in S. Lorenzo wherein Michelagnolo
worked, two statues in one block of marble, representing Hercules
crushing Antaeus, which the Duke was having executed by the sculptor
Fra Giovanni Agnolo. These were well advanced; but Baccio, saying to
the Duke that the friar had spoilt that marble, broke it into many
pieces.

In the end, he constructed all the base of the tomb, which is an
isolated pedestal about four braccia on every side, and has at the
foot a socle with a moulding in the manner of a base, which goes right
round, and with a fillet at the top, such as is generally made for
pedestals; and above this a cyma three-quarters of a braccio in
height, which goes inwards in a concave curve, inverted, after the
manner of a frieze, on which are carved some horse's skulls bound one
to another with draperies; and above the whole was to be a smaller
pedestal, with a seated statue of four braccia and a half, armed in
the ancient fashion, and holding in the hand the baton of a
condottiere captain of armies, which was to represent the person of
the invincible Signor Giovanni de' Medici. This statue was begun by
him from a block of marble, and carried well on, but never finished or
placed on the base built for it. It is true that on the front of that
base he finished entirely a scene of marble in half-relief, with
figures about two braccia high, in which he represented Signor
Giovanni seated, to whom are being brought many prisoners, soldiers,
women with dishevelled hair, and nude figures, but all without
invention and without revealing any feeling. At the end of the scene,
indeed, there is a figure with a pig on the shoulder, which is said to
have been made by Baccio to represent Messer Baldassarre da Pescia, in
derision; for Baccio looked upon him as his enemy, since about this
time Messer Baldassarre, as has been related above, had allotted the
two statues of Leo and Clement to other sculptors, and, moreover, had
so gone to work in Rome that Baccio had perforce to restore at great
inconvenience the money that he had received beyond his due for those
statues and figures.

During this time Baccio had given his attention to nothing else but
demonstrating to Duke Cosimo how much the glory of the ancients had
lived through their statues and buildings, saying that his Excellency
should seek to obtain in the same way immortality for himself and his
actions in the ages to come. Then, after he had brought the tomb of
Signor Giovanni ne