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The traveler who, turning his back to the gates of Ghiberti, passes, for the first time, under the glittering new mosaics and through the main doors of Santa Maria Del Fiore experiences a sensation. He leaves behind him the façade, dazzling in its patterns of black and white marble, all laced with sculpture, he enters to dim, bare vastness surely, never was bleaker lining to a splendid exterior.

And so all the stone-cutters and carvers of S. Maria del Fiore were set to work, and a beginning was made with the structure. Bandinelli had resolved, with the advice of Giuliano, to let the work remain out of square, following in part the course of the wall.

A beginning was made with the quarrying and cutting of the Fossato stone, in order to make the ornamentation in the form of the base, columns, and cornices; and Baccio required that all should be done and carried to completion by the stone-cutters of the Office of Works of S. Maria del Fiore.

However, the circumstance that Antonio had already acquired a name as a person of ability in architecture, and one who had a very good manner in matters of building, was the reason that Alessandro, who was first Cardinal Farnese, and afterwards Pope Paul III, conceived the idea of commissioning him to restore the old palace in the Campo di Fiore, in which he lived with his family; and for that work Antonio, desiring to grow in reputation, made several designs in different manners.

"Go in and feed the youngsters, my chuck," said he; "I know where to meet Don Urbano, and please Madonna you shall feed your own before long." "Yes, Ser Baldassare," says pretty Vanna in a twitter. The conference between the high contracting parties was wordy, bristled with the gesticulations of two pair of hands, and was commented on by all the guests in the "Fiore del Marinajo."

Stowe's Capanna di Zio Tom is, of course universally read; and my friend had also read Il Fiore di Maggio, "The May-flower."

For S. Maria del Fiore he made two colossal figures of brick and stucco, which are placed by way of ornament without the church, at the corners of the chapels.

Having then succeeded in this as much as he could desire, he resolved that his first works should be those that are in the arch over the bronze door which he had made for the sacristy, below the organ of S. Maria del Fiore; and therein he made a Resurrection of Christ, so beautiful for that time that it was admired, when placed in position, as something truly rare.

A Dominican monk, sour of face and bitter in his hatred of beauty, was the leader of the mediaeval rear-guard. He fought a valiant battle. Day after day he thundered his warnings of God's holy wrath through the wide halls of Santa Maria del Fiore. "Repent," he cried, "repent of your godlessness, of your joy in things that are not holy!"

If he understood the questions which he now sent for solution, he could not want to be taught this rule. Then Juan Antonio moderated his demand still farther, and said he would be satisfied with a copy of the questions which Fiore had put to Tartaglia, adding that the favour would be much greater if Tartaglia's own questions were also given.