ude Mercury of bronze
about one braccio in height, standing on a ball in the act of taking
flight. In the hands of that figure Rustici placed an instrument that is
made to revolve by the water that it pours down from above, in the
following manner: one leg being perforated, a pipe passes through it and
through the torso, and the water, having risen to the mouth of the
figure, falls upon that instrument, which is balanced with four thin
plates fixed after the manner of a butterfly, and causes it to revolve.
That figure, I say, for a small work, was much extolled. Not long
afterwards, Giovan Francesco made for the same Cardinal the model for a
David to be cast in bronze (similar to that executed by Donato, as has
been related, for the elder Cosimo, the Magnificent), for placing in the
first court, whence the other had been taken away. That model gave much
satisfaction, but, by reason of a certain dilatoriness in Giovan
Francesco, it was never cast in bronze; wherefore the Orpheus in marble
of Bandinelli was placed there, and the David of clay made by Rustici,
which was a very rare work, came to an evil end, which was a very great
loss. Giovan Francesco made an Annunciation in half-relief in a large
medallion, with a most beautiful perspective-view, in which he was
assisted by the painter Raffaello Bello and by Niccolo Soggi. This, when
cast in bronze, proved to be a work of such rare beauty, that there was
nothing more beautiful to be seen; and it was sent to the King of Spain.
And then he executed in marble, in another similar medallion, a Madonna
with the Child in her arms and S. John the Baptist as a little boy,
which was placed in the first hall in the residence of the Consuls of
the Guild of Por Santa Maria.

By these works Giovan Francesco came into great credit, and the Consuls
of the Guild of Merchants, who had caused to be removed certain clumsy
figures of marble that were over the three doors of the Temple of S.
Giovanni (made, as has been related, in the year 1240), after allotting
to Contucci of Sansovino those that were to be set up in place of the
old ones over the door that faces towards the Misericordia, allotted to
Rustici those that were to be placed over the door that faces towards
the canonical buildings of that temple, on the condition that he should
make three figures of bronze of four braccia each, representing the same
persons as the old ones--namely, S. John in the act of preaching,
standing betwe