There was a problem when proofreading this page.
116
The Voyage of Italy.
Part I.

The Garden.

carried on by her to that perfection we now see it in, and which makes it one of the prime Palaces of Europe. The design of it (for it is not yet all quite built) is to be a perfect Roman H, with double Rooms on all sides. As you ascend up to it, by an easie ascent from the Street, it presents you with fair Broad-side of building, in which counted two and twenty great Windows all in a row, and all alike, and all of them cheekt up on either side by fine Stone Pillars. The fashion of building in this Palace, as in most of the best Palaces of Florence, is that which they call in Architecture, la maniera rustica; where great Freestones are made advancing a little one over the other. Entering into the Palace, we saw the fair Court; and in the end of it, the Grotta or Fountain with a large Bason, in which they keep Fish for present use. This Court is square, and open only on one side towards the Garden, but hedged in with a high Terrass of Stone, whose top is level with the ground of the Garden. Beyond this Terrass and Court, lies a fine green spot of ground level with the first Story of the Palace, and half compassed about with a demicircle of Laurel Trees high and thick. Under these Trees of the demicircle, rife up stone seats, six rows high, like the seats in an Amphitheater, and capable of two thousand Men, who may all sit here with ease, and behold the sports of Cavalry which are often exhibited upon this fair green spot of ground by the Nobility: the Great Duke and the Court beholding all this from the Windows of the Palace, while the rest of the Nobi-lity