Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 1.djvu/488

474 sketched as we have before said, that in looking at them one almost believes them really to live and move. It may indeed be truly said of this master, that he effected as much by the superiority of his judgment as by the skill of his hand; seeing that many works are produced which appear very beautiful in the work-rooms where they are executed, but which, when taken thence and placed in another situation, in a different light or higher position, present a much changed aspect, and turn out to be the reverse of what they appeared. Donato, on the contrary, treated his figures in such a manner, that while in the rooms where they were executed they did not produce one-half the effect, which he had in fact secured to them, and which they exhibited when placed in the positions for which they had been calculated. For the new sacristy of Santa Maria del Fiore, Donatello gave the design of those boys who support the festoons, which decorate the frieze; as also that of the figures executed in the circular window beneath the cupola. The subject is the Coronation of Our Lady, and the design of the work is greatly superior to that of the paintings in the other windows, as is clearly obvious. Donato also produced the statue of St. Peter, still to be seen in San Michele, in Orto, in the same city, (Florence); an admirable figure, full of spirit, which he executed for the Guild of Butchers; with the figure of San