n8 



THE GARDENS OF ITALY. 



built over thirty-four classic tombs of great beauty, forming " a small village with streets, side 

 walks arid squares." It stands high above the city, and merits its old name of Belrespiro. Of 

 all Italian palaces, it most resembles an English country seat ; it is surrounded by a 

 fairly extensive, undulating park, which is plentifully timbered with ilexes and stone pines. 

 Nearer the house a cool, dark wood is railed off and remains inaccessible to the ordinary 

 visitor. The villa is surrounded by a finely laid out formal garden, with geometrical beds set 

 in box edging, and is adorned with fountains and sundials, statues, and lemon trees in terra- 

 cotta vases. The prospects from the garden are entrancing and full of interest. In one direction 

 the eye travels over the wide campagna to where Monte Cavo, with its flat top, the site of the 

 ancient temple of Jupiter Latiarius, towers above the range of the Alban hills, while, looking 

 in the opposite direction, there is such a view of St. Peter's as can be obtained from no other 



128. CASCADES, WESTERN GARDENS. 



point. The great mass of Vatican buildings, surmounted bv the dome, is seen by itself, cut 

 off from the rest of Rome by the intervening hills. Behind rises Monte Mario and far away 

 Soracte couches dimly on the plain. 



There are no traces of Donna Olimpia's reign to be seen at the superb Pamphilj palace 

 in the Piazza Navona, where she spent more than half her life, but in the villa which she planned 

 and her son built are to be seen inscriptions and busts. In the past there were many more, but 

 the best were moved for greater security to the Doria palace; In that gallery we find Innocent X 

 both in marble and bronze by Bernini, as well as Pamfilio Pamphilj, Olimpia's husband, a 

 fine-looking man in his Spanish ruff and seventeenth century dress. Here, too, is Olimpia her- 

 self, represented as no longer young, but still handsome, with piercing eyes, marked eyebrows, 

 and close-shut mouth in sum, a strong, resolute and imperious face. 



