We are so high, however, that from the first
floor we have a sweeping view, and look down on the most sumptuous
valley of the Arno from our western windows,--a level plain,
cultivated every inch with grapes and olives and other fruits; and all
round rise up soft hills, and the Apennines afar off where the sun
sets. We see the noble white steers slowly moving in the valley, among
the trees, ploughing as in the days of Cincinnatus. An infinite peace
and quiet reign. We hear birds, and in the evening the cue owl utters
his melodious, melancholy one note. The world does not disturb us. The
air is as pure and fresh as air can possibly be, blowing from the
sweet, carefully tended plain, and sweeping down from the mountains.
Near us is the villa and tower of Aurora Leigh, just at the end of our
estate, and farther off is Galileo's tower, where he studied the
heavens. Northeast from us lies the beautiful Florence, burning in
the bottom of the cup of hills, with all its domes and campaniles,
palaces and churches. Fiesole, the cradle of Florence, is visible
among the heights at the east, and San Miniato, with its grove of
cypresses, is farther off to the south. There is no end of beauty and
interest, and the view becomes ideal and poetic the moment the sun
begins its decline; for then the rose and purple mists drape the
hills, and mountains--the common earth--turn to amethysts, topazes,
and sapphires, and words can never convey an idea of the opaline
heavens, which seem to have illimitable abysses of a penetrable
substance, made up of the light of pearls.
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