On a small island, also called Ambra, Lorenzo planted rare flowers and shrubs, and raised dykes round it to ward off the sudden floods of the Ombrone. But one day “the horned stream” rose and carried away the islet. Lorenzo vented his grief in that charming poem _Ambra_ in which the Florentine love of, and delight in, the country is vividly portrayed in idiomatic style by a thorough Tuscan, who knew and loved his Ovid without servilely imitating him. After describing the flight of Zephyr to Cyprus, where he dances with the lazy flowers amid the joyous grass; and Boreas tearing the mist off the old white-headed Alps, only to fling them back again, he continues, “Auster leaves hot Ethiopia, dipping his dry sponges into the Tyrrhenean sea as he passes; then heavy with water and girdled with clouds he squeezes his tired hands when he reaches his destination, and the rivers joyously burst forth from their ancestral caverns to meet the friendly waters. They give thanks to Father Ocean, whose temples are adorned with rushes and flowering reeds, conches and crooked horns joyfully resound, and his wide bosom swells yet more; the fury conceived days ago against the timid banks at length breaks forth, and foaming he bursts through the hated dykes.” The poor peasant has barely time to open the stable door and save his cattle, the housewife carries away the baby in its cradle, some of the family take refuge on the roof and “thence they watch their poor riches, fruit of their toil, their one resource, vanish below; they neither weep nor speak, for in their sorrowing hearts they fear for their lives and seem to take no account of what was once most dear. Thus a great ill drives out every other.” Ambra the beautiful nymph, flies from the embraces of the river-god Ombrone, and prays to Diana for help, who turns her into a rock. Lorenzo, who was fond of horses and of racing, kept a large stud at Poggio a Cajano, and Poliziano, writing to Valori, mentions an invincible roan horse which, when sick or tired, refused all food save from the hand of his master. When if lying down he heard Lorenzo’s step, he would spring to his feet and neigh, rubbing his head against him with every mark of affection. “What wonder,” exclaims Poliziano, “that Lorenzo should be the delight of mankind when even brute beasts shew such love for him.”