Perhaps to this same period belongs the fantastic "St. John Baptist, with St. Anthony of Padua, St. Sebastian, St. Jerome, and St. Francis," painted for San Francesco al Prato. The St. Sebastian here has degenerated into a girlish fop, with elaborate head-dress and boots, and although the faces of the other three saints are pleasing and thoughtful, yet the picture is terribly degenerate, and the landscape in the rear hardly exists at all. The same faults are to be found in the typical late pictures to be found at Spello, in the church of Sta. Maria Maggiore. They are both signed and dated, and belong to 1521, and can only be admired for their colour and for the knowledge that even they reveal of the possibilities of space. [Illustration: _Anderson photo_] [_San Severo, Perugia_ THE HOLY TRINITY AND VARIOUS SAINTS (Raphael and Perugino), 1505 and 1521] The tale of the 1521 pictures is not yet, however, nearly complete, but in the works now coming under consideration an improvement will be perceptible. The six figures of St. Scholastica, St. Jerome, St. John, St. Gregory, St. Boniface, and St. Martha, which Perugino added in the church of San Severo, below the fresco painted by his great pupil in 1505, are dignified and impressive. They are far removed from the power of early work; there is a cumbersomeness about their draperies, and a sameness in pose and style, but the face of St. Boniface is lovely, and those of St. Jerome and St. John solemn and grand, while all the figures are well-proportioned, and stand well on their feet. It was a melancholy duty to complete the unfinished and early work of the great pupil who had so far surpassed his master, but evidently the old master did it as well as he could, lingered lovingly over its details, and proudly recorded his name upon his work. The whole fresco is of notable interest, as the combination of the works of master and pupil, with the inscriptions recording the names of the artists and of the patrons who employed them, is unique. Sixteen years had passed since the upper fresco was painted. Raphael had mounted on from glory to glory, leaving behind him all his contemporaries, and had been reckoned as the king of them now; and now, in the year after his death, his old master is called up to complete the work, and he gives to the commission the best abilities of a fading old age. Perhaps his neighbours commiserated too much with him, or taunted him with the decay of his powers. Whatever may have been the cause, it is quite clear that, rising superior to the quaintness, stiffness, and formality of Spello, Perugino suddenly wakened up into some old vigour, and much of the old spirit is to be seen in his last works. In the church of San Francesco at Montefalco is his Presepio, which it is absurd to give to Tiberio d' Assisi, Lo Spagna, or Manni. Works by all these men hang close by in the deserted church, which now forms a wonderful picture gallery, and the comparison can easily be made.