Scene in Dove Dale.

77 clouds, which dispersing, admitted a flood of light, that brightly illumined all around---others succeeded, and occasionally threw the whole scene into gloom; but the finest effects were produced, when, through partial openings in the clouds, the concentrated rays of the sun darted in brilliant lines of light, and for a moment lit up the rocky summits of Dove Dale---while every object around them was enveloped in obscurity. The splendour with which they were occasionally touched was at times so intensely bright that they looked like turrets of fire, lifting their illuminated peaks from out the clouds that rolled about them. I wished to have seen this imposing picture an hour or two nearer sunset; at which peculiar time it would have realized one of Sir Walter Scott's most beautiful descriptions in the Lady of the Lake :--

"The western waves of ebbing day
Roll'd o'er the glen their level way;
Each purple peak, each flinty spire,

Was bath'd in floods of living fire;
But not a setting beam could glow
Within the dark ravines below-
Where turn'd the path, in shadows hid,
Round many a rocky pyramid,
Shooting abruptly from the dell
Its thunder-splinter'd pinnacle,
Round many an insulated mass,
The native bulwarks of the pass."

About two hundred yards beyond Reynard's Cave is the termination of the second grand division of Dove Dale. Here the narrow pass commences, which affords only a passage for the troubled waters of the Dove, and a very scanty pathway beneath the rocks, on the Derbyshire side of the stream: the opposite bank is totally

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78

General Character of the Dale.

impassable. Here the river, as if impatient at being restrained within the limits of this contracted chasm, rushes with great impetuosity to a more open part of the dale, when its turbulence subsides, and it becomes again a placid, but a rapid stream. Sometimes the river occupies the whole space between the rocks; at others, the traveller has occasionally to step from one huge stone to another, to avoid the water that passes between. Through this upper division of the dale, the rocks rise in perpendicular masses on both sides of the river. In some places, imposing precipices frown over the path below, inspiring emotions of awe and terror. Beneath these we passed in silence, as if we feared our voices would disturb the firm-fixed rock above, and bring the incumbent mass, like a tremendous avalanche, upon our heads. This, though not the most beautiful, is certainly the most terrific part of Dove Dale. The three divisions which I have noticed are dissimilar in form and feature, yet somewhat of the same general character pervades the whole. The entrance into this romantic dale, from the side of Thorpe Cloud, is an appropriate introduction to the beauties that succeed: proceeding onwards, the forms become more decidedly picturesque---the foliage thickens, and the rocks assume a greater portion of grandeur---every step varies the scene, but the same bold impress is upon the whole. The forms of some of the rocks are peculiar, perhaps fantastic---yet accompanied, as they are, with a variety of beautiful foliage, hung with ivy, and chequered with lychens, they are not only interesting, but even picturesque objects; and, where they call to mind the forms of things to which they have but a remote resemblance, they do it so imperfectly, that the imagination is amused in supplying the deficiencies. The whole scenery indeed of this dale, from the southern to the northern extremity,