Page:The Life of Michael Angelo.djvu/149

 He called him "a powerful genius . . . a miracle . . . . the light of our century"; he implored him "not to despise him, because he could not compare himself to him—he who was without an equal!" He laid the whole of his present and the whole of his future at his feet, and added:

"It is an infinite sorrow to me not to be able to give you my past also, in order to serve you all the longer. For the future will be short. I am too old. . . . I do not believe that anything can destroy our friendship, although I speak in a very presumptuous fashion, for I am infinitely beneath you. . . . I could as easily forget your name as the nourishment on which I live; yes, I could as easily forget the nourishment on which I live, and which only sustains the body, without pleasure, as your name, which nourishes the body and the soul, and fills them with such sweetness that as long as I think of you I feel neither suffering nor the fear of death. My soul is in the hands of the one to whom I have given it. . . . If I were to cease thinking of him I believe that I should fall dead on the spot." He made superb presents to Cavalieri:

"Stupendous designs and heads in black and red chalk, which he had made with the intention of teaching him how to draw. Then he drew for him a Rape of Ganymede, the Vulture eating the Heart of Tityrus, the Fall of the Chariot of the Sun in the Po, and a Bacchanalia of Infants, all most rare and unique."