342 BY ORDER OF THE CZAR.
one lake, but many ; hills that are clothed with foliage and backed at many points by distant Alps that are clothed in everlasting snow. As the steamer skirts the shore you see that the gardens of the innumerable villas are filled with flowers, that the houses are of all descrip- tions, palaces, cottages, chalets, lodges, hotels ; as they go high up into the mountains they dwindle off into the cots of vineyard-tenders or herdsmen. It is wonderful now and then to see up in the mountains villages which look like flights of buildings that have settled down in clusters as pigeons might, all in a heap, with a few trees above them, and always the sheltering elbows of con- venient Alps. The season is late they tell me on the boats and at the hotel, yet the air is soft and balmy, great bunches of westeria decorate garden walls, lilac, rhodo- dendron, Guelder roses, chestnuts are in full bloom, and at every village where the steamer touches, men and women are sitting out of doors, the men swinging their legs over quay walls, the women sewing or tending chil- dren, all in " summery " dresses, and we have long since discarded wraps and overcoats, and find the weather hot enough despite the breeze of the steamer in rapid motion. Bellaggio is probably the most delightful point of the lake. It is fifteen miles from its northern extremity, and divides, the lake into two branches.
Here the travelers commenced their delightful expe- riences of Bellaggio. The weather was like July in En- gland, though the time was early May. The sky was characteristically Italian. The windows of the hotel were open. From the great drawing-room came the voice of a prima donna of the lyric stage, whom some traveling companions had persuaded to sing a few snatches from " Othello " and " Lohengrin." The terraces of the hotel were reflected in the lake in deep colors of green and pink and red and yellow, repetitions of grass and flowers.
