EVOLUTION OF THE GARDEN 17 



treading their way among the flowers, looking like 

 tulips and ranunculus themselves in their fur and 

 brocade. But although in this story Boccaccio em- 

 ploys the word giardino instead of orto, I think we 

 must imagine that magic flower garden rather as a 

 corner of orchard connected with fields of wheat and 

 olive below by the long tunnels of vine-trellis and 

 dying away into them with the great tufts of laven- 

 der and rosemary and fennel on the grassy bank 

 under the cherry trees. This piece of terraced 

 ground along which the water spurted from the 

 dolphin's mouth, or the Siren's breasts runs 

 through walled channels, refreshing impartially vio- 

 lets and salads, lilies and tall, flowering onions 

 under the branches of the peach-tree and the pome- 

 granate, to where, in the shade of the great pink 

 oleander tufts, it pours out below into the big tank 

 for the maids to rinse their linen in the evening and 

 the peasants to fill their cans to water the bedded 

 out tomatoes and the potted clove-pinks in the 

 shadow of the house. 



"The Blessed Virgin's garden is like that where, 

 as she prays in the cool of the evening, the gracious 

 Gabriel flutters on to one knee (hushing the sound 

 of his wings lest he startle her) through the pale 

 green sky, the deep blue-green valley; and you may 



