Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 5.djvu/80

68 mitting a wood-worker and artisan to estimate the work of a sculptor and statuary, was too extraordinary a proceeding; nay, he did all but inform those personages that he considered them little better than a herd of stupid oxen; whereupon Hidolfi replied, that the choice had been well made, and that Rustic! was himself a proud and insolent person.

But what was more unjust than all, has yet to be related: the work, which deserved full two thousand crowns, was estimated at five hundred only, and even that sum was never entirely paid to Giovan-Francesco: four hundred were all that he could ever obtain, nor did he receive that until it was extorted by the interv^ention of Giulio, Cardinal de’ Medici. At the spectacle of so much baseness. Rustic! withdrew almost in despair, and resolving never more to accept any commission from the Civic Magistrates, or indeed from any Company which might render him liable to have more than one person to deal with.

He now lived a very solitary life, and made his dwelling in the rooms of the Sapienza, which is near the Monastery of the Servite monks, where he employed himself with certain small works by way of amusing his leisure, and that he might not be wholly idle. But he also wasted both time and money in attempting to freeze mercury, and this he did, in company with Raffaello Baglioni, a genius of similar character.

In a picture, three braccia long and two high, Giovan-Francesco painted the Conversion of St. Paul. This work, which is in oil, exhibits a large number of horses ridden by soldiers who accompany the Saint; and among them are seen varied and beautiful attitudes with many fine foreshortenings: it is now, with other productions of Giovan-Francesco, in the possession of the heirs of the above-named Pietro Martelli, to whom it was presented by the artist. There is a small picture by the same hand, and representing a Hunt, which is the property of Lorenzo Borghini, by whom it is held in the utmost estimation, as a most fanciful and beautiful performance, which it certainly is; Lorenzo being one who greatly delights in the productions of our arts.

For the Nuns of Santa Lucia, in the Via di San Gallo, Giovan-Francesco executed a figure in clay of Our Saviour