Page:The Life of Michael Angelo.djvu/228

160 ceased, the whole of his life, to assist the unfortunate, both known and unknown. Not only did he ever show the most touching affection for his old servants and for those of his father—for a certain Mona Margherita, whom he took into his house after the death of old Buonarroti, and whose decease caused him "more distress than if she had been a sister"; for a humble carpenter, who had worked on the scaffolding of the Sistine Chapel, and for whose daughter he provided a dowry; but he was constantly giving to the poor, and especially to the disreputable poor. He liked to associate his nephew and niece with these acts of charity, to inspire them with a taste for similar actions, and to get them to carry them out, without his name being mentioned, for he desired that his charity should remain a secret. "He loved