VILLA PALMIERI. 
with the manuscript. Fortunately, the Republic 
would not give up either, and the MS. is now 
one of the treasures of the Laurentian Library. 
The picture was ordered to be removed from the 
chapel, and was taken to the old scholar’s villa 
and walled up for safety. It was only discovered 
at the beginning of the nineteenth century. 
Examining it in the National Gallery, it is easy 
to see traces of stabs and cuts upon the donor 
and his wife, inflicted by the zeal of the faithful 
when it yet hung in the Palmieri Chapel. 
Under its present owner, Lady Crawford, Villa 
Palmieri is as fascinating a resort as you could 
find for spring and summer days and nights. Its 
44 
wide bricked terrace, with a balustrade and statues, 
looking out over the Val d’Arno, would seem the 
very place for the gathering together of a company 
of congenial spirits. The double stairway, with 
its fine, graceful sweep, was built by Palmieri’s 
descendant in 1670; it is overgrown with creepers 
and the air is heavy with perfume. It leads to 
the flower garden, which has a wall in which 
round openings at intervals frame exquisite views, 
and below, the ground falls away into wild 
and distant walks, where irises grow in  spring- 
time, and where such nightingales sing as might 
have heralded the coming of Pampinea and_ her 
goodly company. 
