Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 5.djvu/169

Rh draperies, and in his works the nude form is always seen through the vestment whenever the occasion demands that it should be so. He clothed his figures also in a new and varied manner, displaying much fancy in the choice of headdresses, buskins, and ornaments of different kinds. He handled the colours, whether in oil, tempera, or fresco, in such a manner that he may be truly affirmed to have been one of the most able. Spirited, bold, and yet careful artists of our day. Of this we, who have held close intercourse with him for so many years, are fully competent to bear testimony; and, although from the desire which all conscientious artists feel to surpass each other, there was always between us an amicable emulation, yet the affection of a true friendship was never wanting to us, even when each was labouring in rivalry of the other, through the most renowned cities of Italy, a fact of which proof may be seen in the numerous letters from the hand of Erancesco, which I still retain in my possession.

Salviati was of an amiable disposition in his youth, but subsequently became suspicious and intolerant; possessing sufficient acuteness and penetration on certain points, he was yet credulous on others: if the conversation turned on matters of art, he would often express himself, whether in jest or earnest, in terms calculated to give offence, and sometimes profoundly wounded those with whom he was speaking. He delighted in the society of men of learning and other distinguished persons, but the meaner kind of artists were ever most unwelcome to Erancesco, even though some of these persons were of good repute as to certain branches of art. He avoided such men as he perceived to be habitual slanderers of private character, but if brought into contact with them would fall upon and tear them without mercy; but most of all did he abhor the cozenings and trickery sometimes practised by artists, and of which, having been in Erance and heard somewhat of that matter, he was but too well qualified to speak. There were times when, to escape the attacks of his constitutional melancholy, he sought the society of his friends, and did his utmost to be cheerful. After all, indeed, the suspicious, irresolute, and unsocial dispositions of which he so frequently gave proof, were injurious only to himself. His most intimate friend in Rome was the Elorentine goldsmith, Manno, a person of high dis-