as Browning relates, and prospered every way. But one day,
being employed on the figure of a St. Jerome doing penance,
which he was painting for the mother of the King, there came to him
certain letters from Florence; these were written him by his wife;
and from that time (whatever may have been the cause) he began
to think of leaving France. He asked permission to that effect
from the French King accordingly, saying that he desired to
return to Florence, but that, when he had arranged his affairs
in that city, he would return without fail to his Majesty; he added,
that when he came back, his wife should accompany him, to the end that
he might remain in France the more quietly; and that he would bring
with him pictures and sculptures of great value. The King,
confiding in these promises, gave him money for the purchase of
those pictures and sculptures, Andrea taking an oath on the gospels
to return within the space of a few months, and that done
he departed to his native city.

"He arrived safely in Florence, enjoying the society
of his beautiful wife, and that of his friends, with the sight
of his native city, during several months; but when the period
specified by the King, and that at which he ought to have returned,
had come and passed, he found himself at the end, not only of
his own money, but, what with building" (the "melancholy little house
they built to be so gay with") "indulging himself with
various pleasures, and doing no work, of that belonging to
the French monarch also, the whole of which he had consumed.
He was, nevertheless, determined to return to France, but the prayers
and tears of his wife had more power than his own necessities,
or the faith which he had pledged to the King."