BACCIO BANDINELLI. -(1493-1560.)

Baccio was, like Cellini, a pupil of the goldsmith Michael Angelo di Viviano, and if all that his contemporaries said of him was true, he must have been a man of very contemptible character. All his works were spoken slightingly of by them, and even the most celebrated of his statues met with a hostile reception, due more probably to the unpopularity of the artist than to the indifference of the works themselves.

Baccio, however, enjoyed the favor of Cosimo I., and throughout the whole of his career he was employed by the Medici. Benvenuto Cellini was one of his bitterest enemies, and the Grand Duke derived great amusement from letting the two artists attack one another in his presence, and exhaust the vocabulary of the fish market. It is absurd, however, to accuse Bandinelli of having destroyed Michael An gelds great cartoon of the Pisan war, for we may be sure that if there had been any ground for such a charge Cellini would not have failed to mention it in his Memoirs. His chief fault was his vanity, and his arrogant assertion that the only artist who could come up to him was Michael Angelo, has gone much against him with posterity.

The story of his group of "Hercules and Cacus," on the Piazza Bella Signoria, as told by Cellini, is very amusing. The latter criticized it in the following terms in presence of the Grand Duke and of Bandinelli, to whom he said, "If your Hercules had his hair cropped he would not have skull enough left to hold the brain. One cannot tell whether his face is that of a man or a monster, for he is half lion and half ox. His heavy shoulders remind one of the two panniers of a donkey's pack-saddle. His chest and muscles are copied, not from human nature, but from a bag of bad melons." But, in spite of all criticisms, Baccio was concerned in the principal works of art executed during that period. He was the author of the copy of the "Laocoon " in the Uffizi, which was executed for Francois I., but which the latter exchanged with the Pope for several antique statues. At Santa Maria sopra Minerva, at Rome, he erected the tombs of Pope Clement VII. and Leo X., orders obtained through the influence of the Medici. He also executed a statue of Giovanni de' Medici, surnamed delle Bande Nere. And there are a number of his works in Santa Croce, the Cathedral, and the Palazzo Vecchio. Held in too high esteem by Cosimo de' Medici, and underrated by posterity, the impartial critic must strike the happy mean.

BARTOLOMMEO AMMANATI. -(1511-1592.)

This artist was at one time a pupil of Bandinelli, but unable to put up with his violent behavior, he went to study under Jacopo Sansovino at Venice, where he imbibed many of the principles of the Venetian school, as may be gathered from his different compositions. He was one of Sansovino's assistants in the decorations of the Library of St. Mark, which is one of the most beautiful monuments in Venice, and there he had for comrades Cataneo and Alessandro Vittoria. Upon his return from Venice, his first great work was the tomb of Duke Francesco Maria, which has disappeared from the Santa Chiara Church at Urbino in which it formerly stood. He also erected in the Eremitani at Padua a very complex and elaborate monument to a professor of jurisprudence, one Marco di Mantova Benavides, a wealthy amateur of art who, during his lifetime, resided in a splendid palace, the entrance to which was under a triumphal arch erected by Ammanati, who also executed a Hercules twenty-five feet high for the Cortile.

Summoned to Rome at the instance of Michael Angelo, whose engagements were then very numerous, Ammanati received the order for the tomb of Antonio de' Monti and his father at San Pietro in Montorio. He also was the sculptor of the celebrated fountain at Pratolino, and of the colossal group of Hercules and Ant us at Castello. His most important work as a sculptor was the fountain at the corner of the Ducal Palace, with the figure of Neptune in a car drawn by sea-horses, looking down upon a number of mythological figures in bronze. This fountain, very pleasing to the eye, but devoid of all pretensions to classical outline, was erected by him after the work had been competed for ; Benvenuto Cellini and Giovanni da Bologna being among the unsuccessful competitors.

It is, however, as an architect that Ammanati has the highest claims to the admiration of posterity, and it is difficult to speak too highly of the bridge of Santa Trinita, with the noble proportions of its arches. He also completed the Pitti Palace after Brunelleschi, and the whole of the Cortile is by him. He died, universally regretted, on the 14th of April, 1592, and is buried in the church of San Giovanni,

which he had so much embellished.

The idyl of his life was his passion for the beautiful. Laura Battiferri, who has been made famous by the verses of Bernardo Tasso and Annibale Caro, the former of whom speaks of her as "the pride of Urbino," while the latter styles her "the new Sappho." The Duchess of Urbino was anxious to keep her at that court, but she eloped to Loretto with Ammanati, and was there married to him.

GIOVANNI DA BOLOGNA. -(1524-1608.)

This artist was not the last sculptor of the grand epoch, but he was the last truly great man. Though not born in Florence, he was a Tuscan by affinity, and Florence was, so to speak, his cradle, as it was his centre of action.

He had been successful in the competition for the Fountain of Neptune on the Piazza della Signoria, but was set aside in favor of Ammanati, on the ground of his being too young and inexperienced; but it is probable that the model was afterwards used for the fountain on the grand piazza of Bologna.

The "Mercury," which is the most popular and graceful of his works, at first occupied a very prominent position upon the basin of the fountain of the Villa Medici, and remained there until 1750, when the Grand Duke Peter Leopold T. restored it to Florence. The celebrated group of the " Rape of the Sabines," now at the Loggia dei Lanzi, was also one of his early works. The anecdote of how this group came to be called the " Rape of the Sabines," after having first been merely intended to represent a young man mastering an adversary and taking away a female captive, has been told in a previous chapter. The statue excited so much admiration in its completed form, that John of Bologna was declared to be a fitting successor to Michael Angelo. This was exaggerated praise, but John of Bologna was in so much request that he had more than he could do, and the list of his works is almost interminable. The artists of this period did not throw nearly so much soul into their work as their predecessors, so that the only limit to their productiveness was their physical endurance. Giovanni's successive works were the equestrian statue of Cosimo I. on the Piazza della Signoria ; the group of " Hercules and Nessus," which forms a pendant to the "Rape of the Sabines;" the "Victory" group in the large room of the Palazzo Vecchio; the St. Luke" in Or San Michele; the Boboli Fountain; the "Genius of the Apennines," which is so conspicuous at the Lake of Pratolino; the beautiful bronze "Venus" in the royal villa at Pretaya; and the colossal "Samson slaying the Philistines," which, originally in the casino of St. Mark at Florence, was sent, with the basin and fittings, to the Duke of Lerma, minister of Philip III. of Spain. The Duke of Buckingham, while travelling in that country, purchased it for Buckingham. Palace, and when King George acquired that residence he made a present of it to Sir William Worseley.

This is far from a complete list of his greater works, to say nothing of hundreds of small bronzes which are now in private collections, and of articles of common use, such as fire-dogs, etc. The destruction of the bronze gates of the Pisa Cathedral, which had been melted during the fire of 1595, gave Giovanni da Bologna an opportunity of distinguishing himself; but though he displayed great manual skill, his bas-reliefs were inferior to the original ones. He was assisted in this work by a Portuguese monk of the Dominican order, Portigiani, who as a founder had few or no equals. His sculptures at Siena recall the Medici Chapel, but here, as in all his other works, the depth and inspiration fall short of the outline and style.

There is a general concurrence of testimony as to his having been a man of very estimable private character, and when he died, at eighty-four years of age, he was buried with due honors in the Madonna del Soccorso Chapel at SS. Annunziata.

The last great artists whose names may be mentioned are Tribolo, Vincenzio Danti, Lorenzi Stoldo, and Paolo Ponzio Trebati, to each of whom a brief biographical sketch is attached.