e, with S. Luke the
Evangelist, and some little boys uplifting a piece of drapery, and
others holding flowers. In the other, by the wish of the Warden, he
painted another Madonna with her Son in her arms, S. James the Martyr,
S. Matthew, S. Sylvester the Pope, and S. Turpe the Chevalier. Having to
paint the Madonna, and not wishing to repeat the same composition
(although he had varied it much in other respects), he made her with
Christ dead in her arms, and those saints as it were round a Deposition
from the Cross; and on the crosses, planted on high and made of
tree-trunks, are fixed two naked Thieves, surrounded by horses and
ministers of the crucifixion, with Joseph, Nicodemus, and the Maries;
all for the satisfaction of the Warden, who wished that in those new
pictures there should be included all the saints that there had been in
the past in the various dismantled chapels, in order to renew their
memory in the new works. One picture was still wanting to complete the
whole, and this was executed by Bronzino, who painted a nude Christ and
eight saints. And in this manner were those chapels brought to
completion, all of which Giovanni Antonio could have done with his own
hand if he had not been so slow.

And since Sogliani had won much favour with the Pisans, after the death
of Andrea del Sarto he was commissioned to finish a panel for the
Company of S. Francesco, which the said Andrea left only sketched; which
panel is now in the building of that Company on the Piazza di S.
Francesco at Pisa. The same master executed some rows of cloth-hangings
for the Wardens of Works of the aforesaid Duomo, and many others in
Florence, because he took pleasure in doing that sort of work, and above
all in company with his friend Tommaso di Stefano, a painter of
Florence.

Being summoned by the Friars of S. Marco in Florence to paint a work in
fresco at the head of their refectory, at the expense of one of their
number, a lay-brother of the Molletti family, who had possessed a rich
patrimony when in the world, Giovanni Antonio wished to paint there the
scene of Jesus Christ feeding five thousand persons with five loaves and
two fishes, in order to make the most of his powers; and he had already
made the design for it, with many women and children and a great
multitude of other people, when the friars refused to have that story,
saying that they wanted something definite, simple, and familiar.
Whereupon, to please them, he painted