"I was coming from Siena along the road,
and there had been a heavy fall of snow,
the moon was extremely clear, and every-
thing in the forest, was as plain as day. I
was coming along, thinking of a new gun I
had seen in Siena, when I saw, standing in
the middle of the road, the donnina as plain
as I see your Eccellency now before me. She
stood there, till I was almost close to her.
She wore a sort of light petticoat with
colours on it, and had something all black,
over it, on her head and shoulders. There,
I saw her, and I saw her shadow in the
moonlight, too. She looked like a girl,
though I did not see her face, and she went
away, piano, piano, piano, as I stood still,
and faded out among the trees. I never
saw her so plainly, for the snow made all
so clear. I often see her, poverina. I do
not feel any fear. What harm could she
do to me?" And he spread out his large
chest, and lifted his long arms with that
ejaculatory action common to Italians.
After Carlo came Celso, a respectable
contadino living also on the estate in
a vineyard close to the villa. He told
us " that after he had come back from
serving in the militia, he was standing one
evening with his little brother in the road,
near the Satyro, when he heard himself
called distinctly three times, out of the
wood, in a strange sad voice, ' Celso, Celso,
Celso!' His little brother said, 'Who calls
you, Celso, in such a strange voice?' and
he heard the same voice call him again
when he was alone in the wood." He
was frightened, and liked it so little that
he now never passed by that road in the
evening, but went " round a mile or so,
higher up on the hills."

We have more material mysterious
personages going about the old Cardinal's
Retreat, too, as will presently be seen; and
we have incentives to strange fancies out
of number.

On one side of the villa, adjoining the
broad terrace leading to the Scala Santa,
is a pleasure-ground or park, designed and
specially set apart by the cardinal for
meditation and repose. It may be some
two or three miles round, enclosed by a
high wall, and entered by three lofty gates.
It is full of broad, moss-grown walks, with
here and there statues of monks and angels,
high on carved pedestals, in attitudes of
prayer. The walks, and narrower paths,
are all knit up at the further end, by a
chapel somewhat small and low, with
kneeling statues on either hand darkened and
moss-grown by time and storm. The trees
are the ilex of the surrounding forest,
expanded into superb proportions by being so
long undisturbed. The ground is rocky and
undulating, covered with a graceful
under-growth of arbutus, and holly, and lauristinus,
every plant and every tree being
evergreen. The big branches of the ilex
trees, with long silvery beards of delicate
white moss hanging down amidst the
glittering waxy leaves, pointed like thorns,
wave over the paths, casting flickering
shadows as the eager sun darts through
the dark foliage. As the passing clouds
come and go over the surface of the chapel,
here and there a glint of sun calls out the
dark outlines of the kneeling statues so
vividly, that at a distance, looking from
among the interposing confusion of the
wood, they seem to move under the
changing light. In truth, a very weird
and ghostly spot, set apart it would seem
for unholy rites, altogether solemn and
mystic.

Here, in the brief though ardent
autumnal sunsliine, impenetrable shade
tempts one to wander among the rocks,
and under the dark twisted ilex stems, all
speckled and flecked with patches of black
and white mosses, like the breast of a bird,
that pillar-like bear up the sombre canopy
overhead; or, to rest on a carpet of moss,
and hear the ripe acorns drop from the
evergreen oaks among the dry leaves; or the
busy twitter of the departing birds, arranging
their winter flight, as they circle round
and round, pecking the ripe arbutus berries;
or the buzz of the last bands of bees,
gathering honey from the scented herbs.
It is a rare place, too, in which to watch
the last pale butterflies hovering among
the aromatic flowers of the cyclamen and
caper, growing in the crevices of the rocks;
and the little green lizards racing over the
stones, or immovable in some sunny corner,
watching for the harmless wood- snake
who still creeps out to enjoy the mid-day
warmth. As day declines in this strange
and beautiful wood, the gathering clouds
put out one by one the bright lights on
rock and leaf and stem, and a gloom
gathering around, and a silence of all
those inarticulate utterances that people
woods with life, tell of darkness and
approaching night.

One day sitting in the thickest tangle,
near where the hill abruptly descends
towards the Siena road and the statue of the
Satyro, we heard a low whistle, answered
in an opposite direction, then the sound of
many feet crushing the leaves, and the flap