is in Santo Spirito.

Vasari speaks of a _Nativity_, painted for the Cistercian monks of
Cestello; a beautiful composition, in which the Madonna adores the holy
child, S. Joseph standing near her; S. Francis and S. Jerome kneel in
adoration; the landscape was sketched from the hills near "La Vernia,"
where S. Francis received the stigmata.

Maselli says the picture was lost when the monastery changed hands, but
Messrs. Crowe and Cavalcaselle [Footnote: History of fainting, vol. in.
chap. xvi. pp. 523, 524.] believe they have found it in the Hermitage
at S. Petersburg, under Granacci's name. It is possible that the
favourite pupil of his father and Ridolfo's own friend may have
assisted him. The landscape is Raphaelesque, and might mark the time
when that master and Fra Bartolommeo influenced his style. His best
manner approached so nearly to that of the Frate, that had he continued
he would have very nearly rivalled his excellence.

His two masterpieces are now in the Uffizi; they were painted for the
Brotherhood of S. Zenobio, 1510, to stand one on each side of
Albertinelli's _Annunciation_. One is _S. Zenobio_ (the first
bishop and patron saint of Florence) _restoring a dead child to
life_; the other the _Funeral Procession of the Saint passing the
Baptistery_, where an elm tree, which had been withered, put forth
fresh leaves as the coffin of the bishop touched it. A marble column,
with a bronze tree in relief on it, stands on the spot as a memorial of
this miracle. In these two works Ridolfo Ghirlandajo proved the power
which was in him, but they are the culmination of his art; he never
surpassed, or indeed equalled them again. His richness of colouring and
deep relief equalled that of the Frate, the animation and expression