Benvenuto was thus compelled to resign himself and make up his mind to remain in his native place.
He then separated himself from the Dossi, in whose company he had previously worked; and in the church of San Francesco he painted a chapel entirely alone: the subject is the Resurrection of Lazarus; the numerous figures are very good and most agreeably coloured, the attitudes are full of force and movement; Benvenuto consequently received much commendation for his work. In another chapel of the same church our artist painted the Slaughter of the Innocents cruelly put to death by Herod; this was so well done, and the figures of the soldiers and others engaged therein are so full of life, that the picture is a perfect marvel. The various expressions of the many faces, also, are admirably rendered; grief and fear in the countenances of the mothers and nurses, pain and death in those of the infants, and cruelty in the faces of the murderers, with many other peculiarities, which gave infinite satisfaction.[1]
It is also to be remarked that in the execution of these works, Benvenuto adopted a method which had never before been used in Lombardy; he made models of earth that is to say, to the end that he might the more truthfully render botli the lights and the shadows; he employed the model of a figure in wood likewise, jointed and hinged in such a manner that it could be brought into any attitude whatever, and this he then arranged after his own pleasure, placing his draperies thereon, and moving them into such positions as he required.
But what is of more importance than all the rest, he copied every minutia from life and nature, as one who knew that the right and true method is to observe and copy the living subject. For the same church our artist painted the altar-piece of a chapel, and on one of the wails he painted a fresco, the subject of which is Our Saviour Christ, taken by the multitude in the Garden of the Mount of Olives.[2]
For the church of San Domenico, in the same city of Ferrara, Benvenuto painted two pictures in oil;[3] one representing the Miracle of the Cross and Sant’ Elena; in the other
