have been the cause, these v^orks remained unfinished. There are some drawings by this master in our book, which display very great judgment and extraordinary patience; among them are certain female heads, of which the features, expressions, and arrangement of the hair, were constantly imitated, for their exceeding beauty, by Leonardo da Vinci.[1] We have besides two horses, with the various measurements and the proportions according to which they are to be increased from a smaller to a larger size, all which are correct and free from error. There is also a rilievo in terracotta in my possession; this is the head of a horse copied from the antique, and is a singularly beautiful thing. The venerable Don Vincenzio Borghini has likewise drawings in his book, of which we have already spoken.[2] Among others, there is the design for a sepulchral monument, erected by Andrea, in Venice, for a doge of that republic, with an Adoration of the Magi and a female head, all depicted on paper with the most finished delicacy.
Andrea Verrocchio executed the figure in bronze of a boy strangling a fish,[3] on the fountain of the villa at Careggi, for Lorenzo de’ Medici. This the Signor Duke Cosimo has now caused to be placed, as we see, on the fountain in the court of his palace; the boy is a truly admirable figure.[4]
At a later period, and when the erection of the cupola of Santa Maria del Fiore had been completed, it was resolved, after many discussions, that the copper ball, which, according to the directions left by Filippo Brunelleschi, was to be placed on the summit of that edifice, should be prepared. The order to do this was consequently given to Andrea, who
- ↑ Vasari’s collection of Drawings is unhappily dispersed. The Italian commentators suggest, that many of those now passing under the name of Leonardo da Vinci may, in fact, be by the hand of Verrocchio.
- ↑ The fate of this collection also is unknown. —Masselli.
- ↑ A young dolphin.
- ↑ This admirable work is still in the basin of the fountain: it is im.possible to imagine anything more life-like than the expression and action of the boy as he presses the struggling creature, from whose nostrils water is gushing, to his breast. The beauty of this masterly performance (for a more minute description of which than can here be afforded, see Rumohr, Ital. Forsch.) has been somewhat injured by the removal, effected some years since in the process of clearing, of the fine patina with which time had covered it, a circumstance from which it has now a certain hardness not formerly apparent in the work.
