when Apollonius was covering the walls of San Marco with mosaics, he had
discovered by means of a trick certain secrets the Greek craftsmen were
for keeping sedulously to themselves. Returning to his native city, he
won so high a repute in the art of composing pictures by arranging
together a countless number of little differently coloured cubes of
glass, he could not supply all the demands addressed to him for works of
the sort, and all day and every day, from matins to vespers, he was
busy, mounted on a scaffold in some Church or other, depicting the dead
Christ, or Christ in His glory, the Patriarchs and Prophets, or the
history of Job or of Noah. And as he was likewise keen to paint in
fresco, with pounded colours, in the manner of the Greeks, which was
then the only one known, he refused himself all rest, and gave his
apprentices none either. He used to tell them:

"They who like myself are in possession of noble secrets and excel in
their art should keep both mind and hand ceaselessly active to carry out
their enterprises, so as to win much wealth and leave a long memory
behind them. And if I, old and broken down as I am, spare myself no
trouble, you are bound to do your utmost to help me with all your
strength, which is fresh, hearty and undiminished."

And in order that his colours, his tesseræ of molten glass and his
impastos might be all ready prepared by dawn of day, he forced the lads
to rise in the middle of the night. Nothing could well be more hateful
to Buffalmacco, who was in the habit of supping plentifully, and loved
to run the streets at an hour when, as they say, all cats are grey. He
went to bed late and slept sound, his conscience being clear enough
after all. Accordingly, when Tafi's shrill voice woke him up out of his
beauty sleep, he would only turn round on his pillow and pretend to be
deaf. But his master invariably persisted, and at a pinch would go into