As soon as she heard of his death, Messalina took possession of the villa, and held high revel there with her numerous lovers, with the most favoured of whom, Silius, she had actually gone through the religious rites of marriage in the lifetime of the emperor, who was absent at Ostia. But a conspiracy among the freedmen of the royal household informed the emperor of what was taking place, and at last even Claudius was aroused to a sense of her enormities.
"In her suburban palace, Messalina was abandoning herself to voluptuous transports. The season was mid-autumn, the vintage was in full progress; the wine-press was groaning; the ruddy juice was streaming; women girt with scanty fawnskins danced as drunken Bacchanals around her: while she herself, with her hair loose and disordered, brandished the thyrsus in the midst, and Silius by her side, buskined and crowned with ivy, tossed his head to the flaunting strains of Silenus and the Satyrs. Vettius, one, it seems, of the wanton's less fortunate paramours, attended the ceremony, and climbed in merriment a lofty tree in the garden. When asked what he saw, he replied, 'an awful storm from Ostia'; and whether there was actually such an appearance, or whether the words were spoken at random, they were accepted afterwards as an omen of the catastrophe which quickly followed.
"For now in the midst of these wanton orgies the rumour quickly spread, and swiftly messengers arrived to confirm it, that Claudius knew it all, that Claudius was on his way to Rome, and was coming in anger and vengeance. The lovers part: Silius for the forum and the tribunals; Messalina for the shade of her gardens on the Pincio, the price of the blood of the murdered Asiaticus." Once the empress attempted to go forth to meet Claudius, taking her children with her, and accompanied by Vibidia, the eldest of the vestal virgins, whom she persuaded to intercede for her, but her enemies prevented her gaining access to her husband; Vibidia was satisfied for the moment by vague promises of a later hearing; and upon the arrival of Claudius in Rome, Silius and the other principal lovers of the empress were put to death. "Still Messalina hoped. She had withdrawn again to the gardens of Lucullus, and was there engaged in composing addresses of supplication to her husband, in which her pride and long-accustomed insolence still faintly struggled into her fears. The emperor still paltered with the treason. He had retired to his palace; he had bathed, anointed, and lain down to supper; and, warmed with wine and generous cheer, he had actually despatched a message to the poor creature, as he called her, bidding her come the next day, and plead her cause before him. But her enemy Narcissus, knowing how easy might be the passage from compassion to love, glided from the chamber, and boldly ordered a tribune and some centurions to go and slay his victim. 'Such,' he said, 'was the emperor's command'; and his word was obeyed without hesitation. Under the direction of the freedman Euodus, the armed men sought the outcast in her gardens, where she lay prostrate on the ground, by the side of her mother Lepida. While their fortunes flourished, dissensions had existed between the two; but now, in her last distress, the mother had refused to desert her child, and only strove to nerve her resolution to a voluntary death. 'Life,' she urged, 'is over; nought remains but to look for a decent exit from it.' But the soul of the reprobate was corrupted by her vices; she retained no sense of honour; she continued to weep and groan as if hope still existed; when suddenly the doors were burst open, the tribune and his swordsmen appeared before her, and Euodus assailed her, dumb-stricken as she lay, with contumelious and brutal reproaches. Roused at last to the consciousness of her desperate condition, she took a weapon from one of the men's hands and pressed it trembling against her throat and bosom. Still she wanted resolution to give the thrust, and it was by a blow of the tribune's falchion that the horrid deed was finally accomplished. The death of Asiaticus was avenged on the very spot; the hot blood of the wanton smoked on the pavement of his gardens, and stained with a deeper hue the variegated marbles of Lucullus."—Merivale, Hist. of the Romans under the Empire.
From the garden of the Pincio a terraced road (beneath which are the long-closed catacombs of St. Felix) leads to the Villa Medici, built for Cardinal Ricci da Montepulciano by Annibale Lippi in 1540. Shortly afterwards it passed into the hands of the Medici family, and was greatly enlarged by Cardinal Alessandro de Medici, afterwards Leo XI. In 1801 the Academy for French Art-Students, founded by Louis XIV., was established here. The villa contains a fine collection of casts, open every day except Sunday.
Behind the villa is a beautiful Garden (which can be visited on application to the porter). The terrace, which looks down upon the Villa Borghese, is bordered by ancient sarcophagi, and has a colossal statue of Rome. The garden side of the villa has sometimes been ascribed to Michael Angelo.
"La plus grande coquetterie de la maison, c'est la façade postérieure. Elle tient son rang parmi les chefs-d'œuvre de la Renaissance. On dirait que l'architecte a épuisé une mine de bas-reliefs grecs et romains pour en tapisser son palais. Le jardin est de la même époque: il date du temps où l'aristocratie romaine professait le plus profond dédain pour les fleurs. On n'y voit que des massifs de verdure, alignés avec un soin scrupuleux. Six pelouses, entourées de haies à hauteur d'appui, s'étendent devant la villa et laissent courir la vue jusqu'au mont Soracte, qui ferme l'horizon. A gauche, quatre fois quatre carrés de gazon s'encadrent dans de hautes murailles de lauriers, de buis gigantesques et de chênes verts. Les murailles se rejoignent au-dessus des allées et les enveloppent d'une ombre fraîche et mystérieuse. A droite, une terrasse d'une style noble encadre un bois de chênes verts, tordus et eventrés par le temps. J'y vais quelquefois travailler à l'ombre; et le merle rivalise avec le rossignol au-dessus de ma tête, comme un beau chantre de village peut rivaliser avec Mario ou Roger. Un peu plus loin, une vigne toute rustique s'étend jusqu'à la porte Pinciana, où Belisaire a mendié, dit-on. Les jardins petits et grands sont semés de statues, d'Hermes, et de marbres de toute sorte. L'eau coule dans des sarcophages antiques ou jaillit dans des vasques de marbre: le marbre et l'eau sont les deux luxes de Rome."—About, Rome Contemporaine.
"The grounds of the Villa Medici are laid out in the old fashion of straight paths, with borders of box, which form hedges of great height and density, and are shorn and trimmed to the evenness of a wall of stone, at the top and sides. There are green alleys, with long vistas, overshadowed by ilex-trees; and at each intersection of the paths the visitor finds seats of lichen-covered stone to repose upon, and marble statues that look forlornly at him, regretful of their lost noses. In the more open portions of the garden, before the sculptured front of the villa, you see fountains and flower-beds; and, in their season, a profusion of roses, from which the genial sun of Italy distils a fragrance, to be scattered abroad by the no less genial breeze."—Hawthorne.
A second door will admit to the higher terrace of the Boschetto; a tiny wood of ancient ilexes, from which a steep flight of steps leads to the "Belvidere," whence there is a beautiful view.
"They asked the porter for the key of the Bosco, which was given, and they entered a grove of ilexes, whose gloomy shade effectually shut out the radiant sunshine that still illuminated the western sky. They then ascended a long and exceedingly steep flight of steps, leading up to a high mound covered with ilexes.
"Here both stood still, side by side, gazing silently on the city, where dome and bell-tower stood out against a sky of gold; the desolate Monte Mario and its stone pines rising dark to the right. Behind, close at hand, were sombre ilex woods, amid which rose here and there the spire of a cypress or a ruined arch, and on the highest point, the white Villa Ludovisi; beyond, stretched the Campagna, girdled by hills melting into light under the evening sky."—Mademoiselle Mori.
From the door of the Villa Medici is the scene familiar to artists, of a fountain shaded by ilexes, which frame a distant view of St. Peter's.
"Je vois (de la Villa Medici) les quatre cinquièmes de la ville; je compte les sept collines, je parcours les rues régulières qui s'étendent entre le cours et la place d'Espagne, je fais le d'enombrement des palais, des églises, des dômes, et des clochers; je m'égare dans le Ghetto et dans la Trastévère. Je ne vois pas des ruines autant que j'en voudrais: elles sont ramassées là-bas, sur ma gauche, aux environs du Forum. Cependant nous avons tout près de