ays
enemies, one against the other, although they worked together by the
wish of the Duke. In the court of the said palace they executed stories
of Hercules in chiaroscuro, with an endless number of nudes on those
walls; and in like manner they painted many works on panel and in fresco
throughout all Ferrara. By their hands is a panel in the Duomo of
Modena; and they painted many things in the Cardinal's Palace at Trento,
in company with other painters.

At this same time the painter and architect, Girolamo Genga, was
executing various decorations in the Imperiale Palace, above Pesaro, as
will be related in the proper place, for Duke Francesco Maria of Urbino;
and among the number of painters who were summoned to that work by order
of the same Signor Francesco Maria, invitations were sent to Dosso and
Battista of Ferrara, principally for the painting of landscapes; many
paintings having been executed long before in that palace by Francesco
di Mirozzo[10] of Forli, Raffaello dal Colle of Borgo a San Sepolcro,
and many others. Now, having arrived at the Imperiale, Dosso and
Battista, according to the custom of men of their kidney, found fault
with most of the paintings that they saw, and promised the Duke that
they would do much better work; and Genga, who was a shrewd person,
seeing how the matter was likely to end, gave them an apartment to paint
by themselves. Thereupon, setting to work, they strove with all labour
and diligence to display their worth; but, whatever may have been the
reason, never in all the course of their lives did they do any work less
worthy of praise, or rather, worse, than that one. It seems often to
happen, indeed, that in their greatest emergencies, when most is
expected of them, men become blinded and bewildered in judgment, and do
worse work than at any other time; which may result, perchance, from
their own malign and evil disposition to be always finding fault with
the works of others, or from their seeking to force their genius
overmuch, seeing that to proceed step by step according to the ruling of
nature, yet without neglecting diligence and study, appears to be a
better method than seeking to wrest from the brain, as it were by force,
things that are not there; and it is a fact that in the other arts as
well, but above all in that of writing, lack of spontaneity is only too
easily recognized, and also, so to speak, over-elaboration in
everything.

[Illustration: DOSSO DOSSI: A NYMPH W