Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 5.djvu/487

Rh the door of a writing chamber, which Vasari has caused to be added to the new rooms of the Ducal Palace, and wherein are many antique statues of bronze and marble, with small pictures by modern artists, exquisite miniatures, and a large number of medals, in gold and silver, all arranged in the most perfect order. These portraits of the Illustrious persons of the House of Medici are all exceedingly animated pictures, as well as most faithful likenesses; and it is a great thing in Bronzino, that whereas many artists fall otf in their age, he, on the contrary, does even better now than in the best years of manhood, as his works are daily proving.

No long time since, he painted a picture about a braccio and a half high, in the Monastery of the Angeli at Florence, for Don Silvano Pazzi, a Monk of Camaldoli, who is very much his friend; the subject is St. Catherine, and the figure is so beautiful that it may bear comparison with any one that has been executed by this noble artist; nay, it seems to want only that spirit and voice with which the Saint confounded the tyrant, and confessed her beloved Lord, even to her latest breath. The father has accordingly no possession which he values more highly than that truly graceful picture. Agnolo likewise painted a portrait of Don Giovanni, Cardinal de’ Medici, son of Duke Cosimo, and this was sent to the Court of the Emperor, for the Queen Joanna; the same master afterwards portrayed Don Francesco, Prince of Florence, a most faithful likeness, and so carefully finished, that it has the effect of a miniature.

At the marriage of the Queen Joanna, of Austria, wife of the above-mentioned Prince, Bronzino painted three great pictures, which were placed on the Bridge of the Carraja, as will be related hereafter. He represented therein certain stories, from the Nuptials of Hymen, which were so beautiful that they did not seem like paintings executed for a festival, but were rather like works intended to be permanently fixed in some most honourable position, where they might endure for ever. A few months since, he furthermore painted a small picture, full of minute figures, that have not their equal, and may rather be called fine specimens of miniature. Nor is Bronzino less enamoured of his art now, in his sixty-fifth year, than he was as a youth; he has lately undertaken two