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[Book V
the abundance of water they poured forth, must have greatly cotitributedto the beauty and effect of the surrounding scenery.
Two plenteous fountains the whole prospect crown’d :
This through the garden leads its streams around,
Visits each plant and waters all the ground ;
While that in pipes beneath the palace fiows,
And thence its current on the town bestows. Ody. vii. Pope.
The younger Pliny ’s description of his Tuscan villa contains the onlydetailed account extant of an ancient Roman garden. As might be sup-posed, fountains and jets d’eau frequently occur. The front of the housefaced the south and had several porticos. The terrace was embellishedwith hedges of box, and the lawn overspread with the soft acanthus. At.one end of the front portico a dining room opened on the terrace, andopposite the centre of the portico there was a small area shaded by fourplane trees, “ in the midst of which a fountain rises, from whence thewater running over the edges of a marble basin, gently refreshes the sur-rounding plane trees and the verdure underneath them.” In the samevicinity he describes “ a little fountain playing through several small pipesinto a vase.” Speaking of the view from the front Windows of a spaciouschamber, he observes, they look “ upon a Cascade, which entertains at onceboth the eye and the ear, for the water dashing from a great height foamsover the marble basin that receives it below.”
After mentioning bathing rooms and other apartments, walks, meadows,groves, trees, &c. Pliny continues—“ In one place you have a little mea-dow, in another the box is cut into a thousand different forms, sometimesinto letters, expressing the name of the master, sometimes that of the artist;whilst here and there little obelisks rise, intermixed alternate with fruittrees ; when on a sudden in the midst of this elegant regularity you aresurprised with an imitation of the negligent beauties of rural nature. Inthe centre is a spot surrounded with a knot of dwarf plane trees. Beyondthese is a wall planted with the smooth and twining acanthus, where thetrees are also cut into a variety of names and shapes. At the upper endis an alcove of white marble shaded with vines, supported by four smallCarystian pillars. From the bench [or triclinium, a species of couch onwhich the Romans reclined to eat] the water gushing through severallittle pipes, as if it were pressed aut by the weight of the. persons whorepose themselves upon it, falls into a stone cistern underneath, whence itis received into a fine polished marble basin, so artfully contrived that itis always full without ever overflowing. When I sup here this basinserves for a table, the largest sort of dishes being placed round the margin,while the smaller ones swim about in the form of little vessels and water-fowls. Corresponding to this is a fountain which is incessantly emptyingand filling ; for the water which it throws to a great height, falling backinto it, is by means of two openings returned as fast as it is received.”This must have been either a modification of Heron’s fountain, (No. 163,)in which the water would appear to be returned, or some concealed forcepump threw it back.
The practice of eating, and even of sleeping, in gardens during thesummer months, has always been more or less common in the East. InSolomon’s Song it is obviously alluded to. “ Thou that dwellest in thegardens,” that “ feedeth among the lilies, in a fountain of gardens,” orrather a garden of fountains. Indeed a great part of this song seems torefer to that season, (and anxiety for its approach,) when the custom wasfor the wealthy to remove, like Pliny , to their country villas. It was verycommon with the rieh Greeks and Romans, as well as with the Jews and