and for all."

The admiration and the good-will of the great lady transpire in these
somewhat incoherent and studied paragraphs. Their verbiage leaves much
to be desired in the way of logic and simplicity. It is pleasanter
perhaps to read a familiar note, sent probably by the hand of a
servant to Buonarroti's house in Rome.

"I beg you to let me have the crucifix a short while in my keeping,
even though it be unfinished. I want to show it to some gentlemen who
have come from the Most Reverend the Cardinal of Mantua. If you are
not working, will you not come to-day at your leisure and talk with
me?--Yours to command,

"The Marchioness of Pescara."

It seems that Michelangelo's exchange of letters and poems became at
last too urgent. We know it was his way (as in the case of Luigi del
Riccio) to carry on an almost daily correspondence for some while, and
then to drop it altogether when his mood changed. Vittoria, writing
from Viterbo, gives him a gentle and humorous hint that he is taking
up too much of her time:

"Magnificent Messer Michelangelo,--I did not reply earlier to your
letter, because it was, as one might say, an answer to my last: for I
thought that if you and I were to go on writing without intermission
according to my obligation and your courtesy, I should have to neglect
the Chapel of S. Catherine here, and be absent at the appointed hours
for company with my sisterhood, while you would have to leave the
Chapel of S. Paul, and be absent from morning through the day from
your sweet usual colloquy with painted forms, the which with their
natural accents do not speak to you less clearly than the living
persons round me speak to me. Thus we should both of us fail in our
duty, I to the brides, you to the vicar of Christ. For these reasons,
inasmuch as I am well assured of our steadfast friendship and firm
affection, bound by knots of Christian kindness, I do not think it
necessary to obtain the proof of your good-will in letters by writing
on my side, but rather to await with well-prepared mind some
substantial occasion for serving you. Meanwhile I address my prayers
to that Lord of whom you spoke to me with so fervent and humble a
heart when I left Rome, that when I return thither I may find you with
His image renewed and enlivened by true faith in your soul, in like
measure as you have painted it with perfect art in my Samaritan.
Believe me to remain always yours and your Urbino'