John Miel. Had they not been mentioned in the manner they are, by Cochin and Lalande, they are (in my opinion) fuch wretched daubs, that I fhould not have taken the trouble to have looked at them after the first glance. They are fo much spoiled, that fome parts are effaced, and in what remains, I own I could not discover any kind of merit. The leaft frightful are, a Death of a Stag, and a Repose after Hunting. Over these are a great many equeftrian paintings, all portraits, chiefly women. These Amazons are dreffed in the Spanish fashion, and are mounted upon prancing horses. If they were not portraits, they would not be worth a moment's confideration; but I fhall only trouble you with two or three of them; as they reprefent people who have been diftinguished in the annals of this court: and I believe they were all striking likeneffes, if not caricatures, of their originals. The picture of the Countess de Sebastian, who was afterwards married to the late King, is not so handsome as I should have imagined her to have been; fhe appears indeed with child. Another, of the famous Countefs of Verüe; not handfome neither, but piquante, her nose too long. Each lady is drawn dreffed properly for the chace; and as all their hats and riding-dreffes are much alike, they are diftinguished by filk bridles to their horfes of different colours: this was really the order of the late King, that he might be able to distinguish them from one another at a little distance *. The • See Keyfler, for anecdotes of these ladies. men men are alfo in hunting-dreffes, but with full-bottomed periwigs, as large as thofe worn in the days of Charles the Second. Above thefe portraits, the compartments in the cove are badly painted in fresco. Here are no fine apartments except the gallery, which is of great extent. At each end is a faloon; their cielings are domes fupported by pillars. There is neither picture, ftatue, nor giiding in this gallery; it is stuccoed and whitened only. Wethought the projections of the different members of the architecture of the fides, and the architraves of the windows, too strong and falient, even to heaviness; and that they have a very crowded appearance when viewed from one end. In one of the apartments is a table of lapis lazuli, which appears to confift of feveral pieces, and is by no means a fine thing. There is another table, compofed of excellent morfels of lapis, amethyft, and agate, 22 inches broad, and 3 feet 10 inches long. In the apartment of the Dutchess of Savoy, is a cabinet de toilette and a boudoir, all wainscoted with the finest old japan (I suppose) in Europe. These pannels abound with the beautiful green leaves and filver dragons, fo much admired by all connoiffeurs in japan; and in the boudoir, the compartments represent landfcapes, with ftags, and Indian warriors on horseback, in bas relief, incrufted in Pierre de Lar, which is exceedingly fine. The above pieces of japan were presented by Prince Eugene to the Princess Victoire, from whom they came to the house of Savoy.—The chapel is famous for the beauty beauty and ingenuity of its architecture and pro- rie. The Orangerie is much efteemed for its archi. Orangetecture; it is 582 feet long, 51 broad, and 40 high the front is ornamented with pillars of the Ionic order. The Stables are also very beautiful, Stables. and feem to be to the full as large as the Orangerie; we were told they contained two hundred horses. -The gardens were laid out by a Frenchman; Gardens. one would think this good man had taken his idea of planning gardens from fome of Euclid's problems. They are of great extent; the walks Cochin fays, of St. Auguftin, but he is mistaken. all all straight, and cutting each other at right angles, leaving fquare plantations, or quarters of beech and brushwood, which are frequently intersected by narrow alleys, fo that they form triangular figures, wounding the eye by their uniformity, &c. They told us, that in these copfes are great plenty of pheasants, hares, and chevreuls (roebucks). As all these right lines produce what is called ftars, of one kind or another, his Majefty amufes himself with la chaffe a fufil. Taking post in the centre of the ftar, where many of these angles meet, he is fecure of much sport; the piqueurs enter the quarters, and drive out the game, who croffing the alley, feek the oppofite problem; mean time the King lets fly at them, and knocks them down at pleasure. I walked till I was ready to expire, in order to fee a fylvan theatre. You know my paffion for these theatres *** At last I reached it; but my disappointment was great indeed. Never was any thing of its kind fo ill attempted. From hence we were conducted to another foolish affair, a labyrinth, in this is built a kind of summerhouse, which overlooks it; and when the royal family are to be diverted at La Venerie, a fimple clown is fent into the labyrinth, who in vain attempts to get out; the turning and winding of the walks, joined to the thickness of the hedges, making it almoft impoffible he should, whilst the lookers on are highly amufed from the balconies that command it. We We were struck (from their fingularity) with the terminations of many of the viftas, formed by the great alleys or wood walks, the mountains at a great distance covered with fnow and glittering in the fun; as alfo with a moft beautiful wood of poplars, of a wonderful height, and as straight as upright cypreffes; they call them here (from their manner of growing) Pines of Pavia, but they are properly speaking poplars of that country. They grow quite naturally, never having felt the fheers; yet it is impoffible that any trees, however pruned and dreffed, fhould bear a more exact conical form than these do. What is called here le Bofquet de Charmille is prodigiously admired; it confifts of beech and hornbeam, tortured into kinds of arbours, to imitate open galleries, with pillars fupporting domes. I believe they are brought to as great regularity, as branches of trees admit of; but Nature will not justify fuch paring. You have seen something of the fame kind at Marly, where there is a continuation of what they call, des Cabinets de verdure*. About a small league from Turin, by the side of the road, grows a very large elm-tree, beneath the shadow of whofe fpreading branches, the late King, when Duke of Savoy, held a council with Prince Eugene, the Prince of Anhalt, and the Lalande has the effronterie to affert thefe gardens to be in the taste of those at Richmond. Il y a un labyrinthe curieux, un mail, & des vafte pieces de gazouille, belle fimplicité champétre, a peu près comme aux jardins de Richmond pres de Londres. Vol. i. p. 250. 5 Marquis |