o his friends from the kind
that is generally seen at the present day, when there are very few to be
found who value anything in friendship beyond their own profit and
convenience.

After these things, it being a long time since he had been in his native
city of Volterra, he went there before returning to Rome, and was warmly
welcomed by his relatives and friends. Being besought to leave some
memorial of himself in his native place, he executed the story of the
Innocents in a small panel with little figures, which was held to be a
very beautiful work, and placed it in the Church of S. Piero. Then,
thinking that he would never return, he sold the little that he
possessed there by way of patrimony to Leonardo Ricciarelli, his nephew,
who, having been with him in Rome, and having learned very well how to
work in stucco, afterwards served Giorgio Vasari for three years, in
company with many others, in the works that were executed at that time
in the Palace of the Duke.

When Daniello had finally returned to Rome, Pope Paul IV having a desire
to throw to the ground the Judgment of Michelagnolo on account of the
nudes, which seemed to him to display the parts of shame in an unseemly
manner, it was said by the Cardinals and by men of judgment that it
would be a great sin to spoil them, and they found a way out of it,
which was that Daniello should paint some light garments to cover them;
and the business was afterwards finished in the time of Pius IV by
repainting the S. Catherine and the S. Biagio, which were thought to be
unseemly.

[Illustration: THE MASSACRE OF THE INNOCENTS

(_After the painting by =Daniello Ricciarelli=. Florence: Uffizi, 1107_)

_Anderson_]

In the meantime he began the statues for the Chapel of the above-named
Cardinal of Montepulciano, and the S. Michael for the great portal; but
none the less, being a man who was always going from one notion to
another, he did not work with the promptitude that he could and should
have used. About this time, after King Henry of France had been killed
in a tournament, Signor Ruberto Strozzi being about to come to Italy and
to Rome, Queen Caterina de' Medici, having been left Regent in that
kingdom, and wishing to erect some honourable memorial to her dead
husband, commanded the said Ruberto to confer with Buonarroti and to
contrive to have her desire in that matter fulfilled. Wherefore, having
arrived in Rome, he spoke long of the matter with Michelagnolo, who,