"Cosimus Secundus Dei gratiâ Magnus Dux Etruriæ ex voto."
There is also a King on horseback, of massy gold, two feet high, and an infinity of such like rarities. Looking at the Justice, in copper, set up on a column by Cosmo, in 1555, after the victory over Sienna, we were told that the Duke, asking a gentleman how he liked the piece, he answered, that he liked it very well, but that it stood too high for poor men to come at it.
Prince Leopold has, in this city, a very excellent collection of paintings, especially a St. Catherine of P. Veronese; a Venus of marble, veiled from the middle to the feet, esteemed to be of that Greek workman who made the Venus at the Medici's Palace in Rome, altogether as good, and better preserved, an inestimable statue, not long since found about Bologna.
Signor Gaddi is a lettered person, and has divers rarities, statues, and pictures of the best masters, and one bust of marble as much esteemed as the most antique in Italy, and many curious manuscripts; his best paintings are, a Virgin of del Sarto, mentioned by Vassari, a St. John, by Raphael, and an Ecce Homo, by Titian.
The hall of the Academy de la Crusca is hung about with impresses and devices painted, all of them relating to corn sifted from the bran; the seats are made like breadbaskets and other rustic instruments used about wheat, and the cushions of satin, like sacks.
We took our farewell of St. Laurence, more particularly noticing that piece of the Resurrection, which consists of a prodigious number of naked figures, the work of Pontormo. On the left hand is the Martyrdom of St. Laurence, by Bronzino, rarely painted indeed. In a chapel is the tomb of Pietro di Medici, and his brother John, of copper, excellently designed, standing on two lions' feet, which end in foliage, the work of M. Angelo. Over against this, are sepulchres of all the ducal family. The altar has a statue of the Virgin giving suck, and two Apostles. Paulus Jovius has the honor to be buried in the cloister. Behind the choir is the superb chapel of Ferdinand I., consisting of eight faces, four plain, four a little hollowed; in the other are to be the sepulchres, and a niche of paragon, for the statue of the prince now living, all of copper gilt; above, is a large table of porphyry, for an inscription for the Duke, in letters of jasper. The whole chapel, walls, pavement, and roof, are full of precious stones united with the moldings, which are also of gilded copper, and so are the bases and capitals of the columns. The tabernacle, with the whole altar, is inlaid with cornelians, lazuli, serpentine, agates, onyxes, etc. On the other side are six very large columns of rock crystal, eight figures of precious stones of several colors, inlaid in natural figures, not inferior to the best paintings, among which are many pearls, diamonds, amethysts, topazes, sumptuous and sparkling beyond description. The windows without side are of white marble. The library is the architecture of Raphael; before the port is a square vestibule of excellent art, of all the orders, without confusion; the ascent to it from the library is excellent. We numbered eighty-eight shelves, all MSS. and bound in red, chained; in all about 3,500 volumes, as they told us.
The Arsenal has sufficient to arm 70,000 men, accurately preserved and kept, with divers lusty pieces of
ordnance, whereof one is for a ball of 300 pounds weight, and another for 160, which weighs 72,500 pounds.
When I was at Florence, the celebrated masters were: for pietra-commessa (a kind of mosaic, or inlaying, of various colored marble, and other more precious stones), Dominico Benetti and Mazotti; the best statuary, Vincentio Brochi. This statuary makes those small figures in plaster and pasteboard, which so resemble copper that, till one handles them, they cannot be distinguished, he has so rare an art of bronzing them; I bought four of him. The best painter, Pietro Beretino di Cortona.
This Duke has a daily tribute for every courtezan, or prostitute, allowed to practice that infamous trade in his dominions, and so has his Holiness the Pope, but not so much in value.