I’m not sure whether people still talk about how very “real” a photograph is compared to a painting. Anyway, it’s not. I have a problem with my camera: I like to take pictures while it’s getting dark, but the lens is so “good” that what comes out looks as if it were taken in broad daylight, all bright and cheery. Though it narrows my photographing opportunity to about five or ten minutes (after that everything comes out all blurry), it’s no big deal; I can adjust it afterwards using Photoshop, but I find the brightness that wasn’t there to be disconcerting.
On the right, in this first one, you can just see the waterfall that flows into the lake:
Cows roosting in the trees:
More cows, overhead:
This could be Jamaica:
But unfortunately it isn’t.
Coming up next: The Weather.
A Bad Guide 
As I was walking all alane,
I heard twa corbies makin’ a mane;
The tane unto the t’other say,
“Where sall we gang an’ dine the day?”
“In ahint yon auld fail dyke,
I wot there lies a new-slain knight;
An’ naebody kens that he lies there
But his hawk, his hound an’ his lady fair.
“His hound is to the huntin’s gane,
His hawk to fetch the wild fown hame,
His lady’s ta’en another mate,
Sae we may mak our denner sweet.
“Ye’ll sit on his white hause-bane,
An’ I’ll pike oot his bonny blue een,
Wi’ ae lock o’ his gowden hair
We’ll theek our nest when it grows bare.
“Mony a ane for him maks mane,
But nane shall ken where he is gane;
Ower his white banes when they are bare
The wind sall blaw for evermair”.
It doesn’t say who killed the knight, but for the sake of argument I’ll assume it was Norwegians.
Thank you, Dearie. Norwegians feature a lot in the backstory of Macbeth.
These photos are especially poetic!
Each and every one inspire something different.
Got a coupla cows teasing the cats in my backyard.
Thanks, Julia. I do really appreciate the praise.
Cows are my favourite birds, I think they’re so much like people (and what’s wrong with that?), but I can never get them to stand still for close ups. They’re all over the place in the autumn here, flying around in flocks — especially at dusk.
En gammel munk
En gammel munk gik ud for at spadsere,
thi solen skjen så varmt nu ved Sankt Hans,
at ej han orked’ sidde inde mere
og tælle perler på sin rosenkrans.
Og alt var fred, hvorhen han vendte øjet,
da stille ud af klost’rets port han tren.
Kun klostret’s ko lå doven og fornøjet
og tyggede og tygged’ om igen.
Mod himlen hæved munken fromt sit øje.
Der sejlede en svale højt mod sky.
Forvovne, hvem er du, som i det høje,
i selve Himmerige søger ly ?
Og svalen høflig var som nogen anden,
gav munken på hans spørgsmål grej besked.
Den sendte sit visitkort ned til manden,
det daled’ på hans blanke isse ned.
Men munken hæved atter fromt sit øje,
og sine hænder stille folded’ han:
“Hav tak, oh Gud, at ikke i det høje
som svalen også koen flyve kan.”
An Old Monk
Something like:
An old monk went out for a walk,
the sun shone so hot now at midsummer
that he couldn’t sit inside any longer
and count beads on his rosary.
And all was peace, wherever he cast his eye,
then quietly out of the cloister’s gate he crept.
Only the cloister’s cow lay, lazy and content
and chewed and chewed again.
The pious monk cast his eye towards heaven.
There sailed a swallow high in the sky.
Foolhardy, who are you, up high,
seeks protection even in heaven?
And the swallow, polite as some spirit,
gave the monk to his question a clear answer.
He sent his visiting card down to the man,
it plopped on his shiny crown.
But the monk piously raised his eye again,
and his hands together quietly:
“Give thanks, oh God, that up high
Unlike the swallow, the cow cannot fly.”
Old, Norwegian joke (translated from old Norwegian).
Wua, the cow, but moo, the pig, in the Siamese language.
Very confusing of them.
Wonderful photos, Arthur. Jamaica will be jealous.
I see we have all been working you to death with the translation duties. (I’ve just now thanked you for the wonderful rendering from Norwegian of the spot-on description of my heart.)
There are so many versions of the Twa Corbies… in some there are three cows, not two.
dearieme is right, ’twas certainly the Norwegians who dunnit.
(Is it not remarkable how those three baby cows make themselves so comfortable up there in that nest in the craggy fjord?)
They probably only hung around there for a minute or two. As it gets dark, they like to circle over the lake in groups of 150 or more and then land together in one or two trees. I think they must stay there for the night, but I’ve never checked.