THE GARDENS OF VENICE 



the remembrance of many lovers of Venice. Close to 

 the Public Gardens, on the little island of Sant' Elena, 

 there stood an ancient church and convent with a 

 graveyard, where the ashes of the Empress Helena, 

 mother of Constantine the Great, were said to rest, and 

 where many noble Venetian families had their burying- 

 place. It was the most romantic spot in the world. 

 Violets and periwinkles carpeted the grassy glades 

 under the elms and pine groves, tall cypresses and 

 slender marble columns framed in the cloister garden, 

 where pomegranates and oleanders blossomed, and roses 

 hung in profusion over the low red wall. 



Far away to the north-west, across the open sea, we 

 could see the mountains of Cadore, and beyond the 

 spires of Venice rose the long range of Euganean hills. 

 But campanile and convent garden, marble columns 

 and cypress grove, have alike vanished before the 

 relentless march of civilisation. An iron foundry has 

 now taken their place, the smoke of furnaces blackens 

 the pure atmosphere, and this once lovely isle, hallowed 

 by the worship and memories of past ages, has been 

 utterly ruined. 



In the golden days of Venice, when Casola and De 

 Commines wrote of her glories, the gardens of the 

 patricians were as numerous as those of the religious 

 orders. Thirty or forty years later, Sansovino counted 



above a hundred palaces which had gardens of their 



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