Wonders of Nature, as Seen and Described by Famous WritersEsther Singleton Dodd, Mead, 1900 - 366 pages |
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Common terms and phrases
abyss AIGUILLE DU DRU bank basaltic beautiful beneath Blue Grotto boat boatmen cataract Causeway cave cavern chasm cliff climb clouds colour crags crater dark Dead Sea deep depth descend desert distance earth eyes fall FINGAL'S CAVE foam foot forest garden Garden Island geysers GIANT'S CAUSEWAY gigantic glacier granite green grey height Hekla hills horizon island lake land Land's End lava light look mass Mer de Glace miles mist Mont Blanc morning Mount MOUNT SHASTA MOUNT VESUVIUS mountains never Niagara night passed path peaks pines plain precipice reached rise river roaring rocks rolling rose round rushing sand scene seems seen shore side slopes smoke snow spot spray Staffa stand stone strange stream Stromboli summit Thingvalla tion travellers trees turned valley vapour vast Vesuvius volcano walk walls waves whole wild wind wonderful wood yards
Popular passages
Page 216 - Now, upon SYRIA'S land of roses * Softly the light of Eve reposes, And, like a glory, the broad sun Hangs over sainted LEBANON, Whose head in wintry grandeur towers, And whitens with eternal sleet, While summer, in a vale of flowers, Is sleeping rosy at his feet.
Page 61 - Not for a meaner use ascend Her columns, or her arches bend ; Nor of a theme less solemn tells That mighty surge that ebbs and swells And still, between each awful pause, From the high vault an answer draws, In varied tone prolong'd and high, That mocks the organ's melody.
Page 68 - Suppose now the Giants who rebelled against Jove had taken a whole Mass of black Columns and bound them together like bunches of matches, and then with immense Axes had made a cavern in the body of these columns; of course the roof and floor must be composed of the broken ends of the Columns. Such is fingal's Cave except that the Sea has done the work of excavations and is continually dashing there, so that we walk along the sides of the cave on the pillars which are left as if for convenient Stairs.
Page 190 - H their roots, and beyond these, beginning with the craggy peaks above Vicenza, the chain of the Alps girded the whole horizon to the north — a wall of jagged blue, here and there showing through its clefts a wilderness of misty precipices, fading far back into the recesses of Cadore...
Page 184 - Edged with intolerable radiancy Towering like rocks of jet Crowned with a diamond wreath. And yet there is a moment, When the sun's highest point Peeps like a star o'er ocean's western edge, When those far clouds of feathery gold, Shaded with deepest purple, gleam Like islands on a dark blue sea; Then has thy fancy soared above the earth, And furled its wearied wing Within the Fairy's fane.
Page 79 - ... though conscious of the destiny that awaits them. Here the river is very broad, and comparatively shallow, but from shore to shore it frets itself into little torrents, and begins to assume the majesty of its power. Looking at it even here...
Page 88 - ... the rapids hurrying on to take its fearful plunge ; to linger in the shadow of the solemn rocks three miles below ; watching the river as, stirred by no visible cause, it heaved and eddied and awoke the echoes, being troubled yet, far down beneath the surface, by its giant leap ; to have Niagara before me, lighted by the sun and by...
Page 12 - ... as the first essays of his final usurpation, avalanches, torrents, rocks, and thunders, and above all these deadly glaciers, at once the proof and symbols of his reign ; add to this, the degradation of the human species, who in these regions are half deformed or idiotic, and most of whom are deprived of anything that can excite interest or admiration. This is a part of the subject more mournful and less sublime; but such as neither the poet nor the philosopher should disdain to regard.
Page 89 - I think in every quiet season now, still do those waters roll and leap, and roar and tumble, all day long; still are the rainbows spanning them, a hundred feet below. Still, when the sun is on them, do they shine and glow like molten gold. Still, when the day is gloomy, do they fall like snow, or seem to crumble away like the front of a great chalk cliff, or roll down the rock like dense white smoke. But always does the mighty stream appear to die as it comes down, and always from its unfathomable...
Page 190 - And at last, when its walls were reached, and the outmost of its untrodden streets was entered, not through towered gate or guarded rampart, but as a deep inlet between two rocks of coral in the Indian sea; when first upon the traveller's sight opened the long ranges of columned palaces — each with its black boat moored at the portal — each with its image cast down, beneath its feet, upon that green pavement which every breeze broke into new fantasies of rich tessellation; when first, at the...