Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - XXVII. Summer
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down everything as soon as it was built, San
Michele would never be finished. I told Mastro
Nicola that the proper way to build one’s house was
to knock everything down never mind how many
times and begin again until your eye told you
that everything was right. The eye knew much
more about architecture than did the books.
The eye was infallible, as long as you relied on
your own eye and not on the eye of other people.
As I saw it again I thought San Michele looked
more beautiful than ever. The house was small,
the rooms were few but there were loggias,
terraces and pergolas all around it to watch the
sun, the sea and the clouds—the soul needs more
space than the body. Not much furniture in
the rooms but what there was could not be bought
with money alone. Nothing superfluous, nothing
unbeautiful, no bric-à-brac, no trinkets. A few
primitive pictures, an etching of Dürer and a
Greek bas-relief on the whitewashed walls. A
couple of old rugs on the mosaic floor, a few books
on the tables, flowers everywhere in lustrous
jars from Faenza and Urbino. The cypresses
from Villa d’Este leading the way up to the chapel
had already grown into an avenue of stately trees,
the noblest trees in the world. The chapel itself
which had given its name to my home had at last
become mine. It was to become my library.
Fine old cloister stalls surrounded the white
walls, in its midst stood a large refectory table
laden with books and terracotta fragments. On
a fluted column of giallo antico stood a huge
Horus of basalt, the largest I have ever seen,
brought from the land of the Pharaohs by some
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