o look like bronze, and executed with supreme grace
and extraordinary beauty. On the facade of the Buoni Auguri, near the
Minerva, are some very beautiful stories of Romulus, showing him when he
is marking out the site of his city with the plough, and when the
vultures are flying over him; wherein the vestments, features, and
persons of the ancients are so well imitated, that it truly appears as
if these were the very men themselves. Certain it is that in that field
of art no man ever had such power of design, such practised mastery, a
more beautiful manner, or greater facility. And every craftsman is so
struck with wonder every time that he sees these works, that he cannot
but be amazed at the manner in which Nature has been able in this age to
present her marvels to us by means of these men.

Below the Corte Savella, also, on the house bought by Signora Costanza,
they painted the Rape of the Sabines, a scene which reveals the raging
desire of the captors no less clearly than the terror and panic of the
wretched women thus carried off by various soldiers, some on horseback
and others in other ways. And not only in this one scene are there such
conceptions, but also (and even more) in the stories of Mucius and
Horatius, and in the Flight of Porsena, King of Tuscany. In the garden
of M. Stefano dal Bufalo, near the Fountain of Trevi, they executed some
most beautiful scenes of the Fount of Parnassus, in which they made
grotesques and little figures, painted very well in colour. On the
house of Baldassini, also, near S. Agostino, they executed scenes and
sgraffiti, with some heads of Emperors over the windows in the court. On
Montecavallo, near S. Agata, they painted a facade with a vast number of
different stories, such as the Vestal Tuccia bringing water from the
Tiber to the Temple in a sieve, and Claudia drawing the ship with her
girdle; and also the rout effected by Camillus while Brennus is weighing
the gold. On another wall, round the corner, are Romulus and his brother
being suckled by the wolf, and the terrible combat of Horatius, who is
defending the head of the bridge, alone against a thousand swords, while
behind him are many very beautiful figures in various attitudes, working
with might and main to hew away the bridge with pickaxes. There, also,
is Mucius Scaevola, who, before the eyes of Porsena, is burning his own
hand, which had erred in slaying the King's minister in place of the
King; and in the King's f