damaged, Fra Antonio
Bentivogli, the Bolognese, caused them all to be removed, for good
reasons.

Now, while Mattaccio was executing these scenes, there had gone
thither, to assume the habit of a monk, a Milanese nobleman, who had a
yellow cloak trimmed with black cords, such as was worn at that time;
and, after he had put on the monk's habit, the General gave that cloak
to Mattaccio, who, by means of a mirror, painted a portrait of himself
with it on his back in one of the scenes, wherein S. Benedict, still
almost a child, miraculously puts together and mends the corn-measure,
or rather, tub, of his nurse, which she had broken. At the feet of the
portrait he painted a raven, an ape, and others of his animals. This
work finished, he painted the story of the five loaves and two fishes,
with other figures, in the Refectory of the Monastery of S. Anna, a
seat of the same Order, distant five miles from Monte Oliveto; which
work completed, he returned to Siena. There, at the Postierla, he
painted in fresco the facade of the house of M. Agostino de' Bardi of
Siena, in which were some things worthy of praise, but for the most
part they have been consumed by time and the weather.

[Illustration: THE MARRIAGE OF ALEXANDER AND ROXANA

(_Detail, after the fresco by =Giovanni Antonio Bazzi [Il Sodoma]=.
Rome: Villa Farnesina_)

_Braun_]

During this time there arrived in Siena Agostino Chigi, a very rich
and famous merchant of that city, and he became acquainted with
Giovanni Antonio, both on account of his follies and because he had
the name of a good painter. Wherefore he took him in his company to
Rome, where Pope Julius II was then causing the Papal apartments in
the Palace of the Vatican, which Pope Nicholas V had formerly erected,
to be painted; and Chigi so went to work with the Pope, that some
painting was given also to Sodoma. Now Pietro Perugino, who was
painting the ceiling of an apartment that is beside the Borgia Tower,
was working at his ease, like the old man that he was, and was not
able to set his hand to anything else, as he had been at first
commanded to do: and there was given to Giovanni Antonio to paint
another apartment, which is beside the one that Perugino was painting.
Having therefore set his hand to it, he made the ornamentation of that
ceiling with cornices, foliage, and friezes; and then, in some large
medallions, he executed certain passing good scenes in fresco. But
this animal, devoting his