254 



THE GARDENS OF ITALY. 



holding that the namesake villa at Rome had been sacrificed for the public safety ; when, however, 

 Alexander VII succeeded to the Papal Chair the Duke of Lante obtained his desire in return for 

 six scudi paid yearly on St. Peter's Day. The grant was renewed in 1743, and again later, and, 

 with some payment, the estate now belongs outright to this same family, the representative of 

 the Houses of Montefeltro and della Rovere, which has itself given four Cardinals and one Pope 

 to the Church. 



Various improvements are due to the Lante family. When French gardening was brought 

 into fashion, and Louis XIV and Le Notre were setting the example of ribbon borders at 

 Versailles, the Duke of that day brought a landscape gardener from France, who laid out the 

 elaborate setting of box hedges and borders which surround the grand fountain (Figs. 253 



and 254). The poor 

 man finished his work by 

 drowning himself in its 

 waters, for what reason 

 tradition does not say. 

 The guest chambers of 

 the villa are hung with 

 very handsome old 

 French papers, some of 

 the earliest ever made. 

 They are manufactured 

 in small pieces of about a 

 foot square, hand painted, 

 with a bold, gay pattern 

 of birds and flowers, and 

 are as bright now as 

 when they were new. 



There are very gay 

 records of the life led 

 here in 1820. The 

 chatelaine then was 

 Margherita Marescotti, 

 wife of Don Vincenzo 

 Lante. She was a leader 

 of Florentine society, and 

 gathered round her many 

 gay and brilliant friends. 

 Private theatricals and 

 amateur recitations were 

 the rage, and we can 

 imagine the coming and 

 going, the coaches 

 swinging through the 

 little town ; the castle in 

 the village below packed, 

 as well as the villa, with guests; the alfresco entertainments, the wit and merriment through 

 the long hot summer days and nights. An old print in Villa Montalto shows Donna 

 Margherita, who is said to have been extremely beautiful in her youth, as a handsome, genial 

 woman, scarcely of middle age, in a Josephine dress of velvet, with a lace tucker and her hair 

 in bunches of classic curls, sitting along with her two little girls, who wear high-waisted, scanty 

 frocks, and their hair a la Chinoise. Among the family papers are some of the old libretti 

 which were used by the talented amateur company. Donna Margherita was a devoted friend 

 of the Countess of Albany, and there is some tradition, though no actual record, of visits paid 

 to the villa by the wife of the unfortunate James Stuart. 



265. DETAIL OF THE STAIRWAY. 



