amily. Some
time before this his patron had asked Canova to make for him a group of
Orpheus and Eurydice, taking the moment when Eurydice beholds her lover
torn away from her forever. Canova had been busy with this in his
leisure hours in Venice, and he took with him to Asolo everything
necessary to the work. He completed the Eurydice in his sixteenth year;
it was life-size, and cut from _pietra di Costosa_.

With this first attempt Canova became convinced that the small models
such as were in use by sculptors were quite insufficient to good work,
and he determined that his models should be of the size which the
finished work would have, even when colossal.

After this time he had his studio in a cell of the monastery of the
Augustine friars attached to the Church of San Stefano, in Venice.
During the next three years he was occupied with his Orpheus and a bust
of the Doge Renier. At this time he studied entirely from nature; he
devoted himself to the pursuit of anatomy, and after a time was
accustomed to make dissections in order to sketch or model from
important parts or some conformations that he desired in particular
instances.

In 1776 his Orpheus was finished and exhibited, and it chanced to be at
the annual festival of the Ascension, when the opera of Orpheus was
brought out in Venice. Canova was accustomed to say that the praise he
then received was "that which made him a sculptor;" and so grateful was
he for it that later, when he became Marquis of Ischia, he chose for his
armorial ensigns the lyre and serpent which are the mythological symbols
of Orpheus and Eurydice. The Senator Grimani ordered a copy of the
Orpheus, and this was the first work of Canova in Carrara marble.

He soon found his workshop too small, and removed to one in the street
of San Maurizio, where he remained until he left his native country. His
next work was a statue of AEsculapius, larger than life; a short time
before his death, when he saw this statue, he sorrowfully declared that
"his progress had by no means corresponded with the indications of
excellence in this performance of his youth." About this time he
executed an Apollo and Daphne which was never entirely finished, and
when twenty-two years old he completed a group of Daedalus and Icarus for
the Senator Pisani. This was intended for an exterior decoration of his
palace; but when it was done Pisani considered it worthy of a place in
his gallery, already famous on account of