ething of the good. But Girolamo, having recognized that to stay
in company with Maestro Biagio was not the course for him, and, indeed,
that it was his certain ruin, broke up the partnership when that work
was finished, and began to work for himself.

The first work that he executed on his own account was an altar-piece
for the Chapel of S. Bastiano in the Church of S. Salvadore, in which he
acquitted himself very well. But then, having heard of the death of his
father, he returned to Ferrara, where for a time he did nothing save
some portraits and works of little importance. Meanwhile, Tiziano
Vecelli went to Ferrara to execute certain things for Duke Alfonso, as
will be related in his Life, in a little closet, or rather, study, where
Giovanni Bellini had already painted some pictures, and Dosso a
Bacchanal rout of men which was so good, that, even if he had never done
any other thing, for that alone he would deserve praise and the name of
an excellent painter; and Girolamo, by means of Tiziano and others,
began to have dealings with the Court of the Duke. And so, as it were to
give a proof of his powers before he should do anything else, he copied
the head of Duke Ercole of Ferrara from one by the hand of Tiziano, and
counterfeited it so well, that it seemed the same as the original;
wherefore it was sent, as a work worthy of praise, into France.
Afterwards, having taken a wife and had children by her, sooner,
perchance, than he should have done, Girolamo painted in S. Francesco at
Ferrara, in the angles of the vaulting, the four Evangelists in fresco,
which were passing good figures. In the same place he executed a frieze
right round the church, which was a very large and abundant work, being
full of half-length figures and little boys linked together in a very
pleasing manner; and for that church, also, he painted an altar-picture
of S. Anthony of Padua, with other figures, and another altar-piece of
Our Lady in the air with two Angels, which was placed on the altar of
Signora Giulia Muzzarelli, whose portrait was executed very well therein
by Girolamo.

At Rovigo, in the Church of S. Francesco, the same master painted the
Holy Spirit appearing in Tongues of Fire, which was a work worthy of
praise for the composition and for the beauty of the heads. At Bologna,
for the Church of S. Martino, he painted an altar-piece of the three
Magi, with most beautiful heads and figures; and at Ferrara, in company
with Benvenuto