ts last day. In this part
Giulio painted Briareus in a dark cavern, almost covered with vast
fragments of mountains, and the other Giants all crushed and some dead
beneath the ruins of the mountains. Besides this, through an opening in
the darkness of a grotto, which reveals a distant landscape painted with
beautiful judgment, may be seen many Giants flying, all smitten by the
thunderbolts of Jove, and, as it were, on the point of being overwhelmed
at that moment by the fragments of the mountains, like the others. In
another part Giulio depicted other Giants, upon whom are falling
temples, columns, and other pieces of buildings, making a vast slaughter
and havoc of those proud beings. And in this part, among those falling
fragments of buildings, stands the fireplace of the room, which, when
there is a fire in it, makes it appear as if the Giants are burning, for
Pluto is painted there, flying towards the centre with his chariot
drawn by lean horses, and accompanied by the Furies of Hell; and thus
Giulio, not departing from the subject of the story with this invention
of the fire, made a most beautiful adornment for the fireplace.

In this work, moreover, in order to render it the more fearsome and
terrible, Giulio represented the Giants, huge and fantastic in aspect,
falling to the earth, smitten in various ways by the lightnings and
thunderbolts; some in the foreground and others in the background, some
dead, others wounded, and others again covered by mountains and the
ruins of buildings. Wherefore let no one ever think to see any work of
the brush more horrible and terrifying, or more natural than this one;
and whoever enters that room and sees the windows, doors, and other
suchlike things all awry and, as it were, on the point of falling, and
the mountains and buildings hurtling down, cannot but fear that
everything will fall upon him, and, above all, as he sees the Gods in
the Heaven rushing, some here, some there, and all in flight. And what
is most marvellous in the work is to see that the whole of the painting
has neither beginning nor end, but is so well joined and connected
together, without any divisions or ornamental partitions, that the
things which are near the buildings appear very large, and those in the
distance, where the landscapes are, go on receding into infinity; whence
that room, which is not more than fifteen braccia in length, has the
appearance of open country. Moreover, the pavement being of sm