Part 27 (1/2)
”I gather from your letter that you lend credence to certain envious and scoundrelly persons, who, since they cannot e me or rob me, write you a lot of lies They are a set of sharpers, and you are so silly as to believe what they say about h I were a baby Get rid of them, the scandalous, envious, ill-lived rascals As for ement you write about, I tell you that I could not be better off, or s As forrobbed, to which I think you allude, I assure you that I have people in my house whom I can trust and repose on Therefore, look to your own life, and do not think about my affairs, because I kno to take care of myself if it is needful, and am not a baby Keep well”
This is the last letter to Lionardo It is singular that Michelangelo's correspondence with his father, with Luigi del Riccio, with Tommaso dei Cavalieri, and with his nephew, all of whom he sincerely loved, should close upon a note of petulance and wrath The fact is no doubt accidental But it is strange
X
We have frequently had occasion to notice the extreelo's friends by his unreasonable irritability and readiness to credit injurious reports about them These defects of teery, and theythe most salient features of his personality I shall therefore add three other instances of the sa the inedited documents of the Buonarroti Archives Giovanni Francesco Fattucci was, as ell know, hisand difficult years, when the negotiations with the heirs of Pope Julius were being carried on; yet there exists one letter of unaffected sorrow from this excellent man, under date October 14, 1545, which shows that for soelo had suddenly chosen tothat he is wholly guiltless of things which his friend too credulously believed upon the strength of gossip
He expresses the deepest grief at this unjust and suspicious treatment The letter shows him to have been ned by Francesco Sangallo (the son of his old friend Giuliano), bearing no date, but obviously written when they were both in Florence, and therefore before the year 1535, carries the same burden of complaint The details are sufficiently picturesque to warrant the translation of a passage After expressing astonish his society, he proceeds: ”And now, thisthat I should annoy you, I came up and spoke to you, and you received , too, when I met you on the threshold with Granacci, and you left me by the shop of Pietro Osaio, and the other forenoon at S
Spirito, and to-day, it struck e, especially in the presence of Piloto and so rudge against me; but I marvel that you do not open out yourwhich is wholly false” The letter winds up with an earnest protest that he has always been a true and faithful friend He begs to be allowed to co that he would rather lose the good-will of the whole world than Michelangelo's
The third letter is so Still it illustrates the nervousness and apprehension under which Michelangelo's acquaintances continually lived The painter commonly known as Rosso Fiorentino was on a visit to Rome, where he studied the Sistine frescoes They do not appear to have altogether pleased him, and he uttered his opinion so elaborate epistle, full of adulation, to purge hielo's works People said that ”when I reached Rome, and entered the chapel painted by your hand, I exclai to adopt that manner” One of Buonarroti's pupils had been particularly offended Rosso protests that he rather likes the man for his loyalty; but he wishes to reelo may have received of his own irreverence or want of ad he is ood-will
It ation, that however hot and hasty Michelangelo may have been, and however readily he lent his ear to rumours, he contrived to renew the broken threads of friendshi+p with the persons he had hurt by his irritability
CHAPTER XV
I
During the winter of 1563-64 Michelangelo's friends in Rome became extremely anxious about his health, and kept Lionardo Buonarroti fros After New Year it was clear that he could not long h within a fewabroad in all weathers, and refused to surround hi a e On the 14th of February he see that day to Lionardo, gives expression to his grave anxiety: ”Walking through Roelo was ill
Accordingly I went at once to visit hi I found him out of doors on foot When I saw hiht and see about in such weather 'What do you want?' he answered; 'I am ill, and cannot find rest anywhere' The uncertainty of his speech, together with the look and colour of his face, made me feel extremely uneasy about his life The end reatly that it cannot be far off” Michelangelo did not leave the house again, but spent the next four days partly reclining in an ar, Dio a letter by the hand of Daniele da Volterra, which Michelangelo had signed The old , and wished to see his nephew ”You will learn from the enclosure how ill he is, and that he wants you to come to Rome He was taken ill yesterday I therefore exhort you to come at once, but do so with sufficient prudence The roads are bad now, and you are not used to travel by post This being so, you would run so your own time upon the way, you may feel at ease when you remember that Messer Tommaso dei Cavalieri, Messer Daniele, and I are here to render every possible assistance in your absence Beside us, Antonio, the old and faithful servant of your uncle, will be helpful in any service that may be expected from him” Diomede reiterates his advice that Lionardo should run no risks by travelling too fast ”If the illness portends mischief, which God forbid, you could not with the utmost haste arrive in time I left him just now, a little after 8 PM, in full possession of his faculties and quiet in his mind, but oppressed with a continued sleepiness This has annoyed him so much that, between three and four this afternoon, he tried to go out riding, as his wont is every evening in good weather The coldness of the weather and the weakness of his head and legs prevented him; so he returned to the fire-side, and settled down into an easy chair, which he greatly prefers to the bed” No ielo's friends, and two days later, on the 17th, Tiberio Calcagni took up the correspondence with Lionardo: ”This is to beg you to hasten your coh the weather be unfavourable It is certain now that our dear Messer Michelangelo ht to have the consolation of seeing you” Next day, on the 18th, Dio a will, but in the attitude of a perfect Christian, this evening, about the Ave Maria I was present, together with Messer Tommaso dei Cavalieri and Messer Daniele da Volterra, and we put everything in such order that you elo sent for our friend Messer Daniele, and besought him to take up his abode in the house until such time as you arrive, and this he will do”
It was at a little before five o'clock on the afternoon of February 18, 1564, that Michelangelo breathed his last The physicians who attended hio Donati, and Gherardo Fidelissi his lasthis soul into the hands of God, his body to the earth, and his substance to his nearest relatives; enjoining upon these last, when their hour cas of Jesus Christ”
On the following day, February 19, Averardo Serristori, the Florentine envoy in Roelo's decease: ”This ement I had made, the Governor sent to take an inventory of all the articles found in his house These were few, and very feings However, as there they duly registered The most important object was a box sealed with several seals, which the Governor ordered to be opened in the presence of Messer Tommaso dei Cavalieri and Maestro Daniele da Volterra, who had been sent for by Michelangelo before his death Soht thousand croere found in it, which have now been deposited with the Ubaldini bankers This was the command issued by the Governor, and those whoet the money The people of the house will be exa has been carried away from it This is not supposed to have been the case As far as drawings are concerned, they say that he burned what he had by him before he died What there is shall be handed over to his nephehen he comes, and this your Excellency can inforelo's house were a blocked-out statue of S Peter, an unfinished Christ with another figure, and a statuette of Christ with the cross, reseinal drawings were also catalogued, one of which (a Pieta) belonged to Toiven to the notary, while the rest came into the possession of Lionardo Buonarroti The cash-box, which had been sealed by Tommaso dei Cavalieri and Diomede Leoni, was handed over to the Ubaldini, and from them it passed to Lionardo Buonarroti at the end of February
II
Lionardo travelled by post to Rome, but did not arrive until three days after his uncle's death He began at once to take elo's re to the wish of the old man, frequently expressed and solemnly repeated two days before his death The corpse had been deposited in the Church of the SS Apostoli, where the funeral was celebrated with beco poree The Roard Buonarroti as one of themselves, and, when the report went abroad that he had expressed a wish to be buried in Florence, they refused to believe it, and began to project a decent monument to his memory in the Church of the SS Apostoli In order to secure his object, Lionardo was obliged to steal the body away, and to despatch it under the guise of oods to the custom-house of Florence Vasari wrote to hi hi-case had duly arrived, and had been left under seals until his, Lionardo's, arrival at the custom-house
About this ti elo's memory The scheme started by the Romans immediately after his death took its course, and the result is that tomb at the SS Apostoli, which undoubtedly was meant to be a statue-portrait of the man Vasari received from Lionardo Buonarroti commission to erect the tomb in S Croce The correspondence of the latter, both with Vasari and with Jacopo del Duca, who superintended the Roman monument, turns for some time upon these tombs It is much to Vasari's credit that he wanted to place the Pieta which Michelangelo had broken, above the S Croce sepulchre He writes upon the subject in these words: ”When I reflect that Michelangelo asserted, as is well known also to Daniele, Messer Tommaso dei Cavalieri, andthe Pieta of five figures, which he broke, to serve for his own toht to inquire how it came into the possession of Bandini Besides, there is an old roup who represents the person of the sculptor I entreat you, therefore, to takethis Pieta, and I will n Pierantonio Bandini is very courteous, and will probably consent In this way you will gain several points You will assign to your uncle's sepulchre the group he planned to place there, and you will be able to hand over the statues in Via Mozza to his Excellency, receiving in return enough money to complete the monument” Of the elo's workshop stood, I have seen no catalogue, but they certainly comprised the Victory, probably also the Adonis and the Apollino There had been so the Victory to the toroup could be applied in any forcible sense allegorically to Buonarroti as man or as artist
Eventually, as we know, the very ned by Vasari, which still exists at S Croce, was erected at Lionardo Buonarroti's expense, the Duke supplying a sufficiency of ht here to beof 1563, Cosimo founded an Acadeno” It embraced all the painters, architects, and sculptors of Florence in a kind of guild, with privileges, grades, honours, and officers The Duke condescended to be the first president of this acadeelo was elected unanimously by all the members as their uncontested principal and leader, ”inasmuch as this city, and peradventure the whole world, hath not a reat work upon which the Duke hoped to euild was the completion of the sacristy at S
Lorenzo Vasari's letter to Michelangelo shows that up to this date none of the statues had been erected in their proper places, and that it was intended to add a great nuures, as well as to adorn blank spaces in the walls with frescoes All the best artists of the tina, Cellini, Bronzino, Tribolo, Montelupo, A assistance, ”forasmuch as there is not one of us but hath learned in this sacristy, or rather in this our school, whatever excellence he possesses in the arts of design” We know already only too well that the scheelo's rapidly declining strength prevented hier artists with the necessary working drawings Cosiain possession of any sketches left in Rome after Buonarroti's death un at S Lorenzo
Well then, upon the news of Michelangelo's death, the acadehini, to deliberate upon the best way of paying hi po artists should contribute so, each in his own line, to the erection of a splendid catafalque, and a sub-committee of four elo Bronzino and Vasari, Benvenuto Cellini and Ahestand sculpture The church selected for the ceremony was S Lorenzo; the orator appointed was Benedetto Varchi Borghini, in his capacity of lieutenant or official representative, obtained the Duke's assent to the plan, which was subsequently carried out, as we shall see in due course
Notwithstanding what Vasari wrote to Lionardo about his uncle's coffin having been left at the Dogana, it seems that it was removed upon the very day of its arrival, March II, to the Oratory of the assunta, underneath the church of S Pietro Maggiore On the following day the painters, sculptors, and architects of the newly founded acade to transfer the body secretly to S
Croce They only brought a single pall of velvet, eold, and a crucifix, to place upon the bier When night fell, the elderone with another for the privilege of carrying the coffin Meantioing forward at S Pietro, gathered round, and soon the news spread through the city that Michelangelo was being borne to S Croce A vast concourse of people in this way cah the streets, and doing pathetic honour to the memory of the illustrious dead The spacious church of S Croce was crowded in all its length and breadth, so that the pall-bearers had considerable difficulty in reaching the sacristy with their precious burden In that place Don Vincenzo Borghini, as lieutenant of the acadeht he should be doing as pleasing to many of those present; and, as he afterwards admitted, he was personally anxious to behold in death one whoo as to have quite forgotten the occasion All of us who stood by expected to find the corpse already defaced by the outrage of the sepulchre, inaselo's death, and twenty-one since his consignreat surprise, the dead man lay before us perfect in all his parts, and without the evil odours of the grave; indeed, onein a sweet and very tranquil slumber Not only did the features of his countenance bear exactly the same aspect as in life, except for some inevitable pallor, but none of his liht The head and cheeks, to the touch, felt just as though he had breathed his last but a few hours since”