When we had finished reading this extract, Mary said, that since I was so much amused by it, she would find a description of some curious salt cliffs on the banks of the Indus.
“Near Callabaugh, on the banks of the Indus, the road is cut out of the solid salt, at the foot of salt cliffs, which in some places are more than 100 feet high above the river. The salt is hard, clear, and almost pure; and would be like crystal, were it not a little streaked and tinged with red. Several salt springs issue from the rocks, and leave the ground covered with a crust of the most brilliant whiteness. The earth is blood red, and this, with the beautiful spectacle of the salt rocks, and the Indus flowing in a deep and clear stream, through lofty mountains, presented a most singular scene.”
I have copied these for Mamma, for I am sure you have neither of the books.
26th.—I have been out till very late this lovely evening, which was so calm, and still, and fragrant, that it made me think of some of our own evenings; and the brightness of the stars, and the clear blue sky, increased the resemblance. While walking, I described to Mary and Caroline the country-house of the Condé de San Lourenço, on the slope of the hills which extend from the city towards the south-west; and the fine view, from that spot, of the city and part of the bay. I endeavoured to make them understand the beauty of our evenings, after the sultry day, when the mimosas, that have folded up their leaves to sleep, stand motionless beside the dark manga, jaca, and other trees; or if a little breeze arises, how it makes the stiff, dry leaves of the acaju[2] rustle, and the myrtles drop a fragrant shower of blossoms; while the majestic palms slowly wave their crowns over all.
My cousins appeared so much interested, that I endeavoured to complete my picture of a Brazilian evening. I described to them the shrill cries of the cicada, and the monotonous hum of the tree frog. The singular sound of the little animal called the macue, which almost resembles a distant human voice calling for help. The plaintive cries too of the sloth; and the various noises of the capuira, the goat-sucker, and the bullfrog; along with the incessant chattering of the monkey tribe; while myriads of fire-flies, like moving stars, complete, as you used to say, the beauty of our evenings. I did not forget to mention those palms, whose flowers suddenly burst out in the evening, and join their fragrance to that of the orange groves. Indeed, all these things were so strongly pictured in my mind, that I could almost have thought myself walking amongst them.
Caroline, in her ardent manner, expressed a wish to visit this interesting scene; but quiet Mary repeated a few stanzas of a poem supposed to be written by a European in South America. Two of them are worth sending you.
In the silence and grandeur of midnight I tread,
Where savannahs in boundless magnificence spread;
And, bearing sublimely their snow-wreaths on high,
The far Cordilleras unite with the sky.
The fern-tree waves o’er me—the fire-fly’s red light
With its quick glancing splendour illumines the night;
And I read, in each tint of the skies and the earth,
How distant my steps from the land of my birth.
27th.—I do not wonder at the attachment you feel, Mamma, to this place: it is, indeed, very pretty. These wooded banks, and green lawns and fields that slope towards the Severn, and form such a lovely view from some of the windows! But there is no view so pretty to my fancy, as that from the little bedchamber which my aunt has been so kind as to allot to me. I have a glimpse of the river and its woody banks; and very near my window there is a group of laburnums, and an old fir-tree, in which there are numbers of little birds, that I amuse myself in watching. I am very fond of sitting in the projecting bow window, also, at the end of the library: I call it the poetical window, for all that you see from it suits the feelings that descriptive poetry excites.
By the way, I must say that I can read Thomson’s Seasons now, and other descriptive poetry, with much more pleasure than I could before I came to England, because so much of the scenery described was unknown to me, and so many of the rural occupations I had scarcely seen.