Pietro Laurati, an excellent painter of Siena, proved in his life how great is the contentment of the truly able, who feel that their works are prized both at home and abroad, and who see themselves sought after by all men, for the reason that in the course of his life he was sent for and held dear throughout all Tuscany, having first become known through the scenes that he painted in fresco for the Scala, a hospital in Siena, wherein he imitated in such wise the manner of Giotto, then spread throughout all Tuscany, that it was believed with great reason that he was destined, as afterwards came to pass, to become a better master than Cimabue and Giotto and the others had been; for the figures that represent the Virgin ascending the steps of the Temple, accompanied by Joachim and Anna, and received by the priest, and then in the Marriage, are so beautifully adorned, so well draped, and so simply wrapped in their garments, that they show majesty in the air of the heads, and a most beautiful manner in their bearing. By reason of this work, which was the first introduction into Siena of the good method of painting, giving light to the many beautiful intellects which have flourished in that city in every age, Pietro was invited to Monte Oliveto di Chiusuri, where he painted a panel in distemper that is placed to-day in the portico below the church. In Florence, next, opposite to the left-hand door of the Church of S. Spirito, on the corner where to-day there is a butcher, he painted a shrine which, by reason of the softness of the heads and of the sweetness that is seen in it, deserves the highest praise from every discerning craftsman. Going from Florence to Pisa, he wrought in the Campo Santo, on the wall that is beside the principal door, all the lives of the Holy Fathers, with expressions so lively and attitudes so beautiful that he equalled Giotto and gained thereby very great praise, having expressed in certain heads, both with drawing and with colour, all that vivacity that the manner of those times was able to show. From Pisa he went to Pistoia, where he made a Madonna with some angels round her, very well grouped, on a panel in distemper, for the Church of S. Francesco; and in the predella that ran below this panel, in certain scenes, he made certain little figures so lively and so vivid that in those times it was something marvellous; wherefore, since they satisfied himself no less than others, he thought fit to place thereon his name, with these words: PETRUS LAURATI DE SENIS. [Illustration: PIETRO LORENZETTI: MADONNA AND CHILD WITH S.S. FRANCIS AND JOHN _(Assisi: Lower Church of S. Francesco. Fresco)_]