What I can say is that if you are in a hurry to
inspect, that kind of property, and in immediate need of a piazza, you
cannot do better than take the wagon for touring Rome. In two days you
can visit every piazza worth having, including the Piazza di Spagna,
where there is a fountain in the form of a marble galley in which you
can embark for any fairyland you like, through the Via del Babuino and
the Piazza del Popolo. Come to think of it, I am not so sure but I would
as soon have the Piazza del Popolo as the Piazza Navona. If the
fountains are not so fine, they are still very fine, and the Pincian
Hill overtops one side of the place, with foliaged drives and gardened
walks descending into it.
Everything of importance that did not happen elsewhere in Rome seems to
have happened in the Piazza del Popolo, and I may name as a few of its
attractions for investors the facts that it was here Sulla's funeral
pyre was kindled; that Nero was buried on the left side of it, and out
of his tomb grew a huge walnut-tree, the haunt of demoniacal crows till
the Madonna appeared to Paschal II.
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