THE BARGELLO.
253
pf Silk, who could boast of having maintained his integrity
luring eighty-nine years, always faithful to his country and to
he popular government, in whose cause he had frequently
exposed his person and his possessions ; one to whom it never
occurred to boast of conduct which alone appeared possible to
man of his nature.
Nicolò de’ Lapi was one of many victims sacrificed after the
liege of Florence, in 1530, when the degenerate descendants
pf Silvestro de’ Medici, corrupted by the long possession of
power, and assisted by the Imperialists, destroyed the republi-
an freedom of their native city, which their great ancestor had
ielped to establish.
The beautiful staircase leading to the Loggia above was
puilt by Agnolo Gaddi, who selected, as an example, another
taircase in the municipal palace at Poppi, in the Casentino ;
i lion is seated on the column at the foot, and two other
ions are above the iron gates. The Loggia is attributed to
Andrea Orcagna (1308?-1368). It was divided by the Medici
of the sixteenth century into three chambers ; that at the farther
end was the condemned cell ; in the centre a passage led across
the street of the Vigna Vecchia, like the Bridge of Sighs at
Venice, to the opposite houses, which were converted into a
prison for women. These houses were on the site of the old
church of Sant’ Apollinare ; a few sepulchral tablets in the
valls, still to be seen from the windows of the Bargello, are all
hat remain of the former cloister.
At the end of the Loggia, over a small door, is an exquisitely¬
carved and perforated marble decoration, lately repaired by
uniting the sixty fragments into which it had been broken. In
the centre of the Loggia is a bell of a very elegant form, which
was taken from a small church near Pisa, the work of one
Bartolommeo, who has inscribed his own name upon it, and
who accompanied the Emperor Frederick II. to Germany,
where he was employed to build churches.
On the right of the Loggia is the entrance to a magnificent