ning to show signs of falling, on account of the weight being too
great for the walls. And it would certainly have fallen down but for the
genius of Antonio, who filled up those little chambers with the aid of
props and beams, and refounded the whole fabric, thus making it as firm
and solid as it had ever been in the beginning.

Meanwhile the Florentine colony had begun their church in the Strada
Giulia, behind the Banchi, from the design of Jacopo Sansovino. But they
had chosen a site that extended too far into the river, so that,
compelled by necessity, they spent twelve thousand crowns on foundations
in the water, which were executed in a very secure and beautiful manner
by Antonio, who found the way after Jacopo had failed to discover it;
and several braccia of the edifice were built over the water. Antonio
made a model so excellent, that, if the work had been carried to
completion, it would have been something stupendous. Nevertheless, it
was a great error, giving proof of little judgment, on the part of those
who were at that time the heads of that colony in Rome, for they should
never have allowed the architects to found so large a church in so
terrible a river, for the sake of gaining twenty braccia of length, and
to throw away so many thousands of crowns on foundations, only to be
compelled to contend with that river for ever; particularly because, by
bringing that church forward and giving it another form, they might have
built it on solid ground, and, what is more, might have carried the
whole to completion with almost the same expense. And if they trusted
in the riches of the merchants of that colony, it was seen afterwards
how fallacious such a hope was, for in all the years that the
pontificate was held by Leo and Clement of the Medici family, by Julius
III, and by Marcellus, who all came from Florentine territory, although
the last-named lived but a short time, and for all the greatness of so
many Cardinals and the riches of so many merchants, it remained, as it
still does, in the same condition in which it was left by our San Gallo.
It is clear, therefore, that architects and those who cause buildings to
be erected should look well to the end and to every matter, before
setting their hands to works of importance.

But to return to Antonio: the fortress of Monte Fiascone had been
formerly built by Pope Urban, and he restored it at the commission of
the Pope, who took him to those parts one summer in his t