sing him with
the greatest insistence in the world. In all these figures Berna
expressed the emotions of the mind with much vivacity, and particularly
in the face of Marino, which shows on one side fear, and on the other
the faith and trust that make him hope for his liberation from S. James,
although opposite there is seen the Devil, hideous to a marvel, who is
warmly speaking and declaring his rights to the Saint, who, after having
instilled into Marino extreme penitence for his sin and for the promise
made, is liberating him and leading him back to God. This same story,
says Lorenzo Ghiberti, by the hand of the same man, was in a chapel of
the Capponi, dedicated to S. Nicholas, in S. Spirito at Florence, before
that church was burnt down. After this work, then, Berna painted a great
Crucifix in a chapel of the Vescovado of Arezzo for Messer Guccio di
Vanni Tarlati da Pietramala, and at the foot of the Cross a Madonna, S.
John the Evangelist, and S. Francis, in most sorrowful attitudes,
together with a S. Michelagnolo, with so much diligence that it merits
no small praise, and above all by reason of having been so well
preserved that it appears made only yesterday. Below, moreover, is the
portrait of the said Guccio, kneeling in armour at the foot of the
Cross. In the Pieve of the same city, in the Chapel of the Paganelli, he
painted many stories of Our Lady, and portrayed there after the life the
Blessed Rinieri, a holy man and prophet of that house, who is giving
alms to many beggars who are round him. In S. Bartolommeo, also, he
painted some stories of the Old Testament and the story of the Magi; and
in the Church of Spirito Santo he painted some stories of S. John the
Evangelist, and in certain figures the portrait of himself and of many
of his friends, nobles of that city.

[Illustration: BARNA: THE AGONY IN THE GARDEN

(_San Gimignano. Fresco_)]

Returning after these works to his own country, he made on wood many
pictures both small and great; but he made no long stay there, because,
being summoned to Florence, he painted in S. Spirito the Chapel of S.
Niccolo, which we have mentioned above, and which was much extolled, and
other works that were consumed in the miserable burning of that church.
In the Pieve of San Gimignano in Valdelsa he wrought in fresco some
stories of the New Testament, which he had already very nearly brought
to completion, when, falling by a strange accident from his scaffolding
to the