I now sent to Florence to request Lorenzino that he would send me the
reverse of the medal. Niccolò da Monte Aguto, to whom I had written,
wrote back, saying that he had spoken to that mad melancholy philosopher
Lorenzino for it; he had replied that he was thinking night and day of
nothing else, and that he would finish it as soon as he was able.
Nevertheless, I was not to set my hopes upon his reverse, but I had
better invent one out of my own head, and when I had finished it, I
might bring it without hesitation to the Duke, for this would be to my
advantage.
I composed the design of a reverse which seemed to me appropriate, and
pressed the work forward to my best ability. Not being, however, yet
recovered from that terrible illness, I gave myself frequent relaxation
by going out on fowling expeditions with my friend Felice. This man had
no skill in my art; but since we were perpetually day and night
together, everybody thought he was a first-rate craftsman. This being
so, as he was a fellow of much humour, we used often to laugh together
about the great credit he had gained. His name was Felice Guadagni
(Gain), which made him say in jest: “I should be called Felice
Gain-little if you had not enabled me to acquire such credit that I can
call myself Gain-much.” I replied that there are two ways of gaining:
the first is that by which one gains for one’s self, the second that by
which one gains for others; so I praised him much more for the second
than the first, since he had gained for me my life.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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