-"Introduction to the Decameron".

Chapter 6.1. The Retreat of the Lover.

By the borders of one of the fairest lakes of Northern Italy stood the
favourite mansion of Adrian di Castello, to which in his softer and
less patriotic moments his imagination had often and fondly turned;
and thither the young nobleman, dismissing his more courtly and
distinguished companions in the Neapolitan embassy, retired after his
ill-starred return to Rome. Most of those thus dismissed joined the
Barons; the young Annibaldi, whose daring and ambitious nature had
attached him strongly to the Tribune, maintained a neutral ground; he
betook himself to his castle in the Campagna, and did not return to Rome
till the expulsion of Rienzi.

The retreat of Irene's lover was one well fitted to feed his melancholy
reveries. Without being absolutely a fortress, it was sufficiently
strong to resist any assault of the mountain robbers or petty tyrants in
the vicinity; while, built by some former lord from the materials of
the half-ruined villas of the ancient Romans, its marbled columns and
tesselated pavements relieved with a wild grace the grey stone walls and
massive towers of feudal masonry. Rising from a green eminence gently
sloping to the lake, the stately pile cast its shadow far and dark over
the beautiful waters; by its side, from the high and wooded mountains on
the background, broke a waterfall, in irregular and sinuous course--now
hid by the foliage, now gleaming in the light, and collecting itself at
last in a broad basin--beside which a little fountain, inscribed with
half-obliterated letters, attested the departed elegance of the classic
age--some memento of lord and poet whose very names were lost; thence
descending through mosses and lichen, and odorous herbs, a brief,
sheeted stream bore its surplus into the lake. And there, amidst the
sturdier and bolder foliage of the North, grew, wild and picturesque,
many a tree transplanted, in ages back, from the sunnier East; not
blighted nor stunted in that golden clime, which fosters almost every
produce of nature as with a mother's care. The place was remote and
solitary. The roads that conducted to it from the distant towns were
tangled, intricate, mountainous, and beset by robbers. A few cottages,
and a small convent, a quarter of a league up the verdant margin, were
the nearest habitations; and, save by some occasional pilgrim or some
bewildered traveller, the loneliness of the