Templo de Diana (palacio de Felicia) is both a secluded sanctuary and the residence of the wise Felicia, a place where the pastoral world opens into ceremonial architecture, historical memory, music, and counsel. Its importance lies not only in its extraordinary richness but in the work it performs for the narrative: it receives Felismena and her companions, promises relief for their troubles, and gives their private grief a setting in which it can be remembered, discussed, and answered.

Setting and Arrival

Felismena and her companions reach the palace after leaving the islet where Belisa has been living in sorrow. Guided through a dense forest by the three nymphs, they emerge into a wide plain between two large rivers. A spacious house stands amid the trees; its elevated roof ornaments gleam above the woodland like crystal. The approach makes the palace feel set apart from ordinary pastoral travel, though it remains embedded in a landscape of woods, water, and green open ground.

The reception establishes the place as a refuge with a presiding authority. Several beautiful nymphs come out to meet the travelers, followed by Felicia, dressed in black satin and leaning on a nymph more beautiful than the others. The three nymphs greet her humbly, but Felicia already knows who Felismena is and understands the direction of her hopes. She promises to favor her and encourages her to endure, presenting the hardships of the road as compatible with eventual fulfillment. She then assures the shepherds and shepherdesses that she will attend to their troubles as well. The palace thus receives both a traveler pursuing a particular desire and a community seeking relief from love's injuries.

Architecture and Interior Splendor

The approach to the main building passes through a formal plaza enclosed by orderly rows of tall cypresses. Its pavement alternates alabaster and black marble like a chessboard. At the center stands a variegated-marble fountain supported by four large bronze lions; four white-marble nymphs sit above a jasper column, holding vessels from which water pours through lion-shaped openings. The entrance continues this display in worked marble, gilded capitals and bases, sculpted figures, and doors of cedar. The square building has a tall, artfully constructed tower at each corner, while its walls resemble polished jasper and its windows have paired arches with silver fittings.

Inside, the rooms turn the palace into a gallery of exemplary histories and images. One richly appointed hall has an ivory ceiling and alabaster walls carved with scenes of women whose chastity is remembered through fidelity or death. Among them are Lucretia, Penelope, the wife of Mausolus, and the Spanish Coronel, who chose the fire rather than yield to dishonor. The display makes moral memory part of the visitor's experience: the figures are not merely decoration but examples whose lives and deaths are offered for reflection.

A still more sumptuous chamber has walls covered in fine gold and a floor of precious stones. Portraits of Spanish and foreign ladies surround a monumental image of Diana, made of Corinthian bronze, dressed as a huntress, and bearing a bow and quiver; nymphs stand around her. Near the portraits are four gold laurels enamelled green and rendered to resemble living trees, as well as a silver fountain with a golden nymph pouring clear water from her breast. The room's abundance joins the natural imagery of the pastoral world to the precious materials and commemorative ambitions of courtly display.

Music, Memory, and Courtly Praise

The chamber also stages a performance. Beside the fountain stands an enchanted image of Orfeo, dressed in silver and pearls, with a laurel wreath and a harp in his hands. When the nymphs approach, he begins to play so sweetly that his listeners become absorbed and lose awareness of what has occupied them. His music shifts the room from a display of still images to an experience that acts upon its audience.

Orfeo then sings directly to Felismena. The song expands beyond her personal story into praise of distinguished women and figures of rank: it directs the listeners' gaze toward an enthroned figure, celebrates the Infanta Maria of Portugal, and turns to celebrated ladies of Valencia. The palace therefore accommodates more than private consolation. Within its pastoral setting, music carries its company into a language of public honor, lineage, beauty, and remembrance.

Refuge, Counsel, and Narrative Significance

The palace remains a working household as well as a ceremonial space. After the company has viewed the sepulchres and left the richly carved interiors, they meet Felicia again in the garden. As evening approaches, she calls Sireno and Felismena near her, while Dorida speaks apart with Silvano and Selvagia and Belisa converse with Cintia and Polidora. The garden allows several conversations to unfold at once without the groups being far from one another. The setting turns hospitality into a structure for listening: grief and questions about love can be voiced among companions under Felicia's care.

Belisa's response to the memorials makes the palace's displays more than an ornamental spectacle. Learning who the beautiful dead nymph was, she mourns the loss represented by the tombs and recalls Arsileo, whom she believes dead. The encounter does not remove her own sorrow; instead, another person's remembered loss intensifies her awareness of it. Later, as the company gathers in the garden, Belisa argues that love cannot simply be forgotten in absence, since her love for Arsileo persists even when she believes she will never see him again. Cintia answers by explaining how memory sustains desire but may weaken with time, and Felicia rejects leaving a serious affliction to time alone. She says she intends to consider remedies for Felismena and the others the following day.

At supper, beneath the garden's vine trellises, Felicia asks Felismena to recount a history or event from Vandalia; Felismena begins the tale of Rodrigo de Narváez. The movement from palace conversation to an embedded story shows how the residence gathers different kinds of material: personal affliction, philosophical discussion, remembered exempla, song, and narrated history. Its polished architecture and secluded landscape frame a community in which suffering is neither hidden nor treated as the only possible outcome. The palace is at once refuge, theater, memorial, and meeting place, giving Felicia's promised care a physical center within the larger pastoral journey.