280 CHAPTER XXXVIIL 



can be lost, but much health can be won. The 

 herbage looks all the greener and fresher from being 

 surrounded by a barrier of the barest rocks. In 

 St. Yallier, and in the strange Kasselas Valley of 

 Caussols, the well-to-do bourgeois of Grasse and of 

 Le Bar have country houses where they take refuge 

 from the summer heat. 



^s we ascend still higher from the coast, grass 

 becomes gradually more abundant, until at last we 

 reach the wide-spread mountain pastures where the 

 sward is embroidered with Alpine flowers. On the 

 Bans della Frema, for instance, we are at 8,000 feet, 

 that is, twice the height of Ben Nevis, yet within a 

 walk of St. Martin Vesubia, which village is within 

 a drive of Nice. This indeed is a " Grassy place " 

 which has few equals in snowy Alp or cloud collecting 

 Apennine. The sloping green is sprinkled far and 

 wide with Edelweiss (Gnaphalium leontopod'uim, 

 Stella d' Italia). In no other place that I have 

 heard of is this starry symbol of the snowy summits 

 so enormously abundant. There are acres of it, as 

 easy to pick, unfortunately, as buttercups in a meadow. 

 No climbing is required. Butterflies are swarming. 

 A small fritillary (Melltcea Cynthia) chases his mate 

 which wears a lighter livery. A pale green Colias 

 (C. Phicomone) scuds along, keeping near the ground 

 lest the breeze should carry him away, then darting 

 suddenly downwards to the shelter of the grass when 

 he needs to rest his wings. A little farther up the 

 ridge, among the patches of snow, you may catch the 

 strange Acllo, a primeval butterfly , and Callidice, if 

 you can run fast enough. It is said that Aello 

 appears but every other year. Perhaps the Summer 



