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Grand Duke presented it, having built it on his 

 land), having spent a noble estate by gaming 

 and other extravagance, would be glad to let it 

 for a trifle, and is not rich enough to live in it. 

 Most of the fine furniture is sold ; there remains 

 only a few of the many good pictures that 

 adorned it, and such goods as were not easily to 

 be transported, or for which he found no chap- 

 man. I have said nothing to you of the mag- 

 nificent bath, embellished with statues, or the 

 fish-ponds, the chief of which is in the midst of 

 the garden to which I go from my apartment 

 on the first floor. It is circled by a marble 

 baluster, and supplied by water from a cascade 

 that proceeds from the mouth of a whale, on 

 which Neptune is mounted, surrounded with 

 reeds : on each side of him are Tritons, which, 

 from their shells, pour out streams that aug- 

 ment the pond. Higher on the hill are three 

 colossal statues of Venus, Hercules, and Apollo. 

 The water is so clear you see the numerous fish 

 that inhabit it, and it is a great pleasure to me 

 to throw them bread, which they come to the 

 surface to eat with great greediness. I pass by 

 many other fountains, not to make my descrip- 

 tion too tedious. You will wonder, perhaps, 

 never to have heard any mention of this para- 

 dise either from our English travellers or in any 

 cf the printed accounts of Italy ; it is as much 

 unknown to them as if it was guarded by a 



