JUNE 



What I saw from my window at Areetri — Fireflies — Cypresses — 

 Youthful memories in the ' Casoine ' — Deodar in cloister of 

 San Marco — Fgte at Santa Margharita — Villas — Gardens — 

 Want of colour in Tuscany at midsummer — Slight allusion 

 to picture galleries — The Cabinet of Cardinal Leopoldo de' 

 Medici — June 24th in Florence — Botanical Garden — Silence 

 of birds and summer sounds. 



June 1st. — I alluded in May to a book called ' Earth- 

 work out of Tuscany.' The introductory chapter con- 

 tains the following passage, which comes home to me most 

 strongly, as I begin to write a few notes about my visit 

 to Florence : ' Has any city, save perhaps Caii-o, been 

 so written out as Florence ? . . . . Florence has often 

 been sketched before — putting Browning aside, with his 

 astounding fresco music — by Ruskin and George Eliot 

 and Mr. Henry James, to name only masters. But that 

 is no reason why I should not try my 'prentice hand. 

 Florence alters not at all ; men do. My picture, poor as 

 you like, shall be my own.' I, too, can only, in great 

 humility, beg you to accept this little account of my 

 June near Florence, ' not as what I would fain offer, but 

 what I am able to present.' 



June 2nd. — The weather is getting finer and warmer, 

 and I am more and more delighted with my large, empty 

 house and with the views all round. A more perfect 

 spot could not be found even here. The actual town I 

 cannot see ; it is hidden by the undulating ground that 

 rises behind San Miniato, ending in the Torre del Gallo, 

 close to the villa where Galileo was exiled, when blind 



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