ich account he has always had intercourse and strait
friendship with the greatest men and choicest spirits of our age; and
of this may serve as a proof the work described above, executed by him
with much poetic feeling. By the hand of Danese is the nude statue of
the Sun above the ornament of the well in the courtyard of the Mint,
at Venice; in place of which those Signori desired a Justice, but
Danese considered that in that place the Sun is more appropriate. This
figure has a bar of gold in the left hand, and in the right hand a
sceptre, at the end of which he made an eye, and about the head the
rays of the sun, and above all the globe of the world encircled by the
serpent that holds the tail in the mouth, with some little mounds of
gold about the globe, generated by him. Danese would have liked to
make two other statues, that of the Moon for silver and another for
copper, with that of the Sun for gold; but it was enough for those
Signori that there should be that of gold, as the most perfect of all
the metals. The same Danese has begun another work in memory of Prince
Loredano, Doge of Venice, wherein it is hoped that in invention and
fantasy he is to surpass by a great measure all his other labours;
which work is to be placed in the Church of SS. Giovanni e Polo in
Venice. But, since this master is alive and still constantly at work
for the benefit of the world and of art, I shall say nothing more of
him; nor of other disciples of Sansovino. I will not omit, however, to
speak briefly of some other excellent craftsmen, sculptors and
painters, from that dominion of Venice, taking my opportunity from
those mentioned above, in order to make an end of speaking of them in
this Life of Sansovino.

[Illustration: PALAZZO CHIERICATI

(_After =Andrea Palladio=. Vicenza_)

_Alinari_]

Vicenza, then, has likewise had at various times sculptors, painters,
and architects, of some of whom record was made in the Life of
Vittore Scarpaccia, and particularly of those who flourished in the
time of Mantegna and learned to draw from him; and such were
Bartolommeo Montagna, Francesco Verbo, and Giovanni Speranza, all
painters, by whose hands are many pictures that are dispersed
throughout Vicenza. Now in the same city there are many sculptures by
the hand of one Giovanni, a carver and architect, which are passing
good, although his proper profession has been to carve foliage and
animals, as he still does excellently well, although h