THE SOCIAL SIDE OF GARDENS 



" there were sweet discourses upon stringed instruments, 

 with songs whose words and music had often been 

 composed by one of the company." For in these 

 chosen assemblies one found not only the high nobility 

 of birth, but also the lofty companionship of men of 

 genius and talent ; often the two met in the same man, 

 as with Baldassare himself. 



Strange masques and lovely eclogues were presented 

 before the guests, the actors being drawn from their 

 ranks and, since the little plays were written by one or 

 more among them, personal allusions, veiled sarcasms, 

 and delicate flatteries which would have been lost to the 

 world at large, aroused in the chosen audience "much 

 approval and the most joyous laughter." There were 

 dances too, and mock battles fought to a measured 

 time, with stately steps and clash of blades. Great 

 stone seats over which rugs were thrown were arranged 

 for the ease of the company, and often the moon rose to 

 find the lingering guests, loath to leave, listening to the 

 verses recited by some fair girl with the gift of impro- 

 vising, or vying with each other in the criticism of a 

 recent work of art or literature. 



Even so long ago as the thirteenth century, three 

 hundred years before the white light of the Renaissance 

 was to break over the world, the love of gardens awoke 

 with the dawning perception of what we mean nowa- 

 days by social intercourse between the sexes, and the art 

 of conversation went forth into the green world of grow- 



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