e family who brought
her up are gone to live elsewhere. The sheets were so long in drying
that it was very late before we went to bed. We talked over our day's
adventures by the fireside, and often looked out of the window towards a
huge pyramidal mountain {177} at the entrance of Glen Coe. All between,
the dreary waste was clear, almost, as sky, the moon shining full upon
it. A rivulet ran amongst stones near the house, and sparkled with
light: I could have fancied that there was nothing else, in that
extensive circuit over which we looked, that had the power of motion.

In comparing the impressions we had received at Glen Coe, we found that
though the expectations of both had been far surpassed by the grandeur of
the mountains, we had upon the whole both been disappointed, and from the
same cause: we had been prepared for images of terror, had expected a
deep, den-like valley with overhanging rocks, such as William has
described in these lines, speaking of the Alps:--

Brook and road
Were fellow-travellers in this gloomy Pass,
And with them did we journey several hours
At a slow step. The immeasurable height
Of woods decaying, never to be decayed!
The stationary blasts of waterfalls;
And everywhere along the hollow rent
Winds thwarting winds, bewilder'd and forlorn;
The torrents shooting from the clear blue sky,
The rocks that mutter'd close upon our ears,
Black drizzling crags that spake by the way-side
As if a voice were in them; the sick sight
And giddy prospect of the raving stream;
The unfetter'd clouds, and region of the heavens,
Tumult and peace, the darkness and the light,
Were all like workings of one mind, the features
Of the same face, blossoms upon one tree,
Characters of the great Apocalypse,
The Types and Symbols of Eternity,
Of first, and last, and midst, and without end.

The place had nothing of this character, the glen being open to the eye
of day, the mountains retiring in independent majesty. Even in the upper
part of it, where the stream rushed through the rocky chasm, it was but a
deep trench in the vale, not the vale itself, and could only be seen when
we were close to it.

FOURTH WEEK.

_Sunday_, _September_ 4_th_.--We had desired to be called at six o'clock,
and rose at the first summons. Our beds had proved better than we
expected, and we had not slept ill; but poor Coleridge had passed a
wre