for the high-altar of S. Domenico;
but he did not succeed, for the reason that both those pictures were
allotted to Giorgio Vasari, whose designs, among the many that were
made, gave more satisfaction than any of the others. For the Company of
the Ascension in that city Giovanni Antonio painted on a banner for
carrying in processions Christ in the act of Resurrection, with many
soldiers round the Sepulchre, and His Ascension into Heaven, with the
Madonna surrounded by the twelve Apostles, which was all executed very
well and with diligence. At Castello della Pieve he painted an
altar-piece in oils of the Visitation of Our Lady, with some Saints
about her, and in an altar-piece that was painted for the Pieve a San
Stefano he depicted the Madonna and other Saints; which two works
Lappoli executed much better than the others that he had painted up to
that time, because he had been able to see at his leisure many works in
relief and casts taken in gesso from the statues of Michelagnolo and
from other ancient works, and brought by Giorgio Vasari to his house at
Arezzo. The same master painted some pictures of Our Lady, which are
dispersed throughout Arezzo and other places, and a Judith who is
placing the head of Holofernes in a basket held by her serving-woman,
which now belongs to Mons. M. Bernardetto Minerbetti, Bishop of Arezzo,
who loved Giovanni Antonio much, as he loves all other men of talent,
and received from him, besides other things, a young S. John the Baptist
in the desert, almost wholly naked, which is held dear by him, since it
is an excellent figure.

Finally, recognizing that perfection in this art consists in nothing
else but seeking in good time to become rich in invention and to study
the nude continually, and thus to render facile the difficulties of
execution, Giovanni Antonio repented that he had not spent in the study
of art the time that he had given to his pleasures, perceiving that what
can be done easily in youth cannot be done well in old age. But although
he was always conscious of his error, yet he did not recognize it fully
until, having set himself to study when already an old man, he saw a
picture in oils, fourteen braccia long and six braccia and a half high,
executed in forty-two days by Giorgio Vasari, who painted it for the
Refectory of the Monks of the Abbey of S. Fiore at Arezzo; in which work
are painted the Nuptials of Esther and King Ahasuerus, and there are in
it more than sixty f