embarrassing, it was his delightful good fortune and privilege to
illustrate by pretty and sly references to the characteristic
beauties of the several ladies seated like a ring of roses around
him. Thus he would refer to the shape of Madonna Lampiada's
sumptuous eyelids, and to her shell-like ears, to the correct
length and shape of Madonna Amororrisca's nose, to the lily tower
of Madonna Verdespina's throat; nor would the unabashed old
Florentine shrink from calling attention to the unfairness of
Madonna Selvaggia's covering up her dainty bosom, just as he was
about to discourse upon "those two hills of snow and of roses
with two little crowns of fine rubies on their peaks. "How
could a man lecture if his diagrams were going to behave like
that! Then, feigning a tiff, he would close his manuscript, and
all the ladies with their birdlike voices would beseech him with
"Oh, no, Messer Firenzuola, please go on again; it's SO
charming!" while, as if by accident, Madonna Selvaggia's
moonlike bosom would once more slip out its heavenly silver,
perceiving which, Messer Firenzuola would open his manuscript
again and proceed with his sweet learning.

Happy Firenzuola! Oh, days that are no more!

By selecting for his illustrations one feature from one lady and
another from another, Messer Firenzuola builds up an ideal of the
Beautiful Woman, which, were she to be possible, would probably
be as faultily faultless as the Perfect Woman, were she possible.

Moreover, much about the same time as Firenzuola was writing,
Botticelli's blonde, angular, retrousse women were breaking every
one of that beauty- master's canons, perfect in beauty none the