At this the Duke said: ‘Madam, my Benvenuto has told me that I would be throwing my money away if I bought it, since the pearls are neither round nor even, and many of them are old. And to prove it, look at this one, and that, and look here and here… No, they’re not for me.’
As he said this, the Duchess shot a malevolent look at me, and with a menacing nod of her head left us to ourselves. My immediate impulse was to run away and be rid of Italy; but as my Perseus was all but finished I was reluctant to go without having displayed it. But you can understand what a serious plight I found myself in.
In my presence, the Duke had ordered his porters to let me have access to him wherever he was; and the Duchess ordered the same men to chase me away whenever I showed myself at the palace. As a result whenever they caught sight of me they immediately left their lodges and drove me away; but they took care not to be seen by the Duke, for if the Duke caught sight of me before those ruffians did he either called me or made me a sign that I was to come forward.
The Duchess meanwhile sent for the broker, Bernardo – the man of whose idleness and thorough good-for-nothingness she had so often complained to me – and pleaded for his help as she had done for mine.
‘My lady,’ he said, ‘rely on me.’
Then this rogue went to the Duke with the necklace in his hand. As soon as the Duke saw him he ordered him to get out. So then the great rogue, braying down his ugly nose like a donkey, said:
‘But my lord, please buy this necklace for that poor lady who is dying to have it and will pine away unless she does.’
He went on in this stupid, idiotic strain till the Duke lost patience and said: ‘Get out or I’ll give you a slap on the face.’
The great villain, who knew perfectly well what he was doing, because if by blowing out his cheeks or by singing322 ‘La bella Franceschina’ he could persuade the Duke to make the purchase, he would gain the favour of the Duchess and his commission as well (a matter of several hundred crowns), puffed out his cheeks, and the Duke gave him several good slaps on his ugly face. And in order to be rid of him he hit him a little harder than usual. The blows were so violent that his cheeks reddened, and tears sprang to his eyes as well.
And for all that he began to say: ‘Look, my lord, look at your faithful servant – he tries to do his best and he’s ready to put up with any kind of bad treatment provided only that poor lady is happy.’
By now the oaf was really beginning to strain the Duke’s patience, and so because of the blows he had given him and because of his love for the Duchess, whom his Most Illustrious Excellency always tried to please, he suddenly said:
‘Get out of here and go to the devil: go and buy them, I’m ready to do all my lady wants.’
Now here one can see the way ill fortune rages against a poor man and the shameless way in which a villain is favoured. I completely lost the favour of the Duchess, and as a result nearly lost the Duke’s, and he won a fat commission and their regard. So it is not enough merely to be an honest, virtuous man.
It was at that time that the war of Siena broke out:323 the Duke intended to fortify the town, and so he distributed the duty of seeing to the gates among his sculptors and architects.324 I was consigned the Prato gate and the little gate leading to the Arno, which is by the meadow on the way to the mills. Cavaliere Bandinello was given the San Friano gate; Pasqualino d’Ancona, the San Pietro Gattolino gate; Giuliano di Baccio d’Agnolo, the wood-carver, the gate of San Giorgio; Particino, the wood-carver, the gate of Santo Niccolò; Francesco da Sangallo, the sculptor, known as Margolla, the gate of Santa Croce; and Giovanbatista, known as Tasso, the Pinti gate. Besides these, certain other bastions and gates were put under the charge of various engineers, whom I do not remember and whose names do not matter.
The Duke, who really had always been a very capable man, made a tour of inspection round the city, and when he had conducted a thorough examination and made up his mind he sent for Lattanzio Gorini, one of his paymasters. As Lattanzio Gorini also liked this sort of work his Most Illustrious Excellency made him produce designs of the various ways in which he wanted the gates fortified, and then he sent each of us the appropriate one. When I received mine I decided that the design was entirely incorrect, let alone unsuitable, and so straight away I went off, the plan in my hand, to find the Duke. My idea was to point out to his Excellency the defects in the plan that I had been given, but no sooner had I begun to speak than the Duke turned on me in a fury and said:
‘Benvenuto, when it comes to making statues I bow to your knowledge, but in this business I want you to give way to me: so keep to the plan I’ve given you.’
When I heard these angry words I replied as gently as I knew how, saying:
‘But my lord, even with regard to the sculptor’s art I’ve learnt from your Most Illustrious Excellency, because we’ve always discussed it together to some extent. So in the same way, in this matter of the fortification of your city which is much more important, I beg your Excellency to condescend to listen to me. And as a result of the discussion it will be easier for your Excellency to show me the way I must serve you.’
After this courteous little speech of mine the Duke very kindly began discussing the matter with me. I pointed out to his Excellency, as forcefully and clearly as possible, the reasons why the plan he had given me would be useless.
Then he said: ‘You go and produce your own plan, and I shall see if I like it.’
I therefore drew up two plans, following the correct method for fortifying the two gates, and brought them back to his Excellency. He was able to distinguish the correct method from the false, and he said very agreeably:
‘Go and follow your own method, I shall be content with that.’
And so, very diligently, I began work.
There was a Lombard captain on guard at the Prato gate: he was an extremely powerfully-built fellow, of very coarse speech, as well as being overbearing and extraordinarily ignorant. He immediately began to ask me what I was up to. In reply I very courteously showed him my plans, and took great pains to let him understand the procedure I was going to follow. But while I was doing so the vulgar brute kept shaking his head, and twisting and turning, balancing first on one leg and then on the other, tugging at his moustache, pulling the peak of his cap over his eyes, and muttering at the same time: ‘What in hell’s name is all this about!’
Beginning to lose patience with the idiot, I answered: ‘Very well, then, leave it to me. I do know what it’s about.’
Then I turned my back on him, intending to go about my own business. At this the fellow began tossing his head angrily, dropped his left hand to the pommel of his sword, and lifted the point a little.
‘Wait a minute, my master,’ he said, ‘so you want to make a fight out of it?’
I spun round in a temper – he had so provoked me – and retorted: ‘It would mean less effort on my part to have a battle with you than to make a bastion for this gate.’
In an instant both of us clapped hands on our swords, but before we could draw them we were suddenly surrounded by a crowd of honest fellows, some, Florentine citizens, and others, courtiers. Most of them abused him, telling him that he was in the wrong, that I was the sort of man who would give a good account of himself, and that if the Duke heard what had happened it would be worse for him. As a result he went off about his business and I began work on my bastion. When I had seen to all the arrangements I made my way to the other gate, the little one by the Arno, where I found a captain from Cesena. He proved the most courteous warrior325 I ever came across, with the exquisite manners of a young girl, and yet, when necessary, showing himself incredibly bold and ruthless. The charming man watched what I was doing so attentively that several times it proved embarrassing; he was anxious to understand everything, and so I explained it all to him, very courteously. The upshot was that we so rivalled each other in kindness that I made this bastion much better than the first.
I had almost finished them whe
n some of Piero Strozzi’s men made a sudden incursion and so terrified the Prato district that all the inhabitants evacuated their homes; they poured into the city, with all their belongings laden on to their carts. There was tremendous confusion, with endless lines of carts, all touching, and I warned the guards to take care that the same mishap didn’t happen here as had happened at the gates of Turin,326 because if it had proved necessary to use the portcullis the attempt would have been frustrated as it would have stuck on one of the carts.
When he heard what I was saying, that great brute of a captain turned round and began insulting me, and I gave as good as I got. We would have set to with more fury than before, but we were kept apart. When I had finished the bastions I was slipped several crowns which I had not expected, and so I went back to finish my Perseus in very high spirits.
It was at that time that certain antiquities were unearthed in the countryside of Arezzo, and among them was the Chimera,327 that bronze lion which is to be seen in the rooms near the great hall of the palace. Besides this a quantity of statuettes were found; they were also made of bronze, covered with earth and rust, and all missing a head or the hands or the feet. The Duke amused himself by cleaning them with goldsmith’s chisels. Once when I happened to be talking with his Excellency he handed me a tiny hammer with which I struck the little chisels he was holding. In that way we cleaned away the earth and rust, and spent several evenings at it. Then the Duke set me to work, and I began to restore the parts of the statues that were missing. The Duke enjoyed this little business so much that he had me working during the day as well, and, if ever I was late in arriving, sent for me himself.
More than once I explained to him that if I spent the day without working on my Perseus there would be several unfortunate consequences. The most worrying of these was that the inordinate length of time I was taking over the work might begin to irritate the Duke – and that in fact did afterwards happen. Besides this I was employing several workmen, and when I wasn’t with them, there were two very grave consequences: first, they ruined my work, and then they worked as little as possible. Anyhow, the Duke agreed to my going to him only from sunset onwards. I had made myself so agreeable to him that every time I arrived his welcome was more affectionate than before.
In those days the new apartments near the Via dei Leoni were being built: his Excellency wanted more private quarters, and so he had furnished for his use a little room in the new apartments. He had told me that I was to make my way there through his wardrobe; so I used to pass secretly across the gallery of the great hall and through a number of little box-rooms, entering his room very privately. And then, inside the space of a few days, the Duchess deprived me of this convenience by having the passage barred to me. As a result, every evening I came to the palace I had to wait a long time, all because the Duchess was engaged in her affairs in the ante-rooms I had to pass through. And as her health was poor my arrival always upset her. Now for this and for other reasons she came to dislike me so much that she couldn’t bear the sight of me; but for all the great unpleasantness and trouble involved I persisted in my visits.
The Duke’s express orders were such that as soon as I knocked at the doors they were opened to me, and, without a word being said, I was allowed to go where I liked. In consequence it sometimes happened that on my coming quietly and unexpectedly through those private rooms I found the Duchess engaged in her affairs. On such occasions she would at once begin railing at me, with such rage and fury that I was terrified.
She was always saying: ‘When will you ever finish restoring those little statues? This coming and going of yours is really getting to be too much of a good thing.’
I answered her gently: ‘My lady, my only patron, I have no other wish than to serve you, with loyalty and absolute obedience. But this work that the Duke has given me will last a good few months, so please, your Most Illustrious Excellency, tell me frankly: if you don’t want me to come any more I shall certainly obey you, and even if the Duke sends for me I shall say that I’m ill, and I shall certainly never come again.’
At this she said: ‘I do not say that you’re not to come, and I do not say that you’re to disobey the Duke: but all the same it strikes me that the work you’re doing will never have an end.’
Whether it was that something of this came to his Excellency’s ears, or whether it was for some other reason, he began sending for me again: he would send as it was getting near nightfall, and his messenger always said: ‘Take care you don’t fail, the Duke is expecting you.’
So for several evenings I carried on under these difficulties. On one occasion as I was entering as usual, the Duke, who must have been discussing what were probably private matters with the Duchess, turned on me with the greatest imaginable fury and all of a sudden, while I was standing there rather terrified, anxious to get away quickly, he said: ‘Come in, Benvenuto, and get on with your work: I shall be with you shortly.’
As I was walking through, the lord Don Garzia328 seized me by the cloak: he was still quite a child, and he began playing with me in the most amusing way. The Duke was astonished and cried out: ‘Look what a charming friendship my children have with you!’
Every evening while I was working on these unimportant trifles, the Prince, and Don Giovanni, and Don Arnando,329 and Don Garzia used to stand near and poke me playfully whenever their father’s back was turned. I begged them to be kind enough to leave me alone, and all they answered was: ‘We can’t.’
‘Very well,’ I said, ‘if you can’t, you can’t: so carry on.’
Then all at once the Duke and the Duchess burst out laughing.
Another evening, after I had finished those four little bronze figures,330 which are set into the base (the Jupiter, the Mercury, the Minerva, and Danaë, the mother of Perseus, with her little son sitting at her feet) I had them carried into the room where I used to work in the evenings, and there I arranged them in line, a little above eye-level, so that they made a very beautiful spectacle. When the Duke was informed he came in rather soon erth an he usually did: and because whoever told his Excellency about them must have used excessive praise – saying ‘better than the ancients’ and suchlike things – my Duke came along with the Duchess, talking happily about my work. I immediately rose to my feet and went to meet them. He greeted me with princely courtesy, lifted up his right hand, in which he was holding a very large and fine pear-branch, and said:
‘Take it, my dear Benvenuto: plant this pear in your own garden.’
I replied smilingly: ‘My lord, does your Excellency in fact mean that I should plant it in my own garden – the garden of my house?’
The Duke repeated: ‘In the garden of your house – your own house. Have you understood me?’
At this I thanked his Excellency and likewise the Duchess as best I knew how. Then both of them sat down, facing the statues, and all they talked about, for more than two hours, was those beautiful figures. The Duchess was so enraptured by them that she said to me:
‘I don’t want you to waste those statues by throwing them away on the pedestal down in the piazza, where they’ll risk being spoilt: why not arrange them for me in one of my apartments where they’ll be treated with the respect that their unique qualities deserve?’
I opposed this idea with a whole host of powerful arguments, but I realized that she was determined to prevent my placing them in the base, where they are now; so I waited till the next day and then went to the palace two hours before sunset. I discovered that the Duke and Duchess were out riding, and as the base was already prepared I had the little statues brought down and straight away soldered them in, each one in its right place. And then! Well, when the Duchess heard what I had done she was so furious that if it had not been for the Duke, who very nobly came to my help, I would have come a nasty cropper. Anyhow, what with her anger over the incident in connexion with the pearls, and now this, she so arranged matters that the Duke abandoned his little pastime, and as a result I had to give up going
there: and whenever I entered the palace I had to endure the same bother as before.
I returned to the Loggia, where I had already brought my Perseus, and tried to finish it, working in the difficult circumstances I have already mentioned: what with being penniless and afflicted, I reckon that half my misfortunes would have wrecked a man of iron. However I carried on in my usual way.
Then, one morning or other, I had just heard Mass when the broker Bernardo, a shocking goldsmith and – because of the Duke’s kindness – the purveyor to the Mint, passed in front of me. This was in San Piero Scheraggio. He was hardly through the door of the church when the filthy pig let loose four cracks which could have been heard from San Miniato. I cried out: ‘You whimpering pig, you beast! Is that what your filthy talents sound like?’ And I ran for a stick. He made off into the Mint, and I stood just inside my own door, stationing one of my young boys outside to give me the word when the pig should come out of the Mint. After I had waited for some time I lost patience and my anger subsided; and then remembering that anything can happen in a fight and that this affair might lead somewhere unexpected, I decided to take my revenge some other way. All this took place within a day or so of the feast of St John, so I composed a verse and stuck it up in the corner of the church where one goes for a piss or a shit.
Here’s Bernardo, pig and mule,
The thievish broker, and the spy:
From him Pandora’s evils fly
Into booby-Baccio, the other fool.
The story and the verse circulated in the palace and gave the Duke and the Duchess a good laugh. And before he himself got to hear of it, scores of people stopped and saw the verse and roared with laughter; then they would look towards the Mint and stare at Bernardo. When his son Baccio noticed it he tore it down in a passion. Bernardo went round shaking his fist and breathing threats and defiance down his great bellowing nose.
The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini Page 46
