ed. The Duke had thought
that a public funeral would recall old memories, and might cause a
disturbance; but Michael Angelo had left Florence thirty years before
his death, and his connection with the city was forgotten by many.

The July following was appointed for a memorial service in his honor;
San Lorenzo was splendidly decorated; Varchi delivered an oration.
Leonardo, his nephew, erected a monument to him in Santa Croce, for
which the Duke gave the marble. His statue stands in the court of the
Uffizi with those of other great Florentines, but with no especial
prominence. His house in the Ghibelline Street is preserved as a museum,
and visitors there see many mementos of this great man.

In 1875 a grand festival was held in Florence to celebrate the four
hundredth anniversary of his birth. The ceremonies were impressive, and
certain documents relating to his life which had never been opened, by
command of the king, were given to suitable persons for examination. Mr.
Heath Wilson, an English artist, then residing at Florence, wrote a new
life of Michael Angelo, and the last signature which Victor Emmanuel
wrote before his death was upon the paper which conferred on Mr. Wilson
the Order of the _Corona d'Italia_, given as a recognition of his
services in writing this book.

The national pride in Michael Angelo is very strong. "All Italians feel
that he occupies the third place by the side of Dante and Raphael, and
forms with them a triumvirate of the greatest men produced by their
country--a poet, a painter, and one who was great in all arts. Who would
place a general or a statesman by their side as equal to them? It is art
alone which marks the prime of nations."

The genius of Michael Angelo and his spirit were powerful forces. They
pervaded the whole art of Italy to such an extent that it may be said
that all sculptors were his imitators, both while he lived and after his
death. He loved to treat strong subjects, such as demanded violent
movement and unusual positions. It was only a man of his genius who
could raise such subjects above grotesqueness and the one effect of
strange and unnatural exaggeration. As we look over all his works it
seems as if the idea of beauty and such things as are pleasing to the
ordinary mind rarely, if ever, came to his mind. Noble feeling, depth of
thought, strength, and grandeur are the associations which we have with
him, and in the hands of weaker men, as his imitators were, the