ch was beginning to assume the semblance
of a "square" or "piazza," had put in the foundations but had not
proceeded much further with his work. I completed it, improving
largely, as I thought, on his plan; adapted it for a single residence,
instead of its division into sundry dwellings; obtained possession of
additional ground between the house and the city wall, sufficient for
a large garden; built around it, looking to the south, the largest and
handsomest "stanzone"[1] for orange and lemon plants in Florence, and
gathered together a collection of very fine trees, the profits from
which (much smaller in my hands than would have been the case in those
of a Florentine to the manner born) nevertheless abundantly sufficed
to defray the expenses of the garden and gardeners. In a word, I made
the place a very complete and comfortable residence. Nearly the whole
of my first married life was spent in it. And much of the literary
work of my life has been done in it.

[Footnote 1: "Stanzone" is the term used in Tuscany to signify the
buildings destined to shelter the "Agrumi," as the orange and lemon
plants are called generically, in the winter; which in Florence is too
severe to permit of their being left in the open air.]

I used in those days, and for very many years afterwards, to do all
my writing standing; and I strongly recommend the practice to brother
quill-drivers. Pauses, often considerable intervals, occur for thought
while the pen is in the hand. And if one is seated at a table, one
remains sitting during these intervals. But if one is standing, it
becomes natural to one, during even a small pause, to take a turn up
and down the room, or even, as I often used to do, in the garden. And
such change and movement I consider eminently salutary both for mind
and body.

I had specially contrived a little window immediately above the desk
at which I stood, fixed to the wall. The room looking on the "loggia,"
which was the scene of the little poem transcribed in the preceding
chapter, was abundantly lighted, but I liked some extra light close to
my desk.

In that room my Bice was born. For it was subsequently to her birth
that the destination of it was changed from a bedroom to a study.

Few men have passed years of more unchequered happiness than I did in
that house. And I was very fond of it.

But, as may be readily imagined, it became all the more odious and
intolerable to me when the "angel in the house" had bee