CARDINAL BEMBO AND HIS VILLA 
“ I am back at my Villa,” he wrote to Soranzo, 
“ and have already spent three days here with singular 
pleasure, owing to the extraordinary beauty of the 
season. No one ever remembers so fine a March ! 
Not only are the roads dry, the skies blue and the air 
as balmy as in summer—all three things that are very 
unusual at this time of year—but the trees are green 
and full of leaf, and their foliage already affords us 
shade from the heat of the sun, which has not yet 
climbed far towards the north. Yesterday, which was 
the Feast of Our Lady, I picked some quite large 
almonds and several ripe strawberries, which is more 
singular as none have yet arrived in the city from 
Arqua, where, as you know, fruit ripens earlier than in 
any of these parts. What is still more remarkable, the 
vines in this district have put forth not only eyes, but 
young tendrils, before the pruning-knife has touched 
them. The swallows have been here some days, and 
the turtle, cuckoo, and nightingale have all been heard. 
If, as I hear, the Papal Court is on the way to Rome, 
you will have summer weather at Easter, which I for 
one do not envy you.” 1 
The wonderful beauty of the season, as Bembo told 
the Pope in another letter, made him less inclined to 
envy the gentle citizens of Padua, whom he saw return¬ 
ing from the Coronation festivities with faces flushed 
and tired by their exertions to secure a good place at 
the pageant. But these halcyon days at the Villa were 
already numbered. On the death of Navagero, 
1 Lettere, ii. 200. 
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