f
hands he receives the lost sight of his eyes, and is baptized; in which
work, either because the space was restricted, or whatever may have been
the reason, I did not satisfy myself completely, although it was perhaps
not displeasing to others, and in particular to Michelagnolo. For that
Pontiff, likewise, I executed another altar-picture for a chapel in the
Palace; but this, for reasons given elsewhere, was afterwards taken by
me to Arezzo and placed at the high-altar of the Pieve. If, however, I
had not fully satisfied either myself or others in the last-named
picture or in that of S. Pietro a Montorio, it would have been no matter
for surprise, because, being obliged to be continually at the beck and
call of that Pontiff, I was kept always moving, or rather, occupied in
making architectural designs, and particularly because I was the first
who designed and prepared all the inventions of the Vigna Julia, which
he caused to be erected at incredible expense. And although it was
executed afterwards by others, yet it was I who always committed to
drawing the caprices of the Pope, which were then given to Michelagnolo
to revise and correct. Jacopo Barozzi of Vignuola finished, after many
designs by his own hand, the rooms, halls, and many other ornaments of
that place; but the lower fountain was made under the direction of
myself and of Ammanati, who afterwards remained there and made the
loggia that is over the fountain. In that work, however, it was not
possible for a man to show his ability or to do anything right, because
from day to day new caprices came into the head of the Pope, which had
to be carried into execution according to the daily instructions given
by Messer Pier Giovanni Aliotti, Bishop of Forli.

During that time, being obliged in the year 1550 to go twice to
Florence on other affairs, the first time I finished the picture of S.
Gismondo, which the Duke went to see in the house of M. Ottaviano de'
Medici, where I executed it; and he liked it so much, that he said to me
that when I had finished my work in Rome I should come to serve him in
Florence, where I would receive orders as to what was to be done. I then
returned to Rome, where I gave completion to those works that I had
begun, and painted a picture of the Beheading of S. John for the
high-altar of the Company of the Misericordia, different not a little
from those that are generally done, which I set in place in the year
1553; and then I wished t