344 



THE GARDENS OF ITALY. 



f- 





CHAPTER XXVII. 

 VENETIAN GARDENS AND VILLAS.-INTRODUCTORY. 



THE traveller proceeding from Tuscany through Padua leaves the mainland at Fusina by the 

 Venetian boat. In the evening light the long lines of the City State stretch across 

 the lagoon, extended by the outlying coast-line of the Lido and the Malamocco barrier. 

 The mirage effect of Venice so approached is strengthened if, on landing on the 

 Riva Schiavone, the traveller passes to the far end of the Piazza before turning to glance at 

 St. Mark's. This view, framed by the arcades of the Piazza, realises the dream palace of 

 Aladdin, and the insubstantiality of the fabric is established by the contrast of the sober 



seriousness of the great 

 Byzantine brick - built 

 Campanilli. It is well 

 for the traveller and 

 artist to realise that 

 beneath the fantastic 

 surface decoration of 

 St. Mark's the same 

 structural and sober 

 architecture of the early 

 founders of Venice still 

 exists. It is thus a 

 mirror of Venetian life, 

 which has always had 

 the background of a 

 solid and serious 

 labouring population, 

 whose existence may 

 too easily escape the 

 attention of the passing 

 visitor and lead him 

 to suppose that Venice 

 is a colossal Earl's 

 Court and that the 

 native is an idler of the 

 worst description. 



To the end of time 

 Italian Renaissance 

 architecture is likely to 

 be grouped in the three 

 main schools the 

 Florentine, Roman and 

 Venetian, of which the 

 last is likely to remain 

 the most popular. 

 356. DETAIL OF STUCCOWORK BY viTTORiA AT MASER. When Michelangelo 



Andrea Palladia, Architect. Paid hlS faniOUS VlSlt tO 



1(0 I.E(K1K l KIITTI. ' 



F H I r.lllllisi.l. II. >UI!I'. 



l IIIMIVI Illl CIKI. 



I'KVi E II. HBttVlRK. 



