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The metamorphosis of Arethusa pursued by Alpheus, of Ambra by Ombrone, of the nymphs by the satyrs of the Salices, or as frescoed on the temple of Pales in the Arcadia, the loves of Mulla and Mollana in Spenser, and the mythological impersonations of the Polyolbion, find, as it were, a meeting-place in Browne's lay of Walla. The three parts of Britannia's Pastorals did not appear together.
The poem recounts how the wood-nymph Ambra, beloved of Lauro, is pursued by the river-god Ombrone, one of Arno's tributary divinities, and praying to Diana in her hour of need, is by her transformed into a rock . Lorenzo's Selva d'amore and Caccia col falcone might also be mentioned in the same connexion.
The suit-case contains valuable documents, so you must on no account let it out of your sight, even for a minute, from the time you leave here until you hand it over personally to the gentleman I am sending you to Monsieur Duperré. He is staying at the Hôtel Ombrone, that very smart and exclusive place in the Rue de Rivoli.
It is simply an allegorical narrative of the inundation, by the river Ombrone, of a portion, called Ambra, of the great Medicean villa of Poggio a Caiano.
Even now the police, with their wonderful acumen, might be on my track! I reached Paris at last, and as my taxi swung round from the Place Jeanne d'Arc into the Rue de Rivoli I began to feel extremely nervous. In reply to my inquiry at the bureau of the smart Hôtel Ombrone I was told that I could be given a bed. Monsieur Duperré? Ah, monsieur had just gone out, but would be back soon, most likely.
These thoughts, and the ones I shall try to make clear as I go on, began to take shape one early winter morning some ten years ago, while I was staying among the vineyards in the little range of hills which separate the valley of the Ombrone from the lower valley of the Arno.
This village lies on the edge of a great oasis in the Sienese desert an oasis, formed by the waters of the Orcia and Asso sweeping down to join Ombrone, and stretching on to Montalcino.
There were many new buildings of a good sort, and of wood as well as stone; when we came to Grosetto, where we had spent a memorable night after being overturned in the Ombrone, in the attempt of our diligence to pass its flood, we were aware, in the evening light, of a prosperity which, if not excessive for the twoscore years that had passed, was still very noticeable.
It was S. Romolo who first brought the gospel to Pistoja, and the tradition is that he converted a temple built by the Romans to the God Mars into a church, on the spot where now the Duomo stands, and indeed in 1599 certain inscriptions were found, and the capitals of some Roman columns. It is generally thought that a church was built here in the early part of the fifth century, dedicated to St. Martin of Tours, on whose day Stilicho, that Roman general who was by birth a Vandal, gained a victory over Radaugasius and his army of some 400,000 Goths, who had ravaged the country as far as Florence in 406. However this may be, in 589 the church was finally rebuilt, and certainly re-dedicated to S. Zenone, the Bishop of Verona, who, so it was said, had saved the Pistojese from the floods by breaking through the Gonfolina Pass, that narrow defile beyond Signa through which the Arno flows, with the Ombrone in her bosom, into the Empolese. After being dedicated at various times to many saints, in 1443 it was given to S. Zenone, whose name it still bears. The present church is for the most part a work of the twelfth century, and certainly not the work of Niccolò Pisano. The façade, like the rest of the church, has suffered an unfortunate restoration. The marble loggia is a work of the fifteenth century, and the two statues are, one of S. Jacopo, by Scarpellino, the other of S. Zenone, by Andrea Vacc
An agent of police was regulating the traffic on my left, and he being in controversy with the driver of a motor-lorry, I took my opportunity and dropped the dog with its secret into the water. Two boys had watched me, so I waited a moment, then turning upon my heel, I retraced my steps back to the Hôtel Ombrone, having been absent about twenty minutes.
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