limestone cliffs surmounted by fortifications and signal stations. At
the old, queer-looking town of La Turbie, while the horses rested for an
hour, we selected postal cards and took kodak views. Soon after leaving
La Turbie, while descending the mountain, we looked down upon the little
principality of Monaco, its capital, the city of Monaco, the palace of
the Prince built upon a rocky promontory, and the white buildings of
Monte Carlo.

Mentone is a popular winter resort on the Mediterranean with handsome
houses and flower-filled gardens. Vineyards and groves of orange, lemon,
and fig trees, cover the hillsides surrounding the city. We lunched in
Mentone, and were entertained under the palm trees of the hotel garden
by a band of Italian musicians, one of whom, an amusing character actor
as well as singer, responded cheerfully to our requests for special
selections and solos.

[Illustration: THROUGH THE PARK THAT SURROUNDS THE CASINO.]

Our return from Mentone to Nice was through a succession of
towns and villages. Along this coast road are many white hotels,
comfortable-looking villas, and trimly kept lawns. In the gardens there
were century plants, orange, lemon, and palm trees, and rose bushes of
great size covered with bloom. On the tops of the garden walls, plants
of various kinds were growing. Some of the walls were covered with long
clusters of pink geraniums, some gracefully festooned with masses of
overhanging heliotrope, and others draped with trailing vines aglow with
scarlet bloom. The exuberant growth and bloom of these flowers attracted
much attention and drew forth exclamations of delight.

"Did you ever see geraniums and heliotropes growing in such luxuriance?"
asked one of the ladies.

"Only in my own state," replied a Californian. "There the plants grow to
immense size and bloom in profusion."

"Do not forget charming Funchal," said another. "Remember that there we
saw geraniums and fuschias of wonderful size, and vines of pink
bouguainvillia that covered the mountain-side cottages."

At Monte Carlo, as we drove through the park that surrounds the white
marble gambling palace, we admired the magnificent parterres of flowers,
the beds of pansies being especially beautiful in variety of color and
size of the flowers. On the piazza of the Cafe de Paris, where a band
was playing, we had afternoon tea and from there watched the throng of
visitors who were moving along the palm-lined paths or were a