returned to Cortona,
where, in his last years, he worked more for pleasure than any other
reason, as one who, accustomed to labour, knew not how to be idle."[26]
Of these later paintings the "Deposition" of Umbertide proves that the
old man of seventy-five had lost little of his power. It is one of his
most beautiful and tender renderings of a scene he has so often painted.
The "Madonna," now in the Arezzo Gallery, painted three years later
(1519), shows, perhaps, a slight falling off in technical power, while
retaining to the full his characteristic grandeur of conception. It was
this picture which, Vasari tells us, was borne on the shoulders of the
brothers, for whose order it was painted, from Cortona to Arezzo, and
Luca, old as he was, insisted on accompanying them, partly to place it
in position, as was customary, and partly to revisit his friends and
relations. The biographer gives a characteristic incident in connection
with this visit, told so charmingly, that I can do no better than
transcribe it:--

"And he, being lodged in the house of the Vasari, where I was a little
child of eight years, I remember how that good old man, who was always
gracious and courteous, having learnt from the master who first taught
me my letters, that I cared for nothing else at school but drawing
pictures; I remember, I say, he turned to Antonio, my father, and said
to him: 'Antonio, since Giorgio takes after his family, let him by all
means be taught how to draw, because, even if he cares for literature,
to know how to draw cannot but be a source of honour and enjoyment, if
not of utility, to him, as to every honourable man.' Then he turned to
me, who stood up straight before him, and said, 'Learn, little
kinsman.'" And Vasari adds, how, hearing that he suffered much from
bleeding at the nose, which sometimes left him half dead, Signorelli
hung a jasper charm about his neck, "with infinite tenderness. Which
memory of Luca," he concludes, "will remain eternally fixed in my
soul."[27]--One of those delightful human touches of which the writings
of Vasari are so full.

This visit to Arezzo took place only four years before his death. He
must have died in 1523, at the age of eighty-two, but there is no
special record of the event, the date being gathered only from a
document, which tells of the election on the 8th of December of another
Inspector of Santa Margherita, to fill the place of the dead
painter.[28] On the 13th of October o