to demonstrate the
talent of Niccolo and the patience with which he laboured at this work
up to the very last. And no sooner had he finished it than he was
requested by the men of the Company of S. Maria della Neve, at Monte
Sansovino, to paint for that Company an altar-piece wherein was to be
the story of the Snow, which, falling on the site of S. Maria Maggiore
at Rome on the 5th of August, was the reason of the building of that
temple. Niccolo, then, executed that altar-piece for the above-mentioned
Company with much diligence; and afterwards he executed at Marciano a
work in fresco that won no little praise.

Now in the year 1524, after M. Baldo Magini had caused Antonio, the
brother of Giuliano da San Gallo, to build in the Madonna delle Carceri,
in the town of Prato, a tabernacle of marble with two columns,
architrave, cornice, and a quarter-round arch, Antonio resolved to bring
it about that M. Baldo should give the commission for the picture which
was to adorn that tabernacle to Niccolo, with whom he had formed a
friendship when he was working in the Palace of the above-mentioned
Cardinal dal Monte at Monte Sansovino. He presented him, therefore, to
M. Baldo, who, although he had been minded to have it painted by Andrea
del Sarto, as has been related in another place, resolved, at the
entreaties and advice of Antonio, to allot it to Niccolo. And he, having
set his hand to it, strove with all his power to make a beautiful work,
but he did not succeed; for, apart from diligence, there is no
excellence of design to be seen in it, nor any other quality worthy of
much praise, because his hard manner, with his labours over his models
of clay and wax, almost always gave a laborious and displeasing effect
to his work. And yet, with regard to the labours of art, that man could
not have done more than he did or shown more lovingness; and since he
knew that none ...[33] for many years he could never bring himself to
believe that others surpassed him in excellence. In this work, then,
there is a God the Father who is sending down the crown of virginity and
humility upon the Madonna by the hands of some Angels who are round her,
some of whom are playing various instruments. Niccolo made in the
picture a portrait from life of M. Baldo, kneeling at the feet of S.
Ubaldo the Bishop, and on the other side he painted S. Joseph; and those
two figures are one on either side of the image of the Madonna, which
worked miracles in tha