14 - The tempered or smiling riverscape

Summary

A living landscape with economically viable farms is the main requirement for biodiversity and cultural components.

(Ihse & Lindall, 2000)

He looked out over a plain and saw fields and trees and woods – green and golden in the srong sunshine. He saw the silver smoke of a river wandering in a leisurely manner towards the sea, and far away over the treetops, the land tilting up gently into hills, … the clouds moved slowly over the shallow, tilted bowl.

(D. E. Stevenson)

I dared to rest, or wander, in a rest

Made sweeter by the step upon the grass,

And view the ground's most gentler dimplement

(As if God's finger touched, but did not press

In making England) such an up and down

A ripple of land, such little hills, the sky

can stoop to tenderly, and the wheatfields climb;

Such nooks of valleys lined with orchards,

Fed full of noises by invisible streams;

And open pastures where you scarcely tell

White daisies from white dew – at intervals.

The mythic oaks and elm-tree standing out

Self-poised upon their prodigy of shade,

I thought my father's land was worthy too

Of being my Shakespeare's

(E. B. Browning)

A little nameless brook that winds between [small meadows] with a course which, in its infinite variety, clearness and rapidity, seems to emulate the bold rivers of the north…. Rich tufts of golden marsh marigolds which grow on its margin … so clear, so wide, so shallow [and] dashing … in a torrent deep and narrow … sleeping, half-hidden beneath the alders and wild roses … flags, lilies and other aquatic plants almost cover the surface.[…]