Vasari tells us that Michelozzo Michelozzi designed for Cosimo the Elder “the palace of Cafaggiuolo in the Mugello in the guise of a fortress amid the woods, the copses and other matters appertaining to fine and famous villas, and two miles distant from the said palace he finished the Capuchin monastery, which is a very splendid thing.”[10] Dr G. Brocchi, a contemporary of Zocchi, wrote a history of the Mugello in 1747, and describes Cafaggiuolo as being “built after the fashion of an ancient fortress with sundry towers, and moats round it and drawbridges. Inside is a large chapel dedicated to the saints Cosimo and Damiano, protectors of the royal house of Medici. There are likewise many halls and great rooms, with various courtyards, loggie and galleries, which make it (though according to ancient fashion) very noble and magnificent.” Very noble the old place still is though the real entrance under the tower is now abolished, and the late Princess Borghese, who bought Cafaggiuolo in 1864, made an arch in the front wall which spoils the façade. Moats and drawbridges have disappeared, and the grass grows right up to the walls. Cafaggiuolo is typical of the practical style of Michelozzi, who adopted classical forms rather because of their simplicity and convenience than because he shared Brunelleschi’s æsthetic enthusiasm. Cosimo probably ordered his favourite architect to build a castle to serve as a stronghold in case of any popular rising, rather than a villa, but the lines dictated by this utilitarian end are treated with great skill and produce a sense of dignity and grandeur. It is in fact a mediæval castle adapted to the new taste for classical architecture by the use of classical mouldings in doors and windows, but without any essential reconstruction of the mediæval plan of building. Cosimo Pater Patriae spent what time he could spare from the cares of government between his two favourite villas Careggi and Cafaggiuolo; he preferred the latter to his other possessions because all the country he saw from the windows belonged to him, and whenever the plague broke out in Florence he took refuge in the pure air of the Mugello. “You may know,” wrote one of his friends, “when Florence is menaced; for if Cosimo and his family go to Cafaggiuolo you may be sure that eight or ten people die _per diem_ in the town, but should they leave it the plague is indeed severe.”