Nice 221 



trivance, which I have seen nowhere else. A row of low houses 

 forming one side of a street, a quarter of a mile long, has flat 

 roofs, which are covered with a stucco floor, forming a noble 

 terrace, opens immediately to the sea, raised above the dirt and 

 annoyance of a street, and equally free from the sand and shingle 

 of a beach. At one end some finely situated lodging-houses 

 open directly on to it. The walk this terrace affords is, in fine 

 weather, delicious. The square is handsome, and the works 

 which form the port are well built, but it is small and difficult 

 to enter, except in favourable weather; admits ships of near 

 three hundred tons ; yet, though free, has but an inconsiderable 

 trade. — The number of new streets and houses building at 

 present is an unequivocal proof that the place is flourishing; 

 owing very much to the resort of foreigners, principally English, 

 who pass the winter here, for the benefit and pleasure of the 

 climate. They are dismally alarmed at present with the news 

 that the disturbances in France will prevent many of the English 

 from coming this winter; but they have some consolation in 

 expecting a great resort of French. Last winter there were fifty- 

 seven English and nine French; this winter, they think it will 

 be nine English and fifty-seven French. At the table d'hote 

 informed that I must have a passport for travelling in Italy; 

 and that the English consul is the proper person to apply to. 

 I went to Mr. Consul Green, who informed me that it was a 

 mistake, there was no want of any passport ; but if I wished to 

 have one, he would very readily give it. My name occurring to 

 him, he took the opportunity to be very polite to me, and offered 

 anything in his power to assist me. On my telling him the object 

 of my travels, he remarked that the gardens here, and mixture 

 of half garden half farm, were rather singular, and if I called 

 on him in the evening he would walk and show me some. I 

 accepted his obliging invitation, and when I v/ent again, met a 

 Colonel Ross, a gentleman from Scotland, second in command in 

 the King of Sardinia's marine, and at present in chief: having 

 been much in Sardinia, I made some inquiries of him concerning 

 that island, and the circumstances he instanced were curious. 

 The intemperia is so prevalent in summer, from the quantity of 

 evaporating water leaving mud exposed to the sun, as to be 

 death to a stranger : but in winter it is a good climate. The soil 

 wonderfully rich and fertile, but vast plains that would produce 

 anything are uncultivated. He has past one line of fifty miles 

 by thirty, all plain and the land good, yet without one house 

 and mostly a neglected desert. The people are wretched and 



