Prince Ferdinando de’ Medici died in 1713 before his father and the theatre was closed for ever. A hundred years later another Ferdinand, but of the family of Lorraine, called in a Bohemian engineer of the name of Frichs, who made new roads, threw many farms out of cultivation, planted trees and finally persuaded the Austrian Grand Duke to destroy the Medici villa built by Buontalento. Ferdinand died in 1824, before the new villa designed by Frichs had been begun, and Pratolino became the private property of his successor, Leopold II, as compensation for large sums advanced from his privy purse for the bonification of the Maremme of Massa and Grosseto. Not only were the foundations of the old villa blown up, but all the water-works and grottoes, save one, were destroyed; some of the statues were removed to Florence, many were stolen, others broken up and used to fill in cisterns and under-ground grottoes. [Illustration: (Drawing of giant statue looking into lake, with trees)] When in 1872 Prince Paul Demidoff bought Pratolino from the house of Lorraine he added to the old _Paggeria_ or villa of the pages, and restored other smaller villas in the magnificent park; but his death in 1885 put a stop to further work, and the present villa is not worthy of its beautiful surroundings or of the memories of bygone splendour. FOOTNOTES: [56] _Descrizione Della Regia Villa, Fontane, e Fabbriche di Pratolino._ Bernadone Sgrilli. Architetto Fiorentino. Nella Stamperia Ducale. Firenze, 1742. [57] The translations are by R. C. Trevelyan, from _Cinquanta Madrigalli Inediti_, del Signor Torquato Tasso, alla Gran Duchessa Bianca Cappello nei Medici. Firenze, M. Ricci, 1871. Ediz. di CCL Esemplari non venale. [58] _Reliquæ Wottonianæ_, pp. 672, 690. [59] _Diary of John Evelyn._ Vol. I. p. 190. [Illustration: VILLA SALVIATI.] [Illustration: (Drawing of Villa seen through gardens)] VILLA SALVIATI