orence,
and Ippolito wandered about until Clement VII, the second Medici
Pope, was in Rome, after the sack, and, joining him there, he was,
against his will, made a cardinal, and sent to Hungary: Clement's idea
being to establish Alessandro (his natural son) as Duke of Florence,
and squeeze Ippolito, the rightful heir, out. This, Clement succeeded
in doing, and the repulsive and squalid-minded Alessandro--known as
the Mule--was installed. Ippolito, in whom this proceeding caused
deep grief, settled in Bologna and took to scholarship, among other
tasks translating part of the Aeneid into Italian blank verse;
but when Clement died and thus liberated Rome from a vile tyranny,
he was with him and protected his corpse from the angry mob. That
was in 1534, when Ippolito was twenty-seven. In the following year
a number of exiles from Florence who could not endure Alessandro's
offensive ways, or had been forced by him to fly, decided to appeal
to the Emperor Charles V for assistance against such a contemptible
ruler; and Ippolito headed the mission; but before he could reach the
Emperor an emissary of Alessandro's succeeded in poisoning him. Such
was Ippolito de' Medici, grandson of the great Lorenzo, whom Titian
painted, probably when he was in Bologna, in 1533 or 1534.

This room also contains a nice little open decorative scene--like a
sketch for a fresco--of the Death of Lucrezia, No. 388, attributed
to the School of Botticelli, and above it a good Royal Academy Andrea
del Sarto.

The next is the best of these small rooms--the Sala of
Prometheus--where on Sundays most people spend their time in
astonishment over the inlaid tables, but where Tuscan art also is
very beautiful. The most famous picture is, I suppose, the circular
Filippino Lippi, No. 343, but although the lively background is
very entertaining and the Virgin most wonderfully painted, the Child
is a serious blemish. The next favourite, if not the first, is the
Perugino on the easel--No. 219--one of his loveliest small pictures,
with an evening glow among the Apennines such as no other painter
could capture. Other fine works here are the Fra Bartolommeo, No. 256,
over the door, a Holy Family, very pretty and characteristic, and his
"Ecce Homo," next it; the adorable circular Botticini (as the catalogue
calls it, although the photographers waver between Botticelli and
Filippino Lippi), No. 347, with its myriad roses and children with
their little folded hands a