equisite tools, began forthwith, on the highway,
the process of shoeing. I stepped out, and walked on before, thankful
for the incident, which had given me the opportunity of a saunter along
the road. You can _see_ nature from the windows of your carriage, but
you can _converse_ with her only by a quiet stroll amidst her scenes. On
the right were the great plains which the Po waters, finely mottled with
meadow and corn-field, besprint with chestnut trees, mulberries, and
laurels, and fringed, close by the highway, with rolling heights, on
which grew the vine. On the left was the far expanding lake, with its
bays and creeks, and the shadows of its stately hills mirrored on its
surface. It looked as if some invisible performer was busy shifting the
scenes for the traveller's delight, and spreading a different prospect
before his eye at every few yards. New bays were continually opening,
and new peaks rising on the horizon. "It was so rough with tempests when
we passed by it," says Addison, "that it brought into my mind Virgil's
description of it."

"Here, vexed by winter storms, _Benacus_ raves,
Confused with working sands and rolling waves;
Rough and tumultuous, like a sea it lies;
So loud the tempest roars, so high the billows rise."

I saw it in more peaceful mood. Cool and healthful breezes were blowing
from the Tyrol; and the salubrious character of the region was amply
attested by the robust forms of the inhabitants. I have seldom seen a
finer race of men and women than the peasants adjoining the Lake Garda.
They were all of goodly stature, and singularly graceful and noble in
their gait.

In a few hours we approached the strong fortress of Peschiera. We passed
through several concentric lines of fortifications, walls, moats,
drawbridges, and sloping earthen embankments, in which cart-loads of
balls, impelled with all the force which powder can give, would sink and
be lost. In the very heart of these grim ramparts, like a Swiss hamlet
amid its mountain ranges, or a jewel in its iron-bound casket, lay the
little town of Peschiera, sleeping quietly beside the blue and
full-flooded Mincio, Virgil's own river:--

"Where the slow Mincius through the valley strays;
Where cooling streams invite the flocks to drink,
And reeds defend the winding water's brink."

It issues from the lake, and, flowing underneath the ramparts, freshens
a spot which otherwise wears sufficiently the grim iron-visaged features
of war