ITALIAN GARDENS OF THE RENAISSANCE 



He devoted much time and money to agricultural 

 , experiments, and introduced the system of the 

 \ mezzadria or metayer system among the peasants on 

 his estates, with the happiest results. More than 

 this, he spent large sums in building bridges, making 

 new roads, and draining the marshes of the Brenta, 

 being convinced that he could do the State no better 

 service than to reclaim these waste lands and 

 make them fit for cultivation. Happily, Alvise 

 Cornaro's example was followed by many of his 

 countrymen, and the last half of the sixteenth century 

 witnessed an extraordinary outburst of activity in this 

 direction. The ever-increasing passion for vi/leggiatura 

 life led wealthy patricians to build pleasure-houses 

 all along the /shores of the Brenta, and in the 

 course of the next hundred years this fertile district 

 between Padua and Mestre became practically a 

 suburb of Venice. 



When, in 1574, the last of the Valois kings, 

 Henry III, visited Venice on his return from Poland, 

 he was lost in wonder at the splendours of the 

 palaces luoghi di delizie which lined the banks as he 

 rowed down the Brenta in his barge. The Palazzo 

 Malcontenta, where the royal guest was entertained 

 on this occasion, was built for the Foscari in the 

 sixteenth century by Palladio, and decorated with 

 frescoes by the painter Zelotti. Its stately Ionic 



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