Baden is not without its Italian Corso. Every afternoon, that is from 6 o’clock till dark, ladies and gentlemen drive from Baden to Lichtenthal, a distance of not more than two English miles, but which, by art, is so arranged as to convey the idea of a much longer jaunt. You drive all the time through a most beautiful alley of horse-chestnuts; but you are not fatigued with the tiresome monotony of a straight line, and its diminishing perspective. The line you follow is serpentine, with unequal curves on both sides, so as to lengthen your course and still keep you in the valley bounded on both sides by semi-circular mountains. In this manner you enjoy every possible scenery, and every advantageous position to view it. Now the old castle, which you have just left, again bursts on your sight; then the landscape seems to be changed into an open prairie, bound on both sides by craggy rocks; then you find yourself suddenly traversing a flower-garden, traveling along between rose-bushes raised to the height of from eight to ten feet; and all at once you are again, as if by magic, buried within the dark foliage of a dense oak forest. Thus the scenery varies till you have come to the nunnery of Lichtenthal, where you may alight and take some refreshment in the hotel opposite, or if you are fond of clear, mountain streamlets, taste the cool water of the rills that trickle down the mountains; some blowsy children being always ready to present you with a tumbler-full on a waiter, with a bunch of flowers placed by the side of it, for which you are expected to make a small return. Germany is essentially the country of flowers and music, and you can indulge in both of them, during the season, at Baden-Baden. By the side of the alley of horse-chestnuts, which is wide enough for two or three carriages to drive abreast, there is another for cavaliers on horseback, so that ladies and gentlemen can practice all the arts of refined coquetry whilst admiring the beauties of nature, and enjoying the fragrant air with which this romantic valley is constantly blessed. On the left hand, following the gurgling brook which meanders through the valley, is a gravel-walk, sufficiently near the drive for the promenaders to observe and to be observed, and with its animated groups, much contributing to the variety of the scene. There is no social difference observed between those who drive and those who walk, parties frequently alighting from their carriages to join the pedestrians, and carriages being ready on both ends of the promenade to convey them. Whichever way you turn, social distinctions vanish—the life you lead seems to be all romance; you have left the cares of the world behind you, and are willing to look upon all men as honest and true, and on all women as angels. Neither are you answerable for your doings at the watering-place, except to your own conscience—all that occurs there is a mere episode, you live, as it were, in a parenthesis. What a pretty parenthesis one lives in at Saratoga with a “corps of reporters” at one’s elbow to note one’s acts, and chronicle one’s fancies! But this very freedom from social trammels is often the cause of the most lasting affections, as those trees frequently strike the deepest roots which are early exposed to the blast.