After the death of Cosimo I, Petraja was the favourite residence of his son, Cardinal Ferdinando de’ Medici, on his rare visits to Florence. He commissioned Bernardo Buontalenti to enlarge and improve the villa, “but,” says Ammirato, “I am persuaded that the tower we see to-day, which Cardinal Ferdinando certainly did not touch when he altered the rest of the building, is the same that was assaulted by the Pisan army.[42] When the Cardinal left the church and married Christine of Lorraine, Petraja was their favourite residence; and here in May 1598 they received the _Chiaus_ of the _Gran Signore_, as old Settimanni calls the Sultan’s ambassador, who came to treat about Levantine commerce, a very important thing for Leghorn. The Turk evidently enjoyed himself at Florence, as he spent seventy-four days there, and “although he had a large company with him he was a cheap and frugal guest,” remarks the old chronicler. Ferdinando, one of the best of the Medici, was fond of gathering literary society about him. He gave Scipione Ammirato, “the modern Livy,” rooms in his palace in Florence, and offered him La Topaja as a country residence. But the steepness of the road alarmed the southern Italian, accustomed to the dead flat of the country about Lecce; so the Grand Duke gave him an apartment in Petraja, where the history of Florence was chiefly written. In front of La Topaja is an orchard garden with a marble statue of St Fiacrio, whom Moreni calls a son of Eugenius IV, King of Scotland (he really was I am told an Irish Chief), who devoted all the hours he could spare from his orations to the culture of medicinal plants. A laudatory inscription was put on the base of the statue by Cosimo III, in 1696.[43] When Victor Emanuel came to Florence (as a stepping-stone to Rome) Petraja and Castello were his two favourite villas, and enormous aviaries were erected on the upper terrace of Petraja for his fine collection of pheasants. His wife “la bella Rosina” lived there, and her beauty is still talked of by the people about the place. For the King’s convenience the great inner courtyard, with frescoes by Volterrano—or what little was left of them after having been white-washed and then “restored”—was glazed over, which though perhaps convenient has entirely spoiled the look of the villa. [Illustration: (Drawing of fountain with trees in background)] FOOTNOTES: [36] Translated by R. C. Trevelyan. [37] Critics declare the “Florence” to be by Giovanni Bologna. [38] Under the command of Sir John Hawkwood, “Giovanni Aguto, who for a surname in his own country,” says Ammirato, “had the appellation _Falcone di Bosco_ (Hawk of the wood), because his mother being taken with the pains of labour on an estate belonging to her, had herself carried into a wood and there gave birth to a son.” [39] Scipione Ammirato. _Istoria di Firenze_, p. 638. [40] Galluzzi. _Istoria del Granducato di Toscana._ Vol. I. p. 22. [41] _Cosimo de’ Medici._ Dorothea Ewart. P. 184.