ITALIAN GARDENS OF THE RENAISSANCE 
On one side it opened into the studio adorned with 
the works of Mantegna and Costa, of Perugino and 
Correggio, and the priceless antiques which she had 
been at infinite pains to collect from the ruins of 
Rome or the isles of the Archipelago. On the other 
it led into a little garden full of the choicest fruits 
and the sweetest flowers, of the trees and plants that 
she loved best. Often during her absence from 
Mantua the Marchesana’s thoughts turned to this 
little corner of the world which in a peculiar way bore 
the stamp of her individuality, and she begged her 
friends at home for the latest report of this favourite 
garden. 
“I have been to your palace,” wrote a favoured gentle¬ 
man of her suite one May-day when the Marchesana 
was in Rome, “ and I have seen your little garden which 
is so green and beautiful that it might be Paradise 
itself; the little apple trees are already laden with 
large fruit, my friends the figs are ripening fast, the 
jessamines are climbing heavenwards, and everything 
invites to joy and calls on you to return home. That 
divine Grotta would give light and glory to hell 
itself.” 1 
Here, too, in the brightest corner of the little 
garden, was the beautiful loggia where Isabella invited 
Castiglione to sup with her on his return from Rome, 
and for which this loyal knight sighed in the burning 
1 A. Luzio in Arch. st. lomb. xxxv. 19. 
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