Note 293 — Chapter III · (continued 3)

Besides this, in a country so diversified in surface—I wish we could with the French say accidented—as Italy with the exception of the champaign region drained by the Po, every new field of view requires either an extraordinary coup d'œil in the spectator, or a long study, in order to master its relief, its plans, its salient and retreating angles. In summer, the universal greenery confounds light and shade, distance and foreground; and though the impression upon a traveller, who journeys for the sake of "sensations," may be strengthened by the mysterious annihilation of all standards for the measurement of space, yet the superior intelligibility of the winter scenery of Italy is more profitable to those who see with a view to analyze.