Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 1.djvu/328

314 is, the best for such things, seeing that they are required to have an appearance of massiveness and solidity, yet when completed and dried, are in fact very light, and being whitened over, they have a sufficient resemblance to marble to render them very pleasing to the eye, as was the case with this horse of Jacopo’s; to which may be added, that figures thus made, and with this cement, are not liable to crack, as they would do if formed from the clay merely. The models used by sculptors, in our own day, are prepared in this manner, to the great convenience of the artists, who have the exact form and the just measurements of the sculptures they are executing constantly before their eyes, an advantage for which they owe much gratitude to Jacopo, who is said to have been the inventor of this method.

Having completed the statue here described, Jacopo, still working in Siena, prepared two tables, in the wood of the lime-tree; and in this work he carved the figures, their hair, beards, &c. with such extraordinary patience, that it was a marvel. These tables were placed in the cathedral, and when they were finished, the artist executed the figures of some of the prophets, not of large size, which are now to be seen in the façade of that church. In the works of this building he would, doubtless, have continued to labour, had not pestilence, famine, and the discords of the Sienese citizens, brought the city to a very unhappy condition: they had more than once risen tumultuously, and at length they expelled Orlando Malevolti, by whose favour Jacopo had been honourably employed in his native city. The master departed from Siena, therefore, being invited, by means of certain friends, to Lucca, where he constructed a, who was then lord of that city, and who had died some short time previously. This tomb is in the church of San Martino, and on the basement are figures of boys in marble, supporting a garland; these are so finely executed, that they seem rather to be of flesh than stone. On the sarcophagus is the figure of the lady buried within, also finished with infinite care, and at her feet, in the same stone, is a dog in full-relief, as an emblem of her fidelity to her husband.