III Green & Pleasant Land

As you travel through the counties of Britain you pass through countryside , which is constantly changing.

And you begin to see how these landscapes, each with its own distinctive character, have been reflected in the work of our writers and artists.

Go to Dorset for example and you'll find yourself in the Wessex of Thomas Hardy the author of 'Tess of the D'Urbervilles' and 'Far from the madding crowd '.

You can visit the cottage in which Hardy was born.

And you can still see many of the places described in his books, like the church of Barereedges where his doomed heroin Tess saw the D'Urbervilles windows.

Very different from the roaming hills of Hardy's Wessex is the flat and open scenery of East Anglia.

Here in Suffolk are the landscapes painted in the early 1800s by John Constable: Deadham Vale , Willy Lot's cottage and Flatford Mill.

John Constable's Suffolk is one of the many interesting rural areas , which can be visited in a day's coach-ride from London.

To get a fuller experience of the countryside however , it might be worth hiring a car and spending a night or two in a country Inn or at one of the many farms and cottages, which offer Bed & Breakfast.

If you're prepared to travel further afield , you could discover the pleasures of the West Country, Wales, the North of England and Scotland.

Some of the most beautiful scenery in Europe is to be found in the Highlands and Lowlands of Scotland. Parts of Britain are surprisingly isolated and unless you've got a car and a good map very hard to reach .

In some remote areas , such as the Highlands of Scotland, you can take a ride with the postman and travel with him on his delivery round .

This may not be the speediest way of getting about but it gives you a good opportunity to meet local people.

Somewhere else where you can take advantage of the post bus is the Lake District.

At Dove Cottage in Grasmere lived the poet William Wordsworth and his sister Dorothy.

In his youth Wordsworth loved to explore this mountainous landscape and his poems give vivid accounts of its impact upon him.

For many people the Lake District is first and foremost Wordsworth' country.

But he wasn't the only writer to live here.