Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 5.djvu/250

238 year, but that Prelate, not understanding matters of art, did nothing for him.

At that time a Barber of the Cardinal, who had been a painter, and worked tolerably in fresco, but had no power of design, formed an acquaintance with Michelagnolo, who made him a Cartoon of St. Francis receiving the Stigmata, and this was painted by the Barber very carefully; it is now in the first Chapel of the Church of San Pietro, in Montorio. The ability of Michelagnolo was, however, clearly perceived by Messer Jacopo Galli, a Roman gentleman of much judgment, who commissioned him to make a Cupid, the size of life, with a Bacchus of ten palms high; the latter holds a Tazza in the right hand, and in the left he has the skin of a Tiger, with a bunch of grapes which a little Satyr is trying to nibble away from him. In this figure the artist has evidently brought to mingle beauties of a varied kind, labouring to exhibit the bold bearing of the youth united to the fulness and roundness of the female form; and herein did he prove himself to be capable of surpassing the statues of all other modern masters.

During his abode in Rome, Michelagnolo made so much progress in art, that the elevation of thought he displayed, with the facility with which he executed works in the most difficult manner, was considered extraordinary, by persons practised in the examination of the same, as well as by those unaccustomed to such marvels, all other works appearing as nothing in the comparison with those of Michelagnolo. These things caused the Cardinal Saint Denis, a Frenchman, called Rovano, to form the desire of leaving in that renowned city some memorial of himself by the hand of so famous an artist. He therefore commissioned Michelagnolo to execute a Pieta of marble in full relief; and this when finished, was placed in San Pietro, in the Chapel of Santa Maria della Febbre namely, at the Temple of Mars. To this work I think no sculptor, however distinguished an artist, could add a single grace, or improve it by whatever