Page:The Life of Benvenuto Cellini Vol 1.djvu/85

Rh the reasons why the artist had left Paris. "He came back to this country," says the Grand Duke, "in order that his nieces might benefit by his talents and assistance; and I am no less pleased by this mark of dutiful regard for his family than by the beauty of his works." For some reason or another, Cellini does not appear to have used this letter. Still, twelve years afterwards, the Queen of France again required his services. Henri II. died in 1559, and in 1562 his widow had not yet erected her husband's monument. At the latter date her envoy to Florence, Baccio del Bene, invited Cellini to complete the work, which had been begun by Daniele da Volterra. Whether he did not care to go, being old and having recently married, or whether, as he says, the Duke refused him leave, cannot be decided. It is only certain that he never returned to France. These two episodes are, it seems to me, the two most dubious passages in Cellini's life—those, I mean, upon which a charge of roguery might most plausibly be founded. In the matter of the Pope's jewels he stands acquitted; but scrupulous critics may still perhaps trace a mystery in the circumstances which attended his quitting the service of King Francis. It is hardly necessary here to refer to a sentence passed on him in 1 548 for selling garnets under the pretence that they were rubies. The facts are not sufficiently established.