s, on a gold
ground. He drew this from nature, to the best of his powers, although
it was a novelty to do so in those days, and about it he represented
the whole of the saint's life in twenty small pictures full of little
figures, on a gold ground. He afterwards undertook a large picture
for the monks of Vallombrosa in their abbey of S, Trinita at
Florence. This was a Madonna with the child in her arms, surrounded
by many adoring angels, on a gold ground. To justify the high opinion
in which he was already held, he worked at it with great industry,
showing improved powers of invention and exhibiting our lady in a
pleasing attitude. The painting when finished was placed by the monks
over the high altar of the church, whence it was afterwards removed
to make way for the picture of Alesso Baldovinetti, which is there
to-day. It was afterwards placed in a small chapel of the south aisle
in that church. Cimabue next worked in fresco at the hospital of the
Porcellana, at the corner of the via Nuova which leads to the Borgo
Ognissanti. On one side of the facade, in the middle of which is the
principal door, he represented an Annunciation, and on the other
side, Jesus Christ with Cleophas and Luke, life-size figures. In this
work he abandoned the old manner, making the draperies, garments, and
other things somewhat more life-like, natural and soft than the style
of the Greeks, full as that was of lines and profiles as well in
mosaics as in painting. The painters of those times had taught one
another that rough, awkward and common-place style for a great number
of years, not by means of study but as a matter of custom, without
ever dreaming of improving their designs by beauty of colouring or by
any invention of worth. After this was finished Cimabue again
received a commission from the same superior for whom he had done the
work at S. Croce. He now made him a large crucifix of wood, which may
still be seen in the church. The work caused the superior, who was
well pleased with it, to take him to their convent of S. Francesco at
Pisa, to paint a picture of St Francis there. When completed it was
considered most remarkable by the people there, since they recognised
a certain quality of excellence in the turn of the heads and in the
fall of the drapery which was not to be found in the Byzantine style
in any work executed up to that time not only in Pisa but throughout
Italy.

For the same church Cimabue afterwards painted a large