s,
See there the emblems of a flowering soul
That hath its root in other world than ours,
And which doth ever seek its native goal;
Meanwhile decks life with love and grace and flowers,
And in one beauteous garland binds the whole.

F.A. HILLARD.

NICE.

Twenty-Two centuries ago--eighteen hundred years before Columbus sailed
in quest of the New World--a Phocean colony from Marseilles founded this
celebrated city, calling it Niche (Nice or Victory), in honor of a
signal triumph obtained by their arms over their enemies, the Ligurians,
or inhabitants of the northern coast of Italy. For ages it flourished,
being almost as famous with the ancients as a health-resort as it is
to-day; but its evil hour came when the Goths, Lombards and Franks in
A.D. 405, pouring through the defiles and gorges of the Maritime Alps,
laid Nice and almost all the other cities of Italy, even beyond Rome, in
ashes. A hundred years later it was rebuilt, but its beautiful forum,
its classical temples, its mosaic-paved villas and marble theatres had
disappeared utterly, and the new city was but a shadow of the old. In
the tenth century the Saracens conquered Nice, and remained in quiet
possession for seventy years, and during their stay introduced much of
the tropical vegetation which we still admire. They were finally driven
away by the insurgent natives in A.D. 975, but they left the impress of
their occupation in many Arabic words which still mark the local
_patois_; and as a number of the fugitives were captured and reduced to
slavery, intermarrying in the course of time with the native population,
the Moorish type is still very noticeable amongst the peasantry. Freed
from the Saracenic yoke, the Nicois lived in peace for nearly two
centuries, being only disturbed from time to time by the unwelcome
visitations of pirates. Later on, toward the middle of the thirteenth
century, like most other Southern and Italian cities, Nice fell a victim
to the constant quarrels of the powerful families allied respectively to
the Ghibelline and Guelphic factions. Thus, the incessant broils between
the Lascaris of Tenda, the Grimaldis of Monaco and the Dorias of
Dolceacqua desolated the surrounding country, and often reduced the city
to a state of siege. The Nicois were compelled to keep up a perpetual
guerilla, which, however inspiriting, was by no means conducive to their
material pro