It is the dream of the owners of Villino Loki to build on another wing;
but, so far, funds do not run to this. The Villino is sadly short of
guest chambers; that is because one room has been for ever allotted to
the little Oratory.
This little Chapel is a haven of peace. One’s thoughts turn to it when
one has the misfortune to be away from home. Over the altar there hangs
a large, wonderfully beautiful crucifix. The figure, white majolica, was
bought in a villainous den of a curiosity shop on the Tiber. We remember
how it shone out of the darkness at us, and we felt it _had_ to be ours!
It is now affixed to a large gilt carved wood cross made for us by the
_doratore_ in _Piazza Nicosia_.... Excellent ruffian! The cross has one
arm much longer than the other, though no one would know it who did not
measure; and it has the inimitable stamp of the artistic hand bound by
no slavish measure or hideous time-saving mechanism.
The Chapel is chiefly white and gold. Two large Donatello angels, warm
ivory-coloured, from the _Manifattura di Signa_, carry the red Sanctuary
lamps. One is certainly the real Donatello—the other, we fear, a poor
foundling. But they both look very well.
There is a great window over the moor.
The few small statues are, we think, attractive; chiefly decorated with
bronzy golds and deep colours. There is St. Louis, King of France,
specially carved by a Bavarian artist; a slender noble figure with a
face of grave asceticism, holding up the Crown of Thorns. And there is a
sternly warlike St. Michael, all golden, resting on his sword. And a St.
Anthony ‹a real discovery this› lifting a pale countenance that seems on
fire with ardour towards the Divine Infant who stands on his book—St.
Anthony is “in glory”; his habit golden over the brown. St. George, a
fine splash of colour, charges the dragon over the fireplace. It is a
most satisfying dragon with red jaws open and a green claw tearing at
the lance that has conquered him. St. George’s iron-grey horse, with
flowing crimson trappings, starts aside and rolls a distraught eye—as
well he might. It is all in plaster and in rather deep relief. Two tall
golden wood-carved Roman church candlesticks flank it on either side,
fitted with electric light.
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[Illustration: garden view]
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We have placed square Compton pots with Italian wreaths, filled with
palms and flowering plants, one on each side of the altar step.
At night, when there is no light in the Oratory, except that of the
Sanctuary lamps, the shadows of the palms look like angels’ wings,
crossing and re-crossing....
* * * * *
But, just as to a Garden there is no end—no end to its wants or to our
desires for it; to its phases, its transmutation surprises; to our joys
and disappointments in it—so there is no end to a Garden and Country
House gossip. We might go on for ever—like Tennyson’s Brook! And
meanwhile the year is passing on, in its stately pomp.
[Sidenote: SUMMER ONCE MORE ... AND AFTER]
Full Summer is once more upon the Garden. The Delphiniums are rampant.
We are in the centre of a heat wave, and our dry hill-side pants in the
sun. At the fall of eve our souls rejoice in the sound of the refreshing
showers when the watering begins; for one thirsts sympathetically with
the cherished borders....
The moor is deepening to purple. The trees wear the deep green that
precedes the turn. Life is rushing by with us so quickly that it seems
but the “blink of an eye,” as the Germans say, since we were peering for
the first bulb shoot.... In a little while the Ramblers and Wichurianas
will be one blaze of glory; and in a little while again the Autumn winds
will be shouting up the valley and the Bracken turning gold over the
rolling hills; and again in a little while again it will be the Winter
and the snow and we shall be watching for the Spring.
And it will be all even as before and yet all quite different. And so
year by year.... And one day our garden will bloom for other eyes than
ours.
_Nunc tibi—mox aliis_, the Book-Lover’s motto has it. How true also of
the beloved Garden!... Another “eye-blink.”
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[Illustration: path down garden]