buckling on their armor as they rush forward, eager for the fight, we see
the wild, splendid swell of muscle and warm, tense, pulsing flesh. As an
example of Michelangelo's consummate knowledge of form it was believed to
be his finest work.

But it did not last long; the jealous Bandinelli made a strong bid for
fame by destroying it. And thus do Bandinelli and Torrigiano go
clattering down the corridors of time hand in hand. Yet we know what the
picture was, for various men who saw it recorded their impressions; but
although many of the younger artists of Italy flocked to Florence to see
it, and many copied it, only one copy has come down to us--the one in the
collection of the Earl of Leicester, at Holkham.

So even beautiful Florence could not treat her gifted son with
impartiality, and when a call came from Pope Julius the Second, who had
been elected in Fifteen Hundred Three, to return to Rome, the summons was
promptly obeyed.

* * * * *

Julius was one of the most active and vigorous rulers the earth has
known. He had positive ideas on many subjects and like Napoleon "could do
the thinking for a world."

The first work he laid out for Michelangelo was a tomb, three stories
high, with walls eighteen feet thick at the base, surrounded with
numerous bas-reliefs and thirty heroic statues. It was to be a monument
on the order of those worked out by the great Rameses, only incorporating
the talent of Greece with that of ancient and modern Rome.