1884.] AN ITALIAN LAKE GARDEN. 395 



AN ITALIAN LAKE GARDEN. 



>HE sun-seeking traveller, discreetly leaving our cloud-canopied 

 islands when October's early frosts begin to colour the wood- 

 lands, and anxious to settle down for the winter in some 

 comfortable, quiet and cheap part of Southern Europe amidst beauti- 

 ful scenery, cannot do better than ' pitch his tent ' on the shores of 

 one of the Italian lakes. Of the villages on Lake Como, Cadenabbia 

 and Menaggio will most commend themselves by virtue of their 

 aspect, there being no winter season at Bellaggio, on the eastern side of 

 the lake, owing to its being shielded from the sun by a lofty hill. 

 But perhaps the most popular resort of sun-seekers is Pallanza on 

 Lake Maggiore. This highly-favoured little town commands a series 

 of views of enchanting loveliness, and enjoys a larger share of sun- 

 shine than any other of the numerous towns and villages on the lakes. 

 It has several large and well-conducted hotels, each boasting a 

 beautiful garden, and at any one of these one can live well at from 

 six to ten francs a day. In the Grand Hotel there were nearly 

 seventy pensionnaires when I was there for a few days in the first 

 week of last November, three-fourths of which number were English, 

 so that society was not wanting, though the allurements of the opera 

 and gaming-tables must be sought elsewhere. 



From the promontory on which Pallanza is built the lake stretches 

 away in three directions — north to Luino and Locarno, south to Arona, 

 and west into the bight of the bay from which rise the foot-hills of the 

 Simplon. The most striking mountain of the entire Lake district, II 

 Sasso del Ferro, 5,918 ft., rises from behind Laveno on the eastern shore ; 

 and a more exquisite outline than that which it presents as viewed from 

 Pallanza could hardly be imagined by the most fanciful of artists. 

 Hence, too, Monte Ptosa with its five peaks, and the towering summits 

 of the Simplon range, ever draped with glaciers and snow-fields, are 

 seen piercing the blue of the western horizon. Along the shores of 

 the lake at short intervals the white houses and red roofs of many a 

 tiny village peep out from amidst luxuriant vegetation. The slopes 

 of the foot-hills are clothed with Pine, Fir, Poplar and other evergreen 

 and deciduous trees and shrubs, or with orchards of mulberries, 

 chestnuts, figs, and olives, amongst which here and there a spreading 

 vineyard alternates picturesquely. Villas and castles of the Milanese 

 aristocracy are seen embosomed in woods and orange groves which 

 run down to the very verge of the tiny cliffs, at the foot of which are 

 breaking the wavelets of the lake. The trees, shrubs, and flowers of 

 sub-tropical climes are everywhere growing and blooming with the 



