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Rome
September 21, 1907
My dear ones
Don't be surprised by my writing so seldom; I have already warned you that in Rome one is continually oppressed by self-imposed tasks and one doesn't get around to anything. I have had a wonderful day again; the Villa Borghese is a huge park with castle and museum which until recently belonged to a Roman prince, but is now the property of the city and generally accessible, for the good prince made some unfortunate speculations and was obliged to sell everything for three million lire. Very cheap, by the way; the museum contains what must be the loveliest of all Titians, called “Sacred and Profane Love,” for which alone the Americans would have paid that sum. You are sure to know the picture; the title doesn't make any sense; what the painting actually means is not known; that it is very beautiful is quite enough.
One couldn't wish for a lovelier park than this, except that instead of green lawns you have to imagine barren ground; at least that's how it is now. It is filled with the most noble trees-umbrella pines, cypresses, all sorts of unknown things, between them spacious playgrounds filled with innumerable children, stone tables and benches on which the petite bourgeoisie eat their meals, a lake with an island on which there stands an Aesculapian temple, all sorts of other artificial ruins and reproductions of temples-in other words a Schönbrunn1 condescending to be a Prater. It is also like Schönbrunn in that strange animals have homes here-gazelles, pheasants; I noticed a monkey whose life was being made a hell by some street urchins. Peacocks strut freely about, taking their chicks (which look rather insignificant) for a walk. All kinds of things are forbidden in this park of course, but not more than is necessary, and I am under the impression that everyone makes himself comfortable and no one is very law-abiding. Here and there in what used to be the prince's private garden are also some samples of genuine antiquity, a beaut