I was almost sixty years old when a flood of the Brenta carried away again the ancient wooden bridge with which Bassano was connected to Vicenza passing through the Bassano district of Angarano, where my great friend Giacomo lived - to whom I was about to dedicate half of my Four Books.

I had designed the villa for him, a palace that had never been built and another wooden bridge, but I was well known by everyone in Bassano, as I was now in the whole of the Serenissima.
 
I proposed a stone bridge, but as with the Rialto it was not destiny. Tradition and economy prevailed, so that the city council asked me to do it again where it was and how it was.
The architect is the servant of the will of others.