The Italian lakes have that in them and their air which removes them from common living. Their beauty is not the beauty which each of us sees for himself in the world; it is rather the beauty of a special creation; the expression of some mind. To eyes innocent, and first freshly noting our great temporal inheritance--1 mean to the eyes of a boy and girl just entered upon the estate of this glorious earth, and thinking themselves immortal, this shrine of Europe might remain for ever in the memory; an enchanted experience, in which the single sense of sight had almost touched the boundary of music. They would remember these lakes as the central emotion of their youth. To mean men also who, in spite of years and of a full foreknowledge of death, yet attempt nothing but the satisfaction of sense, and pride themselves upon the taste and fineness with which they achieve this satisfaction, the Italian lakes would seem a place for habitation, and there such a man might build his house contentedly. But to ordinary Christians I am sure there is something unnatural in this beauty of theirs, and they find in it either a paradise only to be won by a much longer road to a bait and veil of sorcery, behind which lies great peril. Now, for all we know, beauty beyond the world may not really bear this double aspect; but to us on earth--if we are ordinary men--beauty of this kind has something evil. Have you not read in books how men when they see even divine visions are terrified? So as I looked at Lake Major in its halo I also was afraid, and I was glad to cross the ridge and crest of the hill and to shut out that picture framed all round with glory. But on the other side of the hill I found, to my great disgust, not as I had hoped, a fine slope down leading to Lugano, but a second interior valley and another range just opposite me. I had not the patience to climb this so I followed down the marshy land at the foot of it, passed round the end of the hill and came upon the railway, which had tunnelled under the range I had crossed. I followed the railway for a little while and at last crossed it, penetrated through a thick brushwood, forded a nasty little stream, and found myself again on the main road, wishing heartily I had never left it. It was still at least seven miles to Lugano, and though all the way was downhill, yet fatigue threatened me. These short cuts over marshy land and through difficult thickets are not short cuts at all, and I was just wondering whether, although it was already evening, I dared not rest a while, when there appeared at a turn in the road a little pink house with a yard all shaded over by a vast tree; there was also a trellis making a roof over a plain bench and table, and on the trellis grew vines. 'Into such houses,' I thought, 'the gods walk when they come down and talk with men, and such houses are the scenes of adventures. I will go in and rest.'