tourist, spots like Iceland may become what the vineyards and myrtle
gardens of South Europe are to him now; and Heidelberg and Baden
be passed unheeded as he hastens from the Alps to the sand dunes of
Scheveningen.

The most thoroughgoing ascetic could feel that he had a natural right to
wander on Egdon--he was keeping within the line of legitimate indulgence
when he laid himself open to influences such as these. Colours and
beauties so far subdued were, at least, the birthright of all. Only in
summer days of highest feather did its mood touch the level of gaiety.
Intensity was more usually reached by way of the solemn than by way of
the brilliant, and such a sort of intensity was often arrived at
during winter darkness, tempests, and mists. Then Egdon was aroused to
reciprocity; for the storm was its lover, and the wind its friend.
Then it became the home of strange phantoms; and it was found to be the
hitherto unrecognized original of those wild regions of obscurity which
are vaguely felt to be compassing us about in midnight dreams of flight
and disaster, and are never thought of after the dream till revived by
scenes like this.

It was at present a place perfectly accordant with man's nature--neither
ghastly, hateful, nor ugly; neither commonplace, unmeaning, nor tame;
but, like man, slighted and enduring; and withal singularly colossal and
mysterious in its swarthy monotony. As with some persons who have long
lived apart, solitude seemed to look out of its countenance. It had a
lonely face, suggesting tragical possibilities.

This obscure, obsolete, superseded country figures in Domesday.
Its condition is recorded therein as that of heathy, furzy, briary
wilderness--"Bruaria." Then follows the length and breadth in leagues;