ads, arms,
legs, and torsi, coloured in various ways; but, perceiving that this
involved him in greater difficulties than he had expected, through
the drying of the plaster, he returned to his former study of working
in relief. He made a figure of marble, three braccia in height, of a
young Mercury with a flute in his hand, with which he took great
pains, and it was extolled and held to be a rare work; and afterwards,
in the year 1530, it was bought by Giovan Battista della Palla and
sent to France to King Francis, who held it in great estimation.

Baccio devoted himself with great study and solicitude to examining
and reproducing the most minute details of anatomy, persevering in
this for many months and even years. And certainly one can praise
highly in this man his desire for honour and excellence in art, and
for working well therein; spurred by which desire, and by the most
fiery ardour, with which, rather than with aptitude or dexterity in
art, he had been endowed by nature from his earliest years, Baccio
spared himself no fatigue, never relaxed his efforts for a moment, was
always intent either on preparing for work or on working, always
occupied, and never to be found idle, thinking that by continual work
he would surpass all others who had ever practised his art, and
promising this result to himself as the reward of his incessant study
and endless labour. Continuing, therefore, his zealous study, he not
only produced a great number of sheets drawn in various ways with his
own hand, but also contrived to get Agostino Viniziano, the engraver
of prints, to engrave for him a nude Cleopatra and a larger plate
filled with various anatomical studies, in order to see whether this
would be successful; and the latter plate brought him great praise.

He then set himself to make in wax, in full-relief, a figure one braccio
and a half in height of S. Jerome in Penitence, lean beyond belief,
which showed on the bones the muscles all withered, a great part of the
nerves, and the skin dry and wrinkled; and with such diligence was this
work executed by him, that all the craftsmen, and particularly Leonardo
da Vinci, pronounced the opinion that there had never been seen a better
thing of its kind, nor one wrought with greater art. This figure Baccio
carried to Cardinal Giovanni de' Medici and to his brother the
Magnificent Giuliano, and by its means he made himself known to them as
the son of the goldsmith Michelagnolo; and they