Nice is divided into two distinct parts, known as the Old and New Town. The latter is well laid out--there are two very fine squares, one being surrounded by very handsome porticoes; while the other is supplemented by a raised terrace, which serves both as a sea-wall and public promenade. Part of this promenade is on the flat roofs of a row of low houses, which at harvest-time are utilized as drying-floors for wheat and other grain, which are spread in the hot sun. This is, of course, before the season for visitors sets in, and while there are but few strangers in the town.
The shops are remarkably good, the confectioners' windows being very tempting with their array of airy-looking pastry, which is as nice as it is novel to us, accustomed to the more substantial and perhaps slightly heavy preparations of the kind in our own country. Especially to be noticed, too, are the displays of corals in all its most exquisite varieties, which may be purchased at a very reasonable rate, as also various kinds of lace. Indeed, this modern part of Nice is quite a little seaside Paris: the tramcars pass smoothly up and down, and the fashionable equipages, sometimes with bells attached to the horses' heads, dash gaily along.
The Old Town consists of narrow, dirty-smelling labyrinths, unworthy the name of streets, with blocks of shops of every kind. It is, however, interesting, as one here sees the working population "at home." In a large market-square we saw one of the lumbering old-fashioned diligences arrive, which recalled all that we had read of the days of continental travel before railways. There can be no doubt that the smart stage-coaches of England were very superior conveyances to the cumbersome, cobwebby diligence, which seems better adapted for night than for day travelling.
The flower-shops are one of the most interesting features of Nice, especially to ladies. Bouquets composed of the most exquisite flowers, of every size and description, from tiny button-hole sprays to masses of blossoms two feet in diameter, surround you on every side. Yet, after all, I believe no people arrange flowers so tastefully as the English. Our bouquets are not so large or so closely packed, and the flowers may be less rare, though scarcely less beautiful, yet they are grouped with more discernment and harmonious taste than elsewhere. The great business in these little "floral arsenals" is to pack the fragrant blossoms carefully in cotton-wool, for transmission to all parts of the world, especially to Covent Garden. Some are stowed in large round boxes like cheese-tubs, with a hole for the stalks to come through. I could have bought a bouquet here for seven francs which in London would have cost almost as many guineas. There are also small boxes, which you can get addressed and sent, post-free, for three or four francs inclusive. In fact, almost the first thing visitors do on their arrival here, is to send off one or more of these tiny boxes of dainty flowers to dear friends in England. You simply pay for them and give the address, and they are at once despatched. So large a trade is done that there is a special Flower Post, and at the station a warehouse is set apart which is generally filled with these flower-boxes, ready to send off by the night train.