From Meran to Bozen by rail is rather less than twenty miles, and about the same distance by the road, which runs through the valley of the Etsch, or Adige, and in places along the lower slopes of the hills. It is a picturesque journey by either, and for cycling quite delightful. One crosses the Talfer just before reaching Bozen, which lies in a wide basin at the junction of the valley of the Etsch, with the smaller but picturesque Sarnthal, surrounded by great reddish brown crags and precipices of the porphyry mountains on which the semi-tropical cactus grows, and one gets sombre groups of cypresses, and here and there vineyards, and pine-clad crags. The town is a strange mixture of the German elements of Tyrol and the Italian. Its architecture, too, is "an admixture of that of north Italy and South Germany, here and there transfused so that it preserves characteristics of both." It is perhaps for this very reason a town of great charm, and one of considerable beauty. Its surroundings, which include the famous Rosengarten, and many beautiful little valleys and gorges present attractions for a longer stay than one at first contemplates. It is, moreover, one of the busiest (Bozen people claim that it is _the_ busiest) towns in Tyrol, with a population going on towards 20,000, including its outskirts, yet it possesses some most delightful gardens. Seen from almost any point of the lower slopes of the surrounding hills, cactus, and vine-clad, and resembling in general luxuriance of vegetation Italy rather than the Tyrol of but a little further north, Bozen is charming. Below one is spread out a garden-like city, which with all its bustling life yet looks more like a holiday resort than a commercial town, with numbers of white-walled villas dotted amidst green fields, vineyards and gardens, in the latter of which blossom all the flowers one knows and loves, and many less common in England. [Illustration: A STREET IN BOZEN] One of the oldest towns in Tyrol, it stands practically on the site of the Pons Drusi of Roman times. It has for "time out of mind" stood at the cross roads where the Brenner and the Vintsgau routes divide. In the past, Roman armies have passed through it, have crossed the Talfer, or have lain encamped in the fields of its basin-like site. And after them came the Merchants of the Middle Ages, trading between civilized Italy and barbarian northern lands. Still later came Emperors and pilgrims travelling to the "Eternal City," Crusaders outward and homeward bound, roving singers, and hordes of free lances and mercenaries. In a word, Bozen's past must have been a stirring one, and the lives led by her citizens full of the colour of life and gallant deeds.