Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 2.djvu/270

262 which is considered most admirable. By the hand of the same master is the figure of the boy on the clock of the Mercato Nuovo (New Market), the arm of which is left free, in a manner which permits the figure to raise it for the purpose of striking the hours with the hammer which it holds in the hand. This was in those times considered a beautiful and fanciful work.

And here shall be the end of the life of the excellent sculptor Andrea Verrocchio. At the same time with Andrea, lived Benedetto Buglioni, who received from his wife, one of the family of Andrea della Bobbia, the secret of glazing or vitrifying terra-cotta, and who subsequently executed many works of that kind in Florence and other places. Among these may be particularized one in the Church of the Servites, near the Chapel of Santa Barbara — Christ rising from the dead namely; with Angels, which, for a work in terra-cotta, is a tolerably good one. In San Brancazio (Pancrazio) he also executed a Dead Christ for one of the chapels, and above the principal door of the Church of San Piero Maggiore, he placed the figures as we now see them. On the death of Benedetto the secret remained with Santi Buglioni, who is the only person now acquainted with the methods of working in this sort of sculpture.

The powerful effect produced on talent by revrard, is known to every man who, having laboured conscientiously, lias received the due return for his works. He who has ground to hope for honour and reward from the effort he is making, feels no inconvenience, suffers no pain, acknowledges no weariness; he becomes daily more confirmed in power, and his talents attain evermore increased worth and brightness. It is, indeed, true that merit does