Little vistas of greensward, fragments of water; hills and basaltic cliffs are exceptional. As a whole, the isthmus is a vast jungle of trees, canebrakes, and parasites, gay with gorgeous flowers and birds of brilliant plumage, rich with the cocoa-nut, and sometimes dazzling with the brightness of the oranges.

2. Monkeys and parrots chatter on the branches; wild beasts hide in the dingles; insects swarm in the swamps; huge reptiles drag their slow lengths along the oozy soil, darkened by thick foliage which shuts out the light of the rich tropical heavens. From branches sixty feet high vines hang down like ropes, mingling on the earth in mazes and labyrinths, and climbing and winding up the huge trunks. The only fact of nature and figure of rhetoric, the sustaining oak and clinging vine, is reversed. The tree, indeed, supports the vine, but is smothered in the embrace of death. The trunks of some forest kings resemble huge pipes of lead, and even the stems of willows are in sections, with joints like corn-stalks and sugar-cane.

3. Here are the rarest combinations of color and form, wild palms with leaves eighteen inches long yet only a finger's width; immense groves of cultivated palms heavy with fruit, countless bananas upon which the natives subsist, pulpy stalks with leaves the thickness and texture of lily-pads, but sword-shaped, and ten or twelve feet in height; birds of white, black, and yellow; flowers of white, orange, crimson, and scarlet, blazing out from the convolutions and tangles of greenness. All is profusion, luxury, gorgeousness. "Every prospect pleases, and only man is vile."

A. D. Richardson.

PART VII.

MOUNTAIN ROADS AND PASSES.

THE RIVIERA ROAD.

1. THIS road is built along the shore of the Mediterranean from Nice to Genoa. The Romans had a road along this mountain-bound shore. It bore the imperial name of the Aurelian Way; but it was a narrow pass, often overhanging the sea, so narrow as hardly to admit the passage of a single horse. Now, by the energy of the French Government, which began and finished about three fifths of the enlarged road, followed by the persevering efforts of the Sardinian Government, a broad and excellent carriage-way has been completed in regions where, if we look to the right or left, below or above, it seems impossible much of the way to find a foothold. The Maritime Alps rise to the height of several thousand feet, and descend often in nearly vertical precipices. In the sides of these mountains the road is excavated by blasting the solid rocks.

2. A mountain impends above your head, ragged, projecting, and menacing; perhaps from a thousand or two feet below, the Mediterranean, in solemn grandeur, dashes its ever-restless waves against the base of the cliffs. Often a wall is built up from below, either solid or sustained on arches to support the road; and you travel within a few feet or yards of a tremendous precipice, beyond the edge of which there is nothing between you and death. In general

there is a parapet, but not always; and sometimes road materials or rubbish form an imperfect barrier. There is, however, no danger; and the traveler proceeds with full confidence, and is quite at ease to enjoy the magnificent scenery. I feel that it is impossible to convey in language any adequate idea of this conjunction of lofty and dreary mountains with the sea.

3. The mountains rise in terrific grandeur, dark, wild, barren, ragged, and impending, in beetling cliffs, indented with yawning chasms and deep gorges. You are suspended

in mid-air between heaven and earth and ocean, and are equally impressed with the sublimity of nature and the power and daring of man.

4. As we advanced we were much impressed by the skillful husbandry exhibited among these rude, barren mountains. They were extensively terraced-the terraces being supported by stone walls-at distances of two or three yards apart. Wherever a spadeful of earth could be found it was carefully preserved and cultivated; and irrigation was most faithfully performed. To that end, at frequent intervals, little stone basins for water are established, into which the mountain streams are conducted.

Benjamin Silliman.

THE FIGHT OF PASO DEL MAR.

1. GUSTY and raw was the morning,
A fog hung over the seas,
And its gray skirts, rolling inland,

Were torn by the mountain trees;
No sound was heard but the dashing
Of waves on the sandy bar,

When Pablo of San Diego

Rode down to the Paso del Mar.

2. The pescador out in his shallop,

Gathering his harvest so wide,
Sees the dim bulk of the headland
Loom over the waste of the tide ;
He sees, like a white thread, the pathway
Wind round on the terrible wall,
Where the faint, moving speck of the rider
Seems hovering close to its fall.

3. Stout Pablo of San Diego

Rode down from the hills behind;
With the bells on his gray mule tinkling,
He sang through the fog and wind;
Under his thick, misted eyebrows
Twinkled his eye like a star,

And fiercer he sang as the sea-winds
Drove cold on the Paso del Mar.

4. Now Bernal, the herdsman of Chino,
Had traveled the shore since dawn,
Leaving the ranches behind him-

Good reason had he to be gone!
The blood was still red on his dagger,
The fury was hot in his brain,

And the chill driving scud of the breakers
Beat thick on his forehead in vain.

5. With his poncho wrapped gloomily round him, He mounted the dizzying road,

And the chasms and steeps of the headland
Were slippery and wet as he trod

Wild swept the wind of the ocean,

Rolling the fog from afar,

When near him came tinkling a mule-bell

Midway on Paso del Mar.

6. "Back!" shouted Bernal, full fiercely,
And "Back!" shouted Pablo, in wrath,
As his mule halted, startled and shrinking,
On the perilous line of the path.
The roar of devouring surges

Came up from the breakers' hoarse war, And, "Back, or you perish!" cried Bernal, "I turn not on Paso del Mar !"

7. The gray mule stood firm as the headland,
He clutched at the jingling rein,

When Pablo rose up in his saddle
And smote till he dropped it again.
A wild oath of passion swore Bernal,
And brandished his dagger still red,
While fiercely stout Pablo leaned forward,
And fought o'er his trusty mule's head.

8. They fought till the black wall below them
Shone red through the misty blast;
Stout Pablo then struck, leaning farther,
The broad breast of Bernal at last.
And, frenzied with pain, the swart herdsman
Closed on him with terrible strength,
And jerked him, in spite of his struggles,
Down from the saddle at length.

9. They grappled with desperate madness
On the slippery edge of the wall;
They swayed on the brink, and together
Reeled out to the rush of the fall.
A cry of the wildest death-anguish
Rang faint through the mist afar,
And the riderless mule went homeward
From the fight of Paso del Mar.

Bayard Taylor.