, but he himself, and all that he had were at the nobleman's
service.

Lorenzo at once took Michael Angelo into his palace; he clothed the boy
properly, and gave him five ducats a month for spending money. Each day
Lorenzo gave an entertainment, and it was the rule that the first person
who came should sit next the duke at the head of the table. Michael
Angelo often had this place, and he soon became a great favorite with
Lorenzo, and obtained besides the greatest advantages from the life in
the palace; for many eminent men from all parts of the world came to
visit there, and all sorts of subjects were discussed in such a manner
that a young man could learn much of the world and what was in it, and
acquire a feeling of ease with strangers and in society such as few
young persons possess.

Michael Angelo was but seventeen years old when Poliziano advised him to
attempt an original work, and gave him the marble for a relief of the
contest between Hercules and the Centaurs. This work surprised every
one, and is still preserved in the collection of the Buonarroti family.
In the year 1492 he also made a relief of the Madonna Suckling the Child
Jesus, which is also in the same place. In the same year Lorenzo de'
Medici died, and Michael Angelo, full of grief, went to his father's
house and arranged a studio there. After a time Piero de Medici invited
him to come back to the palace, and he went; but it was no more the
same place as formerly, and he was unhappy there. Soon political
troubles drove the Medici from power, and in 1494, in the midst of the
confusion, Michael Angelo escaped to Venice. There he made friends with
Gian Francesco Aldovrandi of Bologna, and was persuaded by that nobleman
to accompany him to his own city.

[Illustration: FIG. 104.--MICHAEL ANGELO'S ANGEL. _Bologna._]

While at Bologna he executed an angel holding a candelabra, which is one
of the most lovely and pleasing things he ever made (Fig. 104). When he
received the commission to ornament the sarcophagus which contained the
remains of San Domenico in the Church of San Petronio, the Bolognese
artists were so angry at being thus set aside for a stranger, and a
youth of twenty, that they threatened vengeance on him, and he returned
to Florence.

It was at this time that he executed a Cupid, which was the means of
leading him to Rome. The story is that when he had the statue completed
Lorenzo de' Medici, a relative of his first patron, advised him