22 



Brosses a celebrated French writer surveyed them, and re- 

 ports that within their vast circuit they must have contained 

 the present scites of the Churches of Madonna della Vittoria 

 — St. Suzanna and St. Nicholas — the street of Bolaria — the 

 ruins of the Erucinian Venus, the whole of the present Negro- 

 ni, the greatest part of the Ludovisii, and the bottom of the 

 Barberini Gardens, besides a considerable, now uncultivated 

 space. So beautiful were they that when Rome fell beneath 

 the sway of her Emperors, they were selected for the imperial 

 residence. Art and nature indeed seem to have been combin- 

 ed to render them delightfiil. The beautiftil prospects seduced 

 the eye to wander, whilst umbrageous walks, open parterres 

 and cool porticoes, interspersed with flowers and streams, and 

 master pieces of Sculpture, invited it when weary to the 

 most luxurious repose* Joining in the tide of fashion we 

 may presume that the foliage of his trees, were cut into 

 regular figures, since it was just previous to his time that 

 Matius, the friend of Julius Ca;sar, and particular favourite of 

 Augustus, first taught his countrymen this method of distorting 

 nature. t A practice which even the refined Pliny admired, 

 and which continued to be practised in England until the close 

 of the last Century. Seats were formed amid the branches of 

 any monarch Trees that grew within their grounds. Such a 

 seat in a Plane Tree near the imperial Villa at Velitrce, was 

 called by the Emperor Caligula, his Nest.J 



About the period of the Christian Era, the love of Horticul- J 

 tural luxuries so far prevailed that every person of any consi- 

 deration possessed a Country Villa. The neighbourhood of 

 Tibur appears to have been the favourite spot for their erec- 

 tion. The magnificence of the attendant Architecture was 

 not now the chief point attended to for the decoration of their 

 Gardens, although they had not yet learnt that Nature could 

 be improved by Art, without being completely subjugated. 



* Tacit. Ann. iii. 30. xiii. 47.— Hist. iii. 82.— Stewarts life of Sallust. 

 t Colnn-oll- 3.1'.- iA. ■ % PUny- Xnt. Hi't. rii, 'J. 1 '>. 



