senti mai uscir di quella bocca se non parole onestissime, e che
avevan forza d' estinguere nella gioventu ogni incomposto e sfrenato
desiderio che in lei potesse cadere." Compare Scipione Ammirato, quoted
by Guasti, "Le Rime," p. xi.

[342] Her intense affection for the Marquis of Pescara, to whom she had
been betrothed by her father at the age of five, is sufficiently proved
by those many sonnets and _canzoni_ in which she speaks of him as her
Sun.

[343] See Grimm, vol. ii.

[344] See the Sonnets translated in my Appendix and in my _Sonnets of
Michael Angelo and Campanella_, London, Smith & Elder, 1878. See also the
letters to Cavalieri, quoted by Gotti, pp. 231, 232, 234. It is surely
strained criticism to conjecture, as Gotti has done, that these epistles
were meant for Vittoria, though written to Cavalieri. Taken together with
the sonnets and the letter of Bartolommeo Angiolini (Gotti, p. 233), they
seem to me to prove only Michael Angelo's warm love for this young man.

CHAPTER IX

LIFE OF BENVENUTO CELLINI

His Fame--His Autobiography--Its Value for the Student of History,
Manners, and Character, in the Renaissance--Birth, Parentage, and
Boyhood--Flute-playing--Apprenticeship to Marcone--Wanderjahr--The
Goldsmith's Trade at Florence--Torrigiani and England--Cellini leaves
Florence for Rome--Quarrel with the Guasconti--Homicidal Fury--Cellini a
Law to Himself--Three Periods in his Manhood--Life in Rome--Diego at the
Banquet--Renaissance Feeling for Physical Beauty--Sack of Rome--Miracles
in Cellini's Life--His Affections--Murder of his Brother's
Assassin--Sanctuary--Pardon and Absolution--Incantation in the
Colosseum--First Visit to France--Adventures on the Way--Accused of
Stealing Crown Jewels in Rome--Imprisonment in the Castle of S.
Angelo--The Governor--Cellini's Escape--His Visions--The Nature of his
Religion--Second Visit to France--The Wandering Court--Le Petit
Nesle--Cellini in the French Law Courts--Scene at Fontainebleau--Return to
Florence--Cosimo de' Medici as a Patron--Intrigues of a petty
Court--Bandinelli--The Duchess--Statue of Perseus--End of Cellini's
Life--Cellini and Machiavelli.

Few names in the history of Italian art are more renowned than that of
Benvenuto Cellini. This can hardly be attributed to the value of his
extant works; for though, while he lived, he was the greatest goldsmith of
his time, a skilled medallist and an admirable statuary, few of his many
masterpiece