THE GARDENS OF ITALY. 
87 
CHAPTER VII I. 
PALAZZO BORGHESE, AND THE COLONNA GARDENS, ROME. 
I T seems impossible for modern ideas of grandeur to compete with those of the Renaissance and 
of the seventeenth century in Italy. The Borghese, during the years of their power, acquired 
eighty estates in the Campagna of Rome. Cardinal Scipione, having a villa at the gates of 
Rome as magnificent as the chief palace of most great nobles, retained it merely as a summer- 
house and lived chiefly in his immense palace in the city itself.* It was begun in 1590 by 
Cardinal Deza from the designs of Martino Lunghi, and finished by order of the great Borghese 
Pope, Paul V, from the designs of E'laminio Ponzdo. The architecture still has something of 
early Renaissance beauty. The 
courtyard is surrounded by a 
colonnade, and an airy loggia 
arches across the garden entrance, 
such as one might see in a fresco 
bv Pintoricchio. From under the 
cloistered granite columns, against 
which are set several ancient 
colossal statues, we pass into the 
little garden. It is screened from 
the courtyard by pedestals set in 
pairs, on which stand small Roman 
statues ; we can fancy the con- 
noisseur Cardinal deciding that 
they were poor works, not worthy 
of gracing his choice collection 
within the place, but that they would 
do well enough for the garden. Two 
low fountains play on either side of 
the w'ide iron gate through which 
we enter the garden. It is locked 
now and no one passes down the 
shallow steps, for the garden is the 
emporium of a dealer in antiquities. 
In the old times it must have been 
the ideal of a little town garden, 
shut in with high walls, into 
which are built three huge fantastic fountain pieces in the baroque style '['—tasteless things, yet 
not without a certain barbaric grace. The canopies are supported by young men crowned with 
baskets of flow'ers, cupids riot with ropes of flow'ers, goddesses hold out alluring arms, all 
are florid but effective. The banksias fling their careless foliage over the walls, and the arums 
grow thick and tall in the old sarcophagi. Inside the palace the rooms still retain their 
painted mirrors, their cupids by Giro Ferri, and their wreaths by Mario di Fiori, though the 
celebrated pictures and statues have been removed to the Villa Borghese. 
* Between the Corso and the Tiber — Via Borghese. t By Carlo RainaUh 
