212 A SKETCH OF THE 



tails, painted ladies, and Camberwell beauties, over sunny hills and 

 valleys ; and whilst the arachnologist is studying the domestic 

 economy of the trapdoor spiders found in every mossy bank, he who 

 takes an interest in the inhabitants of the sea will find an endless 

 variety in the fishermen's nets, or exposed for sale daily in the 

 markets. 



There is probably no road in Europe which offers so many attrac- 

 tions to the naturalist or pedestrian as that which runs between 

 Nice and Genoa. As its name — " Corniche " — implies, it is cut on 

 the side of the mountains which rise out of the Mediterranean, and 

 during its entire length of a hundred and thirty miles the sea breaks 

 upon the rocks below, whilst a succession of hills, valleys, gorges, 

 pine forests, and peeps of distant snow succeed each other in endless 

 variety. But the road is now almost deserted for the line of rail, 

 which passes along the shore through at least a hundred tunnels, so 

 that the most beautiful points of the road are passed by the railway 

 travellers unseen. 



On New Year's Day I walked from Nice to Mentone, the first part 

 of the Corniche road, and even then the surrounding country was 

 green and beautiful ; but when the Spring arrived, and wild flowers 

 were everywhere starting into life, I determined to continue my walk 

 to Genoa. 



Soon after sunrise my companion, Mr. Holcroft, and I set out. 

 The sky, as usual in Mentone, was cloudless, and the only sounds 

 which disturbed the morning air were the murmur of the waves of 

 the Mediterranean breaking on the pebbly beach, and the chorus of 

 a thousand green frogs perched up in the branches of the sur- 

 rounding orange groves. We paused for a few moments under a 

 neem tree (Melia) to watch the Corsican mountains eighty miles 

 distant, and the scene recalled a time in India when, standing under 

 a similar tree in my garden, I watched Mount Everest, the highest 

 mountain in the world, from a distance of one hundred and eighty 

 miles. But here the panorama soon faded from our view before the 

 rising sun, and we then passed on to the market, where at that early 



