[Footnote 235: He was brother to Henry Hugford, a monk of Vallombrosa, to whom we owe, in a great measure, the progress of working in _Scagliola_, which was afterwards successfully practised in Florence by Lamberti Gori, his pupil; and at this day by the Signor Pietro Stoppioni, who receives numerous commissions. Although the portraits, and in general the figures, of a variety of colours, are very pleasing, yet the _dicromi_, or yellow figures upon a black ground, attract most notice, copied from ancient vases formerly called Etruscan, and these copies either form separate pictures, or are inserted for ornament in tablets. The tragic poet Alfieri caused his epitaph to be inscribed on one of these small tables covered with scagliola work. Being found after his death, it quickly spread abroad, but was not inscribed on his tomb. Upon another of these he had written the epitaph of a great personage, whom he wished to be interred near him; and the two little tablets united together folded one upon another in the way of a _dittico_ or small altar, or of a book, on the side of which was written _Alfieri liber novissimus_. In this way others write, on tablets of scagliola, fine precepts from scripture, a philosophy that comes from and leads to heaven, intended to be placed in private sanctuaries, to aid meditation in sight of the crucifix. The silver tablets I have seen for the same purpose are more valuable, but less artificial.] [Footnote 236: In his larger works (such as the altar-pieces at the Missionari and at the Monastero Nuovo,) it would appear that Conti aimed at approaching the style of Trevisani.] [Footnote 237: See _Saggio Istorico della R. Galleria de Firenze_, tom. ii. p. 72. This work, valuable for its learning and authenticity, is written by Sig. Giuseppe Bencivenni (formerly Pelli) a gentleman of Florence, and formerly director of the ducal gallery, who is also known by his other literary labours, on the lives of the most eminent painters, by the life of Dante, and by the learned dissertation on coins, appended to the lives of the followers of Cortona. He arranged the collection of modern coins, that of engravings and of drawings, and the paintings of the ducal gallery; of these, and also of the gems and medals, he has there left manuscript catalogues.] [Footnote 238: See that work at p. 232.] [Footnote 239: Tom iii. p. 113.]