by Lord Crawford, to whose credit also may be placed the laying out of 

 the charming little formal garden, with its beds of old-fashioned flowers 

 and its terra-cotta fountain wreathed in roses and other climbing plants. 

 This garden appears in one of our pictures and makes a delightful fore- 

 ground to the old palace with its balustraded terrace. 



The villa is inseparably connected with the name of Boccacio, for has 

 it not been " identified " with the one described by him in the untrans- 

 latable " Decamerone " ? 



" The garden was at the side of the palace, and walled round about, 

 which at their first entrance seemed so full of delights that they were the 

 more attentive in viewing every part. All round and through the midst 

 of it were broad straight walks covered with vines, . . . and being all 

 in blossom they gave so delicious a scent joined with other flowers then 

 growing in the garden, that it reminded them of all the spices of the 

 Orient. The sides of these alleys were closed in with white and red 

 roses and jasmine so interwoven as to exclude the sun even at midday, 

 creating an odoriferous and delightful shade. The variety of plants in 

 this place ... it would be needless to mention, since there was nothing 

 belonging to our climate which was not found there in abundance. In 

 the midst, what seemed more commendable than anything else, was a 

 prato of small herbs, spangled with innumerable flowers, and set round 

 with orange and lemon trees, whose branches were filled with ripe fruit 

 and blossoms, at the same time most pleasing to the eye and grateful 

 to the smell. In the middle of this prato was a fountain of whitest 

 marble marvellously carved ; and from a figure standing upon a column 

 in the centre of the fountain a jet of water spurted up, which in falling 

 made a most agreeable sound. The water which flowed thence ran 

 through the meadow by hidden ways ; when it appeared again it was 

 carried to every part of the garden through artfully contrived channels, 

 uniting in one stream at its going out." . . . 



" Its beautiful order, its flowers, and its sparkling fountain gave so 

 much pleasure " to the visitors " that all began to affirm, that if Paradise 

 were on this earth they could not imagine what other form it could have 

 but that of this garden ; nor could they think what other beauty might 

 be added to it." 



88 



