o, who was then a
young man and was working at sculpture in the same place under his
master Andrea Contucci, formed so warm and so strait a friendship
together, that neither by day nor by night were they ever separated one
from another. Their discussions were for the most part on the
difficulties of art, so that it is no marvel that both of them should
have afterwards become most excellent, as is now being shown of Andrea
and as will be related in the proper place of Jacopo.

[Illustration: THE LAST SUPPER

(_After the fresco by =Andrea del Sarto=. Florence: S. Salvi_)

_Anderson_]

There was at this same time in the Convent of the Servi, selling the
candles at the counter, a friar called Fra Mariano dal Canto alla
Macine, who was also sacristan; and he heard everyone extolling Andrea
mightily and saying that he was by way of making marvellous proficience
in painting. Whereupon he planned to fulfil a desire of his own without
much expense; and so, approaching Andrea, who was a mild and guileless
fellow, on the side of his honour, he began to persuade him under the
cloak of friendship that he wished to help him in a matter which would
bring him honour and profit and would make him known in such a manner,
that he would never be poor any more. Now many years before, as has been
related above, Alesso Baldovinetti had painted a Nativity of Christ in
the first cloister of the Servi, on the wall that has the Annunciation
behind it; and in the same cloister, on the other side, Cosimo Rosselli
had begun a scene of S. Filippo, the founder of that Servite Order,
assuming the habit. But Cosimo had not carried that scene to completion,
because death came upon him at the very moment when he was working at
it. The friar, then, being very eager to see the rest finished, thought
of serving his own ends by making Andrea and Franciabigio, who, from
being friends, had become rivals in art, compete with one another, each
doing part of the work. This, besides effecting his purpose very
well, would make the expense less and their efforts greater. Thereupon,
revealing his mind to Andrea, he persuaded him to undertake that
enterprise, by pointing out to him that since it was a public and much
frequented place, he would become known on account of such a work no
less by foreigners than by the Florentines; that he should not look for
any payment in return, or even for an invitation to undertake it, but
should rather pray to be allowed to do it