was known that, while occupied
in the pursuit of his pleasures, the works undertaken by him
received little or none of his attention; for which reason
Cosimo de' Medici, wishing him to execute a work in his own palace,
shut him up, that he might not waste his time in running about;
but having endured this confinement for two days, he then made ropes
with the sheets of his bed, which he cut to pieces for that purpose,
and so having let himself down from a window, escaped,
and for several days gave himself up to his amusements.
When Cosimo found that the painter had disappeared, he caused him
to be sought, and Fra Filippo at last returned to his work,
but from that time forward Cosimo gave him liberty to go in and out
at his pleasure, repenting greatly of having previously shut him up,
when he considered the danger that Fra Filippo had incurred by
his folly in descending from the window; and ever afterwards laboring
to keep him to his work by kindness only, he was by this means
much more promptly and effectually served by the painter,
and was wont to say that the excellencies of rare genius
were as forms of light and not beasts of burden."

A Face.

The speaker imagines the head of a beautiful girl he knows,
"painted upon a background of pale gold, such as the Tuscan's
early art prefers", and details the picture as he would have it.

The Bishop orders his Tomb.

The Bishop orders his Tomb at St. Praxed's Church. *
{Rome, 15--.}

--
* First published in `Hood's Magazine', March, 1845, No.
III., vol. iii., pp. 237-239, under the title `The Tomb at
St. Praxed's (Rome, 15--)'.

"This poem and `The Flight of the Duchess' were sent by
Browning to help make up the numbers of the magazine while
Hood lay dying."--Furnivall's `Bibliography of Robert
Browning', p. 48.
--

The dying Bishop pleads with his natural sons that they give him
the sumptuous tomb they stand pledged to,--such a tomb
as will excite the envy of his old enemy Gandolf, who cheated him out
of a favorite niche in St. Praxed's Church, by dying before him,
and securing it for his tomb.

It is not necessary to suppose that the natural sons are present.
His, perhaps, delirious mind is occupied with the precious
marbles and stones and other luxuries he has loved to much,
and with his old rival and enemy, Gandolf.

John Ruskin, in his `Modern Painters' (Vol. IV., chap. XX.,
Section 32), remark