MOUNTAINS.
“And lo! the mountains print the distant sky,
And o’er their airy tops faint clouds are driven,
So softly blending that the cheated eye,
Forgets or which is earth, or which is heaven!”—Fay.
“Mountains and all hills—let them praise the name of the Lord, for his name alone is excellent; his glory is above the earth and heaven.”—David.
Among the wonders, or uncommon phenomena of the world, may be classed stupendous mountains. For though compared with the entire diameter of the earth, the highest elevations on its surface are no more than the inequalities on the skin of the orange to the orange itself, yet to our eyes they often appear immensely lofty and sublime. Descriptions of such vast and striking objects often fail to excite corresponding ideas; so that however accurate or poetical may be the accounts of this class of the prodigies of nature, no just notions of their vastness can be conveyed, by any written or graphical representation. The magnitude of an object must be seen[seen] to be duly conceived; and the mountain-wonders of the world will best be understood and felt by those who have visited Wales, Scotland, Switzerland, or the mountainous regions of America or Asia.