idents of fancy, in
which the Gothic style and the style of the earlier Lombard
Renaissance abounded, are wholly wanting to the rigid, mathematical,
hard-headed genius of the Florentine quattrocento. Pienza,
therefore, disappoints us. Its heavy palace frontispieces shut the
spirit up in a tight box. We seem unable to breathe, and lack that
element of life and picturesqueness which the splendid retinues of
nobles in the age of Pinturicchio might have added to the now
forlorn Piazza.

Yet the material is a fine warm travertine, mellowing to dark red,
brightening to golden, with some details, especially the tower of
the Palazzo Comunale, in red brick. This building, by the way, is
imitated in miniature from that of Florence. The cathedral is a
small church of three aisles, equally high, ending in what the
French would call a _chevet_. Pius had observed this plan of
construction somewhere in Austria, and commanded his architect,
Bernardo, to observe it in his plan. He was attracted by the
facilities for window-lighting which it offered; and what is very
singular, he provided by the Bull of his foundation for keeping the
walls of the interior free from frescoes and other coloured
decorations. The result is that, though the interior effect is
pleasing, the church presents a frigid aspect to eyes familiarised
with warmth of tone in other buildings of that period. The details
of the columns and friezes are classical; and the facade, strictly
corresponding to the structure, and very honest in its decorative
elements, is also of the earlier Renaissance style. But the vaulting
and some of the windows are pointed.

The Palazzo Piccolomini, standing at the right hand of the Duomo, is
a vast square edifice. The walls are flat and even, pierced at
regular intervals with windows, except upon the south-west side,
where the rectangular design is broken by a noble double Loggiata,
gallery rising above gallery--serene curves of arches, grandly
proportioned columns, massive balustrades, a spacious corridor, a
roomy vaulting--opening out upon the palace garden, and offering
fair prospect over the wooded heights of Castiglione and Rocca d'
Orcia, up to Radicofani and shadowy Amiata. It was in these double
tiers of galleries, in the garden beneath and in the open inner
square of the palazzo, that the great life of Italian aristocracy
displayed itself. Four centuries ago these spaces, now so desolate
in their immensity, echoed to the tread