mouths of these beasts water used to spurt into the basin below ; but the 

 waterworks have been allowed to go very much to ruin, and only a tithe 

 of the fountains now play ; many of them have been filled up with earth 

 and planted with trailing geraniums and other bright flowers. 



Beyond the incline, the one level space in the villa is occupied by a 

 rectangular reservoir, about sixty paces by forty, which is enclosed by a 

 low wall overhung with virginian creeper, brambles, and Banksia rose, 

 and further encircled by tall poplars. Arranged at each corner are 

 cabinets de verdure, entered by bizarre archways and provided with benches 

 and pedestals for statues ; left open towards the south, they commanded 

 a view of the open sea and the coast-line stretching away into the grey 

 distance beyond Savona. 



A grotto, about which stairways wind to a belvedere above, marks the 

 division between the more formal garden and the bosco. Within this 

 wilder wood you meet at every turn beasts of ferocious aspect, but fortu- 

 nately for your peace of mind they are firmly rooted to the rocks from 

 which they have been carved. 



Within an open glade beyond the wood, a pavilion, shadowed by 

 ancient cypresses, stands at the margin of the great tank that feeds the 

 fountains on the lower levels. All around are orchards and vineyards, 

 backed by the lower spurs of the Alpes Maritimes ; so far into the 

 country has the garden penetrated that all sign of the busy city and its 

 noisy streets is left far behind. 



The grotto near the edge of the bosco is entered by an archway 

 between statues of two garden deities. Within is a vaulted chamber 

 with a spacious oval basin encircled by a narrow pathway. Walls and 

 vaulting are decorated in rude mosaic, with scroll-work, sea-monsters, 

 and attenuated terminal figures. In many of its details this grotto 

 answers to Vasari's description of a bath built by Alessi for the Villa 

 Grimaldi : " He has, indeed, constructed numerous fine fountains for 

 many persons, but more beautiful than all else is the bath which has been 

 formed after his design in the villa of the Signer Battista Grimaldi at 

 Bisagno. This, which is of a round form, has a basin in the centre 

 within which eight or ten persons can bathe commodiously. Warm 

 water is poured into the basin from four heads of marine monsters, while 



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