are bare, treated similarly to the magnificent bust in the Bargello (177).  The two reliefs, of which the Milan copy is oval, while ours is rectangular with a circular top, are modelled with brilliant and exquisite morbidezza:  the undercutting is square, so that the shadows assert themselves; the wavy hair is brushed back and retained by a fillet, leaving the neck and temples quite free.  In many ways it is the marble version of those portraits attributed to Piero della Francesca in the National Gallery[170] and elsewhere, but treated so that while the painting is curious the marble is beautiful.  These reliefs cannot be traced to Donatello, though they show his style and influence in several particulars.  Madame Andre has a marble relief of an open-mouthed boy crowned with laurels, and with ribands waving behind.  It is very close to the Piot St. John in the Louvre, and analogous in some respects to two other reliefs of great interest, both in Paris, belonging respectively to La Marquise Arconati-Visconti and to M. Gustave Dreyfus.  These are marble reliefs of St. John and Christ facing each other, exquisite in their childhood.  The former is round, the latter square.  It is usual to ascribe them to Desiderio, and there are details which lead one to agree on the point.  They show, however, that Donatello’s influence was strong enough to survive his death in particulars which later men might well have ignored.  And the two reliefs combine the strength of Donatello with the sweetness of Desiderio.

[Footnote 169:  Victoria and Albert Museum, No. 923, 1900, and Museo Archeologico, No. 1681, both marble.]

[Footnote 170:  Nos. 585 and 758.]

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[Sidenote:  San Lorenzo.]

Donatello must have completed the most important decorative work in the Sacristy of San Lorenzo by 1443.  Brunellesco was the architect, and there were differences between them as to their respective spheres of work.  Donatello made the bronze doors, a pair of large reliefs, four large circular medallions of the Evangelists, as well as four others of scenes from the life of St. John the Evangelist.  Excluding the doors, everything is made of terra-cotta.  The reliefs over the inner doors of the Sacristy represent St. Stephen and St. Laurence on one side, and St. Cosmo and St. Damian on the other.  They are nearly life size, modelled in rather low-relief upon panels with circular tops, and of exceptional size for works in terra-cotta.  The reliefs are enclosed in Donatello’s framework of latish Renaissance design, but the figures themselves are very simple.  There is a minimum of ornament, and they harmonise with the remarkable scheme of the bronze doors below them, with which they have so many points in common.  The ceiling of the chapel has been repeatedly whitewashed, and the eight medallions are consequently blurred in surface and outline.  It is a real misfortune, for, so far as one can judge, they contain compositions and