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6 FIRST PERIOD,,
in the recess or mountain bay which the two 'ridges enclose;
every fragment which thunder breaks out of their battlements,
and every grain of dust which the summer rain washes from
their pastures, is at last laid at rest in the blue sweep of the
Lombardic plain; and that plain must have risen within its
rocky barriers as a cup fills with wine, but for two contrary influences which continually depress, or disperse from its surface,
the accumulation of the ruins of ages.
§ iv. I will not tax the reader's faith in modern science by
insisting on the singular depression of the surface of Lombardy,
which appears for many centuries to have taken place steadily
and continually; the main fact with which we have to do is
the gradual transport, by the Po and its great collateral rivers,
of vast masses of the finer sediment to the sea. The character
of the Lombardic plains is most strikingly expressed by the
ancient walls of its cities, composed for the most part of large
rounded Alpine pebbles alternating with narrow courses of
brick; and was curiously illustrated in 1848, by the ramparts
of these same pebbles thrown up four or five feet high round
every field, to check the Austrian cavalry in the battle under
the walls of Verona. The finer dust among which these pebbles are dispersed is taken up by the rivers, fed into continual
strength by the Alpine snow, so that, however pure their waters
may be when they issue from the lakes at the foot of the great
chain, they become of the color and opacity of clay before they
reach the Adriatic; the sediment which they bear is at once
thrown down as they enter the sea, forming a vast belt of low
land along the eastern coast of Italy. The powerful stream of
the Po of course builds forward the fastest; on each side of it,
north and south, there is a tract of marsh, fed by more feeble
streams, and less liable to rapid change than the delta of the
central river. In one of these tracts is built Ravenna, and in
the other Venice.
§ v. What circumstances directed the peculiar arrangement
of this great belt of sediment in the earliest times, it is not here
the place to inquire. It is enough for us to know that from
the mouths of the Adige to those of the Piave there stretches,
| Title | The stones of Venice - 2 |
| Creator | Ruskin, John |
| Publisher | J. Wiley |
| Place of Publication | New York |
| Date | 1889 |
| Language | eng |
| Type | Books/Pamphlets |
| Title | 00000017 |
| Type | Books/Pamphlets |
| Transcript | 6 FIRST PERIOD,, in the recess or mountain bay which the two 'ridges enclose; every fragment which thunder breaks out of their battlements, and every grain of dust which the summer rain washes from their pastures, is at last laid at rest in the blue sweep of the Lombardic plain; and that plain must have risen within its rocky barriers as a cup fills with wine, but for two contrary influences which continually depress, or disperse from its surface, the accumulation of the ruins of ages. § iv. I will not tax the reader's faith in modern science by insisting on the singular depression of the surface of Lombardy, which appears for many centuries to have taken place steadily and continually; the main fact with which we have to do is the gradual transport, by the Po and its great collateral rivers, of vast masses of the finer sediment to the sea. The character of the Lombardic plains is most strikingly expressed by the ancient walls of its cities, composed for the most part of large rounded Alpine pebbles alternating with narrow courses of brick; and was curiously illustrated in 1848, by the ramparts of these same pebbles thrown up four or five feet high round every field, to check the Austrian cavalry in the battle under the walls of Verona. The finer dust among which these pebbles are dispersed is taken up by the rivers, fed into continual strength by the Alpine snow, so that, however pure their waters may be when they issue from the lakes at the foot of the great chain, they become of the color and opacity of clay before they reach the Adriatic; the sediment which they bear is at once thrown down as they enter the sea, forming a vast belt of low land along the eastern coast of Italy. The powerful stream of the Po of course builds forward the fastest; on each side of it, north and south, there is a tract of marsh, fed by more feeble streams, and less liable to rapid change than the delta of the central river. In one of these tracts is built Ravenna, and in the other Venice. § v. What circumstances directed the peculiar arrangement of this great belt of sediment in the earliest times, it is not here the place to inquire. It is enough for us to know that from the mouths of the Adige to those of the Piave there stretches, |
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