ike
himself that he had little satisfaction from them.

Matteo was so gentle and courteous, that he welcomed with extraordinary
warmth anyone who arrived in France, not only from his own city of
Verona, but from every part of Lombardy. His dearest friend in those
regions was Paolo Emilio of Verona, who wrote the history of France in
the Latin tongue. Matteo taught many disciples, among them a
fellow-Veronese, the brother of Domenico Brusciasorzi, two of his
nephews, who went to Flanders, and many other Italians and Frenchmen, of
whom there is no need to make mention. And finally he died, not long
after the death of King Francis of France.

But to come at length to the marvellous art of Valerio Vicentino, of
whom we have now to speak: this master executed so many works, both
great and small, either in intaglio or in relief, and all with such a
finish and such facility, that it is a thing incredible. If Nature had
made Valerio a good master of design, even as she made him most
excellent in engraving, in which he executed his works with
extraordinary patience, diligence, and rapidity, he would not merely
have equalled the ancients, as he did, but would have surpassed them by
a great measure; and even so he had such judgment, that he always
availed himself in his works of the designs of others or of the intagli
of the ancients.

[Illustration: CASKET OF ROCK CRYSTAL

(_After_ Valerio Vincentino (Valerio Belli). _Florence; Uffizi, Cabinet
of Gems_)

_Alinari_]

Valerio fashioned for Pope Clement VII a casket entirely of crystal,
wrought with admirable mastery, for which he received two thousand
crowns of gold from that Pontiff in return for his labour. In those
crystals Valerio engraved the whole Passion of Jesus Christ, after the
designs of others; and that casket was afterwards presented by Pope
Clement to King Francis at Nice, at the time when his niece went to be
married to the Duke of Orleans, who afterwards became King Henry. For
the same Pope Valerio made some most beautiful paxes, and a divine cross
of crystal, and likewise dies for striking medals, containing the
portrait of Pope Clement, with very beautiful reverses; and through him
that art produced in his day many masters, both from Milan and from
other parts, who had grown to such a number before the sack of Rome,
that it was a marvel. He made the medals of the twelve Emperors, with
their reverses, copying the most beautiful antiques, with a great number