CARDINAL BEMBO AND HIS VILLA 



joins, and which here is a swift and joyous river, and 

 waters our meadows on the other side. In this fashion 

 I mean to spend the whole summer and autumn, only 

 going to Padua now and then for a few days to see my 

 friends, and make my Villa seem the more charming 

 compared with the city.' 



i 



So the days slipped away, and by August, Bembo 

 felt himself once more " a simple peasant of the soil." 

 With his own hands he not only picked strawberries 

 and roses, but dug the ground and planted trees and 

 shrubs. Papal Secretaries who paid him a visit were 

 pressed into the service, and became as keenly interested 

 in the garden as its owner. 



" To-morrow," wrote Bembo one October to Flavio 

 Crisolino, " I shall return home, to plant new trees in 

 the little grove which has lost several oaks and chest- 

 nuts, owing to the intense heat of the past summer. 

 Your ivy has already covered a fine large pavilion at 

 the other end of the garden, and I have made another 

 little pergola with ivy and larch-poles firmly fixed in 

 the ground at regular intervals, which in two or three 

 years' time ought to be very beautiful. So you see that 

 your work has produced excellent results. I rejoice 

 to hear that you often think of my Villetta and of the 

 happy life we lead there, although I can hardly believe 

 that your important affairs leave you time to think of 

 my small fortunes. But I do not repent my choice, 

 and am more content every day and, thank God, both 

 well and merry." 2 



1 Letter e> iii. 73. 2 Ibid., iii. 120. 



H7 



