The whole mountain which dominates Terracina, is covered with orange and lemon trees, which embalm the air in a delicious manner. There is nothing in our climate that resembles the southern perfume of lemon trees in the open air; it produces on the imagination almost the same effect as melodious music; it gives a poetic disposition to the soul, stimulates genius, and intoxicates with the charms of nature. The aloe and the broad-leaved cactus, which are met here at every step, have a peculiar aspect, which brings to mind all that we know of the formidable productions of Africa. These plants inspire a sort of terror: they seem to belong to a violent and despotic nature. The whole aspect of the country is foreign: we feel ourselves in another world, a world which is only known by the descriptions of the ancient poets, who have at the same time so much imagination and so much exactness in their descriptions. On entering Terracina, the children threw into the carriage of Corinne an immense quantity of flowers which they gather by the road-side or on the mountain, and which they carelessly scatter about; such is their reliance on the prodigality of nature! The carts which bring home the harvest from the fields are every day ornamented with garlands of roses, and sometimes the children surround the cups they drink out of with flowers; for beneath such a sky the imagination of the common people becomes poetical. By the side of these smiling pictures the sea, whose billows lashed the shore with fury, was seen and heard. It was not agitated by the storm; but by the rocks which stand in habitual opposition to its waves, irritating its grandeur. E non udite ancor come risuona Il roco ed alto fremito marino? _And do you not hear still the hoarse and deep roar of the sea?_ This motion without aim, this strength without object which is renewed throughout eternity without our being able to discover either its cause or its end, attracts us to the shore, where this grand spectacle offers itself to our sight; and we experience, as it were, a desire mingled with terror, to approach the waves and to deaden our thoughts by their tumult.