This ancient font, which stood in the centre of the church, appears to have had round holes or _pozzetti_ in its outer wall, in which the priests stood to baptise; and Dante tells us in the _Inferno_ that he broke one of these _pozzetti_, to save a boy from being drowned or suffocated. The boy saved was apparently not being baptised, but was playing about with others, and had either tumbled into the font itself or climbed head foremost into one of the _pozzetti_. When the divine poet was exiled, charitable people said that he had done this from heretical motives--just as they had looked with suspicion upon his friend Guido's spiritual wanderings in the same locality. [Illustration: THE BAPTISTERY] Though the old font has gone, St. John, to the left of the high altar, still keeps watch over all the Florentine children brought to be baptised--to be made _conti_, known to God, and to himself in God. Opposite to him is the great type of repentance after baptism, St. Mary Magdalene, a wooden statue by Donatello. What a contrast is here with those pagan Magdalenes of the Renaissance--such as Titian and Correggio painted! Fearfully wasted and haggard, this terrible figure of asceticism--when once the first shock of repulsion is got over--is unmistakably a masterpiece of the sculptor; it is as though one of the Penitential Psalms had taken bodily shape. On the other side of the church stands the tomb of the dethroned Pope, John XXIII., Baldassarre Cossa, one of the earliest works in the Renaissance style, reared by Michelozzo and Donatello, 1424-1427, for Cosimo dei Medici. The fallen Pontiff rests at last in peace in the city which had witnessed his submission to his successful rival, Martin V., and which had given a home to his closing days; here he lies, forgetful of councils and cardinals:-- "After life's fitful fever he sleeps well." The recumbent figure in bronze is the work of Donatello, as also the Madonna and Child that guard his last slumber. Below, are Faith, Hope, and Charity--the former by Michelozzo (to whom also the architectural part of the monument is due), the two latter by Donatello. It is said that Pope Martin V. objected to the inscription, "quondam papa," and was answered in the words of Pilate: _quod scripsi, scripsi_. * * * * *