Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 1.djvu/367

Rh senting various animals, which he greatly delighted in, and to the delineation of which he gave his most unwearied attention. He had numbers of painted birds, cats, and dogs, in his house, with every other animal of which he could get the portrait, being too poor to keep the living creatures; and as he preferred birds to all other animals, he received the name of Paul of the Birds (Paolo Uccelli). Among other representations of animals painted for the Medici, was a combat of lions, to which he imparted so much force, and gave the expression of such fierce rage to the movements of the creatures, that they seem to be alive. But the most extraordinary part ot all, was a serpent fighting with a lion; the strength and fierceness of the reptile are finely obvious in his furious contortions, the venom darts from his eyes and mouth. Near to this group is a peasant girl with an ox, the foreshortening of which is admirable. In my collection of drawings, is a sketch of this scene by the hand of Paolo; the girl, full of terror, is in the act of escaping from those beasts by a rapid flight. The same picture exhibits certain herdsmen very naturally pourtrayed, with a landscape, which was considered an exceedingly beautiful thing at the time. In other parts of this work, are representations of armed men on horseback, many of whom are portraits from the life.

Paolo was afterwards commissioned to paint some historical pictures in the cloister of Santa Maria Novella, the first of which are those seen on entering the cloister from the church. In these he depicted the creation of animals, exhibiting infinite numbers and varieties of every kind, whether belonging to earth, air, or water. Paolo Uccello was exceedingly fanciful, and delighted, as we have said, in representing his animals to perfection. We have here an instance of this in some lions which are about to fall on one another with open jaws, and whose fierce rage is expressed with the utmost truth, as is the timidity and velocity of the stags and deer, which also make part of the picture; the birds and fish are, in like manner, depicted with extraordinary exactitude in every feather and scale. In the same place this master pourtrayed the creation of our first parents, with their