he wanteth in the one he may find in the other. Lucullus answered Pompey well; who, when he saw his stately galleries, and rooms so large and lightsome, in one of his houses, said, Surely an excellent place for summer, but how do you in winter? Lucullus answered, Why, do you not think me as wise as some fowl are, that ever change their abode towards the winter?[1]
To pass from the seat to the house itself; we will do as Cicero doth in the orator's art; who writes books De Oratore, and a book he entitles Orator; whereof the former delivers the precepts of the art, and the latter the perfection. We will therefore describe a princely palace, making a brief model thereof. For it is strange to see, now in Europe, such huge buildings as the Vatican[2] and Escurial[3] and some others be, and yet scarce a very fair[4] room in them.
First therefore, I say you cannot have a perfect
- ↑ "He had also fine seats in Tusculum, belvideres, and large open balconies for men's apartments, and porticos to walk in, where Pompey coming to see him, blamed him for making a house which would be pleasant in summer, but uninhabitable in winter; whom he answered with a smile: 'You think me, then, less provident than cranes and storks, not to change my home with the seasons.'" Plutarch. Life of Lucullus. Plutarch's Lives of Illustrious Men. Translated from the Greek by John Dryden and Others.
- ↑ The Vatican, on the Vatican hill, in Rome, is a vast palace which has been the chief residence of the Pope, since the popes returned from Avignon, in 1377. Besides the papal apartments and offices, it contains the Sistine Chapel and the Vatican library and art galleries.
- ↑ The Escurial is a celebrated building situated twenty-seven miles northwest of Madrid, and containing a library, a monastery, a palace, a church, and a mausoleum for the Kings of Spain. It was built by Philip II., in 1563–1584.
- ↑ Fair. Beautiful.
"If thou wouldst view fair Melrose aright,
Go visit it by the pale moonlight."
Scott. The Lay of the Last Minstrel. Canto II. 1.
