angelo's body was carried by the brotherhood to
which he belonged, the Confratelli di S. Giovanni Pecolla, to the church
of the SS. Apostoli for the funeral mass. The pope had meant to have the
body placed in St. Peter's, but Michelangelo had expressed a desire to
return to Florence dead, as he could not do so living,[122] and Lionardo
was determined to carry out his last wishes in accordance with the
orders of Cosmo de' Medici, who promised to erect a statue to him in the
Florentine cathedral. The Romans would not allow the body to be taken
away, so it was necessary to wrap it secretly in a roll of cloth and
to send it to Florence on the twenty-ninth as merchandise.

[Illustration: CHRIST AND THE SAINTS

Detail from The Last Judgment (1536-1541). Sistine Chapel.]

Thus did Michelangelo return to his country on March 10, 1564. The next
day the artists of Florence carried his body by torchlight to the church
of Santa Croce. The crowd was so great that they could hardly force
their way through the church. In the sacristy Vincenzo Borghini,
Director of the Florentine Academy of Painters, had the coffin opened.
The body was intact and Michelangelo seemed asleep. He was dressed in
black velvet, a felt hat on his head, and on his feet boots and spurs,
just as while living he had had the habit of sleeping, dressed and ready
to rise and take up his work.[123]

The Academy of Florence had been preparing since March 2d for the solemn
obsequies. Varchi was given the funeral oration, Bronzino, Vasari,
Cellini and Ammanati the artistic arrangements. On the 14th of July,
1564, in the church of S. Lorenzo, a triumphant memorial service was
held in the presence of a hundred artists and an innumerable crowd of
people.[124]

Between the two side doors arose a huge catafalque. Daniele da Volterra
had wanted to use for the tomb the fine Victory and other sculptures of
the Via Mozza, but this most reverent and appropriate idea for the
glorification of the master was not accepted.[125] Instead, a huge
arrangement, disproportionate and swollen, was erected, a real tower of
Babel to which each sculptor of Florence brought his stone. It was
undoubtedly, however, a fine thought to associate all the world of
artists in a supreme homage to the man whom Italy considered the
incarnation of her genius and the God himself of art.[126] The result of
these combined efforts was only to prove more strikingly the contrast
between the man who was dead