House and Garden 
THE POOL AT VILLA FALCONIERI 
neighbors from the windows of my villa on the slope 
toward Fiesole, I learned how deeply sentiment 
possessed their hearts. In the morning they bristle 
with work-a-day alertness, and clear vision, simple 
as the air about them, sharp cut in outline, of prac¬ 
tical address. The sun lowers, slips down behind 
far ragged mountains of Carrara—the cypress caught 
his passionate gaze, and while through the valley of 
Arno the river grows dark, 
the cypress glows red with 
remembrance of that last 
meaning look. 
And when her color fades 
you never know, for it is 
already grown too dark to 
see, but this is plain, she has 
gained new grandeur, new 
importance. She lifts her 
slender height against the 
huddling foliage of paler 
trees, gathers close her sump¬ 
tuous velvet gown, shows her 
marvelous symmetry against 
the paling horizon where one 
bright star crowns her—and 
stands in revery, queen of 
the passionate Italian night. 
The cypress avenue at Tiv¬ 
oli’s Villa d’Este^—its beauty 
is so voluptuous that almost 
vou resent its power, crying, 
“It is too much—I swoon!” 
And besides, in that spot ] is 
the tourist — a quality only 
pardonable in yourself. 
But some cool humid day 
of quiet February, Frascati 
gives with lavish love the 
secrets of her garden’s beauty, 
and the cypresses of the Fal- 
conieri embrace the soul of 
man, leaving enduring im¬ 
print. Up the long hill—but 
not for tbe hill-top view— 
through the big gate, 
through a smaller one, up a 
sloping bit of wood, a few 
quick strides to the left along 
a tiny path—and then—the 
assemblage of all that the 
soul of man needs to cast it 
into despair or lift it to high 
heaven, or lap it in sweet 
human joy. 
There is an open-air cham¬ 
ber, a long square, floored 
with fresh fragrant turf, the 
four walls, columns of living 
green rising until the tinted sky rests on the firm¬ 
ness of their pointed tops, strong-limbed young 
caryatids bolding the heavenly roof. In the center 
a pool mirroring all. As if the infinite silence of 
peace might be misread into the silence of despair, 
the fountain throws music and motion through the 
enchanted spot by one jocund spray. 
Human feelings are deeper and older than human 
PINES IN THE PUBLIC PARK AT ROME 
162 
