. Round Kangchenjunga; a narrative of mountain travel and exploration . the Swiss Alpsthere is, most travellers will admit, an air of kemptness;about the pinewoods, a certain austerity and monotonythat is the reverse of what we commonly call picturesque-It seems most in accord with the spirit of mountain scenerythat Nature should be allowed to have very much her ownway. With the Swiss she does not get it any further thanthey can help. The Alpine peasants are far too goodmanagers to let her capabilities run to waste. A chaptermight be written on the influence of political institutions onscenery
. Round Kangchenjunga; a narrative of mountain travel and exploration . the Swiss Alpsthere is, most travellers will admit, an air of kemptness;about the pinewoods, a certain austerity and monotonythat is the reverse of what we commonly call picturesque-It seems most in accord with the spirit of mountain scenerythat Nature should be allowed to have very much her ownway. With the Swiss she does not get it any further thanthey can help. The Alpine peasants are far too goodmanagers to let her capabilities run to waste. A chaptermight be written on the influence of political institutions onscenery. With a race of small proprietors Nature has nochance, as in a land of large domains, of keeping corners to ^ I ought jjerhaps to forestall the possible objection that the slopes of the highestvalleys above the forest region are, as a rnle, by no means broken and reason may be found in the fact that they lie in the zone where the torrentialrains are, for six months in the year at least, turned into snow, and for the remain-ing months into Scotch Tllh :.! A \ —AKJVl-: C »^\ B R A >?>OF THE •; THE TEESTA GORGES 91 herself. The valleys are cut up by walls and hedgerows,the streams are dyked, the forests are managed by thecommunity on strictly commercial principles ; the scythespares no wildflowers it can reach even at the risk ofits wielders life. Modern democracy is a determinedenemy of the picturesque. It is not needful to go far forinstances. Scotland is in many respects a far wildercountry than Switzerland; in the Pyrenees the vegetationhas a natural luxuriance, and the beech and chestnut woods,always pleasant substitutes for the pine, show no trace ofcommercial management. In the Central Caucasus mansworks only serve to emphasise the scale of the scenery;they in no way alter its character. In Sikhim man isconspicuous by his absence. In regard to the romance,the variety, and the primaeval aspect of its landscapes, thecoun
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