When the exasperated soul abandons
The body whence it rent itself away,Minos consigns it to the seventh abyss.
It falls into the forest, and no partIs chosen for it; but where Fortune hurls it,There like a grain of spelt it germinates.
It springs a sapling, and a forest tree;The Harpies, feeding then upon its leaves,Do pain create, and for the pain an outlet.
Like others for our spoils shall we return;But not that any one may them revest,For ’tis not just to have what one casts off.
Here we shall drag them, and along the dismalForest our bodies shall suspended be,Each to the thorn of his molested shade.”
We were attentive still unto the trunk,Thinking that more it yet might wish to tell us,When by a tumult we were overtaken,
In the same way as he is who perceivesThe boar and chase approaching to his stand,Who hears the crashing of the beasts and branches;
And two behold! upon our left-hand side,Naked and scratched, fleeing so furiously,That of the forest, every fan they broke.
He who was in advance: “Now help, Death, help!”And the other one, who seemed to lag too much,Was shouting: “Lano, were not so alert
Those legs of thine at joustings of the Toppo!”And then, perchance because his breath was failing,He grouped himself together with a bush.
Behind them was the forest full of blackShe-mastiffs, ravenous, and swift of footAs greyhounds, who are issuing from the chain.
On him who had crouched down they set their teeth,And him they lacerated piece by piece,Thereafter bore away those aching members.
Thereat my Escort took me by the hand,And led me to the bush, that all in vainWas weeping from its bloody lacerations.
“O Jacopo,” it said, “of Sant’ Andrea,What helped it thee of me to make a screen?What blame have I in thy nefarious life?”
When near him had the Master stayed his steps,He said: “Who wast thou, that through wounds so manyArt blowing out with blood thy dolorous speech?”
And he to us: “O souls, that hither comeTo look upon the shameful massacreThat has so rent away from me my leaves,
Gather them up beneath the dismal bush;I of that city was which to the BaptistChanged its first patron, wherefore he for this
Forever with his art will make it sad.And were it not that on the pass of ArnoSome glimpses of him are remaining still,
Those citizens, who afterwards rebuilt itUpon the ashes left by Attila,In vain had caused their labour to be done.
Of my own house I made myself a gibbet.”
Inferno: Canto XIV
Because the charity of my native placeConstrained me, gathered I the scattered leaves,And gave them back to him, who now was hoarse.
Then came we to the confine, where dispartedThe second round is from the third, and whereA horrible form of Justice is beheld.
Clearly to manifest these novel things,I say that we arrived upon a plain,Which from its bed rejecteth every plant;
The dolorous forest is a garland to itAll round about, as the sad moat to that;There close upon the edge we stayed our feet.
The soil was of an arid and thick sand,Not of another fashion made than thatWhich by the feet of Cato once was pressed.
Vengeance of God, O how much oughtest thouBy each one to be dreaded, who doth readThat which was manifest unto mine eyes!
Of naked souls beheld I many herds,Who all were weeping very miserably,And over them seemed set a law diverse.
Supine upon the ground some folk were lying;And some were sitting all drawn up together,And others went about continually.
Those who were going round were far the more,And those were less who lay down to their torment,But had their tongues more loosed to lamentation.
O’er all the sand-waste, with a gradual fall,Were raining down dilated flakes of fire,As of the snow on Alp without a wind.
As Alexander, in those torrid partsOf India, beheld upon his hostFlames fall unbroken till they reached the ground.
Whence he provided with his phalanxesTo trample down the soil, because the vapourBetter extinguished was while it was single;
Thus was descending the eternal heat,Whereby the sand was set on fire, like tinderBeneath the steel, for doubling of the dole.
Without repose forever was the danceOf miserable hands, now there, now here,Shaking away from off them the fresh gleeds.
“Master,” began I, “thou who overcomestAll things except the demons dire, that issuedAgainst us at the entrance of the gate,
Who is that mighty one who seems to heed notThe fire, and lieth lowering and disdainful,So that the rain seems not to ripen him?”
And he himself, who had become awareThat I was questioning my Guide about him,Cried: “Such as I was living, am I, dead.
If Jove should weary out his smith, from whomHe seized in anger the sharp thunderbolt,Wherewith upon the last day I was smitten,
And if he wearied out by turns the othersIn Mongibello at the swarthy forge,Vociferating, ‘Help, good Vulcan, help!’
Even as he did there at the fight of Phlegra,And shot his bolts at me with all his might,He would not have thereby a joyous vengeance.”
Then did my Leader speak with such great force,That I had never heard him speak so loud:“O Capaneus, in that is not extinguished
Thine arrogance, thou punished art the more;Not any torment, saving thine own rage,Would be unto thy fury pain complete.”
Then he turned round to me with better lip,Saying: “One of the Seven Kings was heWho Thebes besieged, and held, and seems to hold
God in disdain, and little seems to prize him;But, as I said to him, his own despitesAre for his breast the fittest ornaments.
Now follow me, and mind thou do not placeAs yet thy feet upon the burning sand,But always keep them close unto the wood.”
Speaking no word, we came to where there gushesForth from the wood a little rivulet,Whose redness makes my hair still stand on end.
As from the Bulicame springs the brooklet,The sinful women later share among them,So downward through the sand it went its way.
The bottom of it, and both sloping banks,Were made of stone, and the margins at the side;Whence I perceived that there the passage was.
“In all the rest which I have shown to theeSince we have entered in within the gateWhose threshold unto no one is denied,
Nothing has been discovered by thine eyesSo notable as is the present river,Which all the little flames above it quenches.”
These words were of my Leader; whence I prayed himThat he would give me largess of the food,For which he had given me largess of desire.
“In the mid-sea there sits a wasted land,”Said he thereafterward, “whose name is Crete,Under whose king the world of old was chaste.
There is a mountain there, that once was gladWith waters and with leaves, which was called Ida;Now ’tis deserted, as a thing worn out.
Rhea once chose it for the faithful cradleOf her own son; and to conceal him better,Whene’er he cried, she there had clamours made.
A grand old man stands in the mount erect,Who holds his shoulders turned tow’rds Damietta,And looks at Rome as if it were his mirror.
His head is fashioned of refined gold,And of pure silver are the arms and breast;Then he is brass as far down as the fork.
From that point downward all is chosen iron,Save that the right foot is of kiln-baked clay,And more he stands on that than on the other.
Each part, except the gold, is by a fissureAsunder cleft, that dripping is with tears,Which gathered together perforate that cavern.
From rock to rock they fall into this valley;Acheron, Styx, and Phlegethon they form;Then downward go along this narrow sluice
Unto that point where is no more descending.They form Cocytus; what that pool may beThou shalt behold, so here ’tis not narrated.”
And I to him: “If so the present runnelDoth take its rise in this way from our world,Why only on this verge appears it to us?”
And he to me: “Thou knowest the place is round,And notwithstanding thou hast journeyed far,Still to the left descending to the bottom,
Thou hast not yet through all the circle turned.Therefore if something new appear to us,It should not bring amazement to thy face.”
And I again: “Master, where shall be foundLethe and Phlegethon, for of one thou’rt silent,And sayest the other of this rain is made?”
“In all thy questions truly thou dost please me,”Replied he; “but the boiling of the redWater might well solve one of them thou makest.
Thou shalt see Lethe, but outside this moat,There where the souls repair to lave themselves,When sin repented of has been removed.”
Then said he: “It is time now to abandonThe wood; take heed that thou come after me;A way the margins make that are not burning,
And over them all vapours are extinguished.”
Inferno: Canto XV
Now bears us onward one of the hard margins,And so the brooklet’s mist o’ershadows it,From fire it saves the water and the dikes.
Even as the Flemings, ’twixt Cadsand and Bruges,Fearing the flood that tow’rds them hurls itself,Their bulwarks build to put the sea to flight;
And as the Paduans along the Brenta,To guard their villas and their villages,Or ever Chiarentana feel the heat;
In such similitude had those been made,Albeit not so lofty nor so thick,Whoever he might be, the master made them.
Now were we from the forest so remote,I could not have discovered where it was,Even if backward I had turned myself,
When we a company of souls encountered,Who came beside the dike, and every oneGazed at us, as at evening we are wont
To eye each other under a new moon,And so towards us sharpened they their browsAs an old tailor at the needle’s eye.
Thus scrutinised by such a family,By some one I was recognised, who seizedMy garment’s hem, and cried out, “What a marvel!”
And I, when he stretched forth his arm to me,On his baked aspect fastened so mine eyes,That the scorched countenance prevented not
His recognition by my intellect;And bowing down my face unto his own,I made reply, “Are you here, Ser Brunetto?”
And he: “May’t not displease thee, O my son,If a brief space with thee Brunetto LatiniBackward return and let the trail go on.”
I said to him: “With all my power I ask it;And if you wish me to sit down with you,I will, if he please, for I go with him.”
“O son,” he said, “whoever of this herdA moment stops, lies then a hundred years,Nor fans himself when smiteth him the fire.
Therefore go on; I at thy skirts will come,And afterward will I rejoin my band,Which goes lamenting its eternal doom.”
I did not dare to go down from the roadLevel to walk with him; but my head bowedI held as one who goeth reverently.
And he began: “What fortune or what fateBefore the last day leadeth thee down here?And who is this that showeth thee the way?”
“Up there above us in the life serene,”I answered him, “I lost me in a valley,Or ever yet my age had been completed.
But yestermorn I turned my back upon it;This one appeared to me, returning thither,And homeward leadeth me along this road.”
And he to me: “If thou thy star do follow,Thou canst not fail thee of a glorious port,If well I judged in the life beautiful.
And if I had not died so prematurely,Seeing Heaven thus benignant unto thee,I would have given thee comfort in the work.
But that ungrateful and malignant people,Which of old time from Fesole descended,And smacks still of the mountain and the granite,
Will make itself, for thy good deeds, thy foe;And it is right; for among crabbed sorbsIt ill befits the sweet fig to bear fruit.
Old rumour in the world proclaims them blind;A people avaricious, envious, proud;Take heed that of their customs thou do cleanse thee.
Thy fortune so much honour doth reserve thee,One party and the other shall be hungryFor thee; but far from goat shall be the grass.
Their litter let the beasts of FesoleMake of themselves, nor let them touch the plant,If any still upon their dunghill rise,
In which may yet revive the consecratedSeed of those Romans, who remained there whenThe nest of such great malice it became.”
“If my entreaty wholly were fulfilled,”Replied I to him, “not yet would you beIn banishment from human nature placed;
For in my mind is fixed, and touches nowMy heart the dear and good paternal imageOf you, when in the world from hour to hour
You taught me how a man becomes eternal;And how much I am grateful, while I liveBehoves that in my language be discerned.
What you narrate of my career I write,And keep it to be glossed with other textBy a Lady who can do it, if I reach her.
This much will I have manifest to you;Provided that my conscience do not chide me,For whatsoever Fortune I am ready.
Such handsel is not new unto mine ears;Therefore let Fortune turn her wheel aroundAs it may please her, and the churl his mattock.”
My Master thereupon on his right cheekDid backward turn himself, and looked at me;Then said: “He listeneth well who noteth it.”
Nor speaking less on that account, I goWith Ser Brunetto, and I ask who areHis most known and most eminent companions.
And he to me: “To know of some is well;Of others it were laudable to be silent,For short would be the time for so much speech.
Know them in sum, that all of them were clerks,And men of letters great and of great fame,In the world tainted with the selfsame sin.
Priscian goes yonder with that wretched crowd,And Francis of Accorso; and thou hadst seen thereIf thou hadst had a hankering for such scurf,