Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 5.djvu/93

Rh fully obedient servants. At the end of the feast, a ship laden with choice confections appeared, and this the masters thereof, as men who were selling their merchanize, distributed among the company; when all were thus disposed of the guests were conducted into the upper rooms, where a much renowned comedy called Philogenia, for which very splendid and beautiful scenic decorations had been prepared, was performed; after which all departed, in the dawn of the morning, and having been infinitely delighted, to their respective homes.

Two years had elapsed from the time of the feast above described, when, after many festivals and dramatic performances, it again came to the turn of the same person to be ‘‘ Signore,” when, by way of reproving some of the members who had gone to unreasonable expenses for those suppers, and, as the phrase goes, had “eaten themselves up alive ” in the same; he caused his feast to be arranged as follows:—At the Aia, or threshing floor of Santa Maria, where the Company was accustomed to hold its. assemblies, he caused figures such as are commonly depicted on the walls and at the entrances of almshouses and hospitals, to be painted on the building, outside of the door: that of the Director, or Spedalingo, among others, who was represented as in the act of charitably and kindly receiving certain pilgrims and poor men. This picture was displayed on the evening of the feast, and when the members began to arrive; having knocked, and being received by the Spedalingo, the guests were then ushered into a great room, such as are used in almshouses, with its beds ranged on each side, and all the rest of the furniture being of the sort usually found in places of that kind.

In the centre of the chamber, and gathered aboitt a great fire, were Bientina, Battista dell’ Ottonaio, Barlacchi, Baia, and others selected from the most facetious of the companions, all clothed in the garb of idle, worthless beggars, and poor wretched rogues. These men assumed the appearance of not supposing themselves to be visible to the general company of the guests, who soon began to assemble, and of whom, in their turn, they took no notice whatever, but carried on a discourse relating entirely to the men of the society by whom they were surrounded. These