nedict in the said
cloister, from the design that he had made and left with Don
Laurentino; and this Marco did as best he knew, delivering the whole
work finished in chiaroscuro on April 24, in the year 1448, as it may be
seen written by his hand in verses and words that are no less rude than
the pictures. Having returned to his country and being restored to
health, Lorenzo painted, on the same wall of the Convent of S. Croce
whereon he had made the S. Christopher, the Assumption into Heaven of
Our Lady, surrounded by a choir of angels, and below her a S. Thomas,
who is receiving the Girdle. In the execution of this work, being
indisposed, Lorenzo caused Donatello, then a youth, to help him;
wherefore, with assistance so able, it was finished in the year 1450, in
such wise that I believe that it is the best work, both in design and in
colouring, that was ever made by Lorenzo, who, no long time after, being
old and worn out, died at the age of about sixty, leaving two sons who
applied themselves to painting; one of whom, named Bicci, gave him
assistance in making many works, while the other, who was called Neri,
portrayed his father and himself in the Chapel of the Lenzi in
Ognissanti, in two medallions with letters round them, which give the
name of both one and the other. In this chapel the same man, in painting
some stories of the Madonna, strove to counterfeit many costumes of
those times, both of men and of women; and he made the panel in
distemper for the chapel. In like manner, he made some panels for the
Abbey of S. Felice in Piazza at Florence, belonging to the Order of
Camaldoli, and one for the high-altar of S. Michele in Arezzo, a church
of the same Order. And at S. Maria delle Grazie without Arezzo, in the
Church of S. Bernardino, he made a Madonna that has under her mantle the
people of Arezzo, and on one side that S. Bernardino kneeling with a
wooden cross in his hand, such as he was wont to carry when he went
preaching through Arezzo, and on the other side and about her S.
Nicholas and S. Michelagnolo; and on the predella are painted stories of
the acts of the said S. Bernardino, and of the miracles that he wrought,
particularly in that place. The same Neri made the panel of the
high-altar of S. Romolo in Florence; and in S. Trinita, in the Chapel of
the Spini, he painted in fresco the life of S. Giovanni Gualberto, and
in distemper the panel that is over the altar. From these works it is
recognized that i