Closely connected with the sense for landscape is the use of geographical romance,[313] or the heightening of poetic effect by the accumulation of sounding geographical names.[314] The finest example of this device is in the lines descriptive of the thunder re-echoed among the mountains.[315] In this passage the impression of sublimity is due to the suggestions of mysterious elemental forces subtly associated with such names as Carnarvon, Penmaenmawr, Snowdon, Thule, and Cheviot.[316] This mental following of the thunder from peak to distant peak, this endeavor to strengthen the impression by the use of the remote and the unknown, show a mind set toward romantic rather than classical ideals. A further indication of Thomson’s defiance of limits is his curiosity. His mind goes back of the present fact and restlessly strives after causes and origins.[317] In imagination he seeks to penetrate to the vast eternal springs from which Nature refreshes the earth.[318] The most poetic example of this questioning spirit is in his address to the winds that blow with boisterous sweep to swell the terrors of the storm. In what far-distant region of the sky, Hush’d in deep silence, sleep you when ’tis calm?[319] The classical spirit held itself to useful questions that could have some rational answer. It is the romantic spirit that pushes its inquiries into the realms of the unknowable. Throughout this study of Thomson’s work there has been an implicit recognition of his strong love for Nature. This fact receives further definite confirmation from his letters. It is interesting to note that his early life was almost as fortunate in its environment as Wordsworth’s. When he was a year old his father moved to Southdean, a small hamlet near Jedborough. Here the lad remained till he entered the university at Edinburgh at fifteen,[320] and here he apparently passed most of his vacations till he went to London at twenty-five. One of his especial friends was Dr. Cranston of Ancrum whose love of Nature was equal to his own. Thomson’s letters to Dr. Cranston, though somewhat stilted and high-flown, show clearly the eagerness with which they had together explored the picturesque country along the Tiviot and its tributary streams, the Ale and the Jed. In the first letter from London, under the date April 3, 1725, was written, “I wish you joy of the spring.” In September of the same year Thomson wrote from Barnet: Now I imagine you seized with a fine romantic kind of melancholy on the fading of the year; now I figure you wandering, philosophical and pensive, ’midst the brown, wither’d groves, while the leaves rustle under your feet, the sun gives a farewell parting gleam, and the birds Stir the faint note and but attempt to sing.