298 



THE GARDENS OF ITALY. 



lord to be truly a magnificent person. Going afterwards below stairs and observing the spacious 

 and pleasant court, the cellars stored with the richest wines, and delicate springs of water 

 everywhere running, they extolled it yet more. Thence they went to rest in an open gallery 

 which overlooked the court set out with all the flowers of the season, whither the master of the 

 household brought wine and sweetmeats for their refreshment. 



' They were now shown into the garden, which was on one side of the palace, and walled 

 about. All round and through the midst of it were broad, straight walks flanked with vines. 

 . . . The sides of these walks were closed with white and red roses and jasmine in such a 

 manner as to exclude the morning and even the midday sun. ... In the midst, what 

 seemed more delightful than anything else was a plot of ground like a meadow, the grass of deep 

 green, spangled with a thousand different flowers, and set round with orange and cedar trees. 

 . . . In the centre of this meadow was a fountain of white marble, beautifully carved 

 . . . a jet of water spurted up which made a most agreeable sound in its fall ; the water 

 which came thence ran through the meadow by a secret passage, and was carried to every part 



310. LOOKING ON TO FLORENCE. 



of the garden, uniting in one stream at its going out, and falling with such force into the plain 

 as to turn two mills." Boccaccio is evidently painting the villa as he knew it. The two mills 

 still exist, but were rebuilt after being destroyed in a flood of the Mugnone in 1409. The life 

 his youths and ladies lived, walking about, discoursing, and wearing chaplets of flowers, feasting 

 by the side of a fountain, singing and dancing, reading and playing chess, and after supper going 

 to the meadow by the fountain-side to tell stories, was the way in which much of that society 

 was carried on, at a time when the need of noble forms of social intercourse was strongly felt. 

 The " Decameron " gives us a real and charming picture of a highly cultured, if pagan, company, 

 which carried the art of getting the best out of life to its highest point, and 



Wandering in idleness, but not in folly, 

 Sate down in the high grass and in the shade 

 Of many a tree, sun-proof -day after day, 

 When all was still and nothing to be heard 

 But the cicala's voice among the olives, 

 Relating in a ring, to banish care, 

 Their hundred tales. 



