THE GARDENS OF ITALY. 
stone setting, in the midst of which a green bronze 
Neptune moulded by Gian Bologna poises his 
trident above four crouching mermen. Against 
the ilexes behind stands a statue of Abundance, 
a woman with a fair, expressionless face, believed 
to be a portrait of Joanna of Austria, wife 
of Francesco I. The statue was executed by 
Gian Bologna and Tocca and erected in 1636, 
to commemorate the fact that during the general 
distress in {taly from wars, Tuscany alone, 
under the ‘benevolent prince,’ Ferdinand I1., 
revelled in plenty. This part of the garden, like 
so many old Italian pleasure grounds, is a good 
deal spoilt by the planting of deciduous trees, dotted 
about in a manner quite alien to the conception of 
the whole. There ought to be a law prohibiting 
the planting of copper beeches, pampas grass, and 
other ornamental foliage which looks so out of 
keeping with the close-cut, sober green of bay and 
ilex and the beauty of time-worn stone and marble. 
On the plateau at the top the flower garden, or 
giardina segreto, is laid out. In Italian gardens this 
is generally near the palace, unless, as in the 
present instance, it has a good-sized casino attached, 
in which the guests could spend the day, lie down 
and rest during the hot hours, and dine if they 
pleased. The casino, with its gently curving cream 
walls, is now given up as a storehouse for lemon 
trees, and the garden itself is not very gay. It is 
formally laid out, in the usual way, with a fountain 
in the middle, round the base of which climb 
three green bronze monkeys. Its interest lies 
chiefly in its position. It is situated on the remains 
of one of those bastions which Michael Angelo 
constructed in 1529 when he was engineer of the 
Republic, and which he helped to defend during 
an eleven months’ siege. The great brown walls, 
with one remaining tower, look almost impreg- 
nable, and are in curious contrast to the frivolous 
little garden planted on them when a hundred 
years had passed. Here we look over the ridge 
in the opposite direction to all the rest of the 
grounds, and very lovely the view is, the Apennines 
from this point taking an exquisite intense blue, like 
lapis-lazuli, and groups of dark cypresses standing 
out against the silver foam of the olive gardens. 
At the entrance to the garden is a belvedere, 
from which we overlook the town. There are few 
open spaces in these gardens; the whole consists 
of a sort of docage of ilexes, overarching in dense 
shade, with their rich black trunks and branches 
looking almost uncanny in the gloom, or clipped 
into long green walls in which niches are cut for 
seats and marble statues. 
A very imposing avenue of tall cypresses 
leads away from the flower-garden to the south- 
west down a steep hill; outside it, on either 
hand, runs a pleached alley of ilexes ; and halfway 
down, where it is broken by groups of statuary, 
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a very wide alley branches off to right and left, 
each “ending at a fountain. The effect of this 
avenue, with its dark sentinels against the blue sky, 
and the glimmering forms of god and goddess, is 
very grand, and must have been much more 
harmonious before the broad pathway was 
vulgarised by gravel. Formerly, of course, it had 
only a dark, moss-grown road, set across, every 
yard or so, by a low, transverse bar of grooved 
grey stone, like one or two which still remain. 
The path sweeps down, and we come to 
another enclosure, a break as striking as, and 
quite different from, any we have yet seen, 
illustrating the clever way in which the garden 
artists of the Renaissance understood how to 
space out their ground and how to lead up to 
surprises. The avenue is so stately that it was 
felt to be necessary that it should have some 
adequate goal. This is aftorded by a giardino 
del /ago, a miniature lake set in clese-cut walls 
like all the rest, and having a fantastically shaped 
island, an #so/otto, which is reached by bridges and 
boats. It is all balustraded about and set with 
pots of lemon trees, and over the whole towers 
one of Gian Bologna’s fountains high in the 
air, with shallow basin, upon which stands a 
figure of Oceanus. A stone pathway with seats 
at intervals encircles the toy lake. It is a 
fitting setting for the society of a Court, a 
place to assemble on a summer evening; these 
close-paved paths seem made for the tap-tap of 
high-heeled satin slippers, and little voyages could 
be made round the tiny lake without danger of 
splashing delicate brocades or ruffling powdered 
curls, Publicity has well-nigh obliterated the 
charm of the Court garden, but a little of it may 
still be recalled. The little meadow beyond was 
once called PUcellaja, and snares were set here 
for catching small birds. It is now used by 
the King and his officers as a jumping-eround for 
horses, and is laid out in all the intricacies of 
in and out, fences with a drop, a double, a 
bullfinch, which no doubt the Italian officers, 
who are splendid riders, negotiate very easily in 
spite of their formidable appearance. 
Ghosts are not common in Italy, but this 
old pleasure-ground is credited with one. Boboli 
was the name of the owner who cultivated the 
land and sold it to the Medici. After he had 
parted with it he pined for it, and so great was 
his love and longing that he could not eat or 
sleep or banish it from his mind. He was always 
talking of it, and his refrain was, “You will see, 
after death I will come to it again.” Soon after 
his death it bezan to be said that the figure of 
an old man was often seen on moonlight nights, 
working in the garden. We are assured that 
to this day it is often beheld, and that the tap 
of his spade can be heard. 
