The mosaics in the recesses of the clerestory--grey and white--are the most soft and lovely of all.

I believe the Baptistery is the most restful place in Florence; and this is rather odd considering that it is all marble and mosaic patterns.

But its shape is very soothing, and age has given it a quality of its own, and there is just that touch of barbarism about it such as one gets in Byzantine buildings to lend it a peculiar character here.
The most notable sculpture in the Baptistery is the tomb of the ex-Pope John XXIII, whose licentiousness was such that there was nothing for it but to depose and imprison him.

He had, however, much money, and on his liberation he settled in Florence, presented a true finger of John the Baptist to the Baptistery, and arranged in return for his bones to repose in that sanctuary.

One of his executors was that Niccolo da Uzzano, the head of the noble faction in the city, whose coloured bust by Donatello is in the Bargello.