entered only through one of three gates, approached by bridges across
the moat, from the north, south-east and south,--the Udine Gate, the
Gradisca Gate and the Maritime Gate. Each gate is double, so that you
pass through a small square court, almost like a well, and at each gate
you can see the remains of an old portcullis and drawbridge. Each is
topped by two slender towers, and is wide enough to allow only one
vehicle to pass at a time, and at each there is a guard of Carabinieri
in their grey lantern-hats, to stop and examine all questionable
traffic.

From the ramparts you can see the Carnic and the Julian Alps, sweeping
round the Venetian plain in a great half circle. To the north the
mountains seem to rise sheer out of green orchards and maize fields, but
to the east there is a gradual slope of less fertile uplands, where the
Austrians in the first days of war on this Front would not face the
onrush of the Italians in the open, but fell back hurriedly to the more
difficult country behind. At night all the inhabitants sit out on the
ramparts, talking of the hot weather and the war, and watching the
searchlights winking on the hills.

In the centre of the town is a large Piazza, planted round with myrtles
which smell strong and sweet in the sun, and at midday an old woman sets
up a stall here and sells the newspapers of Rome and Milan, Bologna and
Venetia. In one corner of this Piazza is a restaurant, where one can
play billiards and dine well and cheaply. A youth serves here who has
been rejected for the Army because of defective eyesight. He speaks a
little French and a little German and a very little English, and in
moments of excitement words from all these languages come tumbling out
together, mixed up with Italian. He has, I am sure, an Italian-English
phrase book, which he consults hurriedly in the kitchen, for, whenever