One verse, at least, I will cite,--so full it is of all pastoral
feeling, so brimming over with the poet's passion for the country: it is
from "The Castle of Indolence":--

"I care not, Fortune, what you me deny:
You cannot rob me of free Nature's grace;
You cannot shut the windows of the sky,
Through which Aurora shows her brightening face;
You cannot bar my constant feet to trace
The woods and lawns, by living stream at eve:
Let health my nerves and finer fibres brace,
And I their toys to the great children leave;
Of fancy, reason, virtue, nought can me bereave."

Another Scotchman, Lord Kames, (Henry Home by name,) who was Senior Lord
of Sessions in Scotland about the year 1760, was best known in his own
day for his discussion of "The Principles of Equity"; he is known to the
literary world as the author of an elegant treatise upon the "Elements
of Criticism"; I beg leave to introduce him to my readers to-day as a
sturdy, practical farmer. The book, indeed, which serves for his card of
introduction, is called "The Gentleman Farmer";[F] but we must not judge
it by our experience of the class who wear that title nowadays. Lord
Kames recommends no waste of money, no extravagant architecture, no mere
prettinesses. He talks of the plough in a way that assures us he has
held it some day with his own hands. People are taught, he says, more by
the eye than the ear; _show_ them good culture, and they will follow it.

As for what were called the principles of agriculture, he found them
involved in obscurity; he went to the book of Nature for instruction,