the death of Duke Alessandro had gone to Rome for two months;
saying to him that, once he had finished a picture of a young S. John
that he was painting for his master Cardinal Salviati, a Passion of
Christ on canvas that was to be sent to Spain, and a picture of Our Lady
that he was painting for Raffaello Acciaiuoli, he wished to turn his
steps to Florence in order to revisit his native place, his relatives,
and his friends, for his father and mother were still alive, to whom he
was always of the greatest assistance, and particularly in settling two
sisters, one of whom was married, and the other is a nun in the Convent
of Monte Domini.

Coming thus to Florence, where he was received with much rejoicing by
his relatives and friends, it chanced that he arrived there at the very
moment when the festive preparations were being made for the nuptials of
Duke Cosimo and the Lady Donna Leonora di Toledo. Wherefore he was
commissioned to paint one of the already mentioned scenes that were
executed in the courtyard, which he accepted very willingly; and that
was the one in which the Emperor was placing the Ducal crown on the head
of Duke Cosimo. But being seized, before he had finished it, with a
desire to go to Venice, Francesco left it to Carlo Portelli of Loro, who
finished it after Francesco's design; which design, with many others by
the same hand, is in our book.

Having departed from Florence and made his way to Bologna, Francesco
found there Giorgio Vasari, who had returned two days before from
Camaldoli, where he had finished the two altar-pieces that are in the
tramezzo[17] of the church, and had begun that of the high-altar; and
Vasari was arranging to paint three great panel-pictures for the
refectory of the Fathers of S. Michele in Bosco, where he kept Francesco
with him for two days. During that time, some of his friends made
efforts to obtain for him the commission for an altar-piece that was to
be allotted by the men of the Della Morte Hospital. But, although
Salviati made a most beautiful design, those men, having little
understanding, were not able to recognize the opportunity that Messer
Domeneddio[18] had sent them of obtaining for Bologna a work by the hand
of an able master. Wherefore Francesco went away in some disdain,
leaving some very beautiful designs in the hands of Girolamo Fagiuoli,
to the end that he might engrave them on copper and have them printed.

[Footnote 17: See note on p. 57,