “Journal in the Lakes,” though not first, is certainly most important. Both in feeling and in spontaneity and adequacy of expression it shows a marked advance on his preceding work, and as literature it is distinctly in advance of what others had done. The whole of this famous tour occupied but three weeks, and the trip in the Lakes but ten days. Gray was by no means so unwearied in sight-seeing as Young. He was “not fond of dirt,” and he was fastidious about roads and inns. He did not go on an eager search for views. He did not climb Skiddaw, and he passed by Orrest-Head. He saw what he could see comfortably. His descriptions are quiet and controlled. They have none of the “dizzy raptures” of Brown and Young. There is no straining after epithets, no struggle to find expression adequate to the emotion. The following brief quotations may serve to indicate his style: The shining purity of the lake, just ruffled by the breeze, enough to show it is alive. The lake majestic in its calmness. Little shining torrents hurry down the rocks. The grass was covered with a hoar frost, which soon melted, and exhaled in a thin blueish smoke. In the evening walked alone down to the lake after sunset and saw the solemn colouring of night draw on, the last gleam of sunshine fading away on the hill-tops, the deep serene of the waters and the long shadows of the mountains thrown across them. At distance heard the murmur of many waterfalls not audible in the day-time. Wished for the moon, but she was _dark to me and silent, hid in her vacant interlunar cave_. The charm of Gray’s descriptions lies in a certain bare perfection of phrase, in his direct, unadorned statement of beautiful facts. His words have a vital, penetrating quality, while his sense of form, his artistic reticence, keep his enthusiasm free from exclamatory extravagances. Thomas Pennant’s first tour in Scotland was made in 1769. The notes taken on this tour were put into shape and published in 1771. Dissatisfied with the result, he went again in 1772, and his “Second Tour in Scotland and the Hebrides” appeared in 1776. In the first tour his professed object was the study of zoölogy. In the second he was assisted by two friends, one trained in botany, and the other well up in Scotch customs and legends. But Pennant’s interest was not confined to zoölogy and botany, to manners and customs. His curiosity was omnivorous and insatiable. Everything was fish that came to his net, and his industry in note-taking was prodigious. The two journeys occupied six months, and the record of what he saw and heard filled 570 folio pages.