Recreations of Christopher North, Volume 1

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It is nearly as impossible a thing as we know, to borrow a dog about the time the sun has reached his meridian, on the First Day of the Partridges. Ponto by this time has sneake...

And who that loves to walk or wander over the green earth, except indeed it merely be some sonnetteer or ballad-monger, if he had time and could afford it, and lived in a tolera...

The "Lang Gun," again, was of a much gentler disposition, and, instead of kicking, ran into the opposite extreme on being let off, inclining forwards as if she would follow the...

Now is the time for the snow-white, here and there ebon-spotted Fro--who with burning eyes has lain couched like a spaniel, his quick breath ever and anon trembling on a passion...

But 'tis now mid-day--and lo! in that mediterranean--a flock of wild Swans! Have they dropt down from the ether into the water almost as pure as ether, without having once folde...

Forgotten all human dwellings, and all the thoughts and feelings that abide by firesides, and doorways, and rooms, and roofs--delightful was it, during the long long midsummer h...

And many at last were the kind--some the sad farewells, ere long whispered by us at gloaming among the glens. Let them rest for ever silent amidst that music in the memory which...

No one said, no one thought that Ludovic and Margaret were lovers--nor were they, though well worthy indeed of each other's love; for the orphan's whole heart was filled and sat...

There were various accounts of the behaviour of the prisoner. Some said that he was desperately hardened--others, sunk in sullen apathy and indifference--and one or two persons...

The Morning of that Day arose, and the Moor was all blackened with people round the tall gibbet, that seemed to have grown, with its horrid arms, out of the ground during the ni...

Ere we set off for Salem, we had thoughts of entering the Church, and of becoming Bishops. But it was necessary, we were told, first to be tutor to a lord. That, in our pride, w...

There is a glen in the Highlands (dearly beloved Southrons, call on us, on your way through Edinburgh, and we shall delight to instruct you how to walk our mountains) called Gle...

"Nothing but a full faith in Divine Revelation," solemnly said his aged friend, "can subdue the evil passions of our nature, or enable conscience itself to see and repent of sin...

We could tell many stories about bees, but that would be leading us away from the main argument. We remember reading in an American newspaper, some years ago, that the United St...

We see only the uncertain glimmer of their dwelling through the low-lying mist; and therefore we cannot describe it, as if it were clearly before our eyes. But should you ever c...

The owner of that house was once a man well to do in the world; but he minded this world's goods more than it was fitting to do, and made Mammon his god. Abilities he possessed...

No great travellers are we, yet have we seen something of this habitable globe. The Highlands of Scotland is but a small region, nor is its interior by any means so remote as th...

Then there is the poetry of Crabbe. We hear it is not very popular. If so, then neither is human life. For of all our poets, he has most skilfully woven the web and woven the wo...

Of all his chief Poems the conception and the execution are original; in much faulty and imperfect both; but bearing throughout the impress of original power; and breathing a mo...

Such men seem to us more clearly and certainly men of genius, than many who, under different circumstances, may have effected higher achievements. For though they enjoyed in the...

Nor from those visions need we fear to turn to Sybil Lesley. We see her in Elvar Tower, a high-born Lady--in Dalgonar Glen, a humble bondmaid. The change might have been the rev...

We have been gradually growing national overmuch, and are about to grow even more so, therefore ask you to what era, pray, did Thomson belong? To none. Thomson had no precursor-...

And is not "The Fairy Queen" a Great Poem? Like "The Excursion," it is at all events a long one--"slow to begin, and never ending." That fire was a fortunate one in which so man...

Away we go westwards--like fire-worshippers devoutly gazing on the setting sun. And another isle seems to shoot across our path, separated suddenly, as if by magic, from the mai...

Immediately in front, the hills are low and lovely, sloping with gentle undulations down to the lake, here grove-girdled along all its shores. The elm-grove that overshadows the...

and Diana, who has ascended high in heaven, without our having once observed the divinity, bends her silver bow among the rejoicing stars, while the lake, like another sky, seem...

"For many a tale Traditionary, round the mountains hung, And many a legend, peopling the dark woods, Nourish'd Imagination in her growth, And gave the mind that apprehensive pow...

So charmed have we been with the sound of our own voice--of all sounds on earth the sweetest surely to our ears--and, therefore, we so dearly love the monologue, and from the di...

To speak more prosaically, every true and accepted lover of nature regards her with a painter's as well as a poet's eye. He breaks not down any scene rudely, and with "many an o...

But, alas! for the Odontist! He, the "_Deliciæ generis Humani_," is dead. The best of all the Bishops of Bristol is no more. Mansel had not a tithe of his wit--nor Kaye a tithe...

But is it our intention to sit scribbling here all day? Our fancy lets our feet enjoy their sinecure, and they stretch themselves out in indolent longitude beneath the Tent-tabl...

But to see what he owes to inventive art, we should compare man, not with inferior creatures, but with himself, looking over the face of human society, as history or observation...

A Tarn--a Tarn! with but a small circle of unbroken water in the centre, and all the rest of its shallowness bristling, in every bay, with reeds and rushes, and surrounded, all...

And is the spirit of the inhabitation there worthy of the place inhabited? We are a Scotsman. And the great English Moralist has asked, where may a Scotsman be found who loves n...

Half an hour since we parted--we cannot help being a little sad--and fear we were not so kind to the old people--not so considerate as we ought to have been--and perhaps, though...

Such fancies as these, among many others, were with us in the Still. But a glimmering and a humming and a dizzy bewilderment hangs over that time and place, finally dying away i...

a man evidently not shooting for a wager, and performing a match from the mean motive of avarice or ambition, but blazing away "at his own sweet will," and, without seeming to k...

Was there ever such a man as Ossian? We devoutly hope there was--for if so, then there were a prodigious number of fine fellows, besides his Bardship, who after their death figu...

One family lived in Glencreran, and another in Glenco--the families of two brothers--seldom visiting each other on working-days--seldom meeting even on Sabbaths, for theirs was...

Who were they--the solitary pair--all alone by themselves save a small image of her on whose breast it lay--whom--seven summers after--we came upon in our wanderings, before the...

Sister or brother of her own had she none--and often both her parents--who lived in a hut by itself up among the mossy stumps of the old decayed forest--had to leave her alone--...

Away he flies, and he is humming a tune. But what's this? A merry-making in the moor? Ay, merry-making; but were you to take part in it, you would find it about the hardest work...

Was it not a Paragon of a Parish? But we have not told you one half of its charms. There was a charm in every nook--and Youth was the master of the spell. Small magicians were w...