and told him he had finished the shield which he hoped would please him, and that he might have it whenever he liked. Ser Piero was at the time engaged in superintending his harvest, but when he was free he set off to see his son. Leonardo himself answered his knock, and, showing his father into another room, begged him to wait for a few minutes while he put away his work. Then he rushed back to the studio, darkened the window a little, and carefully chose a position for the easel on which the shield was standing.
'Will you come in now, father?' he said holding open the door, but no sooner was Ser Piero within the room than ho turned to fly, so terrible was the object that met his gaze.
'It will do, I see,' remarked Leonardo, catching him by the arm. 'I wanted to make something so dreadful that men would shiver with fear at the sight of it. Take it away, I pray you, and do with it as you will. But stay, I had better wrap it first in a cloth, lest it should frighten people out of their wits as you go along.'
Ser Piero took it, and departed without a word to his son; he really felt quite shaken from the shock he had had, and he determined that so wonderful a painting should never fall into the hands of a peasant. So he went to a shop where he found a shield the same size as the other, bearing the device of a heart pierced by an arrow, and when next he went into the country he bade the farmer come up to the house to receive it.
'Oh Excellency! how beautiful! how can I ever thank you for your goodness?' cried the man in delight when, after his long waiting, the shield was at last delivered to him.
'I thought you would be pleased,' answered Ser Piero, smiling to himself as he pictured what would have been the face of the man before him, had he been given Leonardo's monster. But this he kept for some time and then sold to a merchant for a hundred ducats, who in his turn parted with it to the Duke of Milan for three times the price.
In this way Leonardo da Vinci grew to manhood, gaining friends as he went by his beauty and his talents, and keeping them by his sweetness of temper and his generosity. He
