* * * * * On the promenade one sees a good deal of the peculiarities of the different countries represented in Mentone, especially in the matter of dress; and on this account, if for no other reason, it affords opportunities for observation not without their interest. Let us take a walk. It is, we shall suppose, the 21st December, the shortest day, cold and shivery in the north, and verging to eleven o’clock of the forenoon. The fishing operations of the morning are over, and the boats engaged in it have been drawn up upon the beach. The water carts, small wooden boxes drawn by men, have performed their rounds, and the roadway is moist, but is rapidly drying up under the burning beams of the hot sun; but the dust is laid. The sea is tranquil—not a ripple disturbs it, except at the very edge, where it lazily turns over in the tiniest of waves, as if the exertion implied far too much fatigue for this melting day. A ship has ventured out of the harbour, spreading its white sails in vain attempt to catch a breeze. A flock of gulls are resting, in quiet happiness and contemplation, their snowy bosoms on the glassy water. In the distance, bright Bordighera is stretching its long green sleeve far into the blue sea, its fair hand lighted by the sun; while its cathedral window, like a jewel on the finger, catches and glistens with a blazing ray. Nearer, the fortifications of Ventimiglia are peering round from behind a jutting hill. Belinda, high and verdant; the gorge of St. Louis, deep in the shade; and the lofty Berceau, just emerging into the solar beams, fill up the near background, against which is cast the pier, terminated by its old castle, and half concealing the little sheaf of masts which it girdles, and bounded landward by a line of tall picturesque old buildings, out of and above which the minarets of the town churches gracefully rise. Then down along the promenade, on the one side, rests the irregular and diversified line of hotels and houses and gardens, partly filled with low trees, refreshing to the sight; while a low, scrubby, ill–kept belt of evergreens, dusty and withered, strives at some parts to guard the frontier on the other side against a careless tumble down the bulwarks bordering the beach; and all along this level road, common to man and to beast (for there is no footway), a crowd of people is streaming. In the view of so much that is grand in nature, we are at first hardly conscious of the concourse. We begin to move down the promenade,—’cric–crac,’—turn the shoulder suddenly, and find a _voiture_ has almost run us down. Neither man nor horse apologizes. They pass on unheeding our well–merited indignation; and, as we cast a fierce look and waste an English word, down comes another at full speed with angry ‘crack, crack.’ Glad, like others, to jump unscathed away, we are about to sit down upon one of the many wooden seats or forms