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Some solitary lights were burning along the river, and occasionally a few Italians passed by, wrapped in their mantles. I went home to the Piazza del Granduca as the light, pouring into the square from behind the old palace, fell over the fountain of Neptune and sheathed in silver the back of the colossal god.
It is the influence of Florence we seem to find too in the simplicity of the Madonna del Granduca . Here is a picture certainly in the manner of Perugino, but with something lost, some light, some beatitude, yet with something gained also, if only in a certain measure of restraint, a real simplicity that is foreign to that master.
A large Braun photograph of the Madonna del Granduca came later from the Pittsburgh School for Children's Librarians. The furniture is of the simplest kind. We used some tables that we had, and bought one new one, some bentwood chairs for the older children and others such as are used in kindergartens for the younger.
Our first walk in Florence was to the Royal Gallery we wished to see the "goddess living in stone" without delay. Crossing the neighboring Piazza del Granduca, we passed Michael Angelo's colossal statue of David, and an open gallery containing, besides some antiques, the master-piece of John of Bologna.
Luca Pitti's pride Preliminary caution A terrace view A collection but not a gallery The personally-conducted Giorgione the superb Sustermans The "Madonna del Granduca" The "Madonna della Sedia" From Cimabue to Raphael Andrea del Sarto Two Popes and a bastard The ill-fated Ippolito The National Gallery Royal apartments "Pallas Subduing the Centaur" The Boboli Gardens.
The Metal Pig raised himself gently, and the boy heard him say quite distinctly, "Hold tight, little boy, for I am going to run;" and away he started for a most wonderful ride. First, they arrived at the Piazza del Granduca, and the metal horse which bears the duke's statue, neighed aloud.
More elaborate backgrounds were introduced from the growing resources of technique. In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, pictures of the portrait style were comparatively rare. Raphael, however, was not above adopting this method, as every lover of the Granduca Madonna will remember. His friend Bartolommeo also selected this style of composition for some of the loveliest of his works.
In the city of Florence, not far from the Piazza del Granduca, runs a little street called Porta Rosa. In this street, just in front of the market-place where vegetables are sold, stands a pig, made of brass and curiously formed.
That picture is now in the Pitti Palace at Florence and it is called the "Madonna del Granduca."
By the window is a Velasquez, the first we have seen in Florence, a little Philip IV on his prancing steed, rather too small for its subject, but very interesting here among the Italians. In the next large room the Sala di Saturno we come again to Raphael, who is indeed the chief master of the Pitti, his exquisite "Madonna del Granduca" being just to the left of the door.
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