Genoa, April 27, 1839. Saturday evening.--I have just finished my afternoon and evening stroll through this, to me, the first Italian city: the birthplace of Columbus, the city of the Dorias, the rival and even the conqueror of that other proud republic of the Middle Ages, Venice, in remembrance of which, huge pieces of the chains which were employed to bar the harbors of the latter city are suspended from the gates of Genoa. We arrived in the bay before twelve o’clock to-day, and during our gradual approach to the town enjoyed the view to the full; both the distant view and the near are very fine,--equal, I may say, to what I expected, which is saying a great deal. As seen from the bay it certainly deserves the name its citizens long ago gave it,--Genoa the Superb. You have the whole completely before you in one view, the buildings rising one behind the other, the fortifications that overtop the whole, with the vast mountain amphitheatre for a background.... You are not much disturbed with the rattling of carriage wheels here. With the exception of one street, and this a new one (Strada Nuova) at least as to its present dimensions, they are barely wide enough for a wheelbarrow, and mostly too steep for a carriage, even if they were wider. The houses are very high; six, seven, or eight stories being very common, indeed usual, so that the streets are mere chinks or crevices. I found the same advantage from this in Avignon and the other towns of the south of France, that is, the perfect protection afforded these warm days from the heat of the sun. You are sure of shade; and the air is so dry that none of the inconvenience and unhealthiness results which would surely be the case in other countries. I am at the Hôtel des Etrangers, not far from the quay, and my room, five or six stories high, looks down upon the harbor and bay. It is nine o’clock in the evening. The light is burning quietly in the light-house, a tall and very slender column at the entrance of the harbor, forming a beacon which is visible far and wide. I don’t know as I may say that “The scene is more beautiful far to my eye Than if day in her pride had arrayed it;” but it is much softer. The evening gun has just been fired off from one of the batteries next the sea, the signal, I suppose, for closing the harbor, and the echo sent back by the hills on either side was prolonged and repeated fainter and fainter for nearly a minute.... The coast at Marseilles and that I saw yesterday may be described in a few words: bare, jagged, sterile, rocky mountains; scarcely high enough to be picturesque, perfectly destitute of verdure, barely supporting here and there a few stunted olive-trees. We passed Toulon and had a distant view. We sailed between the mainland and the islands of Hyères, so remarkable for their fine climate and healthfulness, but they did not look very inviting to me.