nished, was placed in his chapel in S. Piero Cigoli at Lucca. In
another of the same size--namely, seven braccia high and four broad--I
painted Our Lady, S. Jerome, S. Luke, S. Cecilia, S. Martha, S.
Augustine, and S. Guido the Hermit; which altar-picture was placed in
the Duomo of Pisa, where there were many others by the hands of
excellent masters. And I had scarcely carried that one to completion,
when the Warden of Works of that Duomo commissioned me to execute
another, in which, since it was to be likewise of Our Lady, in order to
vary it from the other I painted the Madonna with the Dead Christ at the
foot of the Cross, lying in her lap, the Thieves on high upon their
crosses, and, grouped with the Maries and Nicodemus, who are standing
there, the titular Saints of those chapels, all forming a good
composition and rendering the scene in that picture pleasing. Having
returned again to Rome in the year 1544, besides many pictures that I
executed for various friends, of which there is no need to make mention,
I made a picture of a Venus from a design by Michelagnolo for M. Bindo
Altoviti, who took me once more into his house; and for Galeotto da
Girone, a Florentine merchant, I painted an altar-picture in oils of
Christ taken down from the Cross, which was placed in his chapel in the
Church of S. Agostino at Rome. In order to be able to paint that picture
in comfort, together with some works that had been allotted to me by
Tiberio Crispo, the Castellan of Castel S. Angelo, I had withdrawn by
myself to that palace in the Trastevere which was formerly built by
Bishop Adimari, below S. Onofrio, and which has since been finished by
the second Salviati; but, feeling indisposed and wearied by my infinite
labours, I was forced to return to Florence. There I executed some
pictures, and among others one in which were Dante, Petrarca, Guido
Cavalcanti, Boccaccio, Cino da Pistoia, and Guittone d'Arezzo,
accurately copied from their ancient portraits; and of that picture,
which afterwards belonged to Luca Martini, many copies have since been
made.

In that same year of 1544 I was invited to Naples by Don Giammateo of
Aversa, General of the Monks of Monte Oliveto, to the end that I might
paint the refectory of a monastery built for them by King Alfonso I; but
when I arrived, I was for not accepting the work, seeing that the
refectory and the whole monastery were built in an ancient manner of
architecture, with the vaults in point