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THE REPUBLIC OF GENEVA.

descend into the lake, afford the most delicious viewsever beheld. The pendant branches of the toweringwoods, the melody of the murmuring streams, theamaranthine odours of the plains, the majestic alpscovered with perpetual snow, and rearing their loftyheads to heaven, the richness of the cultivation, andthe projecting rocks on the different chains of moun-tains which surround this lake, have the most brilliantand beautiful effect, particularly when the summits ofthe latter meet the rays of the sun above the swellingclouds, while their foundation is covered with blue mist,and their roughly broken sides support the ruins of an-cient and solitary castles, diversified with the alternateshades of the oak and fir. In short, these mountainsare embellished by ten thousand indescribable beauties,which form a contrast, that never fails to enliven thesouls of those who behold them as they travel throughthe plains on the borders of the Lake of Geneva ;where every village, tree, and shrub, excites such plea-sures, as, in the words of the poet,

“ Bring with their sweetness no satiety.”