The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini Part 28

I NOW stayed at home, and went rarely to the palace, labouring with great diligence to complete my statue. I had to pay the workmen out of my own pocket; for the Duke, after giving Lattanzio Gorini orders to discharge their wages, at the end of about eighteen months, grew tired, and withdrew this subsidy. I asked Lattanzio why he did not pay me as usual. The man replied, gesticulating with those spidery hands of his, in a shrill gnat?s voice: ?Why do not you finish your work? One thinks that you will never get it done.? In a rage I up and answered: ?May the plague catch you and all who dare to think I shall not finish it!?

So I went home with despair at heart to my unlucky Perseus, not without weeping, when I remembered the prosperity I had abandoned in Paris under the patronage of that marvellous King Francis, where I had abundance of all kinds, and here had everything to want for. Many a time I had it in my soul to cast myself away for lost. One day on one of these occasions, I mounted a nice nag I had, put a hundred crowns in my purse, and went to Fiesole to visit a natural son of mine there, who was at nurse with my gossip, the wife of one of my workpeople. When I reached the house, I found the boy in good health, and kissed him, very sad at heart. On taking leave, he would not let me go, but held me with his little hands and a tempest of cries and tears. Considering that he was only two years old or thereabouts, the child?s grief was something wonderful. Now I had resolved, in the heat of my despair, if I met Bandinello, who went every evening to a farm of his above San Domenico, that I would hurl him to destruction; so I disengaged myself from my baby, and left the boy there sobbing his heart out. Taking the road toward Florence, just when I entered the piazza of San Domenico, Bandinello was arriving from the other side. On the instant I decided upon bloodshed; but when I reached the man and raised my eyes, I saw him unarmed, riding a sorry mule or rather donkey, and he had with him a boy of ten years old. No sooner did he catch sight of me than he turned the colour of a corpse, and trembled from head to foot. Perceiving at once how base the business would be, I exclaimed: ?Fear not, vile coward! I do not condescend to smite you.? He looked at me submissively and said nothing. Thereupon I recovered command of my faculties, and thanked G.o.d that His goodness had withheld me from so great an act of violence. Then, being delivered from that fiendish fury, my spirits rose, and I said to myself: ?If G.o.d but grant me to execute my work, I hope by its means to annihilate all my scoundrelly enemies; and thus I shall perform far greater and more glorious revenges that if I had vented my rage upon one single foe.?

Having this excellent resolve in heart, I reached my home. At the end of three days news was brought me that my only son had been smothered by his nurse, my gossip, which gave me greater grief than I have ever had in my whole life. However, I knelt upon the ground, and, not without tears, returned thanks to G.o.d, as I was wont, exclaiming, ?Lord, Thou gavest me the child, and Thou hast taken him; for all Thy dealings I thank Thee with my whole heart.? This great sorrow went nigh to depriving me of reason; yet, according to my habit, I made a virtue of necessity, and adapted myself to circ.u.mstances as well as I was able.

LXVII

ABOUT this time a young fellow called Francesco, the son of a smith, Matteo, left Bandinello?s employment, and inquired whether I would give him work. I agreed, and sent him to retouch my Medusa, which had been new cast in bronze. After a fortnight he mentioned that he had been speaking with his master, that is, Bandinello, who told him, if I cared to make a marble statue, he would give me a fine block of stone. I replied at once: ?Tell him I accept his offer; perhaps this marble will prove a stumbling block to him, for he keeps on provoking me, and does not bear in mind the great peril he ran upon the piazza of San Domenico.

Tell him I will have the marble by all means. I never speak about him, and the beast is perpetually causing me annoyance. I verily believe you came to work here at his orders for the mere purpose of spying upon me.

Go, then, and tell him I insist on having the marble, even against his will: see that you do not come back without it.?

LXVIII

MANY days had elapsed during which I had not shown my face in the palace, when the fancy took me to go there one morning just as the Duke was finis.h.i.+ng his dinner. From what I heard, his Excellency had been talking of me that morning, commending me highly, and in particular praising my skill in setting jewels. Therefore, when the d.u.c.h.ess saw me, she called for me by Messer Sforza; [1] and on my presenting myself to her most ill.u.s.trious Excellency, she asked me to set a little point-diamond in a ring, saying she wished always to wear it; at the same time she gave me the measure and the stone, which was worth about a hundred crowns, begging me to be quick about the work. Upon this the Duke began speaking to the d.u.c.h.ess, and said: ?There is no doubt that Benvenuto was formerly without his peer in this art; but now that he has abandoned it, I believe it will be too much trouble for him to make a little ring of the sort you want. I pray you, therefore, not to importune him about this trifle, which would be no trifle to him owing to his want of practice.? I thanked the Duke for his kind words, but begged him to let me render this trifling service to the d.u.c.h.ess. Then I took the ring in hand, and finished it within a few days. It was meant for the little finger; accordingly I fas.h.i.+oned four tiny children in the round and four masks, which figures composed the hoop. I also found room for some enamelled fruits and connecting links, so that the stone and setting went uncommonly well together. Then I took it to the d.u.c.h.ess, who told me graciously that I had produced a very fine piece, and that she would remember me. She afterwards sent the ring as a present to King Philip, and from that time forward kept charging me with commissions, so kindly, however, that I did my best to serve her, although I saw but very little of her money. G.o.d knows I had great need of that, for I was eager to finish my Perseus, and had engaged some journeymen, whom I paid out of my own purse. I now began to show myself more often than I had recently been doing.

Note 1. Sforza Almeni, a Perugian gentleman, the Duke?s chamberlain.

Cosimo killed this man with his own hand in the year 1566.

LXIX

IT happened on one feast-day that I went to the palace after dinner, and when I reached the clockroom, I saw the door of the wardrobe standing open. As I drew nigh it, the Duke called me, and after a friendly greeting said: ?You are welcome! Look at that box which has been sent me by my lord Stefano of Palestrina. [1] Open it, and let us see what it contains.? When I had opened the box, I cried to the Duke: ?My lord, this is a statue in Greek marble, and it is a miracle of beauty. I must say that I have never seen a boy?s figure so excellently wrought and in so fine a style among all the antiques I have inspected. If your Excellency permits, I should like to restore it--head and arms and feet.

I will add an eagle, in order that we may christen the lad Ganymede. It is certainly not my business to patch up statues, that being the trade of botchers, who do it in all conscience villainously ill; yet the art displayed by this great master of antiquity cries out to me to help him.? The Duke was highly delighted to find the statue so beautiful, and put me a mult.i.tude of questions, saying: ?Tell me, Benvenuto, minutely, in what consists the skill of this old master, which so excites your admiration.? I then attempted, as well as I was able, to explain the beauty of workmans.h.i.+p, the consummate science, and the rare manner displayed by the fragment. I spoke long upon these topics, and with the greater pleasure because I saw that his Excellency was deeply interested.

Note 1. Stefano Colonna, of the princely house of Palestrina. He was a general of considerable repute in the Spanish, French, and Florentine services successively.

LXX

WHILE I was thus pleasantly engaged in entertaining the Duke, a page happened to leave the wardrobe, and at the same moment Bandinello entered. When the Duke saw him, his countenance contracted, and he asked him drily: ?What are you about here?? Bandinello, without answering, cast a glance upon the box, where the statue lay uncovered. Then breaking into one of his malignant laughs and wagging his head, he turned to the Duke and said: ?My lord, this exactly ill.u.s.trates the truth of what I have so often told your Excellency. You must know that the ancients were wholly ignorant of anatomy, and therefore their works abound in mistakes.? I kept silence, and paid no heed to what he was saying; nay, indeed, I had turned my back on him. But when the brute had brought his disagreeable babble to an end, the Duke exclaimed: ?O Benvenuto, this is the exact opposite of what you were just now demonstrating with so many excellent arguments. Come and speak a word in defence of the statue.? In reply to this appeal, so kindly made me by the Duke, I spoke as follows: ?My lord, your most ill.u.s.trious Excellency must please to know that Baccio Bandinello is made up of everything bad, and thus has he ever been; therefore, whatever he looks at, be the thing superlatively excellent, becomes in his ungracious eyes as bad as can be. I, who incline to the good only, discern the truth with purer sense.

Consequently, what I told your Excellency about this lovely statue is mere simple truth; whereas what Bandinello said is but a portion of the evil out of which he is composed.? The Duke listened with much amus.e.m.e.nt; but Bandinello writhed and made the most ugly faces--his face itself being by nature hideous beyond measure--which could be imagined by the mind of man.

The Duke at this point moved away, and proceeded through some ground floor rooms, while Bandinello followed. The chamberlains twitched me by the mantle, and sent me after; so we all attended the Duke until he reached a certain chamber, where he seated himself, with Bandinello and me standing at his right hand and his left. I kept silence, and the gentlemen of his Excellency?s suite looked hard at Bandinello, t.i.ttering among themselves about the speech I had made in the room above. So then Bandinello began again to chatter, and cried out: ?Prince, when I uncovered my Hercules and Cacus, I verily believe a hundred sonnets were written on me, full of the worst abuse which could be invented by the ignorant rabble.? [1] I rejoined: ?Prince, when Michel Agnolo Buonarroti displayed his Sacristy to view, with so many fine statues in it, the men of talent in our admirable school of Florence, always appreciative of truth and goodness, published more than a hundred sonnets, each vying with his neighbour to extol these masterpieces to the skies. [2] So then, just as Bandinello?s work deserved all the evil which, he tells us, was then said about it, Buonarroti?s deserved the enthusiastic praise which was bestowed upon it.? These words of mine made Bandinello burst with fury; he turned on me, and cried: ?And you, what have you got to say against my work?? ?I will tell you if you have the patience to hear me out.? ?Go along then,? he replied. The Duke and his attendants prepared themselves to listen. I began and opened by oration thus: ?You must know that it pains me to point out the faults of your statue; I shall not, however, utter my own sentiments, but shall recapitulate what our most virtuous school of Florence says about it.? The brutal fellow kept making disagreeable remarks and gesticulating with his hands and feet, until he enraged me so that I began again, and spoke far more rudely than I should otherwise have done, if he had behaved with decency. ?Well, then, this virtuous school says that if one were to shave the hair of your Hercules, there would not be skull enough left to hold his brain; it says that it is impossible to distinguish whether his features are those of a man or of something between a lion and an ox; the face too is turned away from the action of the figure, and is so badly set upon the neck, with such poverty of art and so ill a grace, that nothing worse was ever seen; his sprawling shoulders are like the two pommels of an a.s.s? pack-saddle; his b.r.e.a.s.t.s and all the muscles of the body are not portrayed from a man, but from a big sack full of melons set upright against a wall. The loins seem to be modelled from a bag of lanky pumpkins; n.o.body can tell how his two legs are attached to that vile trunk; it is impossible to say on which leg he stands, or which he uses to exert his strength; nor does he seem to be resting upon both, as sculptors who know something of their art have occasionally set the figure. It is obvious that the body is leaning forward more than one-third of a cubit, which alone is the greatest and most insupportable fault committed by vulgar commonplace pretenders. Concerning the arms, they say that these are both stretched out without one touch of grace or one real spark of artistic talents, just as if you had never seen a naked model. Again, the right leg of Hercules and that of Cacus have got one ma.s.s of flesh between them, so that if they were to be separated, not only one of them, but both together, would be left without a calf at the point where they are touching. They say, too, that Hercules has one of his feet underground, while the other seems to be resting on hot coals.?

Note 1. Vasari confirms this statement. The statue, which may still be seen upon the great piazza, is, in truth, a very poor performance. The Florentines were angry because Bandinello had filched the commission away from Michel Angelo. It was uncovered in 1534, and Duke Alessandro had to imprison its lampooners.

Note 2. Cellini alludes of course to the Sacristy of S. Lorenzo, designed by Michel Angelo, with the portraits of the Medici and statues of Day, Night, Dawn, and Twilight.

LXXI

THE FELLOW could not stand quiet to hear the d.a.m.ning errors of his Cacus in their turn enumerated. For one thing, I was telling the truth; for another, I was unmasking him to the Duke and all the people present, who showed by face and gesture first their surprise, and next their conviction that what I said was true. All at once he burst out: ?Ah, you slanderous tongue! why don?t you speak about my design?? I retorted: ?A good draughtsman can never produce bad works; therefore I am inclined to believe that your drawing is no better than your statues.? When he saw the amused expression on the Duke?s face and the cutting gestures of the bystanders, he let his insolence get the better of him, and turned to me with that most hideous face of his, screaming aloud: ?Oh, hold your tongue, you ugly…? [1] At these words the Duke frowned, and the others pursed their lips up and looked with knitted grows toward him.

The horrible affront half maddened me with fury; but in a moment I recovered presence of mind enough to turn it off with a jest; ?You madman! you exceed the bounds of decency. Yet would to G.o.d that I understood so n.o.ble an art as you allude to; they say that Jove used it with Ganymede in paradise, and here upon this earth it is practised by some of the greatest emperors and kings. I, however, am but a poor humble creature, who neither have the power nor the intelligence to perplex my wits with anything so admirable.? When I had finished this speech, the Duke and his attendants could control themselves no longer, but broke into such shouts of laughter that one never heard the like.

You must know, gentle readers, that though I put on this appearance of pleasantry, my heart was bursting in my body to think that a fellow, the foulest villain who ever breathed, should have dared in the presence of so great a prince to cast an insult of that atrocious nature in my teeth; but you must also know that he insulted the Duke, and not me; for had I not stood in that august presence, I should have felled him dead to earth. When the dirty stupid scoundrel observed that those gentlemen kept on laughing, he tried to change the subject, and divert them from deriding him; so he began as follows: ?This fellow Benvenuto goes about boasting that I have promised him a piece of marble.? I took him up at once. ?What! did you not send to tell me by your journeyman, Francesco, that if I wished to work in marble you would give me a block? I accepted it, and mean to have it.? He retorted: ?Be very well a.s.sured that you will never get it.? Still smarting as I was under the calumnious insults he had flung at me, I lost my self-control, forgot I was in the presence of the Duke, and called out in a storm of fury: ?I swear to you that if you do not send the marble to my house, you had better look out for another world, for if you stay upon this earth I will most certainly rip the wind out of your carca.s.s. [2] Then suddenly awaking to the fact that I was standing in the presence of so great a duke, I turned submissively to his Excellency and said: ?My lord, one fool makes a hundred; the follies of this man have blinded me for a moment to the glory of your most ill.u.s.trious Excellency and to myself. I humbly crave your pardon.?

Then the Duke said to Bandinello: ?Is it true that you promised him the marble?? He replied that it was true. Upon this the Duke addressed me: ?Go to the Opera, and choose a piece according to your taste.? I demurred that the man had promised to sent it home to me. The words that pa.s.sed between us were awful, and I refused to take the stone in any other way. Next morning a piece of marble was brought to my house. On asking who had sent it, they told me it was Bandinello, and that this was the very block which he had promised. 3

Note 1. 'Oh sta cheto, soddomitaccio.'

Note 2. 'In questo' ('mondo') 'ti sgonfiero a ogni modo.'

Note 3. Vasari, in his 'Life of Bandinello,' gives a curious confirmation of Cellini?s veracity by reporting this quarrel, with some of the speeches which pdssed between the two rival artists. Yet he had not read Cellini?s 'Memoirs,' and was far from partial to the man.

Comparing Vasari?s with Cellini?s account, we only notice that the latter has made Bandinello play a less witty part in the wordy strife than the former a.s.signed him.

LXXII

I HAD it brought at once in to my studio, and began to chisel it. While I was rough-hewing the block, I made a model. But my eagerness to work in marble was so strong, that I had not patience to finish the model as correctly as this art demands. I soon noticed that the stone rang false beneath my strokes, which made me often-times repent commencing on it.

Yet I got what I could out of the piece--that is, the Apollo and Hyacinth, which may still be seen unfinished in my workshop. While I was thus engaged, the Duke came to my house, and often said to me: ?Leave your bronze awhile, and let me watch you working on the marble.? Then I took chisel and mallet, and went at it blithely. He asked about the model I had made for my statue; to which I answered: ?Duke, this marble is all cracked, but I shall carve something from it in spite of that; therefore I have not been able to settle the model, but shall go on doing the best I can.?

His Excellency sent to Rome post-haste for a block of Greek marble, in order that I might restore his antique Ganymede, which was the cause of that dispute with Bandinello. When it arrived, I thought it a sin to cut it up for the head and arms and other bits wanting in the Ganymede; so I provided myself with another piece of stone, and reserved the Greek marble for a Narcissus which I modelled on a small scale in wax. I found that the block had two holes, penetrating to the depth of a quarter of a cubit, and two good inches wide. This led me to choose the att.i.tude which may be noticed in my statue, avoiding the holes and keeping my figure free from them. But rain had fallen scores of years upon the stone, filtering so deeply from the holes into its substance that the marble was decayed. Of this I had full proof at the time of a great inundation of the Arno, when the river rose to the height of more than a cubit and a half in my workshop. [1] Now the Narcissus stood upon a square of wood, and the water overturned it, causing the statue to break in two above the b.r.e.a.s.t.s. I had to join the pieces; and in order that the line of breakage might not be observed, I wreathed that garland of flowers round it which may still be seen upon the bosom. I went on working at the surface, employing some hours before sunrise, or now and then on feast-days, so as not to lose the time I needed for my Perseus.

It so happened on one of those mornings, while I was getting some little chisels into trim to work on the Narcissus, that a very fine splinter of steel flew into my right eye, and embedded itself so deeply in the pupil that it could not be extracted. I thought for certain I must lose the sight of that eye. After some days I sent for Maestro Raffaello de Pilli, the surgeon, who obtained a couple of live pigeons, and placing me upon my back across a table, took the birds and opened a large vein they have beneath the wing, so that the blood gushed out into my eye. I felt immediately relieved, and in the s.p.a.ce of two days the splinter came away, and I remained with eyesight greatly improved. Against the feast of S. Lucia, [2] which came round in three days, I made a golden eye out of a French crown, and had it presented at her shrine by one of my six nieces, daughters of my sister Liperata; the girl was ten years of age, and in her company I returned thanks to G.o.d and S. Lucia. For some while afterwards I did not work at the Narcissus, but pushed my Perseus forward under all the difficulties I have described. It was my purpose to finish it, and then to bid farewell to Florence.

Note 1. Cellini alludes to a celebrated inundation of the year 1547.

Note 2. S. Lucy, I need hardly remark, is the patroness of the eyes. In Italian art she is generally represented holding her own eyes upon a plate.

LXXIII

HAVING succeeded so well with the cast of the Medusa, I had great hope of bringing my Perseus through; for I had laid the wax on, and felt confident that it would come out in bronze as perfectly as the Medusa.

The waxen model produced so fine an effect, that when the Duke saw it and was struck with its beauty--whether somebody had persuaded him it could not be carried out with the same finish in metal, or whether he thought so for himself--he came to visit me more frequently than usual, and on one occasion said: ?Benvenuto, this figure cannot succeed in bronze; the laws of art do not admit of it.? These words of his Excellency stung me so sharply that I answered: ?My lord, I know how very little confidence you have in me; and I believe the reason of this is that your most ill.u.s.trious Excellency lends too ready an ear to my calumniators, or else indeed that you do not understand my art.? He hardly let me close the sentence when he broke in: ?I profess myself a connoisseur, and understand it very well indeed.? I replied: ?Yes, like a prince, not like an artist; for if your Excellency understood my trade as well as you imagine, you would trust me on the proofs I have already given. These are, first, the colossal bronze bust of your Excellency, which is now in Elba; [1] secondly, the restoration of the Ganymede in marble, which offered so many difficulties and cost me so much trouble, that I would rather have made the whole statue new from the beginning; thirdly, the Medusa, cast by me in bronze, here now before your Excellency?s eyes, the execution of which was a greater triumph of strength and skill than any of my predecessors in this fiendish art have yet achieved. Look you, my lord! I constructed that furnace anew on principles quite different from those of other founders; in addition to many technical improvements and ingenious devices, I supplied it with two issues for the metal, because this difficult and twisted figure could not otherwise have come out perfect. It is only owing to my intelligent insight into means and appliances that the statue turned out as it did; a triumph judged impossible by all the pract.i.tioners of this art. I should like you furthermore to be aware, my lord, for certain, that the sole reason why I succeeded with all those great arduous works in France under his most admirable Majesty King Francis, was the high courage which that good monarch put into my heart by the liberal allowances he made me, and the mult.i.tude of workpeople he left at my disposal. I could have as many as I asked for, and employed at times above forty, all chosen by myself. These were the causes of my having there produced so many masterpieces in so short a s.p.a.ce of time. Now then, my lord, put trust in me; supply me with the aid I need. I am confident of being able to complete a work which will delight your soul.

But if your Excellency goes on disheartening me, and does not advance me the a.s.sistance which is absolutely required, neither I nor any man alive upon this earth can hope to achieve the slightest thing of value.?

Note 1. At Portoferraio. It came afterwards to Florence.

LXXIV

IT was as much as the Duke could do to stand by and listen to my pleadings. He kept turning first this way and then that; while I, in despair, poor wretched I, was calling up remembrance of the n.o.ble state I held in France, to the great sorrow of my soul. All at once he cried: ?Come, tell me, Benvenuto, how is it possible that yonder splendid head of Medusa, so high up there in the grasp of Perseus, should ever come out perfect?? I replied upon the instant: ?Look you now, my lord! If your Excellency possessed that knowledge of the craft which you affirm you have, you would not fear one moment for the splendid head you speak of. There is good reason, on the other hand, to feel uneasy about this right foot, so far below and at a distance from the rest.? When he heard these words, the Duke turned, half in anger, to some gentlemen in waiting, and exclaimed: ?I verily believe that this Benvenuto prides himself on contradicting everything one says.? Then he faced round to me with a touch of mockery, upon which his attendants did the like, and began to speak as follows: ?I will listen patiently to any argument you can possibly produce in explanation of your statement, which may convince me of its probability.? I said in answer: ?I will adduce so sound an argument that your Excellency shall perceive the full force of it.? So I began: ?You must know, my lord, that the nature of fire is to ascend, and therefore I promise you that Medusa?s head will come out famously; but since it is not in the nature of fire to descend, and I must force it downwards six cubits by artificial means, I a.s.sure your Excellency upon this most convincing ground of proof that the foot cannot possibly come out. It will, however, be quite easy for me to restore it.? ?Why, then,? said the Duke, ?did you not devise it so that the foot should come out as well as you affirm the head will?? I answered: ?I must have made a much larger furnace, with a conduit as thick as my leg; and so I might have forced the molten metal by its own weight to descend so far. Now, my pipe, which runs six cubits to the statue?s foot, as I have said, is not thicker than two fingers. However, it was not worth the trouble and expense to make a larger; for I shall easily be able to mend what is lacking. But when my mould is more than half full, as I expect, from this middle point upwards, the fire ascending by its natural property, then the heads of Perseus and Medusa will come out admirably; you may be quite sure of it.? After I had thus expounded these convincing arguments, together with many more of the same kind, which it would be tedious to set down here, the Duke shook his head and departed without further ceremony.

LXXV

ABANDONED thus to my own resources, I took new courage, and banished the sad thoughts which kept recurring to my mind, making me often weep bitter tears of repentance for having left France; for though I did so only to revisit Florence, my sweet birthplace, in order that I might charitably succour my six nieces, this good action, as I well perceived, had been the beginning of my great misfortune. Nevertheless, I felt convinced that when my Perseus was accomplished, all these trials would be turned to high felicity and glorious well-being.

Accordingly I strengthened my heart, and with all the forces of my body and my purse, employing what little money still remained to me, I set to work. First I provided myself with several loads of pinewood from the forests of Serristori, in the neighbourhood of Montelupo. While these were on their way, I clothed my Perseus with the clay which I had prepared many months beforehand, in order that it might be duly seasoned. After making its clay tunic (for that is the term used in this art) and properly arming it and fencing it with iron girders, I began to draw the wax out by means of a slow fire. This melted and issued through numerous air-vents I had made; for the more there are of these, the better will the mould fill. When I had finished drawing off the wax, I constructed a funnel-shaped furnace all round the model of my Perseus.

[1] It was built of bricks, so interlaced, the one above the other, that numerous apertures were left for the fire to exhale at. Then I began to lay on wood by degrees, and kept it burning two whole days and nights.

At length, when all the wax was gone, and the mould was well baked, I set to work at digging the pit in which to sink it. This I performed with scrupulous regard to all the rules of art. When I had finished that part of my work, I raised the mould by windla.s.ses and stout ropes to a perpendicular position, and suspending it with the greatest care one cubit above the level of the furnace, so that it hung exactly above the middle of the pit, I next lowered it gently down into the very bottom of the furnace, and had it firmly placed with every possible precaution for its safety. When this delicate operation was accomplished, I began to bank it up with the earth I had excavated; and, ever as the earth grew higher, I introduced its proper air-vents, which were little tubes of earthenware, such as folk use for drains and such-like purposes. [2] At length, I felt sure that it was admirably fixed, and that the filling-in of the pit and the placing of the air-vents had been properly performed.

I also could see that my work people understood my method, which differed very considerably from that of all the other masters in the trade. Feeling confident, then, that I could rely upon them, I next turned to my furnace, which I had filled with numerous pigs of copper and other bronze stuff. The pieces were piled according to the laws of art, that is to say, so resting one upon the other that the flames could play freely through them, in order that the metal might heat and liquefy the sooner. At last I called out heartily to set the furnace going. The logs of pine were heaped in, and, what with the unctuous resin of the wood and the good draught I had given, my furnace worked so well that I was obliged to rush from side to side to keep it going. The labour was more than I could stand; yet I forced myself to strain every nerve and muscle. To increase my anxieties, the workshop took fire, and we were afraid lest the roof should fall upon our heads; while, from the garden, such a storm of wind and rain kept blowing in, that it perceptibly cooled the furnace.

Battling thus with all these untoward circ.u.mstances for several hours, and exerting myself beyond even the measure of my powerful const.i.tution, I could at last bear up no longer, and a sudden fever, [3] of the utmost possible intensity, attacked me. I felt absolutely obliged to go and fling myself upon my bed. Sorely against my will having to drag myself away from the spot, I turned to my a.s.sistants, about ten or more in all, what with master-founders, hand-workers, country-fellows, and my own special journeymen, among whom was Bernardino Mannellini of Mugello, my apprentice through several years. To him in particular I spoke: ?Look, my dear Bernardino, that you observe the rules which I have taught you; do your best with all despatch, for the metal will soon be fused. You cannot go wrong; these honest men will get the channels ready; you will easily be able to drive back the two plugs with this pair of iron crooks; and I am sure that my mould will fill miraculously. I feel more ill than I ever did in all my life, and verily believe that it will kill me before a few hours are over. [4] Thus, with despair at heart, I left them, and betook myself to bed.

Note 1. This furnace, called 'manica,' was like a grain-hopper, so that the mould could stand upright in it as in a cup. The word 'manica' is the same as our 'manuch,' an antique form of sleeve.

Note 2. These air-vents, or 'sfiatatoi,' were introduced into the outer mould, which Cellini calls the 'tonaca,' or clay tunic laid upon the original model of baked clay and wax. They served the double purpose of drawing off the wax, whereby a s.p.a.ce was left for the molten bronze to enter, and also of facilitating the penetration of this molten metal by allowing a free escape of air and gas from the outer mould.

Note 3. 'Una febbre efimera.' Lit., 'a fever of one day?s duration.'

Note 4. Some technical terms require explanation in this sentence. The 'ca.n.a.li' or channels were sluices for carrying the molten metal from the furnace into the mould. The 'mandriani,' which I have translated by 'iron crooks,' were poles fitted at the end with curved irons, by which the openings of the furnace, 'plugs,' or in Italian 'spine,' could be partially or wholly driven back, so as to the molten metal flow through the channels into the mould. When the metal reached the mould, it entered in a red-hot stream between the 'tonaca,' or outside mould, and the 'anima,' or inner block, filling up exactly the s.p.a.ce which had previously been occupied by the wax extracted by a method of slow burning alluded to above. I believe that the process is known as 'casting a cire perdue.' The 'forma,' or mould, consisted of two pieces; one hollow ('la tonaca'), which gave shape to the bronze; one solid and rounded ('la anima'), which stood at a short interval within the former, and regulated the influx of the metal. See above, p. 354, note.

LXXVI

NO sooner had I got to bed, than I ordered my serving-maids to carry food and wine for all the men into the workshop; at the same time I cried: ?I shall not be alive tomorrow.? They tried to encourage me, arguing that my illness would pa.s.s over, since it came from excessive fatigue. In this way I spent two hours battling with the fever, which steadily increased, and calling out continually: ?I feel that I am dying.? My housekeeper, who was named Mona Fiore da Castel del Rio, a very notable manager and no less warm-hearted, kept chiding me for my discouragement; but, on the other hand, she paid me every kind attention which was possible. However, the sight of my physical pain and moral dejection so affected her, that, in spite of that brave heart of hers, she could not refrain from shedding tears; and yet, so far as she was able, she took good care I should not see them. While I was thus terribly afflicted, I beheld the figure of a man enter my chamber, twisted in his body into the form of a capital S. He raised a lamentable, doleful voice, like one who announces their last hour to men condemned to die upon the scaffold, and spoke these words: ?O Benvenuto!

your statue is spoiled, and there is no hope whatever of saving it.? No sooner had I heard the shriek of that wretch than I gave a howl which might have been heard from the sphere of flame. Jumping from my bed, I seized my clothes and began to dress. The maids, and my lads, and every one who came around to help me, got kicks or blows of the fist, while I kept crying out in lamentation: ?Ah! traitors! enviers! This is an act of treason, done by malice prepense! But I swear by G.o.d that I will sift it to the bottom, and before I die will leave such witness to the world of what I can do as shall make a score of mortals marvel.?