I ABANDON THE SKETCH.
"Oh, what a fine sketch! It is Michael Angelo's 'Pietà.'"
"What?" said I.
"Oh, I see I have made a mistake," said my friend; "it is quite a different thing."
But none the less, this was the impression he had received and proclaimed, and, if not absolutely correct, was yet a sincere, true, spontaneous, and disinterested one; for my friend, although far from being an artist, or even a dilettante, was very intelligent, and a lover of art. So from that moment my mind was made up, and I said to myself—"Either I will find some new idea, even though it be a less beautiful one, or I will abandon the commission." I put by all the things that had been prepared, went to work on other work, and thought no more of it. I ought rather to say that I thought of it constantly, perhaps even too much; for it was an irritated, futile kind of thinking, that did harm, giving me no rest even during my sleep, and not leaving my mind sufficiently free or my inspirations calm enough to seize hold of a new idea and make another attempt.
A QUOTATION FROM DANTE.
The gentleman who had given me the commission still pressed me, and could not understand why I had set aside the work after having, as he said, so well conceived it, and after it had met with his own approval. To which I only answered these words, "Have patience!" And so he had, the poor Marchese, for I must do him the justice to say, that seeing that this was a painful subject to me, he never spoke to me any more about it; and only when affairs called him sometimes to Florence, after having talked to me about many other things, he would say, when leaving me, with his usual kind and genial manner, "Good-bye, Nannino, memento mei!" This blessed Latin in its brevity worked upon me more than a long sermon would have done; but it was useless to try to set myself to make another sketch, for think about it as much as I would, although in my brain there were any number of mediocre groups of the "Pietà," there was still wanting the one of my own creation, for the others belonged to me as some cantos of the 'Divina Commedia' do by force of memory. Àpropos of this, here is a curious little story. It happened one day when I was speaking with a man excellent in every respect, that, being to the point, I quoted the following well-known verses:—
"O voi che siete in piccioletta barca,
Desiderosi d'ascoltar, seguìti
Dietro al mio legno che cantando varca," &c.
"O ye who in some pretty little boat,
Eager to listen, have been following
Behind my ship, that singing sails along;"[14]
at which that excellent gentleman showed himself surprised, and asked if those verses were mine. I looked at him attentively, and saw in his face that he was perfectly frank, serious, and ingenuous; and so I had the impudence to say Yes. I regretted it afterwards, and still do so. That gentleman died some time ago, and I should not have told this joke if he had been still living, for even withholding his name, he might have recognised himself and taken it in ill part; but for all this, I repeat, he was an excellent man, stood high in his art, was professor, cavaliere, and commendatore of more than one order, but as ignorant, as it would seem, of our classics as I am of the propositions of Euclid.