The country round about San Remo is full of pleasant walks. Ospedaletti is only two miles away, and one may take a charming walk there and back in the afternoon. It is an interesting place, albeit a dreary one, for it is the monument of a great failure. Some years ago a great International Company bought up all the land along the lovely bay, built splendid hotels and shops, made good roads and put up the magnificent Casino still to be seen there. The shares were at a high premium and every one was sure the company would make a huge fortune, and so it would if it had not neglected the trifling formality of obtaining the consent of King Humbert to the establishment of a large gambling hell in his dominions. The result was that he stepped in at the last minute and intimated that while he had no objections to a Casino, he was not prepared to allow games of chance. Of course, this ruined not only the company, but the place, for Ospedaletti’s only raison d’être was in the Casino, and the Casino’s in the roulette table. The hotels and shops are all closed now and the beautiful building is gradually falling to pieces from decay. The roads are all overgrown, and a few poor Italian families are the only representatives of the gay world that was to make Ospedaletti a successful rival of Monte Carlo.
Then, beyond, is the town of Bordighera, an Anglo-Italian resort nearer the frontier and especially loved by consumptives. George McDonald, the Scotch author, has a beautiful house there and his daughters are famous in the tennis courts along the Riviera. Bordighera is a garden of palms and supplies all the churches of Rome on Palm Sunday.
A more interesting walk from San Remo is to take the Corniche road as far as the Pietra Lunga on the east side of San Remo, and then to strike inland through the olive groves until one finds the dreary village of Bussana, a place totally destroyed by the earthquake of 1886. The ruins of the quaint old church are still shown (with the inevitable monogram of the Virgin on everything), where a service was being held when the first shock came on that eventful Sunday. The peasants say there are still bodies hidden under the massive masonry and swear that the place is haunted. This was the earthquake that startled Cannes early on the same morning, when walls were falling and people flying from the hotels and houses in various stages of undress. The Prince of Wales was there then on his yearly visit to the Riviera, and one of his valets rushed in to call him at five o’clock for the hotel walls had fallen at the back, and there was danger that the others might go. But the Prince only scolded the valet sleepily for waking him and refused to get up in spite of the man’s entreaties, finally turning over and going to sleep again amid the noise of falling chimneys and crashing walls. It is needless to say that H. R. H. was not injured and that the other walls did not fall.
The local government of San Remo is vested in the Syndic, the jovial Cavvaliere Bartolomeo Aquasciati, who is practically elected for life and who has an almost despotic authority over the civil affairs of the town; while the Sous Prefect is at the head of the police and ranks above the Colonel of the regiment of Bersaglieri (or sharpshooters) now here.
San Remo is particularly suited, on account of its peculiarly antiseptic climate, to persons troubled with throat complaints, and several really wonderful cures have been wrought by its balmy air. Living is much cheaper than in Cannes, Nice or Mentone; there is capital medical advice available, and very pleasant society. The old rhyme that applies to Zante:
“Zante, Zante,
Fior di Levante,”
might be paraphrased to suit San Remo, for it is certainly the fine fleur of the Riviera.
