that an apartment and an income worthy of his sister awaited her at Grianta. The versatile-minded countess welcomed the idea of this new life with enthusiasm. It was twenty years since she had lived in the venerable pile which rose so proudly among the old chestnut trees planted in the days of the Sforzas. “There,” she reflected, “I shall find peace; and at my age, is that not happiness?” (As she had arrived at the age of one-and-thirty, she believed that the hour of her retirement had struck.) “I shall find a[23] happy and peaceful life at last, on the shores of the noble lake beside which I was born.”

[23]

Whether she was mistaken I know not, but it is certain that this eager-hearted creature, who had just so unhesitatingly refused two huge fortunes, carried happiness with her into the Castle of Grianta. Her two nieces were beside themselves with delight. “You have brought the beautiful days of my youth back to me!” said the marchesa as she kissed her. “The night before you arrived I felt a hundred years old.”

In Fabrizio’s company the countess went about revisiting all those enchanting spots near Grianta which travellers have made so famous: the Villa Melzi, on the other side of the lake, opposite the castle, and one of the chief objects in the view therefrom; the sacred wood of the Sfondrata; and the bold promontory which divides the branches of the lake, that of Como, so rich in its beauty, and that which runs toward Lecco, of aspect far more severe—a sublime and graceful prospect, equalled, perhaps, but not surpassed, by the most famous view in all the world, that of the Bay of Naples. The countess found the most exquisite delight in calling up memories of her early days, and comparing them with her present sensations. “The Lake of Como,” she said to herself, “is not hemmed in, like the Lake of Geneva, by great tracts of land, carefully hedged and cultivated on the best system, reminding one of money and speculation. Here, on every side, I see hills of unequal height, covered with clumps of trees, growing as chance has scattered them, and which have not yet been ruined, and forced to bring in an income, by the hand of man. Amid these hills, with their beautiful shapes and their curious slopes that drop toward the lake, I can carry on all the illusions of the descriptions of Tasso and Ariosto. It is all noble and tender, it all speaks of love; nothing recalls the hideousness of civilization. The villages set half-way up the hills are sheltered by great trees, and above the tree tops rise the charming outlines of their pretty church spires. Where some little field, fifty paces wide, shows itself here and there among 

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