a few days. Whereupon Tribolo, undertaking the charge of directing
all the building by himself, perceived that, although the waters
brought to Castello were in great abundance, nevertheless they were
not sufficient for all that he had made up his mind to do; not to
mention that, coming from Castellina, they did not rise to the height
that he required for his purposes. Having therefore obtained from the
Lord Duke a commission to conduct thither the waters of Petraia, a
place more than one hundred and fifty braccia above Castello, which
are good and very abundant, he caused a conduit to be made, similar to
the other, and so high that one can enter into it, to the end that
thus those waters of Petraia might come to the fish-pond through
another aqueduct with enough fall for the fish-pond and the great
fountain.

This done, Tribolo began to build the above-mentioned grotto,
proposing to make it with three niches, in a beautiful architectural
design, and likewise the two fountains that were one on either side of
it. In one of these there was to be a large statue of stone,
representing Monte Asinaio, which, pressing its beard, was to pour
water from its mouth into a basin that was to be in front of it; from
which basin the water, issuing by a hidden channel, and passing under
the wall, was to flow to the fountain that there is at the present day
behind the wall, at the end of the slope of the garden of the
labyrinth, pouring into the vase on the shoulder of the figure of the
River Mugnone, which is in a large niche of grey-stone decorated with
most beautiful ornaments, and all covered with sponge-stone. This
work, if it had been finished in all its perfection, even as it is in
part, would have had great similarity to the reality, since the
Mugnone rises from Monte Asinaio.

For the Mugnone, then, to describe that which has been done, Tribolo
made a figure of grey-stone, four braccia in length, and reclining in
a very beautiful attitude, which has upon one shoulder a vase that
pours water into a basin, and rests the other on the ground, leaning
upon it, with the left leg crossed over the right. And behind this
river is a woman representing Fiesole, wholly naked, issuing from
among the sponge-stones and rocks in the middle of the niche, and
holding in the hand a moon which is the ancient emblem of the people
of Fiesole. Below this niche is a very large basin supported by two
great Capricorns, which are one of the devices of