ts of inlaid panel-work on door or window,
enables us to reconstruct the former richness of these princely rooms.

Exception must be made in favour of two apartments between the towers
upon the southern facade. These were apparently the private rooms of
the Duke and Duchess, and they are still approached by a great winding
staircase in one of the _torricini_. Adorned in indestructible or
irremovable materials, they retain some traces of their ancient
splendour. On the first floor, opening on the vaulted loggia, we find
a little chapel encrusted with lovely work in stucco and marble;
friezes of bulls, sphinxes, sea-horses, and foliage; with a low relief
of Madonna and Child in the manner of Mino da Fiesole. Close by is a
small study with inscriptions to the Muses and Apollo. The cabinet
connecting these two cells has a Latin legend, to say that Religion
here dwells near the temple of the liberal arts:

Bina vides parvo discrimine juncta sacella,
Altera pars Musis altera sacra Deo est.

On the floor above, corresponding in position to this apartment, is a
second, of even greater interest, since it was arranged by the Duke
Frederick for his own retreat. The study is panelled in tarsia of
beautiful design and execution. Three of the larger compartments show
Faith, Hope, and Charity; figures not unworthy of a Botticelli or a
Filippino Lippi. The occupations of the Duke are represented on a
smaller scale by armour, _batons_ of command, scientific instruments,
lutes, viols, and books, some open and some shut. The Bible, Homer,
Virgil, Seneca, Tacitus, and Cicero, are lettered; apparently to
indicate his favourite authors. The Duke himself, arrayed in his state
robes, occupies a fourth great panel; and the whole of this elaborate
composition is harmonised by emblems, badges, and occasional devices
of birds, articles of furniture, and so forth. The tarsia, or inlaid
wood of different kinds and colours, is among the best in this kind of
art to be found in Italy, though perhaps it hardly deserves to rank
with the celebrated choir-stalls of Bergamo and Monte Oliveto. Hard by
is a chapel, adorned, like the lower one, with excellent reliefs. The
loggia to which these rooms have access looks across the Apennines,
and down on what was once a private garden. It is now enclosed and
paved for the exercise of prisoners who are confined in one part of
the desecrated palace!

A portion of the pile is devoted to more worthy purposes