Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 2.djvu/247

Rh a Choir of Angels, commenced by Botticelli for the chapel of the Impagliata, but the work not pleasing him, he left it unfinished. He also painted the picture of the high altar in the church of San Francesco, at Montevarchi; and in the capitular church of Empoli he depicted two Angels, on the same side with the St. Sebastian of Rossellino. It was by Sandro Botticelli that the method of preparing banners and standards, in what is called inlaid work, was invented; and this he did that the colours might not sink through, showing the tint of the cloth on each side. The Baldachino of Orsanmichele is by this master, and is so treated, different figures of Our Lady are represented on it, all of which are varied and beautiful; and this work serves to show how much more eifectually that mode of proceeding preserves the cloth than do those mordants, which, corroding the surface, allow but a short life to the work; but as the mordants cost less, they are nevertheless more frequently used in our day than the first-named method.

Sandro Botticelli drew remarkably well, insomuch that, for a long time after his death, artists took the utmost pains to procure examples of his drawings, and we have some in our book which are executed with extraordinary skill and judgment; his stories were..exceedingly rich in figures, as may be seen in the embroidered ornaments of the Cross borne in procession by the monks of Santa Maria Novella, and which were executed entirely after his designs. This master was, in short, deserving of the highest praise for all such works as he chose to execute with care and good will, as he did the Adoration of the Magi, in Santa Maria Novella, which is exceedingly beautiful. A small round picture by his hand, which may be seen in the apartments of the prior, in the monastery of the Angeli at Florence, is also very finely done; the figures are small, but singularly graceful, and finished with the most judicious care and delicacy. Similar in size to that of the Magi just mentioned is a picture,