Cosimo de' Medici had a villa near the convent of S. Domenico at Fiesole, where, as it is said, he would often go when Careggi was too far, and the summer had turned the city into a furnace. Here, as we may think, he may well have talked with Fra Angelico, for he would often walk in the cloisters in the evening with the friars, and must have seen and praised the frescoes there. These Dominicans at Fiesole had already sent a colony to Florence, for in June 1435 they had obtained from Pope Eugenius iv, who was then at S. Maria Novella the little church of S. Giorgio across Arno. Seeing the order and comeliness of that convent at Fiesole, Cosimo, on behalf of the magistrates of Florence, presented a petition to the Pope about this time, praying that since he was engaged on a reform of the Religious Orders, which, partly owing to the schism and partly to the plague, were much relaxed, he would suppress the Sylvestrians who dwelt in the old convent of S. Marco, and give it to the Dominicans of Fiesole, who in exchange would give up their convent of S. Giorgio, for in the centre of the city numerous and zealous ministers were needed. Eugenius very gladly agreed to this, and in a Bull of January 1436, S. Marco was given to the Dominican Friars.[97] So they came down from Fiesole in procession, and went through the city accompanied by three bishops, all the clergy, and an immense concourse of people, and Fra Cipriano took possession of S. Marco "in the name of his congregation." The convent at this time would seem to have been in a deplorable state: in the previous year a fire had destroyed much of it, and the church even was without a roof, so that the friars were obliged to build themselves wooden cells to live in, and to roof the church with timber. When Cosimo heard this he prepared at once to rebuild the convent, and sent Michelozzo to see what could be done. Michelozzo first pulled down the old cloister, leaving only the church and the refectory; and in 1437 began to build the beautiful convent we see to-day, completing it in 1443, at a cost of 36,000 ducats. The church which was then restored has suffered many violations since, and is very different to-day from what it was at the end of the fifteenth century. It was consecrated in 1442, on the feast of the Epiphany, by Pope Eugenius in the presence of his Cardinals. The library, Vasari tells us, was built later. It was vaulted above and below, and had sixty-four bookcases of cypress wood filled with most valuable books, among them later the famous collection of Niccolo Niccoli, whose debts Cosimo paid on condition that he might dispose freely of his books, which were arranged here by Thomas of Sarzana, afterwards Nicholas v. The convent thus completed is "believed to be," says Vasari, "the most perfectly arranged, the most beautiful and most convenient building of its kind that can be found in Italy, thanks to the skill and industry of Michelozzo."