eBooks Base 2000

The Villa Albani
itself is an edifice separate from both the coffee-house and casino, and
is not opened to strangers. It rises, palace-like, in the midst of the
garden, and, it is to be hoped, has some possibility of comfort amidst
its splendors.--Comfort, however, would be thrown away upon it; for
besides that the site shares the curse that has fallen upon every
pleasant place in the vicinity of Rome, . . . . it really has no occupant
except the servants who take care of it. The Count of Castelbarco, its
present proprietor, resides at Milan. The grounds are laid out in the
old fashion of straight paths, with borders of box, which form hedges of
great height and density, and as even as a brick wall at the top and
sides. There are also alleys forming long vistas between the trunks and
beneath the boughs of oaks, ilexes, and olives; and there are shrubberies
and tangled wildernesses of palm, cactus, rhododendron, and I know not
what; and a profusion of roses that bloom and wither with nobody to pluck
and few to look at them.


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