have two husbands-to the inexpressible amusement of the conscript fathers.

There is another reason why it cannot represent Papirius and his mother, because the ancient sculptors never chose a subject from Roman history.* But it is much easier to prove what it is not, than what it is, we may be content to confess, that we know nothing about it; and to call it, for want of a better name, Electra recognizing Orestes.

It is, however, certain that it is a groupe of singular beauty, and the work of Menelaus, a Grecian sculptor, whose name is inscribed upon it.

We saw the statues and paintings of the Villa Ludovisi only once, and in haste; and we were indebted to the kindness of Canova, who conducted us there, for seeing them at all. But this privilege is now denied even to him; and the most respectful requests of the most distinguished foreigners, for permission to view them, are treated by Prince Piombino with contemptuous neglect, or answered with haughty refusal. It is not, that strangers can intrude upon him, for he resides constantly in Rome. And such is his dread lest they should obtain admittance by bribery to see them, that he has been known, on a wet day, to walk under an umbrella, through miry lanes, and watch within sight of the gate-a spy upon his own servants. What would this tyrant have been upon a throne !-The

* Vide Winkelman, Hist. de l'Art. liv. vi. chap. 6. § 28.

only excuse that can be alleged for him is, that he is supposed to be mad; but it is unfortunate when such a madman, instead of being locked up himself, has it in his power to lock up such works of

art.

The Villa Ludovisi stands in one of the most beautiful situations in the neighbourhood of Rome, for, though enclosed within the walls of the city, it is completely in the country. The view from the top of the Belvedere Casino is one of the most varied beauty. The blue mountains rising behind the dark shade of the pines and cypress, which form the fore-ground-but I forgot that I must not describe. I see you yawn already.

These pines and cypress are ever green and ever beautiful; but, in all directions of right lines and angles, extend tall hedges of ilex and laurel, clipped into green walls, impenetrably thick, and inconceivably dull. With two miles of pleasureground, close to a capital city, on such a soil, and beneath such a sky, what would an English villa and its gardens have been? But gardening, which is, in our country, the art of creating landscape, is, in Italy, the art of marring it.

In my enthusiasm for the Aurora of Guido, I forgot to mention the paintings of the Rospigliosi Palace.

You are taken, reluctantly, from the contemplation of the Aurora, into an adjoining room in the same Casino, to see Domenichino's Adam and Eve in Paradise-a very poor production indeed. The

whole of an immense piece of canvas is crowded with a heterogeneous assemblage of all the birds of the air and beasts of the field, and reptiles that ever crawled upon the earth; and in the middle of them stand our first Parents, in a most unenviable situation.

Some bad bronze heads, and other wretched scraps of sculpture, and a Diana and Minerva, more frightful than any thing you can conceive, are stuck round the room. They were found in the baths of Constantine, upon a part of which this palace was built. Here is a pretty little bronze horse, also found in them,-the work, probably, of a better age. The beautiful bas reliefs, which adorn the exterior of the Casino, and are unmercifully exposed to all the injuries of the weather, are of the age of Trajan; and the larger ones are said to have been brought from his Forum. They are placed at such a height from the ground, that the beauty of the sculpture is lost.

Two magnificent columns of Rosso Antico, the only ones of this size in the world, are judiciously wedged into the wall of the Casino, and so totally hidden in it, that they would pass unobserved were they not pointed out. If they were made of painted stucco, they would look quite as well in such a situation, as this precious marble-for the beauty of the material is totally lost.

The palace itself contains a scanty collection of paintings generally passed over in haste,-for what stranger can view them with patience, before

he sees the Aurora; and after it, how can he admire them? Among them, however, are some paintings of considerable merit.

Guido's Andromeda is one of these. It is seldom Guido erred from want of expression, but she is surely too calm, and too placid, for such a situation. Neither Perseus winging his flight to her rescue, nor the Sea Monster raising its jaws to devour her, seem to have the power to agitate her with hope or fear. But she is Beauty's self; and it is a painting that irresistibly forces admiration.

Domenichino's Triumph of David, is not, on the whole, one of his finest compositions. The figures are larger than nature. One of the daughters of Israel, who welcomes him with the harp and the timbrel, has all the living brightness, and beautiful expression, of his pencil.

Samson, pulling down the Temple on the Philistines, by L. Caracci, is extremely admired; but the subject is, I think, a peculiarly unfortunate one for painting. The gigantic columns, and tumbling roofs, yielding to the force of a single man of human size, has something in it of revolting impossibility and disproportion.

Eighteen ancient frescos, found in the baths of Constantine, once adorned this palace. The servants here say, the Prince Rospigliosi carried them off with him to Florence, where he now resides; and his servants there, maintained they were at Rome. They are not now to be seen or heard of any where.

LETTER LXIX.

ROMAN VILLAS-RAPHAEL'S CASINO, AND FRESCOS -BORGHESE GARDENS-ITALIAN AND ENGLISH GARDENING-VILLAS ALDOBRANDINI, ALTIERI, GIRAUD, PAMFILI DORIA, AND LANTI-FRENCH ACADEMY-UTILITY OF AN ENGLISH ONE-VISIT TO MONTE MARIO-VILLA MADAMA-PASTOR FIDO RAPHAEL'S Ffrescos.

SINCE I have been in Rome, many are the visits I have paid to the Casino of Raphael, which was the chosen scene of his retirement, and adorned by his genius. It is about half a mile from the Porta del Popolo. The first wooden gate in the lane, on the right of the entrance into the grounds of the Villa Borghese, leads you into a vineyard, which you cross to the Casino di Raffaello; for it still bears his name, though it now belongs to Signore Nelli. It is unfurnished, except with casks of wine, and uninhabited, except by a Contadina, who shews it to strangers.

We passed through two rooms, painted by his scholars; the third, which was his bed-room, is entirely adorned with the work of his own hands.