morning through a valley of
perfect silence, where everything around, which is motionless, is
colossal, and everything which has motion, resistless; where the
strength and the glory of nature are principally developed in the very
forces which feed upon her majesty; and where, in the midst of
mightiness which seems imperishable, all that is indeed eternal is the
influence of desolation; one is apt to be surprised, and by no means
agreeably, to find, crouched behind some projecting rock, a piece of
architecture which is neat in the extreme, though in the midst of
wildness, weak in the midst of strength, contemptible in the midst of
immensity. There is something offensive in its neatness: for the wood is
almost always perfectly clean, and looks as if it had just been cut; it
is consequently raw in its color, and destitute of all variety of tone.
This is especially disagreeable, when the eye has been previously
accustomed to, and finds, everywhere around, the exquisite mingling of
color, and confused, though perpetually graceful, forms, by which the
details of mountain scenery are peculiarly distinguished. Every fragment
of rock is finished in its effect, tinted with thousands of pale lichens
and fresh mosses; every pine tree is warm with the life of various
vegetation; every grassy bank glowing with mellowed color, and waving
with delicate leafage. How, then, can the contrast be otherwise than
painful, between this perfect loveliness, and the dead, raw, lifeless
surface of the deal boards of the cottage. Its weakness is pitiable;
for, though there is always evidence of considerable strength on close
examination, there is no _effect_ of strength: the real thickness of the
logs is concealed by the cutting and carving of their exposed surfaces;
and even what is seen is felt to be so utterly contemptible, when
opposed to the destructive forces which are in operation around, that
the feelings are irritated at the imagined audacity of the inanimate
object, with the self-conceit of its impotence; and, finally, the eye is
offended at its want of size. It does not, as might be at first
supposed, enhance the sublimity of surrounding scenery by its
littleness, for it provokes no comparison; and there must be proportion
between objects, or they cannot be compared. If the Parthenon, or the
Pyramid of Cheops, or St. Peter's, were placed in the same situation,
the mind would first form a just estimate of the magnificence of the
building,