The world concedes the sovereign beauty of Lake Como. Its fame began with Roman civilization. It never was more widespread than to-day. Two thousand years of adulation have not spoiled it. Serene in its perennial loveliness, it greets us with the freshness of eternal youth. Day after day delighted tourists glide along its surface, now voicing their enthusiasm in a dozen dialects; now silent, yet revealing eloquently by their eager faces the admiration common to them all. Ensconced beneath magnolia trees upon the border of that portion of Lake Como, called the Tremezzina Bay, I watch the steamers slipping by, freighted with happy travelers. They pass before me like a series of spectators, admitted section after section to behold a masterpiece. If, through familiarity, I could possibly forget the splendor of this scene, the oft-recurring transit of enraptured tourists would prevent it. Among them I occasionally see - not often traveling with maids and couriers - faces illumined by a tranquil joy, which tells me that this Old World tour is for them the realization of a life-long dream, cherished and toiled for during years of study and self-sacrifice. These are the visitors I love to recognize, as coming justly to their own. For not alone do great desires usually prove prophetic of their own fulfillment; they necessarily prepare the soul to comprehend the noble and the beautiful, when it at last beholds them. One feels instinctively that thoughtful tourists, such as these, have never bowed the knee to the demoralizing demon of the age, at present deified under the name of Speed. Within the sacred cloisters of their hearts the flowers of sentiment are not withered by the breath of cynicism. Their slender outfit holds not only Baedeker, but Byron. They do not fail to kindle their enthusiasm at the flame of poetry; still less to quicken their imagination at the inextinguishable embers of the past. For them the all-important question will be always, not Have I done Europe, but What has Europe done for me?

Serene In Its Perennial Loveliness.

The Passing Steamer.

What an unusual privilege, in a world so full of misery, to witness, hour after hour, genuine enjoyment! Most of the towns we dwell in are but smoke-dimmed battlefields, heart-breaking in the tragedies resulting from their social and commercial competition. The faces we encounter there are haggard, stoical, and sad. But on these shores one breathes an atmosphere of pure serenity. Between this region and the world's unrest Lake Como's zone of azure curves about us like a moat, across which rumors of the wars of nations and of individuals arrive like softened echoes from an unreal world. Hence many a weary stranger who comes hither from those fields of conflict, and must soon return to them, surveys this vision of tranquillity and beauty with pathetic wistfulness. Sometimes a sense of deep humility sweeps over me at thought of my good fortune in having this magnificent vista constantly before me, while practically all those furloughed travelers can view it only from a winged boat. A voyage of several hours, or a few days' sojourn at a single point upon the shore, form usually their sole acquaintance with it, and yet that brief experience must suffice to furnish them with life-long memories and inspiration! The weather may, however, prove unpropitious. Mists may conceal the mountains, or rain invest with gloom romantic sites which Italy's "bel sole" would have made delightful, while the inexorable goading of a fixed itinerary makes it impossible for them to await unclouded sunshine. When, therefore, under such conditions the resident here reflects that in a day or two, perhaps within as many hours, all will have changed, and the divine attractions of the lake will have again revealed themselves, it is with genuine sadness that he sees the travelers who have had but partial glimpses of this peaceful paradise, depart and vanish in the whirlpool of the outer world.

Making A Landing.

Sunshine And Flowers.

A Portion Of The Tremezzina Bay.