Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 4.djvu/553

Rh able sculptor, but these stories are still in process of execution, being at this time carried forward by a very studious youth called Francesco Brambilari, who has almost completed one, in which are the Apostles receiving the Holy Spirit. This also is a very beautiful work. Francesco has likewise made a basin or reservoir in marble, which he has decorated with ornaments pierced in the stone, as well as with admirable foliage and a group of children, which are singularly graceful; over this (which is to be placed in the cathedral) there is eventually to stand a marble statue of Pope Pius IY. de’ Medici, who was a native of Milan.

And here we may with truth affirm, that if the study of art were pursued with as much zeal in Milan as it is in Rome and Florence, the able masters to be found there might have produced, nay, might still be producing, very admirable works; and of a verity the Milanese are at this time not a little indebted to the Aretine Leone Leoni, seeing that he, as we shall relate hereafter, has spent considerable sums of money as well as much time, in collecting many casts from the antique which he has had brought to Milan for his own use and that of the other artists.

But to return to the Milanese painters. After Leonardo da Vinci had executed the before-mentioned Last Supper in that place there were many who sought to imitate him, more particularly Marco Uggioni and some others, of whom we have made mention in the Life of Leonardo. That master was very successfully imitated by Cesare da Sesto likewise, and this last-mentioned artist was also a Milanese; in addition to the works by his hand whereof we have made mention in the Life of Dosso, there is a large picture in the house of the Mint at Milan, which is indeed a rich and beautiful work. The subject is the Baptism of Our Saviour Christ by St.