Giuliano Bugiardini should be called the assistant rather than the scholar of Albertinelli, being older than his master. He was born in 1471 in a suburb outside the Via Faenza, Florence, and was placed in the shop of Domenico Ghirlandajo, where his acquaintance with Michelangelo--begun in the Medici Gardens--ripened into intimacy, and he was employed by him in the Sistine Chapel. Giuliano had that happily constructed mind which, with an ineffable content in its own works, will pass through life perfectly happy in the feeling that in reaching mediocrity it has achieved success. Not only wanting talent to produce better works, he lacked also the faculty of perceiving where his own were faulty, and having a great aptitude for copying the works of others, he felt himself as great as the original artists. Michelangelo was always amused with his naïve self-conceit, and kept up a friendship with him for many years. He even went so far as to sit to Bugiardini for his likeness, at the request of Ottaviano de' Medici. Giuliano, having painted and talked nonsense for two hours, at last exclaimed, to his sitter's great relief, "Now, Michelangelo, come and look at yourself; I have caught your very expression." But what was Michelangelo's horror to see himself depicted with eyes which were neither straight nor a pair! The worthy artist looked from his work to the original, and declared he could see no difference between them, on which Michelangelo, shrugging his shoulders, said, "It must be a defect of nature," and bade his friend go on with it. This charming portrait was presented to Ottaviano de' Medici, with that of _Pope Clement VII._, copied from Sebastian del Piombo, and is now in the Louvre. Bugiardini's works always take the style of other masters. There is a _Madonna_ in the Uffizi, and one in the Leipsic Museum, both in Leonardo's style, with his defects exaggerated. The former is a sickly woman in a sentimental attitude, the child rather heavy, the colouring is bright and well fused; he has evidently adopted the method which he had seen Albertinelli use in his studio. During a stay in Bologna he painted a _Madonna and Saints_ as an altar-piece for the church of S. Francesco, besides a _Marriage of S. Catherine_, now in the Bologna Pinacoteca. The composition of this is not without merit; the child Jesus seated on his mother's knees, gives the ring to S. Catherine, little S. John stands at the Virgin's feet, S. Anthony on her left. The colouring is less pleasing, the flesh tints too red and raw.