was
buried here with public honours in 1394. And then in the north aisle you
may see the statue called a portrait of Poggio Bracciolini[89] by
Donatello. Donatello carved a number of statues, of which nine have been
identified, for the Opera del Duomo, three of these are now in the
Cathedral: the Poggio, the so-called Joshua in the south aisle, which
has been said to be a portrait of Gianozzo Manetti; and the St. John
the Evangelist in the eastern part of the nave. The Poggio certainly
belongs to the series: it would be delightful if the cryptic writing on
the borders of the garment were to prove it to be the Job. The St. John
Evangelist is an earlier work than the Poggio; it was begun when
Donatello was twenty-two years old, and, as Lord Balcarres says, "it
challenges comparison with one worthy rival, the Moses of Michelangelo."
It was to have stood on one side of the central door. Something of the
wonder of this work in its own time may be understood if we compare it,
not with the later work of Michelangelo, but with the statues of St.
Mark by Niccolo d'Arezzo, the St. Luke of Nanni di Banco, and the St.
Matthew of Bernardo Ciuffagni, which were to stand beside it and are now
placed in a good light in the nave, while the work of Donatello is
almost invisible in this dark apsidal chapel. Of the other works which
Donatello made for the Opera del Duomo, the David is in the Bargello,
while the Jeremiah, and Habbakuk, the so-called Zuccone, the Abraham,
and St. John Baptist are still on the Campanile.

The octagonal choir screens carved in relief by Baccio Bandinelli, whom
Cellini hated so scornfully because he spoke lightly of Michelangelo,
will not keep you long; but there behind the high altar is an unfinished
Pieta by Michelangelo himself. It is a late work, but in that fallen
Divine Figure just caught in Madonna's arms you may see perhaps the most
beautiful thing in the church, less splendid but more pitiful than the
St. John of Donatello, but certainly not less moving than that severe,
indomitable son of thunder. Above, the dome soars into heaven; that
mighty dome, higher than St. Peter's, the despair of Michelangelo, one
of the beauties of the world. One wanders about the church looking at
the bronze doors of the Sagrestia Nuova, or the terra-cottas of Luca
della Robbia, always to return to that miracle of Brunellesco's. Not far
away in the south aisle you come upon his monument with his portrait in
marble by Buggia