The Riviera is a constant source of delight to those who love flowers and beautiful vegetation of all kinds. But few of its visitors appreciate the fact that it is really from end to end one big garden, cultivated for ages by its inhabitants, and full of plants introduced by man which at present seem at first sight to be characteristic natives of it, but are, in reality, quite distinct from its primitive vegetation. This primitive vegetation is now represented only in what is locally called the “maquis”—what we should, perhaps, term the “scrub” or “bush” in English. It comprises some pines, the juniper, the lovely rock roses, balsams, rosemary, the giant heath (bruyère), from which our briar-root pipes are made, the larger thyme, the myrtle, the rose of Provence, two kinds of lavender, and many aromatic plants with grey hairy leaves, and often provided with sharp thorns as additional defences against browsing goats. The delicious perfumes of these hardy inhabitants of the dry, rocky grounds, where little or no grass can flourish, are developed by them as a protection against browsing animals, who cannot tolerate much of these pungent volatile oils, although mankind extracts them and uses them in the manufacture of such scents as eau-de-Cologne and also in cookery. Many a visitor to the Riviera never strays from the cultivated fields and roadways into this scrub-land. The olive tree, which forms so prominent and beautiful a feature in the panorama of gardens which unrolls itself as we steam or drive along the coast from Toulon to Mentone and from Mentone to Genoa and Spezzia, is not a native plant; it was introduced in prehistoric times, and has been again and again re-established by emigrants from Italy; but it was brought to Italy from the East. It is astonishing how many of the cultivated trees of the Riviera have the same kind of history—the vine came from India in prehistoric times, the fig tree more recently from Persia, the lemon from India, the orange and the peach tree from China. All of them were introduced in very ancient times to the eastern parts of the Mediterranean basin, and so gradually were carried to the shores of the Ligurian sea, and would die out here were they not to a certain extent under the care of ownership.