At a time when he had passed middle age, Titian would seem to have exhausted for the moment the possibilities of Venice. We have seen that the Fathers of the City had been a little vexed with his delay in painting the "Battle of Cadore" in the Hall of the Grand Council. He had received a State allowance in order to enable him to paint it, and twenty years had not sufficed him for the completion of the commission. When he was threatened with the loss of his money and dignities by the indignant Councillors, whose patience at the end of two decades was quite stale, he did set to work, and satisfied them that the picture was worth the waiting. But they could hardly have been inclined to extend much more patronage to a man who allowed the rulers of other States to turn his attention from commissioned work, and never hesitated to leave it for years at a time when other and more remunerative orders came to hand. Moreover the great churches were fairly well filled, and the smaller ones could hardly afford to employ the greatest master of the day. So Pietro Aretino, perhaps casting about to do his friend a good turn, bethought him of his influence in Rome, and addressed certain letters to the leading lights of Mother Church who were to be found there. These letters were doubtless supervised by Titian himself, because they bear a striking likeness in phraseology to the petition the painter had addressed to the Council of Ten in the days when he was little known, and Gian Bellini was still working for the State. Then, it will be remembered, the painter declared that he had been asked to go to Rome but preferred to stay in Venice; now Aretino told the Romans that Titian had been invited to go to Madrid but preferred to work in Rome. So it happened early in the 'forties that, through the useful Aretino, Titian entered into relations with the Farnese family, who were represented in the Papal Chair by Pope Paul III. The result was that Titian was invited to Ferrara, where he met the Pope and painted his portrait. The whole correspondence, so far as it can be seen, would seem to suggest that Titian and Aretino managed this business exceedingly well. When the painter found that his ambition was within measurable distance of being gratified, and that his graceless elder son for whom he had entered a special plea, was to receive a benefice, he seems to have remembered that Venice held many attractions for him, and that he could not leave it in a hurry. Not until the close of 1545 did he visit the Eternal City, only to regret that the greater part of his life had been passed outside its walls. As soon as he was established in Rome, Titian found himself received by princes and prelates in fashion befitting his age and reputation. And Giorgio Vasari, the author of the great work on Italian artists, was commissioned, by one of the heads of the house of Farnese, to show the painter the wonders of the city. [Illustration: PLATE VI.--FLORA