never have consented to deprive Florence of such a picture, and he
marvelled that the Pope should have given it up so readily. However, he
answered that he would not fail to satisfy the Duke; but that, since
the frame was bad, he was having a new one made, and when it had been
gilt he would send the picture with every possible precaution to Mantua.
This done, Messer Ottaviano, in order to "save both the goat and the
cabbage," as the saying goes, sent privately for Andrea and told him how
the matter stood, and how there was no way out of it but to make an
exact copy of the picture with the greatest care and send it to the
Duke, secretly retaining the one by the hand of Raffaello. Andrea, then,
having promised to do all in his power and knowledge, caused a panel to
be made similar in size and in every respect, and painted it secretly in
the house of Messer Ottaviano. And to such purpose did he labour, that
when it was finished even Messer Ottaviano, for all his understanding in
matters of art, could not tell the one from the other, nor distinguish
the real and true picture from the copy; especially as Andrea had
counterfeited even the spots of dirt, exactly as they were in the
original. And so, after they had hidden the picture of Raffaello, they
sent the one by the hand of Andrea, in a similar frame, to Mantua; at
which the Duke was completely satisfied, and above all because the
painter Giulio Romano, a disciple of Raffaello, had praised it, failing
to detect the trick. This Giulio would always have been of the same
opinion, and would have believed it to be by the hand of Raffaello, but
for the arrival in Mantua of Giorgio Vasari, who, having been as it were
the adoptive child of Messer Ottaviano, and having seen Andrea at work
on that picture, revealed the truth. For Giulio making much of Vasari,
and showing him, after many antiquities and paintings, that picture of
Raffaello's, as the best work that was there, Giorgio said to him, "A
beautiful work it is, but in no way by the hand of Raffaello." "What?"
answered Giulio. "Should I not know it, when I recognize the very
strokes that I made with my own brush?" "You have forgotten them," said
Giorgio, "for this picture is by the hand of Andrea del Sarto; and to
prove it, there is a sign (to which he pointed) that was made in
Florence, because when the two were together they could not be
distinguished." Hearing this, Giulio had the picture turned round, and
saw the mark; at