cut out of
one of the sides of the tower and closed the gap with wooden
supports, a braccia and a half long, he then set fire to the props,
and so soon as these were consumed the tower fell down and was
totally destroyed. The idea seemed so ingenious and so well adapted
for such emergencies, that it afterwards came into general use, so
that whenever it was necessary to destroy a building, the task was
speedily accomplished in this most facile manner.

Niccola was present when the foundations of the Duomo of Siena were
laid, and he designed the Church of S. Giovanni in that city. He went
back to Florence in the year of the return of the Guelphs, and
designed the church of S. Trinita, and the women's convent at Faenza,
pulled down in recent years to make the citadel. Being subsequently
summoned to Naples, and not wishing to abandon his enterprises in
Tuscany, he sent thither his pupil Maglione, sculptor and architect,
who in the time of Conrad afterwards built the church of S. Lorenzo
at Naples, finished a part of the Vescorado, and made some tombs
there, in which he closely imitated the manner of his master,
Niccola. In the meantime Niccola went to Volterra, in the year that
the people of that place came under the dominion of the Florentines
(1254), in response to a summons, because they wished him to enlarge
their Duomo, which was small; and although it was very irregular, he
improved its appearance, and made it more magnificent than it was
originally. Then at length he returned to Pisa and made the marble
pulpit of S. Giovanni, devoting all his skill to it, so that he might
leave a memory of himself in his native place. Among other things in
it he carved the Last Judgment, filling it with a number of figures,
and if they are not perfectly designed they are at any rate executed
with patience and diligence, as may be seen; and because he
considered that he had completed a work which was worthy of praise,
as indeed he had, he carved the following lines at the foot:

"Anno milleno bis centum bisque trideno.
Hoc opus insigne sculpsit Nicola Pisanus."

The people of Siena, moved by the fame of this work, which greatly
delighted not only the Pisans, but whoever saw it, assigned to
Niccola the task of making for their Duomo the pulpit from which the
gospel is sung, at the time when Guglielmo Mariscotti was praetor. In
this Niccola introduced a number of subjects from the life of Jesus
Christ, especially remarka