{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_1995/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_1995","id":"gutenberg_1995","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1995","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Classics of Literature","Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Category: Poetry","Epic poetry, Italian -- Translations into English","Harvard Classics","Hell -- Poetry","Italian poetry -- To 1400 -- Translations into English","Italy"],"text":"The Divine Comedy of Dante Aligheri\n\nTranslated by Charles Eliot Norton\n\n\n\n\nTo\n\nJAMES RUSSELL LOWELL.\n\nE come sare\u2019 io sense lui corso?\n\nIt is a happiness for me to connect this volume with the memory of my\nfriend and master from youth. I was but a beginner in the study of the\nDivine Comedy when I first had his incomparable aid in the\nunderstanding of it. During the last year of his life he read the\nproofs of this volume, to what great advantage to my work may readily\nbe conceived.\n\nWhen, in the early summer of this year, the printing of the Purgatory\nbegan, though illness made it an exertion to him, he continued this act\nof friendship, and did not cease till, at the fifth canto, he laid down\nthe pencil forever from his dear and honored hand.\n\nCHARLES ELIOT NORTON.\n\n\nCAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS,\n1 _October_, 1891\n\n\nThe text followed in this translation is, in general, that of Witte. In\na few cases I have preferred the readings which the more recent\nresearches of the Rev. Dr. Edward Moore, of Oxford, seem to have\nestablished as correct.\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n\nINTRODUCTION\n\nAIDS TO THE STUDY OF THE DIVINE COMEDY\n\n\nCANTO I.\nDante, astray in a wood, reaches the foot of a hill which he begins to\nascend; he is hindered by three beasts; he turns back and is met by\nVirgil, who proposes to guide him into the eternal world.\n\nCANTO II.\nDante, doubtful of his own powers, is discouraged at the outset.\u2014Virgil\ncheers him by telling him that he has been sent to his aid by a blessed\nSpirit from Heaven.\u2014Dante casts off fear, and the poets proceed.\n\nCANTO III.\nThe gate of Hell. Virgil leads Dante in.\u2014The punishment of the neither\ngood nor bad.\u2014Acheron, and the sinners on its\nbank.\u2014Charon.\u2014Earthquake.\u2014Dante swoons.\n\nCANTO IV.\nThe further side of Acheron.\u2014Virgil leads Dante into Limbo, the First\nCircle of Hell, containing the spirits of those who lived virtuously\nbut without Christianity.\u2014Greeting of Virgil by his fellow poets.\u2014They\nenter a castle, where are the shades of ancient worthies.\u2014Virgil and\nDante depart.\n\nCANTO V.\nThe Second Circle: Carnal sinners.\u2014Minos.\u2014Shades renowned of\nold.\u2014Francesca da Rimini.\n\nCANTO VI.\nThe Third Circle: the Gluttonous.\u2014Cerberus.\u2014Ciacco.\n\nCANTO VII.\nThe Fourth Circle: the Avaricious and the Prodigal.\u2014\nPluto.\u2014Fortune.\u2014The Styx.\u2014The Fifth Circle: the Wrathful and the\nSullen.\n\nCANTO VIII.\nThe Fifth Circle.\u2014Phlegyas and his boat.\u2014Passage of the Styx.\u2014Filippo\nArgenti.\u2014The City of Dis.\u2014The demons refuse entrance to the poets.\n\nCANTO IX.\nThe City of Dis.\u2014Eriehtho.\u2014The Three Furies.\u2014The Heavenly\nMessenger.\u2014The Sixth Circle: Heresiarchs.\n\nCANTO X.\nThe Sixth Circle: Heresiarchs.\u2014Farinata degli Uberti.\u2014Cavalcante\nCavalcanti.\u2014Frederick II.\n\nCANTO XI.\nThe Sixth Circle: Heretics.\u2014Tomb of Pope Anastasius.\u2014Discourse of\nVirgil on the divisions of the lower Hell.\n\nCANTO XII.\nFirst round of the Seventh Circle: those who do violence to\nothers.\u2014Tyrants and Homicides.\u2014The Minotaur.\u2014The\nCentaurs.\u2014Chiron.\u2014Nessus.\u2014The River of Boiling Blood, and the Sinners\nin it.\n\nCANTO XIII.\nSecond round of the Seventh Circle: those who have done violence to\nthemselves and to their goods.\u2014The Wood of Self-murderers.\u2014The\nHarpies.\u2014Pier della Vigne.\u2014Lano of Siena and others.\n\nCANTO XIV.\nThird round of the Seventh Circle those who have done violence to\nGod.\u2014The Burning Sand.\u2014Capaneus.\u2014Figure of the Old Man in Crete.\u2014The\nRivers of Hell.\n\nCANTO XV.\nThird round of the Seventh Circle: those who have done violence to\nNature.\u2014Brunetto Latini.\u2014Prophecies of misfortune to Dante.\n\nCANTO XVI.\nThird round of the Seventh Circle: those who have done violence to\nNature.\u2014Guido Guerra, Tegghiaio Aldobrandi and Jacopo Rusticucci.\u2014The\nroar of Phlegethon as it pours downward.\u2014The cord thrown into the\nabyss.\n\nCANTO XVII.\nThird round of the Seventh Circle: those who have done violence to\nArt.\u2014Geryon.\u2014The Usurers.\u2014Descent to the Eighth Circle.\n\nCANTO XVIII.\nEighth Circle: the first pit: Panders and Seducers.\u2014Venedico\nCaccianimico.\u2014Jason.\u2014Second pit: false flatterers.\u2014Alessio\nInterminei.\u2014Thais.\n\nCANTO XIX.\nEighth Circle: third pit: Simonists.\u2014Pope Nicholas III\n\nCANTO XX.\nEighth Circle: fourth pit: Diviners, Soothsayers, and\nMagicians.\u2014Amphiaraus.\u2014Tiresias.\u2014Aruns.\u2014Manto.\u2014 Eurypylus.\u2014Michael\nScott.\u2014Asolente.\n\nCANTO XXI.\nEighth Circle: fifth pit: Barrators.\u2014A magistrate of Lucca.\u2014The\nMalebranche.\u2014Parley with them.\n\nCANTO XXII.\nEighth Circle: fifth pit: Barrators.\u2014Ciampolo of Navarre.\u2014Brother\nGomita.\u2014Michael Zanche.\u2014Fray of the Malebranche.\n\nCANTO XXIII.\nEighth Circle. Escape from the fifth pit.\u2014The sixth pit:\nHypocrites.\u2014The Jovial Friars.\u2014Caiaphas.\u2014Annas.\u2014Frate Catalano.\n\nCANTO XXIV.\nEighth Circle. The poets climb from the sixth pit.\u2014 Seventh pit:\nFraudulent Thieves.\u2014Vanni Fucci.\u2014Prophecy of calamity to Dante.\n\nCANTO XXV.\nEighth Circle: seventh pit: Fraudulent Thieves.\u2014Cacus.\u2014Agnello\nBrunellesehi and others.\n\nCANTO XXVI.\nEighth Circle: eighth pit: Fraudulent Counsellors.\u2014Ulysses and Diomed.\n\nCANTO XXVII.\nEighth Circle: eighth pit: Fraudulent Counsellors.\u2014Guido da\nMontefeltro.\n\nCANTO XXVIII.\nEighth Circle: ninth pit: Sowers of discord and schism.\u2014Mahomet and\nAli.\u2014Fra Dolcino.\u2014Pier da Medicina.\u2014 Curio.\u2014Mosca.\u2014Bertran de Born.\n\nCANTO XXIX.\nEighth Circle: ninth pit.\u2014Geri del Bello.\u2014Tenth pit: Falsifiers of all\nsorts.\u2014Griffolino of Mezzo.\u2014Capocchio.\n\nCANTO XXX.\nEighth Circle: tenth pit: Falsifiers of all sorts.\u2014Myrrha.\u2014Gianni\nSchiechi.\u2014Master Adam.\u2014Sinon of Troy.\n\nCANTO XXXI.\nThe Giants around the Eighth Circle.\u2014Nimrod.\u2014Ephialtes.\u2014Antiens sets\nthe Poets down in the Ninth Circle.\n\nCANTO XXXII.\nNinth Circle: Traitors. First ring: Caina.\u2014Counts of Mangona.\u2014Camicion\nde\u2019 Pazzi.\u2014Second ring: Antenora.\u2014Bocca degli Abati.\u2014Buoso da\nDuera.\u2014Count Ugolino.\n\nCANTO XXXIII.\nNinth Circle: Traitors. Second ring: Antenora.\u2014 Count Ugolino.\u2014Third\nring: Ptolomaea.\u2014Brother Alberigo.\u2014Branca d\u2019 Oria.\n\nCANTO XXXIV.\nNinth Circle: Traitors. Fourth ring: Judecca.\u2014Lucifer.\u2014Judas, Brutus\nand Cassius.\u2014Centre of the universe.\u2014Passage from Hell.\u2014Ascent to the\nsurface of the Southern hemisphere.\n\n\n\n\nINTRODUCTION.\n\n\nSo many versions of the Divine Comedy exist in English that a new one\nmight well seem needless. But most of these translations are in verse,\nand the intellectual temper of our time is impatient of a transmutation\nin which substance is sacrificed for form\u2019s sake, and the new form is\nitself different from the original. The conditions of verse in\ndifferent languages vary so widely as to make any versified translation\nof a poem but an imperfect reproduction of the archetype. It is like an\nimperfect mirror that renders but a partial likeness, in which\nessential features are blurred or distorted. Dante himself, the first\nmodern critic, declared that \u201cnothing harmonized by a musical bond can\nbe transmuted from its own speech without losing all its sweetness and\nharmony,\u201d and every fresh attempt at translation affords a new proof of\nthe truth of his assertion. Each language exhibits its own special\ngenius in its poetic forms. Even when they are closely similar in\nrhythmical method their poetic effect is essentially different, their\nindividuality is distinct. The hexameter of the Iliad is not the\nhexameter of the Aeneid. And if this be the case in respect to related\nforms, it is even more obvious in respect to forms peculiar to one\nlanguage, like the terza rima of the Italian, for which it is\nimpossible to find a satisfactory equivalent in another tongue.\n\nIf, then, the attempt be vain to reproduce the form or to represent its\neffect in a translation, yet the substance of a poem may have such\nworth that it deserves to be known by readers who must read it in their\nown tongue or not at all. In this case the aim of the translator should\nbe to render the substance fully, exactly, and with as close a\ncorrespondence to the tone and style of the original as is possible\nbetween prose and poetry. Of the charm, of the power of the poem such a\ntranslation can give but an inadequate suggestion; the musical bond was\nof its essence, and the loss of the musical bond is the loss of the\nbeauty to which form and substance mutually contributed, and in which\nthey were both alike harmonized and sublimated. The rhythmic life of\nthe original is its vital spirit, and the translation losing this vital\nspirit is at best as the dull plaster cast to the living marble or the\nbreathing bronze. The intellectual substance is there; and if the work\nbe good, something of the emotional quality may be conveyed; the\nimagination may mould the prose as it moulded the verse,\u2014but, after\nall, \u201ctranslations are but as turn-coated things at best,\u201d as Howell\nsaid in one of his Familiar Letters.\n\nNo poem in any tongue is more informed with rhythmic life than the\nDivine Comedy. And yet, such is its extraordinary distinction, no poem\nhas an intellectual and emotional substance more independent of its\nmetrical form. Its complex structure, its elaborate measure and rhyme,\nhighly artificial as they are, are so mastered by the genius of the\npoet as to become the most natural expression of the spirit by which\nthe poem is inspired; while at the same time the thought and sentiment\nembodied in the verse is of such import, and the narrative of such\ninterest, that they do not lose their worth when expressed in the prose\nof another tongue; they still have power to quicken imagination, and to\nevoke sympathy.\n\nIn English there is an excellent prose translation of the Inferno, by\nDr. John Carlyle, a man well known to the reader of his brother\u2019s\nCorrespondence. It was published forty years ago, but it is still\ncontemporaneous enough in style to answer every need, and had Dr.\nCarlyle made a version of the whole poem I should hardly have cared to\nattempt a new one. In my translation of the Inferno I am often Dr.\nCarlyle\u2019s debtor. His conception of what a translation should be is\nvery much the same as my own. Of the Purgatorio there is a prose\nversion which has excellent qualities, by Mr. W. S. Dugdale. Another\nversion of great merit, of both the Purgatorio and Paradiso, is that of\nMr. A. J. Butler. It is accompanied by a scholarly and valuable\ncomment, and I owe much to Mr. Butler\u2019s work. But through what seems to\nme occasional excess of literal fidelity his English is now and then\nsomewhat crabbed. \u201cHe overacts the office of an interpreter,\u201d I cite\nagain from Howell, \u201cwho doth enslave himself too strictly to words or\nphrases. One may be so over-punctual in words that he may mar the\nmatter.\u201d\n\nI have tried to be as literal in my translation as was consistent with\ngood English, and to render Dante\u2019s own words in words as nearly\ncorrespondent to them as the difference in the languages would permit.\nBut it is to be remembered that the familiar uses and subtle\nassociations which give to words their full meaning are never\nabsolutely the same in two languages. Love in English not only SOUNDS\nbut IS different from amor in Latin, or amore in Italian. Even the most\nfelicitous prose translation must fail therefore at times to afford the\nentire and precise meaning of the original.\n\nMoreover, there are difficulties in Dante\u2019s poem for Italians, and\nthere are difficulties in the translation for English readers. These,\nwhere it seemed needful, I have endeavored to explain in brief\nfootnotes. But I have desired to avoid distracting the attention of the\nreader from the narrative, and have mainly left the understanding of it\nto his good sense and perspicacity. The clearness of Dante\u2019s\nimaginative vision is so complete, and the character of his narration\nof it so direct and simple, that the difficulties in understanding his\nintention are comparatively few.\n\nIt is a noticeable fact that in by far the greater number of passages\nwhere a doubt in regard to the interpretation exists, the obscurity\nlies in the rhyme-word. For with all the abundant resources of the\nItalian tongue in rhyme, and with all Dante\u2019s mastery of them, the\ntruth still is that his triple rhyme often compelled him to exact from\nwords such service as they did not naturally render and as no other\npoet had required of them. The compiler of the Ottimo Commento records,\nin an often-cited passage, that \u201cI, the writer, heard Dante say that\nnever a rhyme had led him to say other than he would, but that many a\ntime and oft he had made words say for him what they were not wont to\nexpress for other poets.\u201d The sentence has a double truth, for it\nindicates not only Dante\u2019s incomparable power to compel words to give\nout their full meaning, but also his invention of new uses for them,\nhis employment of them in unusual significations or in forms hardly\nelsewhere to be found. These devices occasionally interfere with the\nlimpid flow of his diction, but the difficulties of interpretation to\nwhich they give rise serve rather to mark the prevailing clearness and\nsimplicity of his expression than seriously to impede its easy and\nunperplexed current. There are few sentences in the Divina Commedia in\nwhich a difficulty is occasioned by lack of definiteness of thought or\ndistinctness of image.\n\nA far deeper-lying and more pervading source of imperfect comprehension\nof the poem than any verbal difficulty exists in the double or triple\nmeaning that runs through it. The narrative of the poet\u2019s spiritual\njourney is so vivid and consistent that it has all the reality of an\naccount of an actual experience; but within and beneath runs a stream\nof allegory not less consistent and hardly less continuous than the\nnarrative itself. To the illustration and carrying out of this interior\nmeaning even the minutest details of external incident are made to\ncontribute, with an appropriateness of significance, and with a freedom\nfrom forced interpretation or artificiality of construction such as no\nother writer of allegory has succeeded in attaining. The poem may be\nread with interest as a record of experience without attention to its\ninner meaning, but its full interest is only felt when this inner\nmeaning is traced, and the moral significance of the incidents of the\nstory apprehended by the alert intelligence. The allegory is the soul\nof the poem, but like the soul within the body it does not show itself\nin independent existence. It is, in scholastic phrase, the form of the\nbody, giving to it its special individuality. Thus in order truly to\nunderstand and rightly appreciate the poem the reader must follow its\ncourse with a double intelligence. \u201cTaken literally,\u201d as Dante declares\nin his Letter to Can Grande, \u201cthe subject is the state of the soul\nafter death, simply considered. But, allegorically taken, its subject\nis man, according as by his good or ill deserts he renders himself\nliable to the reward or punishment of Justice.\u201d It is the allegory of\nhuman life; and not of human life as an abstraction, but of the\nindividual life; and herein, as Mr. Lowell, whose phrase I borrow, has\nsaid, \u201clie its profound meaning and its permanent force.\u201d[1] And herein\ntoo lie its perennial freshness of interest, and the actuality which\nmakes it contemporaneous with every successive generation. The increase\nof knowledge, the loss of belief in doctrines that were fundamental in\nDante\u2019s creed, the changes in the order of society, the new thoughts of\nthe world, have not lessened the moral import of the poem, any more\nthan they have lessened its excellence as a work of art. Its real\nsubstance is as independent as its artistic beauty, of science, of\ncreed, and of institutions. Human nature has not changed; the motives\nof action are the same, though their relative force and the desires and\nideals by which they are inspired vary from generation to generation.\nAnd thus it is that the moral judgments of life framed by a great poet\nwhose imagination penetrates to the core of things, and who, from his\nvery nature as poet, conceives and sets forth the issues of life not in\na treatise of abstract morality, but by means of sensible types and\nimages, never lose interest, and have a perpetual contemporaneousness.\nThey deal with the permanent and unalterable elements of the soul of\nman.\n\n[1] Mr. Lowell\u2019s essay on Dante makes other writing about the poet or\nthe poem seem ineffectual and superfluous. I must assume that it will\nbe familiar to the readers of my version, at least to those among them\nwho desire truly to understand the Divine Comedy.\n\n\nThe scene of the poem is the spiritual world, of which we are members\neven while still denizens of the world of time. In the spiritual world\nthe results of sin or perverted love, and of virtue or right love, in\nthis life of probation, are manifest. The life to come is but the\nfulfilment of the life that now is. This is the truth that Dante sought\nto enforce. The allegory in which he cloaked it is of a character that\nseparates the Divine Comedy from all other works of similar intent. In\nThe Pilgrim\u2019s Progress, for example, the personages introduced are mere\nsimulacra of men and women, the types of moral qualities or religious\ndispositions. They are abstractions which the genius of Bunyan fails to\ninform with vitality sufficient to kindle the imagination of the reader\nwith a sense of their actual, living and breathing existence. But in\nthe Divine Comedy the personages are all from real life, they are men\nand women with their natural passions and emotions, and they are\nundergoing an actual experience. The allegory consists in making their\ncharacters and their fates, what all human characters and fates really\nare, the types and images of spiritual law. Virgil and Beatrice, whose\nnature as depicted in the poem makes nearest approach to purely\nabstract and typical existence, are always consistently presented as\nliving individuals, exalted indeed in wisdom and power, but with hardly\nless definite and concrete humanity than that of Dante himself.\n\nThe scheme of the created Universe held by the Christians of the Middle\nAges was comparatively simple, and so definite that Dante, in accepting\nit in its main features without modification, was provided with the\nlimited stage that was requisite for his design, and of which the\ngeneral disposition was familiar to all his readers. The three\nspiritual realms had their local bounds marked out as clearly as those\nof time earth itself. Their cosmography was but an extension of the\nlargely hypothetical geography of the tune.\n\nThe Earth was the centre of the Universe, and its northern hemisphere\nwas the abode of man. At the middle point of this hemisphere stood\nJerusalem, equidistant from the Pillars of Hercules on the West, and\nthe Ganges on the East.\n\nWithin the body of this hemisphere was hell, shared as a vast cone, of\nwhich the apex was the centre of the globe; and here, according to\nDante, was the seat of Lucifer. The concave of Hell had been formed by\nhis fall, when a portion of the solid earth, through fear of him, ran\nback to the southern uninhabited hemisphere, and formed there, directly\nantipodal to Jerusalem, the mountain of Purgatory which rose from the\nwaste of waters that covered this half of the globe. Purgatory was\nshaped as a cone, of similar dimensions to that of Hell, amid at its\nsummit was the Terrestrial Paradise.\n\nImmediately surrounding the atmosphere of the Earth was the sphere of\nelemental fire. Around this was the Heaven of the Moon, and encircling\nthis, in order, were the Heavens of Mercury, Venus, the Sun, Mars,\nJove, Saturn, the Fixed Stars, and the Crystalline or first moving\nHeaven. These nine concentric Heavens revolved continually around the\nEarth, and in proportion to their distance from it was time greater\nswiftness of each. Encircling all was the Empyrean, increate,\nincorporeal, motionless, unbounded in time or space, the proper seat of\nGod, the home of the Angels, the abode of the Elect.\n\nThe Angelic Hierarchy consisted of nine orders, corresponding to the\nnine moving heavens. Their blessedness and the swiftness of time motion\nwith which in unending delight they circled around God were in\nproportion to their nearness to Him, \u2014first the Seraphs, then the\nCherubs, Thrones, Dominations, Virtues, Powers, Princes, Archangels,\nand Angels. Through them, under the general name of Intelligences, the\nDivine influence was transmitted to the Heavens, giving to them their\ncircular motion, which was the expression of their longing to be united\nwith the source of their creation. The Heavens in their turn streamed\ndown upon the Earth the Divine influence thus distributed among them,\nin varying proportion and power, producing divers effects in the\ngeneration and corruption of material things, and in the dispositions\nand the lives of men.\n\nSuch was the general scheme of the Universe. The intention of God in\nits creation was to communicate of his own perfection to the creatures\nendowed with souls, that is, to men and to angels, and the proper end\nof every such creature was to seek its own perfection in likeness to\nthe Divine. This end was attained through that knowledge of God of\nwhich the soul was capable, and through love which was in proportion to\nknowledge. Virtue depended on the free will of man; it was the good use\nof that will directed to a right object of love. Two lights were given\nto the soul for guidance of the will: the light of reason for natural\nthings and for the direction of the will to moral virtue the light of\ngrace for things supernatural, and for the direction of the will to\nspiritual virtue. Sin was the opposite of virtue, the choice by the\nwill of false objects of love; it involved the misuse of reason, and\nthe absence of grace. As the end of virtue was blessedness, so the end\nof sin was misery.\n\nThe cornerstone of Dante\u2019s moral system was the Freedom of the Will; in\nother words, the right of private judgment with the condition of\naccountability. This is the liberty which Dante, that is man, goes\nseeking in his journey through the spiritual world. This liberty is to\nbe attained through the right use of reason, illuminated by Divine\nGrace; it consists in the perfect accord of the will of man with the\nwill of God.\n\nWith this view of the nature and end of man Dante\u2019s conception of the\nhistory of the race could not be other than that its course was\nprovidentially ordered. The fall of man had made him a just object of\nthe vengeance of God; but the elect were to be redeemed, and for their\nredemption the history of the world from the beginning was directed.\nNot only in his dealings with the Jews, but in his dealings with the\nheathen was God preparing for the reconciliation of man, to be finally\naccomplished in his sacrifice of Himself for them. The Roman Empire was\nforeordained and established for this end. It was to prepare the way\nfor the establishment of the Roman Church. It was the appointed\ninstrument for the political government of men. Empire and Church were\nalike divine institutions for the guidance of man on earth.\n\nThe aim of Dante in the Divine Comedy was to set forth these truths in\nsuch wise as to affect the imaginations and touch the hearts of men, so\nthat they should turn to righteousness. His conviction of these truths\nwas no mere matter of belief; it had the ardor and certainty of faith.\nThey had appeared to him in all their fulness as a revelation of the\nDivine wisdom. It was his work as poet, as poet with a divine\ncommission, to make this revelation known. His work was a work of\nfaith; it was sacred; to it both Heaven and Earth had set their hands.\n\nTo this work, as I have said, the definiteness and the limits of the\ngenerally accepted theory of the Universe gave the required frame. The\nvery narrowness of this scheme made Dante\u2019s design practicable. He had\nhad the experience of a man on earth. He had been lured by false\nobjects of desire from the pursuit of the true good. But Divine Grace,\nin the form of Beatrice, who had of old on earth led him aright, now\nintervened and sent to his aid Virgil, who, as the type of Human\nReason, should bring him safe through Hell, showing to him the eternal\nconsequences of sin, and then should conduct him, penitent, up the\nheight of Purgatory, till on its summit, in the Earthly Paradise,\nBeatrice should appear once more to him. Thence she, as the type of\nthat knowledge through which comes the love of God, should lead him,\nthrough the Heavens up to the Empyrean, to the consummation of his\ncourse in the actual vision of God.\n\n\n\n\nAIDS TO THE STUDY OF THE DIVINE COMEDY.\n\n\nThe Essay by Mr. Lowell, to which I have already referred (Dante,\nLowell\u2019s Prose Works, vol. iv.) is the best introduction to the study\nof the poem. It should be read and re-read.\n\nDante, an essay by the late Dean Church, is the work of a learned and\nsympathetic scholar, and is an excellent treatise on the life, times,\nand work of the poet.\n\nThe Notes and Illustrations that accompany Mr. Longfellow\u2019s translation\nof the Divine Comedy form an admirable body of comment on the poem.\n\nThe Rev. Dr. Edward Moore\u2019s little volume, on The Time-References in\nthe Divina Cominedia (London, 1887), is of great value in making the\nprogress of Dante\u2019s journey clear, and in showing Dante\u2019s scrupulous\nconsistency of statement. Dr. Moore\u2019s more recent work, Contributions\nto the Textual Criticism of the Divina Commedia (Cambridge, 1889), is\nto be warmly commended to the advanced student.\n\nThese sources of information are enough for the mere English reader.\nBut one who desires to make himself a thorough master of the poem must\nturn to foreign sources of instruction: to Carl Witte\u2019s invaluable\nDante-Forschungen (2 vols. Halle, 1869); to the comment, especially\nthat on the Paradiso, which accompanies the German translation of the\nDivine Comedy by Philalethes. the late King John of Saxony; to\nBartoli\u2019s life of Dante in his Storia della Letteratura Italiana\n(Firenze, 1878 and subsequent years), and to Scartazzini\u2019s Prolegomeni\ndella Divina Commedia (Leipzig, 1890). The fourteenth century Comments,\nespecially those of Boccaccio, of Buti, and of Benvenuto da Imola, are\nindispensable to one who would understand the poem as it was understood\nby Dante\u2019s immediate contemporaries and successors. It is from them and\nfrom the Chronicle of Dante\u2019s contemporary and fellow-citizen, Giovanni\nVillani, that our knowledge concerning many of the personages mentioned\nin the Poem is derived.\n\nIn respect to the theology and general doctrine of the Poem, the Summa\nTheologica of St. Thomas Aquinas is the main source from which Dante\nhimself drew.\n\nOf editions of the Divina Commedia in Italian, either that of Andreoli,\nor of Bianchi, or of Fraticelli, each in one volume, may be recommended\nto the beginner. Scartazzini\u2019s edition in three volumes is the best, in\nspite of some serious defects, for the deeper student.\n\n\n\n\nHELL.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO I.\n\n\nDante, astray in a wood, reaches the foot of a hill which he begins to\nascend; he is hindered by three beasts; he turns back and is met by\nVirgil, who proposes to guide him into the eternal world.\n\n\nMidway upon the road of our life I found myself within a dark wood, for\nthe right way had been missed. Ah! how hard a thing it is to tell what\nthis wild and rough and dense wood was, which in thought renews the\nfear! So bitter is it that death is little more. But in order to treat\nof the good that there I found, I will tell of the other things that I\nhave seen there. I cannot well recount how I entered it, so full was I\nof slumber at that point where I abandoned the true way. But after I\nhad arrived at the foot of a hill, where that valley ended which had\npierced my heart with fear, I looked on high, and saw its shoulders\nclothed already with the rays of the planet[1] that leadeth men aright\nalong every path. Then was the fear a little quieted which in the lake\nof my heart had lasted through the night that I passed so piteously.\nAnd even as one who with spent breath, issued out of the sea upon the\nshore, turns to the perilous water and gazes, so did my soul, which\nstill was flying, turn back to look again upon the pass which never had\na living person left.\n\n[1] The sun, a planet according to the Ptolemaic system.\n\n\nAfter I had rested a little my weary body I took my way again along the\ndesert slope, so that the firm foot was always the lower. And lo!\nalmost at the beginning of the steep a she-leopard, light and very\nnimble, which was covered with a spotted coat. And she did not move\nfrom before my face, nay, rather hindered so my road that to return I\noftentimes had turned.\n\nThe time was at the beginning of the morning, and the Sun was mounting\nupward with those stars that were with him when Love Divine first set\nin motion those beautiful things;[1] so that the hour of the time and\nthe sweet season were occasion of good hope to me concerning that wild\nbeast with the dappled skin. But not so that the sight which appeared\nto me of a lion did not give me fear. He seemed to be coming against\nme, with head high and with ravening hunger, so that it seemed that the\nair was affrighted at him. And a she-wolf,[2] who with all cravings\nseemed laden in her meagreness, and already had made many folk to live\nforlorn,\u2014she caused me so much heaviness, with the fear that came from\nsight of her, that I lost hope of the height And such as he is who\ngaineth willingly, and the time arrives that makes him lose, who in all\nhis thoughts weeps and is sad,\u2014such made me the beast without repose\nthat, coming on against me, little by little was pushing me back\nthither where the Sun is silent.\n\n[1] According to old tradition the spring was the season of the\ncreation.\n\n\n[2] These three beasts correspond to the triple division of sins into\nthose of incontinence, of violence, and of fraud. See Canto XI.\n\n\nWhile I was falling back to the low place, before mine eyes appeared\none who through long silence seemed hoarse. When I saw him in the great\ndesert, \u201cHave pity on me!\u201d I cried to him, \u201cwhatso thou art, or shade\nor real man.\u201d He answered me: \u201cNot man; man once I was, and my parents\nwere Lombards, and Mantuans by country both. I was born sub Julio,\nthough late, and I lived at Rome under the good Augustus, in the time\nof the false and lying gods. Poet was I, and sang of that just son of\nAnchises who came from Troy after proud Ilion had been burned. But\nthou, why returnest thou to so great annoy? Why dost thou not ascend\nthe delectable mountain which is the source and cause of every joy?\u201d\n\n\u201cArt thou then that Virgil and that fount which poureth forth so large\na stream of speech?\u201d replied I to him with bashful front: \u201cO honor and\nlight of the other poem I may the long seal avail me, and the great\nlove, which have made me search thy volume! Thou art my master and my\nauthor; thou alone art he from whom I took the fair style that hath\ndone me honor. Behold the beast because of which I turned; help me\nagainst her, famous sage, for she makes any veins and pulses tremble.\u201d\n\u201cThee it behoves to hold another course,\u201d he replied, when he saw me\nweeping, \u201cif thou wishest to escape from this savage place; for this\nbeast, because of which thou criest out, lets not any one pass along\nher way, but so hinders him that she kills him! and she has a nature so\nmalign and evil that she never sates her greedy will, and after food is\nhungrier than before. Many are the animals with which she wives, and\nthere shall be more yet, till the hound[1] shall come that will make\nher die of grief. He shall not feed on land or goods, but wisdom and\nlove and valor, and his birthplace shall be between Feltro and Feltro.\nOf that humble[2] Italy shall he be the salvation, for which the virgin\nCamilla died, and Euryalus, Turnus and Nisus of their wounds. He shall\nhunt her through every town till he shall have set her back in hell,\nthere whence envy first sent her forth. Wherefore I think and deem it\nfor thy best that thou follow me, and I will be thy guide, and will\nlead thee hence through the eternal place where thou shalt hear the\ndespairing shrieks, shalt see the ancient spirits woeful who each\nproclaim the second death. And then thou shalt see those who are\ncontented in the fire, because they hope to come, whenever it may be,\nto the blessed folk; to whom if thou wilt thereafter ascend, then shall\nbe a soul more worthy than I for that. With her I will leave thee at my\ndeparture; for that Emperor who reigneth them above, because I was\nrebellious to His law, wills not that into His city any one should come\nthrough me. In all parts He governs and them He reigns: there in His\ncity and His lofty seat. O happy he whom thereto He elects!\u201d And I to\nhim, \u201cPoet, I beseech thee by that God whom thou didst not know, in\norder that I may escape this ill and worse, that thou lead me thither\nwhom thou now hast said, so that I may see the gate of St. Peter, and\nthose whom thou makest so afflicted.\u201d\n\n[1] Of whom the hound is the symbol, and to whom Dante looked for the\ndeliverance of Italy from the discorda and misrule that made her\nwretched, is still matter of doubt, after centuries of controversy.\n\n\n[2] Fallen, humiliated.\n\n\nThen he moved on, and I behind him kept.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO II.\n\n\nDante, doubtful of his own powers, is discouraged at the outset.\u2014Virgil\ncheers him by telling him that he has been sent to his aid by a blessed\nSpirit from Heaven.\u2014Dante casts off fear, and the poets proceed.\n\n\nThe day was going, and the dusky air was taking the living things that\nare on earth from their fatigues, and I alone was preparing to sustain\nthe war alike of the road, and of the woe which the mind that erreth\nnot shall retrace. O Muses, O lofty genius, now assist me! O mind that\ndidst inscribe that which I saw, here shall thy nobility appear! I\nbegan:\u2014\u201cPoet, that guidest me, consider my virtue, if it is sufficient,\nere to the deep pass thou trustest me. Thou sayest that the parent of\nSilvius while still corruptible went to the immortal world and was\nthere in the body. Wherefore if the Adversary of every ill was then\ncourteous, thinking on the high effect that should proceed from him,\nand on the Who and the What,[1] it seemeth not unmeet to the man of\nunderstanding; for in the empyreal heaven he had been chosen for father\nof revered Rome and of her empire; both which (to say truth indeed)\nwere ordained for the holy place where the successor of the greater\nPeter hath his seat. Through this going, whereof thou givest him vaunt,\nhe learned things which were the cause of his victory and of the papal\nmantle. Afterward the Chosen Vessel went thither to bring thence\ncomfort to that faith which is the beginning of the way of salvation.\nBut I, why go I thither? or who concedes it? I am not Aeneas, I am not\nPaul; me worthy of this, neither I nor others think; wherefore if I\ngive myself up to go, I fear lest the going may be mad. Thou art wise,\nthou understandest better than I speak.\u201d\n\n[1] Who he was, and what should result.\n\n\nAnd as is he who unwills what he willed, and because of new thoughts\nchanges his design, so that he quite withdraws from beginning, such I\nbecame on that dark hillside: wherefore in my thought I abandoned the\nenterprise which had been so hasty in the beginning.\n\n\u201cIf I have rightly understood thy speech,\u201d replied that shade of the\nmagnanimous one, \u201cthy soul is hurt by cowardice, which oftentimes\nencumbereth a man so that it turns him back from honorable enterprise,\nas false seeing does a beast when it is startled. In order that thou\nloose thee from this fear I will tell thee wherefore I have come, and\nwhat I heard at the first moment that I grieved for thee. I was among\nthose who are suspended,[1] and a Lady called me, so blessed and\nbeautiful that I besought her to command. Her eyes were more lucent\nthan the star, and she began to speak to me sweet and low, with angelic\nvoice, in her own tongue: \u2018O courteous Mantuan soul, of whom the fame\nyet lasteth in the world, and shall last so long as the world endureth!\na friend of mine and not of fortune upon the desert hillside is so\nhindered on his road that he has turned for fear, and I am afraid,\nthrough that which I have heard of him in heaven, lest already he be so\nastray that I may have risen late to his succor. Now do thou move, and\nwith thy speech ornate, and with whatever is needful for his\ndeliverance, assist him so that I may be consoled for him. I am\nBeatrice who make thee go. I come from a place whither I desire to\nreturn. Love moved me, and makes me speak. When I shall be before my\nLord, I will commend thee often unto Him.\u2019 Then she was silent, and\nthereon I began: \u2018O Lady of Virtue, thou alone through whom the human\nrace surpasseth all contained within that heaven which hath the\nsmallest circles![2] so pleasing unto me is thy command that to obey\nit, were it already done, were slow to me. Thou hast no need further to\nopen unto me thy will; but tell me the cause why thou guardest not\nthyself from descending down here into this centre, from the ample\nplace whither thou burnest to return.\u2019 \u2018Since thou wishest to know so\ninwardly, I will tell thee briefly,\u2019 she replied to me, \u2018wherefore I\nfear not to come here within. One ought to fear those things only that\nhave power of doing harm, the others not, for they are not dreadful. I\nam made by God, thanks be to Him, such that your misery toucheth me\nnot, nor doth the flame of this burning assail me. A gentle Lady[3] is\nin heaven who hath pity for this hindrance whereto I send thee, so that\nstern judgment there above she breaketh. She summoned Lucia in her\nrequest, and said, \u201cThy faithful one now hath need of thee, and unto\nthee I commend him.\u201d Lucia, the foe of every cruel one, rose and came\nto the place where I was, seated with the ancient Rachel. She said,\n\u201cBeatrice, true praise of God, why dost thou not succor him who so\nloved thee that for thee he came forth from the vulgar throng? Dost\nthou not hear the pity of his plaint? Dost thou not see the death that\ncombats him beside the stream whereof the sea hath no vaunt?\u201d In the\nworld never were persons swift to seek their good, and to fly their\nharm, as I, after these words were uttered, came here below, from my\nblessed seat, putting my trust in thy upright speech, which honors thee\nand them who have heard it.\u2019 After she had said this to me, weeping she\nturned her lucent eyes, whereby she made me more speedy in coming. And\nI came to thee as she willed. Thee have I delivered from that wild\nbeast that took from thee the short ascent of the beautiful mountain.\nWhat is it then? Why, why dost thou hold back? why dost thou harbor\nsuch cowardice in thy heart? why hast thou not daring and boldness,\nsince three blessed Ladies care for thee in the court of Heaven, and my\nspeech pledges thee such good?\u201d\n\n[1] In Limbo, neither in Hell nor Heaven.\n\n\n[2] The heaven of the moon, nearest to the earth.\n\n\n[3] The Virgin.\n\n\nAs flowerets, bent and closed by the chill of night, after the sun\nshines on them straighten themselves all open on their stem, so I\nbecame with my weak virtue, and such good daring hastened to my heart\nthat I began like one enfranchised: \u201cOh compassionate she who succored\nme! and thou courteous who didst speedily obey the true words that she\naddressed to thee! Thou by thy words hast so disposed my heart with\ndesire of going, that I have returned unto my first intent. Go on now,\nfor one sole will is in us both: Thou Leader, thou Lord, and thou\nMaster.\u201d Thus I said to him; and when he had moved on, I entered along\nthe deep and savage road.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO III.\n\n\nThe gate of Hell.\u2014Virgil lends Dante in.\u2014The punishment of the neither\ngood nor bad.\u2014Acheron, and the sinners on its\nbank.\u2014Charon.\u2014Earthquake.\u2014Dante swoons.\n\n\n\u201cThrough me is the way into the woeful city; through me is the way into\neternal woe; through me is the way among the lost people. Justice moved\nmy lofty maker: the divine Power, the supreme Wisdom and the primal\nLove made me. Before me were no things created, unless eternal, and I\neternal last. Leave every hope, ye who enter!\u201d\n\nThese words of color obscure I saw written at the top of a gate;\nwhereat I, \u201cMaster, their meaning is dire to me.\u201d\n\nAnd he to me, like one who knew, \u201cHere it behoves to leave every fear;\nit behoves that all cowardice should here be dead. We have come to the\nplace where I have told thee that thou shalt see the woeful people, who\nhave lost the good of the understanding.\u201d\n\nAnd when he had put his hand on mine, with a glad countenance,\nwherefrom I took courage, he brought me within the secret things. Here\nsighs, laments, and deep wailings were resounding though the starless\nair; wherefore at first I wept thereat. Strange tongues, horrible\ncries, words of woe, accents of anger, voices high and hoarse, and\nsounds of hands with them, were making a tumult which whirls forever in\nthat air dark without change, like the sand when the whirlwind\nbreathes.\n\nAnd I, who had my head girt with horror, said, \u201cMaster, what is it that\nI hear? and what folk are they who seem in woe so vanquished?\u201d\n\nAnd he to me, \u201cThis miserable measure the wretched souls maintain of\nthose who lived without infamy and without praise. Mingled are they\nwith that caitiff choir of the angels, who were not rebels, nor were\nfaithful to God, but were for themselves. The heavens chased them out\nin order to be not less beautiful, nor doth the depth of Hell receive\nthem, because the damned would have some glory from them.\u201d\n\nAnd I, \u201cMaster, what is so grievous to them, that makes them lament so\nbitterly?\u201d\n\nHe answered, \u201cI will tell thee very briefly. These have no hope of\ndeath; and their blind life is so debased, that they are envious of\nevery other lot. Fame of them the world permitteth not to be; mercy and\njustice disdain them. Let us not speak of them, but do thou look and\npass on.\u201d\n\nAnd I, who was gazing, saw a banner, that whirling ran so swiftly that\nit seemed to me to scorn all repose, and behind it came so long a train\nof folk, that I could never have believed death had undone so many.\nAfter I had distinguished some among them, I saw and knew the shade of\nhim who made, through cowardice, the great refusal.[1] At once I\nunderstood and was certain, that this was the sect of the caitiffs\ndispleasing unto God, and unto his enemies. These wretches, who never\nwere alive, were naked, and much stung by gad-flies and by wasps that\nwere there. These streaked their faces with blood, which, mingled with\ntears, was harvested at their feet by loathsome worms.\n\n[1] Who is intended by these words is uncertain.\n\n\nAnd when I gave myself to looking onward, I saw people on the bank of a\ngreat river; wherefore I said, \u201cMaster, now grant to me that I may know\nwho these are, and what rule makes them appear so ready to pass over,\nas I discern through the faint light.\u201d And he to me, \u201cThe things will\nbe clear to thee, when we shall set our steps on the sad marge of\nAcheron.\u201d Then with eyes bashful and cast down, fearing lest my speech\nhad been irksome to him, far as to the river I refrained from speaking.\n\nAnd lo! coming toward us in a boat, an old man, white with ancient\nhair, crying, \u201cWoe to you, wicked souls! hope not ever to see Heaven! I\ncome to carry you to the other bank, into eternal darkness, to heat and\nfrost. And thou who art there, living soul, depart from these that are\ndead.\u201d But when he saw that I did not depart, he said, \u201cBy another way,\nby other ports thou shalt come to the shore, not here, for passage; it\nbehoves that a lighter bark bear thee.\u201d[1]\n\n[1] The boat that bears the souls to Purgatory. Charon recognizes that\nDante is not among the damned.\n\n\nAnd my Leader to him, \u201cCharon, vex not thyself, it is thus willed there\nwhere is power to do that which is willed; and farther ask not.\u201d Then\nthe fleecy cheeks were quiet of the pilot of the livid marsh, who round\nabout his eyes had wheels of flame.\n\nBut those souls, who were weary and naked, changed color, and gnashed\ntheir teeth soon as they heard his cruel words. They blasphemed God and\ntheir parents, the human race, the place, the time and the seed of\ntheir sowing and of their birth. Then, bitterly weeping, they drew back\nall of them together to the evil bank, that waits for every man who\nfears not God. Charon the demon, with eyes of glowing coal, beckoning\nthem, collects them all; he beats with his oar whoever lingers.\n\nAs in autumn the leaves fall off one after the other, till the bough\nsees all its spoils upon the earth, in like wise the evil seed of Adam\nthrow themselves from that shore one by one at signals, as the bird at\nhis call. Thus they go over the dusky wave, and before they have landed\non the farther side, already on this a new throng is gathered.\n\n\u201cMy son,\u201d said the courteous Master, \u201cthose who die in the wrath of\nGod, all meet together here from every land. And they are eager to pass\nover the stream, for the divine justice spurs them, so that fear is\nturned to desire. This way a good soul never passes; and therefore if\nCharon snarleth at thee, thou now mayest well know what his speech\nsignifies.\u201d This ended, the dark plain trembled so mightily, that the\nmemory of the terror even now bathes me with sweat. The tearful land\ngave forth a wind that flashed a vermilion light which vanquished every\nsense of mine, and I fell as a man whom slumber seizes.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO IV.\n\n\nThe further side of Acheron.\u2014Virgil leads Dante into Limbo, the First\nCircle of Hell, containing the spirits of those who lived virtuously\nbut without Christianity.\u2014Greeting of Virgil by his fellow poets.\u2014They\nenter a castle, where are the shades of ancient worthies.\u2014Virgil and\nDante depart.\n\n\nA heavy thunder broke the deep sleep in my head, so that I started up\nlike a person who by force is wakened. And risen erect, I moved my\nrested eye round about, and looked fixedly to distinguish the place\nwhere I was. True it is, that I found myself on the verge of the valley\nof the woeful abyss that gathers in thunder of infinite wailings. Dark,\nprofound it was, and cloudy, so that though I fixed my sight on the\nbottom I did not discern anything there.\n\n\u201cNow we descend down here into the blind world,\u201d began the Poet all\ndeadly pale, \u201cI will be first, and thou shalt be second.\u201d\n\nAnd I, who had observed his color, said, \u201cHow shall I come, if thou\nfearest, who art wont to be a comfort to my doubting?\u201d And he to me,\n\u201cThe anguish of the folk who are down here depicts upon my face that\npity which thou takest for fear. Let us go on, for the long way urges\nus.\u201d\n\nSo he set forth, and so he made me enter within the first circle that\ngirds the abyss. Here, so far as could be heard, there was no plaint\nbut that of sighs which made the eternal air to tremble: this came of\nthe woe without torments felt by the crowds, which were many and great,\nof infants and of women and of men.\n\nThe good Master to me, \u201cThou dost not ask what spirits are these that\nthou seest. Now I would have thee know, before thou goest farther, that\nthey sinned not; and if they have merits it sufficeth not, because they\nhad not baptism, which is part of the faith that thou believest; and if\nthey were before Christianity, they did not duly worship God: and of\nsuch as these am I myself. Through such defects, and not through other\nguilt, are we lost, and only so far harmed that without hope we live in\ndesire.\u201d\n\nGreat woe seized me at my heart when I heard him, because I knew that\npeople of much worth were suspended in that limbo. \u201cTell me, my Master,\ntell me, Lord,\u201d began I, with wish to be assured of that faith which\nvanquishes every error,[1] \u201cdid ever any one who afterwards was blessed\ngo out from here, either by his own or by another\u2019s merit?\u201d And he, who\nunderstood my covert speech, answered, \u201cI was new in this state when I\nsaw a Mighty One come hither crowned with sign of victory. He drew out\nhence the shade of the first parent, of Abel his son, and that of Noah,\nof Moses the law-giver and obedient, Abraham the patriarch, and David\nthe King, Israel with his father, and with his offspring, and with\nRachel, for whom he did so much, and others many; and He made them\nblessed: and I would have thee know that before these, human spirits\nwere not saved.\u201d\n\n[1] Wishing especially to be assured in regard to the descent of Christ\ninto Hell.\n\n\nWe ceased not going on because he spoke, but all the while were passing\nthrough the wood, the wood I mean of crowded spirits. Nor yet had our\nway been long from where I slept, when I saw a fire, that conquered a\nhemisphere of darkness. We were still a little distant from it, yet not\nso far that I could not partially discern that honorable folk possessed\nthat place. \u201cO thou that honorest both science and art, these, who are\nthey, that have such honor that from the condition of the others it\nsets them apart?\u201d And he to me, \u201cThe honorable fame of them which\nresounds above in thy life wins grace in heaven that so advances them.\u201d\nAt this a voice was heard by me, \u201cHonor the loftiest Poet! his shade\nreturns that was departed.\u201d When the voice had ceased and was quiet, I\nsaw four great shades coming to us: they had a semblance neither sad\nnor glad. The good Master began to say, \u201cLook at him with that sword in\nhand who cometh before the three, even as lord. He is Homer, the\nsovereign poet; the next who comes is Horace, the satirist; Ovid is the\nthird, and the last is Lucan. Since each shares with me the name that\nthe single voice sounded, they do me honor, and in that do well.\u201d\n\nThus I saw assembled the fair school of that Lord of the loftiest song\nwhich above the others as an eagle flies. After they had discoursed\nsomewhat together, they turned to me with sign of salutation; and my\nMaster smiled thereat. And far more of honor yet they did me, for they\nmade me of their band, so that I was the sixth amid so much wit. Thus\nwe went on as far as the light, speaking things concerning which\nsilence is becoming, even as was speech there where I was.\n\nWe came to the foot of a noble castle, seven times circled by high\nwalls, defended round about by a fair streamlet. This we passed as if\nhard ground; through seven gates I entered with these sages; we came to\na meadow of fresh verdure. People were there with eyes slow and grave,\nof great authority in their looks; they spake seldom, and with soft\nvoices. Thus we drew apart, on one side, into a place open, luminous,\nand high, so that they all could be seen. There opposite upon the green\nenamel were shown to me the great spirits, whom to have seen I inwardly\nexalt myself.\n\nI saw Electra with many companions, among whom I knew both Hector and\nAeneas, Caesar in armor, with his gerfalcon eyes; I saw Camilla and\nPenthesilea on the other side, and I saw the King Latinus, who was\nseated with Lavinia his daughter. I saw that Brutus who drove out\nTarquin; Lucretia, Julia, Marcia, and Cornelia; and alone, apart, I saw\nthe Saladin. When I raised my brow a little more, I saw the Master of\nthose who know, seated amid the philosophic family; all regard him, all\ndo him honor. Here I saw both Socrates and Plato, who before the others\nstand nearest to him; Democritus, who ascribes the world to chance;\nDiogenes, Anaxagoras, and Thales, Empedocles, Heraclitus, and Zeno; and\nI saw the good collector of the qualities, Dioscorides, I mean; and I\nsaw Orpheus, Tully, and Linus, and moral Seneca, Euclid the geometer,\nand Ptolemy, Hippocrates, Avicenna, Galen, and Averrhoes, who made the\ngreat comment. I cannot report of all in full, because the long theme\nso drives me that many times speech comes short of fact.\n\nThe company of six is reduced to two. By another way the wise guide\nleads me, out from the quiet, into the air that trembles, and I come\ninto a region where is nothing that can give light.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO V.\n\n\nThe Second Circle, that of Carnal Sinners.\u2014Minos.\u2014Shades renowned of\nold.\u2014Francesca da Rimini.\n\n\nThus I descended from the first circle down into the second, which\ngirdles less space, and so much more woe that it goads to wailing.\nThere abides Minos horribly, and snarls; he examines the sins at the\nentrance; he judges, and he sends according as he entwines himself. I\nmean, that, when the miscreant spirit comes there before him, it\nconfesses itself wholly, and that discerner of sins sees what place of\nHell is for it; he girdles himself with his tail so many times as the\ndegrees he wills it should be sent down. Always before him stand many\nof them. They go, in turn, each to the judgment; they speak, and hear,\nand then are whirled below.\n\n\u201cO thou that comest to the woeful inn,\u201d said Minos to me, when he saw\nme, leaving the act of so great an office, \u201cbeware how thou enterest,\nand to whom thou trustest thyself; let not the amplitude of the\nentrance deceive thee.\u201d And my Leader to him, \u201cWhy then dost thou cry\nout? Hinder not his fated going; thus is it willed there where is power\nto do that which is willed; and ask thou no more.\u201d\n\nNow the woeful notes begin to make themselves heard; now am I come\nwhere much lamentation smites me. I had come into a place mute of all\nlight, that bellows as the sea does in a tempest, if it be combated by\nopposing winds. The infernal hurricane that never rests carries along\nthe spirits in its rapine; whirling and smiting it molests them. When\nthey arrive before its rushing blast, here are shrieks, and bewailing,\nand lamenting; here they blaspheme the power divine. I understood that\nto such torment are condemned the carnal sinners who subject reason to\nappetite. And as their wings bear along the starlings in the cold\nseason in a troop large and full, so that blast the evil spirits;\nhither, thither, down, up it carries them; no hope ever comforts them,\nnot of repose, but even of less pain.\n\nAnd as the cranes go singing their lays, making in air a long line of\nthemselves, so saw I come, uttering wails, shades borne along by the\naforesaid strife. Wherefore I said, \u201cMaster, who are those folk whom\nthe black air so castigates?\u201d \u201cThe first of these of whom thou wishest\nto have knowledge,\u201d said he to me then, \u201cwas empress of many tongues.\nTo the vice of luxury was she so abandoned that lust she made licit in\nher law, to take away the blame she had incurred. She is Semiramis, of\nwhom it is read that she succeeded Ninus and had been his spouse; she\nheld the land which the Soldan rules. That other is she who, for love,\nkilled herself, and broke faith to the ashes of Sichaeus. Next is\nCleopatra, the luxurious. See Helen, for whom so long a time of ill\nrevolved; and see the great Achilles, who at the end fought with love.\nSee Paris, Tristan,\u2014\u201d and more than a thousand shades he showed me with\nhis finger, and named them, whom love had parted from our life.\n\nAfter I had heard my Teacher name the dames of eld and the cavaliers,\npity overcame me, and I was well nigh bewildered. I began, \u201cPoet,\nwillingly would I speak with those two that go together, and seem to be\nso light upon the wind.\u201d And he to me, \u201cThou shalt see when they shall\nbe nearer to us, and do thou then pray them by that love which leads\nthem, and they will come.\u201d Soon as the wind sways them toward us I\nlifted my voice, \u201cO weary souls, come speak to us, if One forbid it\nnot.\u201d\n\nAs doves, called by desire, with wings open and steady, fly through the\nair to their sweet nest, borne by their will, these issued from the\ntroop where Dido is, coming to us through the malign air, so strong was\nthe compassionate cry.\n\n\u201cO living creature, gracious and benign, that goest through the lurid\nair visiting us who stained the world blood-red,\u2014if the King of the\nuniverse were a friend we would pray Him for thy peace, since thou hast\npity on our perverse ill. Of what it pleaseth thee to hear, and what to\nspeak, we will hear and we will speak to you, while the wind, as now,\nis hushed for us. The city where I was born sits upon the sea-shore,\nwhere the Po, with its followers, descends to have peace. Love, that on\ngentle heart quickly lays hold, seized him for the fair person that was\ntaken from me, and the mode still hurts me. Love, which absolves no\nloved one from loving, seized me for the pleasing of him so strongly\nthat, as thou seest, it does not even now abandon me. Love brought us\nto one death. Caina awaits him who quenched our life.\u201d These words were\nborne to us from them.\n\nSoon as I had heard those injured souls I bowed my face, and held it\ndown, until the Poet said to me, \u201cWhat art thou thinking?\u201d When I\nreplied, I began, \u201cAlas! how many sweet thoughts, how great desire, led\nthese unto the woeful pass.\u201d Then I turned me again to them, and I\nspoke, and began, \u201cFrancesca, thy torments make me sad and piteous to\nweeping. But tell me, at the time of the sweet sighs by what and how\ndid love concede to you to know the dubious desires?\u201d And she to me,\n\u201cThere is no greater woe than in misery to remember the happy time, and\nthat thy Teacher knows. But if to know the first root of our love thou\nhast so great a longing, I will do like one who weeps and tells.\n\n\u201cWe were reading one day, for delight, of Lancelot, how love\nconstrained him. We were alone and without any suspicion. Many times\nthat reading made us lift our eyes, and took the color from our faces,\nbut only one point was that which overcame us. When we read of the\nlonged-for smile being kissed by such a lover, this one, who never from\nme shall be divided, kissed my mouth all trembling. Galahaut was the\nbook, and he who wrote it. That day we read in it no farther.\u201d[1]\n\n[1] In the Romance, it was Galahaut that prevailed on Guinevere to give\na kiss to Lancelot.\n\n\nWhile one spirit said this the other was weeping so that through pity I\nswooned, as if I had been dying, and fell as a dead body falls.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO VI.\n\n\nThe Third Circle, that of the Gluttonous.\u2014Cerberus.\u2014Ciacco.\n\n\nWhen the mind returned, which closed itself before the pity of these\ntwo kinsfolk, that had all confounded me with sadness, new torments and\nnew tormented souls I see around me wherever I move, and howsoever I\nturn, and wherever I gaze.\n\nI am in the third circle, that of the rain eternal, accursed, cold, and\nheavy. Its rule and quality are never new. Coarse hail, and foul water\nand snow pour down through the tenebrous air; the earth that receives\nthem stinks. Cerberus, a beast cruel and monstrous, with three throats\nbarks doglike above the people that are here submerged. He has\nvermilion eyes, and a greasy and black beard, and a big belly, and\nhands armed with claws: he tears the spirits, flays them, and rends\nthem. The rain makes them howl like dogs; of one of their sides they\nmake a screen for the other; the profane wretches often turn\nthemselves.\n\nWhen Cerberus, the great worm, observed us he opened his mouths, and\nshowed his fangs to us; not a limb had he that he kept quiet. And my\nLeader opened wide his hands, took some earth, and with full fists\nthrew it into the ravenous gullets. As the dog that barking craves, and\nbecomes quiet when he bites his food, and is intent and fights only to\ndevour it, such became those filthy faces of the demon Cerberus, who so\nthunders at the souls that they would fain be deaf.\n\nWe were passing over the shades whom the heavy rain subdues, and were\nsetting our feet upon their vain show that seems a body. They all of\nthem lay upon the ground, except one who raised himself to sit, quickly\nas he saw us passing before him. \u201cO thou who art led through this\nHell,\u201d he said to me, \u201crecognize me, if thou canst; thou wast made\nbefore I was unmade.\u201d And I to him, \u201cThe anguish which thou hast\nperchance withdraws thee from my memory, so that it seems not that I\never saw thee. But tell me who thou art, that in a place so woeful art\nset, and with such a punishment, that if any other is greater none is\nso displeasing.\u201d And he to me, \u201cThy city which is so full of envy, that\nalready the sack runs over, held me in it, in the serene life. You\ncitizens called me Ciacco;[1] for the damnable sin of gluttony, as thou\nseest, I am broken by the rain. And I, wretched soul, am not alone, for\nall these endure like punishment, for like sin,\u201d and more he said not.\nI answered him, \u201cCiacco, thy trouble so weighs upon me, that it invites\nme to weeping; but tell me, if thou canst, to what will come the\ncitizens of the divided city; if any one in it is just; and tell me the\nreason why such great discord has assailed it.\u201d\n\n[1] Ciacco, in popular speech, signifies a hog.\n\n\nAnd he to me, \u201cAfter long contention they will come to blood, and the\nsavage party will chase out the other with great injury. Thereafter\nwithin three suns it behoves this to fall, and the other to surmount\nthrough the force of one who even now is tacking. It will hold high its\nfront long time, keeping the other under heavy burdens, however it may\nlament and be shamed thereat. Two men are just, but there they are not\nheeded; Pride, Envy, Avarice are the three sparks that have inflamed\ntheir hearts.\u201d[1]\n\nHere he set end unto the lamentable sound.\n\n[1] This prophecy relates to the dissensions and violence of the\nparties of the Whites and the Blacks by which Florence was rent. The\n\u201csavage party\u201d was that of the Whites, who were mainly Ghibellines. The\n\u201cone who even now is tacking\u201d was the Pope, Boniface VIII., who was\nplaying fast and loose with both. Who the \u201ctwo just men\u201d were is\nunknown.\n\n\nAnd I to him, \u201cStill I would that thou teach me, and that of more\nspeech thou make a gift to me. Farinata and the Tegghiaio who were so\nworthy, Jacopo Rusticucci, Arrigo, and the Mosca, and the rest who set\ntheir minds on well-doing, tell me where they are, and cause that I may\nknow them, for great desire constrains me to learn if Heaven sweeten\nthem, or Hell envenom.\n\nAnd he, \u201cThey are among the blacker souls: a different sin weighs them\ndown to the bottom; if thou so far descendest, thou canst see them. But\nwhen thou shalt be in the sweet world I pray thee that thou bring me to\nthe memory of others. More I say not to thee, and more I answer thee\nnot.\u201d His straight eyes he twisted then awry, looked at me a little,\nand then bent his head, and fell with it level with the other blind.\n\nAnd the Leader said to me, \u201cHe wakes no more this side the sound of the\nangelic trump. When the hostile Sovereign shall come, each one will\nfind again his dismal tomb, will take again his flesh and his shape,\nwill hear that which through eternity reechoes.\u201d\n\nThus we passed along with slow steps through the foul mixture of the\nshades and of the rain, touching a little on the future life. Wherefore\nI said, \u201cMaster, these torments will they increase after the great\nsentence, or will they become less, or will they be just as burning?\u201d\nAnd he to me, \u201cReturn to thy science, which declares that the more\nperfect a thing is the more it feels the good, and so the pain. Though\nthis accursed people never can attain to true perfection, it expects\nthereafter to be more than now.\u201d\n\nWe took a circling course along that road, speaking far more than I\nrepeat; and came to the point where the descent is. Here we found\nPluto,[1] the great enemy.\n\n[1] Pluto appears here not as Hades, the god of the lower world, but in\nhis character as the giver of wealth.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO VII.\n\n\nThe Fourth Circle, that of the Avaricious and the\nProdigal.\u2014Pluto.\u2014Fortune.\u2014The Styx.\u2014The Fifth Circle, that of the\nWrathful and the Sullen.\n\n\n\u201cPape Satan, pape Satan aleppe,\u201d\u2014began Pluto with his clucking voice.\nAnd that gentle Sage, who knew everything, said to comfort me, \u201cLet not\nthy fear hurt thee; for whatso power he have shall not take from thee\nthe descent of this rock.\u201d Then he turned to that swollen lip and said,\n\u201cBe silent, accursed wolf! inwardly consume thyself with thine own\nrage: not without cause is this going to the abyss; it is willed on\nhigh, there where Michael did vengeance on the proud adultery.\u201d[1] As\nsails swollen by the wind fall in a heap when the mast snaps, so fell\nto earth the cruel beast.\n\n[1] Adultery, in the sense of infidelity to God.\n\n\nThus we descended into the fourth hollow, taking more of the woeful\nbank that gathers in the evil of the whole universe. Ah, Justice of\nGod! Who heapeth up so many new travails and penalties as I saw? And\nwhy doth our sin so waste us? As doth the wave, yonder upon Charybdis,\nwhich is broken on that which it encounters, so it behoves that here\nthe people counterdance.\n\nHere saw I people more than elsewhere many, and from one side and the\nother with great howls rolling weights by force of chest. They struck\nagainst each other, and then just there each turned, rolling backward,\ncrying, \u201cWhy keepest thou?\u201d and \u201cWhy flingest thou away?\u201d Thus they\nturned through the dark circle on either hand to the opposite point,\nstill crying out their opprobrious verse; then each, when he had come\nthrough his half circle, wheeled round to the other joust.\n\nAnd I, who had my heart well-nigh pierced through, said, \u201cMy Master,\nnow declare to me what folk is this, and if all these tonsured ones on\nour left were clerks.\u201d\n\nAnd he to me, \u201cAll of these were so asquint in mind in the first life\nthat they made no spending there with measure. Clearly enough their\nvoices bay it out, when they come to the two points of the circle where\nthe contrary sin divides them. These were clerks who have no hairy\ncovering on their head, and Popes and Cardinals, in whom avarice\npractices its excess.\u201d\n\nAnd I, \u201cMaster, among such as these I ought surely to recognize some\nwho were polluted with these evils.\u201d\n\nAnd he to me, \u201cVain thought thou harborest; the undiscerning life that\nmade them foul, to all recognition now makes them dim. Forever will\nthey come to the two buttings; these will rise from the sepulchre with\nclosed fist, and these with shorn hair. Ill-giving and ill-keeping have\ntaken from them the fair world, and set them to this scuffle; such as\nit is, I adorn not words for it. Now canst thou, son, see the brief\njest of the goods that are committed unto Fortune, for which the human\nrace so scramble; for all the gold that is beneath the moon, or that\never was, of these weary souls could not make a single one repose.\u201d\n\n\u201cMaster,\u201d said I to him, \u201cnow tell me further; this Fortune, on which\nthou touchest for me, what is it, that hath the goods of the world so\nin its clutches?\u201d\n\nAnd he to me, \u201cO creatures foolish, how great is that ignorance that\nharms you! I would have thee now take in my judgment of her. He whose\nwisdom transcendeth all made the heavens, and gave them their guides,\nso that every part on every part doth shine, equally distributing the\nlight. In like wise for the splendors of the world, He ordained a\ngeneral ministress and guide, who should ever and anon transfer the\nvain goods from race to race, and from one blood to another, beyond the\nresistance of human wit. Wherefore one race rules, and the other\nlanguishes, pursuant to her judgment, which is occult as the snake in\nthe grass. Your wisdom hath no withstanding of her: she provides,\njudges and maintains her realm, as theirs the other gods. Her\npermutations have no truce; necessity compels her to be swift, so often\ncometh he who obtains a turn. This is she who is so set upon the cross,\neven by those who ought to give her praise, giving her blame amiss and\nill report. But she is blessed and hears this not. With the other\nPrimal Creatures glad she turns her sphere, and blessed she rejoices.\nBut now let us descend to greater woe. Already every star sinks that\nwas rising when I set out, and too long stay is forbidden.\u201d\n\nWe crossed the circle to the other bank, above a fount that boils and\npours down through a cleft that proceeds from it. The water was far\ndarker than perse;[1] and we, in company with the dusky waves, entered\ndown through a strange way. A marsh it makes, that is named Styx, this\ndismal little stream, when it has descended to the foot of the malign\ngray slopes. And I, who stood intent to gaze, saw muddy people in that\nswamp, all naked and with look of hurt. They were smiting each other,\nnot only with hands, but with head, and with chest, and with feet,\nmangling one another piecemeal with their teeth.\n\n[1] Purple-black.\n\n\nThe good Master said, \u201cSon, now thou seest the souls of those whom\nanger overcame; and likewise I would have thee believe for certain that\nbeneath the water are folk who sigh, and make this water bubble at the\nsurface, as thine eye tells thee wherever it turns. Fixed in the slime,\nthey say, \u2018Sullen were we in the sweet air that by the Sun is\ngladdened, bearing within ourselves the sluggish fume; now we are\nsullen in the black mire.\u2019 This hymn they gurgle in their throats, for\nthey cannot speak with entire words.\u201d[1]\n\n[1] The sin here punished is that known to the Middle Ages as acedia,\nor accidie,\u2014slackness in good works, and spiritual gloom and\ndespondency. In the Parson\u2019s Tale Chaucer says: \u201cEnvie and ire maken\nbitternesse in heart, which bitternesse is mother of accidie.\u201d\n\n\nThus we circled a great arc of the foul fen, between the dry bank and\nthe slough, with eyes turned on those who guzzle the mire. We came at\nlength to the foot of a tower.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO VIII.\n\n\nThe Fifth Circle.\u2014Phlegyas and his boat.\u2014Passage of the Styx.\u2014Filippo\nArgenti.\u2014The City of Dis.\u2014The demons refuse entrance to the poets.\n\n\nI say, continuing, that, long before we were at the foot of the high\ntower, our eyes went upward to its top because of two flamelets that we\nsaw set there, and another giving signal back from so far that hardly\ncould the eye reach it. And I turned me to the Sea of all wisdom; I\nsaid, \u201cThis one, what says it? and what answers that other fire? and\nwho are they that make it?\u201d And he to me, \u201cUpon the foul waves already\nthou mayest discern that which is expected, if the fume of the marsh\nhide it not from thee.\u201d\n\nBowstring never sped arrow from itself that ran so swift a course\nthrough the air, as a very little boat which I saw coming through the\nwater toward us at that instant, under the direction of a single\nferryman, who was crying out, \u201cArt thou then come, fell soul?\u201d\n\n\u201cPhlegyas, Phlegyas, this time thou criest out in vain,\u201d said my Lord;\n\u201clonger thou shalt not have us than only while crossing the slough.\u201d As\none who listens to some great deceit that has been practiced on him,\nand then chafes at it, such became Phlegyas in his stifled anger.\n\nMy Leader descended into the bark and then he made me enter after him,\nand only when I was in did it seem laden. Soon as my Leader and I were\nin the boat, the antique prow goes its way, cutting more of the water\nthan it is wont with others.\n\nWhile we were running through the dead channel, before me showed\nhimself one full of mud, and said, \u201cWho art thou that comest before the\nhour?\u201d And I to him, \u201cIf I come I stay not; but thou, who art thou that\nart become so foul?\u201d He answered, \u201cThou seest that I am one who weeps.\u201d\nAnd I to him, \u201cWith weeping and with wailing, accursed spirit, do thou\nremain, for I know thee although thou art all filthy.\u201d Then he\nstretched to the boat both his hands, whereat the wary Master thrust\nhim back, saying, \u201cBegone there, with the other dogs!\u201d Then with his\narms he clasped my neck, kissed my face, and said, \u201cDisdainful soul,\nblessed be she who bore thee! This one was an arrogant person in the\nworld; no goodness is there that adorns his memory; therefore is his\nshade so furious here. How many now up there are held great kings who\nshall stand here like swine in mire, leaving of themselves horrible\ndispraises.\u201d And I, \u201cMaster, I should much like to see him ducked in\nthis broth before we depart from the lake.\u201d And he to me, \u201cEre the\nshore allows thee to see it thou shalt be satisfied; it will be fitting\nthat thou enjoy such a desire.\u201d After this a little I saw such rending\nof him by the muddy folk that I still praise God therefor, and thank\nHim for it. All cried, \u201cAt Filippo Argenti!\u201d and the raging florentine\nspirit turned upon himself with his teeth. Here we left him; so that I\ntell no more of him.\n\nBut on my ears there smote a wailing, whereat forward intent I open\nwide my eye. And the good Master said, \u201cNow, son, the city draws near\nthat is named Dis, with its heavy citizens, with its great throng.\u201d And\nI, \u201cMaster, already in the valley therewithin I clearly discern its\nmosques vermillion, as if issuing from fire.\u201d And he said to me, \u201cThe\neternal fire that blazes within them displays them red as thou seest in\nthis nether Hell.\u201d\n\nWe at last arrived within the deep ditches that encompass that\ndisconsolate city. The walls seemed to me to be of iron. Not without\nfirst making a great circuit did we come to a place where the ferryman\nloudly shouted to us, \u201cOut with you, here is the entrance.\u201d\n\nUpon the gates I saw more than a thousand of those rained down from\nheaven who angrily were saying, \u201cWho is this, that without death goes\nthrough the realm of the dead folk?\u201d And my wise Master made a sign of\nwishing to speak secretly with them. Then they shut in a little their\ngreat scorn, and said, \u201cCome thou alone, and let him be gone who so\nboldly entered on this realm. Alone let him return on the mad path: let\nhim try if he can; for thou, who hast escorted him through so dark a\nregion, shalt remain here.\u201d\n\nThink, Reader, if I was discomforted at the sound of the accursed\nwords, for I did not believe ever to return hither.[1]\n\n[1] To this world.\n\n\n\u201cO my dear Leader, who more than seven times hast renewed assurance in\nme, and drawn me from deep peril that stood confronting me, leave me\nnot,\u201d said I, \u201cthus undone; and, if the going farther onward be denied\nus, let us together retrace our footprints quickly.\u201d And that Lord who\nhad led me thither said to me, \u201cFear not, for no one can take from us\nour onward way, by Such an one it is given to us. But here await me,\nand comfort thy dejected spirit and feed on good hope, for I will not\nleave thee in the nether world.\u201d\n\nSo the sweet Father goes away, and here abandons me, and I remain in\nsuspense; and yes and no contend within my head. I could not hear what\nhe set forth to them, but he had not staid there long with them, when\neach ran vying back within. These our adversaries closed the gates on\nthe breast of my Lord, who remained without, and returned to me with\nslow steps. He held his eyes upon the ground, and his brow was shorn of\nall hardihood, and he said in sighs, \u201cWho hath denied to me the houses\nof woe?\u201d And he said to me, \u201cThou, because I am wroth, be not dismayed,\nfor I shall win the strife, whoever circle round within for the\ndefence. This their insolence is not new, for of old they used it at a\nless secret gate, which still is found without a bolt. Above it thou\ndidst see the dead inscription; and already on this side of it descends\nthe steep, passing without escort through the circles, One such that by\nhim the city shall be opened to us.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCANTO IX.\n\n\nThe City of Dis.\u2014Erichtho.\u2014The Three Furies.\u2014The Heavenly\nMessenger.\u2014The Sixth Circle, that of the Heresiarchs.\n\n\nThat color which cowardice painted outwardly on me when I saw my Guide\nturn back, repressed more speedily his own new color. He stopped\nattentive, like a man that listens, for the eye could not lead him far\nthrough the black air, and through the dense fog.\n\n\u201cYet it must be for us to win the fight,\u201d began he, \u201cunless\u2014Such an one\noffered herself to us.[1] Oh how slow it seems till Some one here\narrive!\u201d[2]\n\n[1] Beatrice.\n\n\n[2] The messenger from Heaven, referred to in the last verses of the\nlast canto.\n\n\nI saw well how he covered up the beginning with the rest that came\nafter, which were words different from the first. But nevertheless his\nspeech gave me fear, because I drew his broken phrase perchance to a\nworse meaning than it held.\n\n\u201cInto this depth of the dismal shell does any one ever descend from the\nfirst grade who has for penalty only hope cut off?\u201d[1] This question I\nput, and he answered me, \u201cSeldom it happens that any one of us maketh\nthe journey on which I am going. It is true that another time I was\nconjured down here by that cruel Erichtho who was wont to call back\nshades into their bodies. Short while had my flesh been bare of me,\nwhen she made me enter within that wall in order to drag out for her a\nspirit from the circle of Judas. That is the lowest place, and the\ndarkest, and the farthest from the Heaven that encircles all. Well do I\nknow the road: therefore assure thyself. This marsh which breathes out\nthe great stench girds round about the woeful city wherein now we\ncannot enter without anger.\u201d\n\n[1] Dante asks for assurance that Virgil, whose station is in Limbo,\n\u201cthe first grade,\u201d knows the way.\n\n\nAnd more he said, but I hold it not in mind because my eye had wholly\nattracted me toward the high tower with the ruddy summit, where in an\ninstant were uprisen suddenly three infernal furies, stained with\nblood, who had the limbs of women and their action, and were girt with\ngreenest hydras. Little serpents and cerastes they had for hair,\nwherewith their savage brows were bound.\n\nAnd he, who well knew the handmaids of the queen of the eternal\nlamentation, said to me, \u201cBehold the fell Erinnyes; this is Megaera on\nthe left side, she who weeps on the right is Alecto, Tisiphone is in\nthe middle,\u201d and therewith he was silent.\n\nWith her nails each was tearing her breast, they beat themselves with\ntheir hands, and cried out so loud that I pressed close to the Poet\nthrough dread. \u201cLet Medusa come, so we will make him of stone,\u201d they\nall said, looking down. \u201cIll was it we avenged not on Theseus his\nassault.\u201d\n\n\u201cTurn thy back, and keep thy sight closed, for if the Gorgon show\nherself, and thou shouldest see her, no return upward would there ever\nbe.\u201d Thus said the Master, and he himself turned me, and did not so\ntrust to my hands that with his own he did not also blindfold me.\n\nO ye who have sound understanding, regard the doctrine that is hidden\nunder the veil of the strange verses.\n\nAnd already was coming across the turbid waves a tumult of a sound full\nof terror at which both the shores trembled. Not otherwise it was than\nof a wind, impetuous through the opposing heats, that strikes the\nforest, and without any stay shatters the branches, beats down and\ncarries them away; forward, laden with dust, it goes superb, and makes\nthe wild beasts and the shepherds fly.\n\nMy eyes he loosed, and said, \u201cNow direct the nerve of sight across the\nancient scum, there yonder where that fume is most bitter.\u201d\n\nAs frogs before the hostile snake all scatter through the water, till\neach huddles on the ground, I saw more than a thousand destroyed souls\nflying thus before one, who at the ford was passing over the Styx with\ndry feet. From his face he removed that thick air, waving his left hand\noft before him, and only with that trouble seemed he weary. Well I\nperceived that he was sent from Heaven, and I turned me to the Master,\nand he made sign that I should stand quiet and bow down unto him. Ah,\nhow full of disdain he seemed to me! He reached the gate and with a\nlittle rod he opened it, for there was no withstanding.\n\n\u201cO outcasts from Heaven, folk despised,\u201d began he upon the horrible\nthreshold, \u201cwherefore is this overweening harbored in you? Why do ye\nkick against that will from which its end can never be cut short, and\nwhich many a time hath increased your grief? What avails it to butt\nagainst the fates? Your Cerberus, if ye remember well, still bears his\nchin and his throat peeled for that.\u201d Then he turned back upon the\nfilthy road and said no word to us, but wore the semblance of a man\nwhom other care constrains and stings, than that of him who is before\nhim.\n\nAnd we moved our feet toward the city, confident after his holy words.\nWithin we entered without any strife, and I, who had desire to observe\nthe condition which such a stronghold locks in, when I was within, sent\nmy eyes round about; and I see on every hand a great plain full of woe\nand of cruel torment.\n\nAs at Arles, where the Rhone stagnates, as at Pola, near the Quarnaro\nthat shuts in Italy and bathes its borders, sepulchres make all the\nplace uneven; so did they here on every side, saving that the manner\nwas more bitter here; for among the tombs flames were scattered, by\nwhich they were so intensely kindled that no art requires iron more so.\nAll their lids were lifted; and such dire laments were issuing forth\nfrom them as truly seemed of wretches and of sufferers.\n\nAnd I, \u201cMaster, who are these folk that, buried within those coffers,\nmake themselves heard with their woeful sighs?\u201d And he to me, \u201cHere are\nthe heresiarchs with their followers of every sect, and the tombs are\nmuch more laden than thou thinkest. Like with like is buried here, and\nthe monuments are more and less hot.\u201d\n\nAnd when he to the right hand had turned, we passed between the\ntorments and the high battlements.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO X.\n\n\nThe Sixth Circle: Heresiarchs.\u2014Farinata degli Uberti.\u2014Cavalcante\nCavalcanti.\u2014Frederick II.\n\n\nNow along a narrow path between the wall of the city and the torments\nmy Master goeth on, and I behind his shoulders.\n\n\u201cO Virtue supreme,\u201d I began, \u201cthat through the impious circles turnest\nme, according to thy pleasure, speak to me and satisfy my desires. The\nfolk that are lying in the sepulchres, can they be seen? All the lids\nare now lifted, and no one keepeth guard.\u201d And he to me, \u201cAll shall be\nlocked in when from Jehoshaphat they shall here return with the bodies\nwhich they have left on earth. Upon this side Epicurus with all his\nfollowers, who make the soul mortal with the body, have their burial\nplace. Therefore as to the demand that thou makest of me, thou shalt\nsoon be satisfied here within; and also as to the desire concerning\nwhich thou art silent to me.\u201d And I, \u201cGood Leader, I hold not my heart\nhidden from thee except in order to speak little; and not only now to\nthat hast thou disposed me.\u201d\n\n\u201cO Tuscan, who through the city of fire alive art going, speaking thus\nmodestly, may it please thee to stop in this place. Thy speech makes\nmanifest that thou art native of that noble fatherland to which\nperchance I was too molestful.\u201d Suddenly this sound issued from one of\nthe coffers, wherefore I drew, in fear, a little nearer to my Leader.\nAnd he said to me, \u201cTurn, what dost thou? Behold Farinata who hath\nuprisen; thou shalt see him all from the girdle up.\u201d\n\nI had already fixed my face on his, and he straightened himself up with\nbreast and front as though he had Hell in great scorn. And the bold and\nready hands of my Leader pushed me among the sepulchres to him, saying,\n\u201cLet thy words be choice.\u201d\n\nWhen I was at the foot of his tomb, he looked at me a little, and then,\nas though disdainful, asked me, \u201cWho were thy ancestors?\u201d I, who was\ndesirous to obey, concealed them not, but disclosed them all to him;\nwhereon he raised his brows a little up, then said, \u201cFiercely were they\nadverse to me, and to my fathers, and to my party, so that twice I\nscattered them.\u201d [1] \u201cIf they were driven out, they returned from every\nside,\u201d replied I to him, \u201cboth one and the other time, but yours have\nnot learned well that art.\u201d\n\n[1] Dante\u2019s ancestors were Guelphs.\n\n\nThen there arose, to view uncovered down to the chin, a shade at the\nside of this one; I think that it had risen on its knees. Round about\nme it looked, as if it had desire to see if another were with me, but\nwhen its expectancy was quite extinct, weeping it said, \u201cIf through\nthis blind dungeon thou goest through loftiness of genius, my son,\nwhere is he? and why is he not with thee?\u201d And I to him, \u201cOf myself I\ncome not; he who waits yonder leads me through here, whom perchance\nyour Guido held in scorn.\u201d[1]\n\n[1] Guido Cavalcanti was charged with the same sin of unbelief as his\nfather. Dante regards this as a sin specially contrary to right reason,\ntypified by Virgil.\n\n\nHis words and the mode of the punishment had already read to me the\nname of this one, wherefore my answer was so full.\n\nSuddenly straightening up, he cried, \u201cHow didst thou say, \u2018he held\u2019?\nlives he not still? doth not the sweet light strike his eyes?\u201d When he\ntook note of some delay that I made before answering, he fell again\nsupine, and forth appeared no more.\n\nBut that other magnanimous one, at whose instance I had stayed, changed\nnot aspect, nor moved his neck, nor bent his side. \u201cAnd if,\u201d he said,\ncontinuing his first words, \u201cthey have ill learned that art, it\ntorments me more than this bed. But the face of the lady who ruleth\nhere will not be rekindled fifty times ere thou shalt know how much\nthat art weighs. And, so mayest thou return unto the sweet world, tell\nme wherefore is that people so pitiless against my race in its every\nlaw?\u201d Then I to him, \u201cThe rout and the great carnage that colored the\nArbia red cause such orison to be made in our temple.\u201d After he had,\nsighing, shaken his head, \u201cIn that I was not alone,\u201d he said, \u201cnor\nsurely without cause would I have moved with the rest; but I was\nalone,\u2014there[1] where it was agreed by every one to lay Florence\nwaste,\u2014he who defended her with open face.\u201d \u201cAh! so hereafter may your\nseed repose,\u201d I prayed to him, \u201cloose for me that knot, which here has\nentangled my judgment. It seems, if I rightly hear, that ye foresee\nthat which time is bringing with him, and as to the present have\nanother way.\u201d \u201cWe see,\u201d he said, \u201clike those who have feeble light, the\nthings that are far from us, so much still shineth on us the supreme\nLeader; when they draw near, or are, our intelligence is all vain, and,\nif some one report not to us, we know nothing of your human state.\nTherefore thou canst comprehend that our knowledge will be utterly dead\nfrom that moment when the gate of the future shall he closed.\u201d Then, as\ncompunctious for my fault I said, \u201cNow wilt thou therefore tell that\nfallen one that his son is still conjoined with the living, and if just\nnow I was dumb to answer, make him know that I was so because I was\nstill thinking in that error which you have solved for me.\u201d[2]\n\n[1] At Empoli, in 1260, after the defeat of the Florentine Guelphs at\nMontaperti on the Arbia.\n\n\n[2] Guido Cavalcanti died in August, 1300; his death, being near at\nhand at the time of Dante\u2019s journey, was not known to his father.\n\n\nAnd now my Master was calling me back, wherefore I prayed the spirit\nmore hastily that he would tell me who was with him. He said to me,\n\u201cHere with more than a thousand do I lie; here within is the second\nFrederick and the Cardinal,[1] and of the others I am silent.\u201d\n\n[1] Ottaviano degli Ubaldini, a fierce Ghibelline, who was reported as\nsaying, \u201cIf there be a soul I have lost it for the Ghibellines.\u201d\n\n\nThereon he hid himself; and I toward the ancient Poet turned my steps,\nreflecting on that speech which seemed hostile to me. He moved on, and\nthen, thus going, he said to me, \u201cWhy art thou so distraught?\u201d And I\nsatisfied his demand. \u201cLet thy memory preserve that which thou hast\nheard against thyself,\u201d commanded me that Sage, \u201cand now attend to\nthis,\u201d and he raised his finger. \u201cWhen thou shalt be in presence of the\nsweet radiance of her whose beautiful eye sees everything, from her\nthou shalt learn the journey of thy life.\u201d Then to the left he turned\nhis step.\n\nWe left the wall, and went toward the middle by a path which strikes\ninto a valley that even up there its stench made displeasing.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XI.\n\n\nThe Sixth Circle: Heretics.\u2014Tomb of Pope Anastasins.\u2014Discourse of\nVirgil on the divisions of the lower Hell.\n\n\nUpon the edge of a high bank formed by great rocks broken in a circle,\nwe came above a more cruel pen. And here, because of the horrible\nexcess of the stench that the deep abyss throws out, we drew aside\nbehind the lid of a great tomb, whereon I saw an inscription which\nsaid, \u201cPope Anastasius I hold, he whom Photinus drew from the right\nway.\u201d\n\n\u201cOur descent must needs be slow so that the sense may first accustom\nitself a little to the dismal blast, and then will be no heed of it.\u201d\nThus the Master, and I said to him, \u201cSome compensation do thou find\nthat the time pass not lost.\u201d And be, \u201cBehold, I am thinking of that.\nMy son, within these rocks,\u201d he began to say, \u201care three circlets from\ngrade to grade like those thou leavest. All are full of accursed\nspirits; but, in order that hereafter sight only may suffice thee, hear\nhow and wherefore they are in constraint.\n\n\u201cOf every malice that wins hate in heaven injury is the end, and every\nsuch end afflicts others either by force or by fraud. But because fraud\nis the peculiar sin of man, it most displeaseth God; and therefore the\nfraudulent are the lower, and more woe assails them.\n\n\u201cThe first circle[1] is wholly of the violent; but because violence can\nbe done to three persons, in three rounds it is divided and\nconstructed. Unto God, unto one\u2019s self, unto one\u2019s neighbor may\nviolence be done; I mean unto them and unto their belongings, as thou\nshalt hear in plain discourse. By violence death and grievous wounds\nare inflicted on one\u2019s neighbor; and on his substance ruins, burnings,\nand harmful robberies. Wherefore homicides, and every one who smites\nwrongfully, devastators and freebooters, all of them the first round\ntorments, in various troops.\n\n[1] The first circle below, the seventh in the order of Hell.\n\n\n\u201cMan may lay violent hands upon himself and on his goods; and,\ntherefore, in the second round must needs repent without avail whoever\ndeprives himself of your world, gambles away and squanders his\nproperty, and laments there where he ought to be joyous.[2]\n\n[2] Laments on earth because of violence done to what should have made\nhim happy.\n\n\n\u201cViolence may be done to the Deity, by denying and blaspheming Him in\nheart, and despising nature and His bounty: and therefore the smallest\nround seals with its signet both Sodom and Cahors, and him who\ndespising God speaks from his heart.\n\n\u201cFraud, by which every conscience is bitten, man may practice on one\nthat confides in him, or on one that owns no confidence. This latter\nmode seemeth to destroy only the bond of love that nature makes;\nwherefore in the second circle[1] nestle hypocrisy, flatteries, and\nsorcerers, falsity, robbery, and simony, panders, barrators, and such\nlike filth.\n\n[1] The second circle below, the eighth in the order of Hell.\n\n\n\u201cBy the other mode that love is forgotten which nature makes, and also\nthat which is thereafter added, whereby special confidence is created.\nHence, in the smallest circle, where is the centre of the universe, on\nwhich Dis sits, whoso betrays is consumed forever.\u201d\n\nAnd I, \u201cMaster, full clearly doth thy discourse proceed, and full well\ndivides this pit, and the people that possess it; but, tell me, they of\nthe fat marsh, and they whom the wind drives, and they whom the rain\nbeats, and they who encounter with such sharp tongues, why are they not\npunished within the ruddy city if God be wroth with them? and if he be\nnot so, why are they in such plight?\u201d\n\nAnd he said to me, \u201cWherefore so wanders thine understanding beyond its\nwont? or thy mind, where else is it gazing? Dost thou not remember\nthose words with which thine Ethics treats in full of the three\ndispositions that Heaven abides not; in continence, malice, and mad\nbestiality, and how incontinence less offends God, and incurs less\nblame?[1] If thou considerest well this doctrine, and bringest to mind\nwho are those that up above, outside,[2] suffer punishment, thou wilt\nsee clearly why from these felons they are divided, and why less wroth\nthe divine vengeance hammers them.\u201d\n\n[1] Aristotle, Ethics, vii. 1.\n\n\n[2] Outside the walls of the city of Dis.\n\n\n\u201cO Sun that healest every troubled vision, thou dost content me so,\nwhen thou explainest, that doubt, not less than knowledge, pleaseth me;\nyet return a little back,\u201d said I, \u201cthere where thou saidst that usury\noffends the Divine Goodness, and loose the knot.\u201d\n\n\u201cPhilosophy,\u201d he said to me, \u201cpoints out to him who understands it, not\nonly in one part alone, how Nature takes her course from the Divine\nIntellect and from its art. And if thou note thy Physics[1] well thou\nwilt find after not many pages that your art follows her so far as it\ncan, as the disciple does the master, so that your art is as it were\ngrandchild of God. By means of these two, if thou bringest to mind\nGenesis at its beginning, it behoves mankind to obtain their livelihood\nand to thrive. But because the usurer takes another course, he despises\nNature in herself, and in her follower, since upon other thing he sets\nhis hope. But follow me now, for to go on pleaseth me; for the Fishes\nare gliding on the horizon, and the Wain lies quite over Corus,[2] and\nfar yonder is the way down the cliff.\u201d\n\n[1] Aristotle, Physics, ii. 2.\n\n\n[2] The time indicated is about 4, or from 4 to 5 A.M. Corus, the name\nof the north-west wind, here stands for that quarter of the heavens.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XII.\n\n\nFirst round of the Seventh Circle; those who do violence to others;\nTyrants and Homicides.\u2014The Minotaur.\u2014The Centaurs.\u2014Chiron.\u2014Nessus.\u2014The\nRiver of Boiling Blood, and the Sinners in it.\n\n\nThe place where we came to descend the bank was rugged, and, because of\nwhat was there besides, such that every eye would be shy of it.\n\nAs is that ruin which, on this side of Trent, struck the Adige on its\nflank, either by earthquake or by failure of support,\u2014for from the top\nof the mountain whence it moved, to the plain, the cliff has so fallen\ndown that it might give a path to one who was above,\u2014so was the descent\nof that ravine. And on the edge of the broken chasm lay stretched out\nthe infamy of Crete, that was conceived in the false cow. And when he\nsaw us he bit himself even as one whom wrath rends inwardly. My Sage\ncried out toward him, \u201cPerchance thou believest that here is the Duke\nof Athens who up in the world brought death to thee? Get thee gone,\nbeast, for this one comes not instructed by thy sister, but he goes to\nbehold your punishments.\u201d\n\nAs a bull that breaks away at the instant he has now received his\nmortal stroke, and cannot go, but plunges hither and thither, the\nMinotaur I saw do the like.\n\nAnd that wary one cried out, \u201cRun to the pass; while he is raging it is\nwell that thou descend.\u201d So we took our way down over the discharge of\nthose stones, which often moved under my feet because of the novel\nburden.\n\nI was going along thinking, and he said, \u201cThou thinkest perhaps on this\nruin which is guarded by that bestial with which I just now quenched.\nNow would I have thee know that the other time when I descended hither\ninto the nether hell, this cliff had not yet fallen. But in truth, if I\ndiscern clearly, a little ere He came, who levied the great spoil on\nDis from the supernal circle, in all its parts the deep foul valley\ntrembled so that I thought the universe had felt the love by which, as\nsome believe, oft times the world has been converted into chaos:[1]\nand, at that moment, this ancient cliff here and elsewhere made this\ndownfall. But fix thine eyes below, for the river of blood is near, in\nwhich boils whoso doth harm to others by violence.\u201d\n\n[1] Empedocles taught, as Dante may have learned from Aristotle, that\nLove and Hate were the forces by which the elements of which the world\nis composed were united and dissociated. The effort of Love was to draw\nall things into a simple perfect sphere, by which the common order of\nthe world would be brought to chaos.\n\n\nOh blind cupidity, both guilty and mad, that so spurs us in the brief\nlife, and then, in the eternal, steeps us so ill!\n\nI saw a broad ditch, bent in an arc, like one that embraces all the\nplain; according as my Guide had said. And between the foot of the bank\nand it, in a file were running Centaurs armed with arrows, as they were\nwont in the world to go to the chase. Seeing us descending, all\nstopped, and from the troop three detached themselves, with bows and\narrows first selected. And one shouted from afar, \u201cTo what torment are\nye coming, ye who descend the slope? Tell it from there; if not, I draw\nthe bow.\u201d My Master said, \u201cWe will make answer unto Chiron near you\nthere: ill was it that thy will was ever thus hasty.\u201d\n\nThen he touched me, and said, \u201cThat is Nessus, who died for the\nbeautiful Dejanira, and he himself wrought vengeance for himself; and\nthat one in the middle, who is gazing on his breast, is the great\nChiron who nurtured Achilles. That other is Pholus, who was so full of\nwrath. Round about the ditch they go by thousands shooting with their\narrows what soul lifts itself from the blood more than its guilt has\nallotted it.\u201d\n\nWe drew near to those fleet wild beasts. Chiron took a shaft, and with\nthe notch put his beard backward upon his jaw. When he had uncovered\nhis great mouth he said to his companions, \u201cAre ye aware that the one\nbehind moves what he touches? so are not wont to do the feet of the\ndead.\u201d And my good Leader, who was now at his breast, where the two\nnatures are conjoined, replied, \u201cTruly he is alive, and thus all alone\nit behoves me to show him the dark valley: necessity brings him hither\nand not delight. One withdrew from singing alleluiah who committed unto\nme this new office; he is no robber, nor I a thievish spirit. But, by\nthat power through which I move my steps along so savage a road, give\nto us one of thine, to whom we may be close, that he may show us where\nthe ford is, and may carry this one on his back, for he is not a spirit\nwho can go through the air.\u201d\n\nChiron turned upon his right breast, and said to Nessus, \u201cTurn, and\nguide them thus, and if another troop encounter you, make it give way.\u201d\n\nWe moved on with the trusty escort along the edge of the crimson\nboiling, in which the boiled were making loud shrieks. I saw folk under\nit up to the brow, and the great Centaur said, \u201cThese are tyrants who\ngave themselves to blood and pillage. Here they weep their pitiless\noffenses: here is Alexander, and cruel Dionysius who caused Sicily to\nhave woeful years. And that front which hath such black hair is\nAzzolino, and that other who is blond is Opizzo of Esti, who in truth\nwas slain by his stepson up there in the world.\u201d\n\nThen I turned me to the Poet, and he said, \u201cLet him now be first, and I\nsecond.\u201d A little further on the Centaur stopped above some folk who\nfar as the throat were seen to issue from that boiling stream. He\nshowed to us at one side a solitary shade, and said, \u201cHe cleft, in the\nbosom of God, the heart that still is honored on the Thames.\u201d[6] Then I\nsaw folk, who out of the stream held their head, and even all their\nchest; and of these I recognized many. Thus ever more and more shallow\nbecame that blood, until it cooked only the feet: and here was our\npassage of the foss.\n\n[1] In 1271, Prince Henry, son of Richard of Cornwall, was stabbed\nduring the mass, in a church at Viterbo, by Guy of Montfort, to avenge\nthe death of his father, Simon, Earl of Leicester, in 1261. The heart\nof the young Prince was placed in a golden cup, as Villani (vii. 39)\nreports, on a column, at the head of a bridge in London.\n\n\n\u201cEven as on this side, thou seest that the boiling stream ever\ndiminishes,\u201d said the Centaur, \u201cI would have thee believe that on this\nother its bed sinks more and more, until it comes round again where it\nbehoves that tyranny should groan. The divine justice here pierces that\nAttila who was a scourge on earth, and Pyrrhus and Sextus; and forever\nmilks the tears that with the boiling it unlocks from Rinier of\nCorneto, and from Rinier Pazzo, who upon the highways made such\nwarfare.\u201d\n\nThen he turned back and repassed the ford.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XIII.\n\n\nSecond round of the Seventh Circle: of those who have done violence to\nthemselves and to their goods.\u2014The Wood of Self-murderers.\u2014The\nHarpies.\u2014Pier delle Vigne.\u2014Lano of Siena and others.\n\n\nNessus had not yet reached the yonder bank when we set forward through\na wood which was marked by no path. Not green leaves but of a dusky\ncolor, not smooth boughs but knotty and gnarled, not fruits were there\nbut thorns with poison. Those savage beasts that hold in hate the\ntilled places between Cecina and Corneto have no thickets so rough or\nso dense.\n\nHere the foul Harpies make their nests, who chased the Trojans from the\nStrophades with dismal announcement of future calamity. They have broad\nwings, and human necks and faces, feet with claws, and a great\nfeathered belly. They make lament upon the strange trees.\n\nAnd the good Master, \u201cBefore thou enter farther know that thou art in\nthe second round,\u201d he began to say to me, \u201cand wilt be, till thou shalt\ncome unto the horrible sand. Therefore look well around, and so thou\nshalt see things that would take credence from my speech.\u201d[1]\n\n[1] Things which if told would seem incredible.\n\n\nI heard wailings uttered on every side, and I saw no one who might make\nthem, wherefore, I, all bewildered, stopped. I believe that he believed\nthat I believed that all these voices issued amid those stumps from\npeople who because of us had hidden themselves.\n\nTherefore said the Master, \u201cIf thou break off a twig from one of these\nplants, the thoughts thou hast will all be cut short.\u201d Then I stretched\nmy hand a little forward and plucked a branchlet from a great\nthorn-bush, and its trunk cried out, \u201cWhy dost thou rend me?\u201d When it\nhad become dark with blood it began again to cry, \u201cWhy dost thou tear\nme? hast thou not any spirit of pity? Men we were, and now we are\nbecome stocks; truly thy hand ought to be more pitiful had we been the\nsouls of serpents.\u201d\n\nAs from a green log that is burning at one of its ends, and from the\nother drips, and hisses with the air that is escaping, so from that\nbroken splinter came out words and blood together; whereon I let the\ntip fall, and stood like a man who is afraid.\n\n\u201cIf he had been able to believe before,\u201d replied my Sage, \u201cO wounded\nsoul, what he has seen only in my verse,[1] he would not upon thee have\nstretched his hand. But the incredible thing made me prompt him to an\nact which grieves my very self. But tell him who thou wast, so that, by\nway of some amends, he may refresh thy fame in the world above, whereto\nit is allowed him to return.\u201d\n\n[1] In the story of Polydorus, in the third book of the Aeneid.\n\n\nAnd the trunk, \u201cSo with sweet speech dost thou allure me, that I cannot\nbe silent, and may it not displease you, that I am enticed to speak a\nlittle. I am he who held both the keys of the heart of Frederick, and\nwho turned them, locking and unlocking so softly, that from his\nconfidence I kept almost every one.[1] Fidelity so great I bore to the\nglorious office, that I lost slumber and strength thereby. The\nharlot,[2] that never from the abode of Caear turned her strumpet\neyes,\u2014the common death and vice of courts,\u2014inflamed all minds against\nme, and they, inflamed, did so inflame Augustus that my glad honors\nturned to dismal sorrows. My mind, in scornful temper thinking to\nescape scorn by death, made me unjust toward my just self. By the\nstrange roots of this tree I swear to you, that I never broke faith\nunto my lord who was so worthy of honor. And if one of you returneth to\nthe world, let him comfort my memory that yet lies prostrate from the\nblow that envy gave it.\u201d\n\n[1] The spirit who speaks is Pier delle Vigne, the Chancellor of\nFrederick II.; of low birth, he rose to the first place in the state;\nhe was one of the earliest writers of Italian verse. Dante has placed\nhis master as well as him in Hell. See Canto X.\n\n\n[3] Envie ys lavendere of the court alway;\n  For she ne parteth neither nyght ne day\n  Out of the house of Cesar, thus saith Daunte.\n     Legende of Goode Women, 358.60.\n\n\nA while he paused, and then, \u201cSince he is silent,\u201d said the Poet to me,\n\u201close not the hour, but speak and ask of him, if more pleaseth thee.\u201d\nWhereon I to him, \u201cDo thou ask him further of what thou thinkest may\nsatisfy me, for I cannot, such pity fills my heart.\u201d\n\nTherefore he began again, \u201cSo may this man do for thee freely what thy\nspeech prays, spirit incarcerate, still be pleased to tell us how the\nsoul is bound within these knots, and tell us, if thou canst, if any\nfrom such limbs is ever loosed.\u201d\n\nThen the trunk puffed strongly, and soon that wind was changed into\nthis voice: \u201cBriefly shall ye be answered. When the ferocious soul\ndeparteth from the body wherefrom itself hath torn itself, Minos sends\nit to the seventh gulf. It falls into the wood, and no part is chosen\nfor it, but where fortune flings it, there it takes root like a grain\nof spelt; it springs up in a shoot and to a wild plant. The Harpies,\nfeeding then upon its leaves, give pain, and to the pain a window.[1]\nLike the rest we shall go for our spoils,[2] but not, forsooth, that\nany one may revest himself with them, for it is not just to have that\nof which one deprives himself. Hither shall we drag them, and through\nthe melancholy wood shall our bodies be suspended, each on the\nthorn-tree of his molested shade.\u201d\n\n[1] The tearing of the leaves gives an outlet to the woe.\n\n\n[2] Our bodies, at the Last Judgment.\n\n\nWe were still attentive to the trunk, believing that it might wish to\nsay more to us, when we were surprised by an uproar, as one who\nperceives the wild boar and the chase coming toward his stand and hears\nthe Feasts and the branches crashing. And behold two on the left hand,\nnaked and scratched, flying so violently that they broke all the limbs\nof the wood. The one in front was shouting, \u201cNow, help, help, Death!\u201d\nand the other, who seemed to himself too slow, \u201cLano, thy legs were not\nso nimble at the jousts of the Toppo:\u201d[1] and when perhaps his breath\nwas failing, of himself and of a bush he made a group. Behind them the\nwood was full of black bitches, ravenous and running like greyhounds\nthat have been unleashed. On him that had squatted they set their teeth\nand tore him to pieces, bit by bit, then carried off his woeful limbs.\n\n[1] Lano was slain in flight at the defeat of the Sienese by the\nAretines, near the Pieve del Toppo, in 1280. He and Jacomo were\nnotorious prodigals.\n\n\nMy Guide then took me by the hand, and led me to the bush, which was\nweeping through its bleeding breaks in vain. \u201cO Jacomo of Sant\u2019\nAndrea,\u201d it was saying, \u201cwhat hath it vantaged thee to make of me a\nscreen? What blame have I for thy wicked life?\u201d When the Master had\nstopped beside it, he said, \u201cWho wast thou, who through so many wounds\nblowest forth with blood thy woeful speech?\u201d And he to us, \u201cO souls who\nart arrived to see the shameful ravage that hath thus disjoined my\nleaves from me, collect them at the foot of the wretched bush. I was of\nthe city which for the Baptist changed her first patron;[1] wherefore\nwill he always make her sorrowful with his art. And were it not that at\nthe passage of the Arno some semblance of him yet remains, those\ncitizens who afterwards rebuilt it upon the ashes that were left by\nAttila[2] would have labored in vain. I made a gibbet for myself of my\nown dwelling.\u201d\n\n[1] The first patron of florence was Mars; a fragment of a statue of\nwhom stood till 1333 on the Ponte Vecchio.\n\n\n[2] It was not Attila, but Totila, who in 542 besieged Florence, and,\naccording to false popular tradition, burned it. The names and\npersonages were frequently confounded in the Dark Ages.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XIV.\n\n\nThird round of the Seventh Circle of those who have done violence to\nGod.\u2014The Burning Sand.\u2014Capaneus.\u2014Figure of the Old Man in Crete.\u2014The\nRivers of Hell.\n\n\nBecause the charity of my native place constrained me, I gathered up\nthe scattered leaves and gave them back to him who was already hoarse.\n\nThen we came to the confine, where the second round is divided from the\nthird, and where is seen a horrible mode of justice.\n\nTo make clearly manifest the new things, I say that we had reached a\nplain which from its bed removeth every plant. The woeful wood is a\ngarland round about it, even as the dismal foss to that. Here, on the\nvery edge, we stayed our steps. The floor was a dry and dense sand, not\nmade in other fashion than that which of old was trodden by the feet of\nCato.\n\nO vengeance of God, how much thou oughtest to be feared by every one\nwho readeth that which was manifest unto mine eyes!\n\nOf naked souls I saw many flocks, that were all weeping very miserably,\nand diverse law seemed imposed upon them. Some folk were lying supine\non the ground, some were seated all crouched up, and others were going\nabout continually. Those who were going around were far the more, and\nthose the fewer who were lying down under the torment, but they had\ntheir tongues more loose for wailing.\n\nOver all the sand, with a slow falling, were raining down dilated\nflakes of fire, as of snow on alps without a wind. As the flames which\nAlexander in those hot parts of India saw falling upon his host, solid\nto the ground, wherefore he took care to trample the soil by his\ntroops, because the vapor was better extinguished while it was single;\nso was descending the eternal glow whereby the sand was kindled, like\ntinder beneath the steel, for doubling of the dole. Without repose was\never the dance of the wretched hands, now there, now here, brushing\nfrom them the fresh burning.\n\nI began, \u201cMaster, thou that overcomest everything, except the obdurate\ndemons, who at the entrance of the gate came out against us, who is\nthat great one that seemeth not to heed the fire, and lies scornful and\ncontorted, so that the rain seems not to ripen him?\u201d And that same one\nwho had perceived that I was asking my Leader about him, cried out,\n\u201cSuch as I was alive, such am I dead. Though Jove weary his smith, from\nwhom in wrath he took the sharp thunderbolt wherewith on my last day I\nwas smitten, or though he weary the others, turn by turn, in Mongibello\nat the black forge, crying, \u2018Good Vulcan, help, help!\u2019 even as he did\nat the fight of Phlegra, and should hurl on me with all his might,\nthereby he should not have glad vengeance.\u201d\n\nThen my Leader spoke with force so great that I had not heard him so\nloud, \u201cO Capaneus, in that thy pride is not quenched, art thou the more\npunished; no torture save thine own rage would be a pain adequate to\nthy fury.\u201d\n\nThen he turned round to me with better look, saying, \u201cHe was one of the\nSeven Kings that besieged Thebes, and he held, and it appears that he\nholds God in disdain, and little it appears that he prizes Him; but as\nI said to him, his own despites are very due adornments for his breast.\nNow come on behind me, and take heed withal, not to set thy feet upon\nthe burning sand, but keep them always close unto the wood.\u201d\n\nSilent we came to where spirts forth from the wood a little streamlet,\nthe redness of which still makes me shudder. As from the Bulicame\nissues a brooklet, which then the sinful women share among them, so\nthis down across the sand went along.[1] Its bed and both its sloping\nbanks were made of stone, and the margins on the side, whereby I\nperceived that the crossing[2] was there.\n\n[1] The Bulicame, a hot spring near Viterbo, much frequented as a bath,\nthe use of a portion of which was assigned to \u201csinful women.\u201d\n\n\n[2] The crossing of the breadth of the round of burning sand, on the\nway inward toward the next circle.\n\n\n\u201cAmong all else that I have shown to thee, since we entered through the\ngate whose threshold is barred to no one, nothing has been discerned by\nthine eyes so notable as is the present stream which deadens all the\nflamelets upon it.\u201d These words were of my Leader, wherefore I prayed\nhim, that he should give me largess of the food for which he had given\nme largess of desire.\n\n\u201cIn mid sea sits a wasted land,\u201d said he then, \u201cwhich is named Crete,\nunder whose king the world of old was chaste. A mountain is there that\nof old was glad with waters and with leaves, which is called Ida; now\nit is desert, like a thing outworn. Rhea chose it of old for the trusty\ncradle of her little son, and to conceal him better when he cried had\nshoutings made there. Within the mountain stands erect a great old man,\nwho holds his shoulders turned towards Damietta, and looks at Rome as\nif his mirror. His head is formed of fine gold, and pure silver are his\narms and breast; then he is of brass far as to the fork. From there\ndownward he is all of chosen iron, save that his right foot is of baked\nclay, and he stands erect on that more than on the other.[1] Every part\nexcept the gold is cleft with a fissure that trickles tears, which\ncollected perforate that cavern. Their course falls from rock to rock\ninto this valley; they form Acheron, Styx, and Phlegethon; then it goes\ndown through this narrow channel far as where there is no more\ndescending. They form Cocytus, and what that pool is, thou shalt see;\ntherefore here is it not told.\u201d\n\n[1] This image is taken directly from the dream of Nebuchadnezzar\n(Daniel ii. 31-33). It is the type of the ages of tradition and\nhistory, with its back to the past, its face toward Rome,\u2014the seat of\nthe Empire and of the Church. The tears of the sin and suffering of the\ngenerations of man form the rivers of Hell.\n\n\nAnd I to him, \u201cIf the present rill floweth down thus from our world,\nwhy doth it appear to us only at this rim?\u201d\n\nAnd he to me, \u201cThou knowest that the place is round, and though thou\nart come far, ever to the left descending toward the bottom, not yet\nhast thou turned through the whole circle; wherefore if a new thing\nappears to us, it ought not to bring wonder to thy face.\u201d\n\nAnd I again, \u201cMaster, where are Phlegethon and Lethe found, for of the\none thou art silent, and of the other thou sayest that it is formed by\nthis rain?\u201d\n\n\u201cIn all thy questions surely thou pleasest me,\u201d he answered, \u201cbut the\nboiling of the red water ought truly to solve one that thou askest.\nLethe thou shalt see, but outside of this ditch, there where souls go\nto lave themselves when sin repented of is taken away.\u201d Then he said,\n\u201cNow it is time to depart from the wood; take heed that thou come\nbehind me; the margins afford way, for they are not burning, and above\nthem all the vapor is extinguished.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XV.\n\n\nThird round of the Seventh Circle: of those who have done violence to\nNature.\u2014Brunetto Latini.\u2014Prophecies of misfortune to Dante.\n\n\nNow one of the hard margins bears us on, and the fume of the brook\novershadows so that it saves the water and the banks from the fire. As\nthe Flemings, between Wissant and Bruges, fearing the flood that is\nblown in upon them, make the dyke whereby the sea is routed; and as the\nPaduans along the Brenta, in order to defend their towns and castles,\nere Chiarentana[1] feel the heat,\u2014in such like were these made, though\nneither so high nor so thick had the master, whoever he was, made them.\n\n[1] The mountain range north of the Brenta, by the floods from which\nthe river is swollen in the spring.\n\n\nWe were now so remote from the wood that I could not have seen where it\nwas though I had turned me round to look, when we encountered a troop\nof souls which was coming along by the bank, and each of them was\nlooking at us, as at eve one is wont to look at another under the new\nmoon, and they so sharpened their brows toward us as the old tailor\ndoes on the needle\u2019s eye.\n\nThus gazed at by that company, I was recognized by one who took me by\nthe hem, and cried out, \u201cWhat a marvel!\u201d And when he stretched out his\narm to me, I fixed my eyes on his baked aspect so that his scorched\nvisage prevented not my mind from recognizing him; and bending down my\nown to his face, I answered, \u201cAre you here, Sir Brunetto?\u201d[1] And he,\n\u201cO my son, let it not displease thee if Brunetto Latini turn a little\nback with thee, and let the train go on.\u201d I said to him, \u201cWith all my\npower I pray this of you, and if you will that I seat myself with you I\nwill do so, if it pleaseth this one, for I go with him.\u201d \u201cO son,\u201d said\nhe, \u201cwhoever of this herd stops for an instant lies then a hundred\nyears without fanning himself when the fire smites him; therefore go\nonward, I will come at thy skirts, and then I will rejoin my band which\ngoeth weeping its eternal sufferings.\u201d\n\n[1] Brunetto Latini, one of the most learned and able Florentines of\nthe thirteenth century. He was banished with the other chiefs of the\nGuelph party, after the battle of Montaperti, in 1260, and went to\nFrance, where he resided for many years. After his return to Florence\nhe became Secretary of the Commune, and he was the master of Dante and\nGuido Cavalcanti. His principal literary work was Li Livres dou Tresor,\nwritten in French, an interesting compend of the omne scibile. He died\nin 1290. Dante uses the plural \u201cyou\u201d in addressing him, as a sign of\nrespect.\n\n\nI dared not descend from the road to go level with him, but I held my\nhead bowed like one who goes reverently. He began, \u201cWhat fortune, or\ndestiny, ere the last day, brings thee down here? and who is this that\nshows the road?\u201d\n\n\u201cThere above, in the clear life,\u201d I answered him, \u201cI lost myself in a\nvalley, before my time was full. Only yester morn I turned my back on\nit; this one[1] appeared to me as I was returning to it, and he is\nleading me homeward along this path.\u201d\n\n[1] Dante never speaks Virgil\u2019s name in Hell.\n\n\nAnd he to me: \u201cIf thou follow thy star, thou canst not miss the\nglorious port, if, in the beautiful life, I discerned aright. And if I\nhad not so untimely died, seeing heaven so benignant unto thee I would\nhave given cheer unto thy work. But that ungrateful populace malign\nwhich descended from Fiesole of old,[1] and smacks yet of the mountain\nand the rock, will hate thee because of thy good deeds; and this is\nright, for among the bitter sorb trees it is not fitting the sweet fig\nshould bear fruit. Old report in the world calls them blind; it is a\npeople avaricious, envious, and proud; from their customs take heed\nthat thou keep thyself clean. Thy fortune reserves such honor for thee\nthat one party and the other shall hunger for thee; but far from the\ngoat shall be the grass. Let the Fiesolan beasts make litter of\nthemselves, and touch not the plant, if any spring still upon their\ndungheap, in which may live again the holy seed of those Romans who\nremained there when it became the nest of so much malice.\u201d\n\n[1] After his flight from Rome Catiline betook himself to Faesulae\n(Fiesole), and here for a time held out against the Roman forces. The\npopular tradition ran that, after his defeat, Faesulae was destroyed,\nand its people, together with a colony from Rome, made a settlement on\nthe banks of the Arno, below the mountain on which Faesulae had stood.\nThe new town was named Fiora, siccome fosse in fiore edificata, \u201cas\nthough built among flowers,\u201d but afterwards was called Fiorenza, or\nFlorence. See G. Villani, Cronica, I. xxxi.-xxxviii.\n\n\n\u201cIf all my entreaty were fulfilled,\u201d replied I to him, \u201cyou would not\nyet be placed in banishment from human nature; for in my mind is fixed,\nand now fills my heart, the dear, good, paternal image of you, when in\nthe world hour by hour you taught me how man makes himself eternal and\nin what gratitude I hold it, so long as I live, it behoves that on my\ntongue should be discerned. That which you tell me of my course I\nwrite, and reserve it to be glossed with other text,[1] by a Lady, who\nwill know how, if I attain to her. Thus much would I have manifest to\nyou: if only that my conscience chide me not, for Fortune, as she will,\nI am ready. Such earnest is not strange unto my ears; therefore let\nFortune turn her wheel as pleases her, and the churl his mattock.\u201d[2]\n\n[1] The prophecy by Ciacco of the fall of Dante\u2019s party, Canto vi., and\nthat by Farinata of Dante\u2019s exile, Canto x., which Virgil had told\nshould be made clear to him by Beatrice.\n\n\n[2] The churl of Fiesole.\n\n\nMy Master then upon his right side turned himself back, and looked at\nme; then said, \u201cHe listens well who notes it.\u201d\n\nNot the less for this do I go on speaking with Sir Brunetto, and I ask,\nwho are his most known and most eminent companions. And he to me, \u201cTo\nknow of some is good, of the others silence will be laudable for us,\nfor the time would be short for so much speech. In brief, know that all\nwere clerks, and great men of letters, and of great fame, defiled in\nthe world with one same sin. Priscian goes along with that disconsolate\ncrowd, and Francesco of Accorso;[1] and thou mightest also have seen,\nhadst thou had desire of such scurf, him who by the Servant of Servants\nwas translated from Arno to Bacchiglione, where he left his\nill-strained nerves.[2] Of more would I tell, but the going on and the\nspeech cannot be longer, for I see yonder a new cloud rising from the\nsand. Folk come with whom I must not be. Let my Tesoro be commended to\nthee, in which I still am living, and more I ask not.\u201d\n\n[1] Priscian, the famous grammarian of the sixth century; Francis of\nAccorso, a jurist of great repute, who taught at Oxford and at Bologna,\nand died in 1294.\n\n\n[2] Andrea de Mozzi, bishop of Florence, translated by Boniface VIII.\nto Viceuza, near which the Bacchiglione runs. He died in 1296.\n\n\nThen he turned back, and seemed of those who run at Verona for the\ngreen cloth[1] across the plain, and of these he seemed the one that\nwins, and not he that loses.\n\n[1] The prize in the annual races at Verona.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XVI.\n\n\nThird round of the Seventh Circle: of those who have done violence to\nNature.\u2014Guido Guerra, Tegghiaio Aldobrandi and Jacopo Rusticucci.\u2014The\nroar of Phlegethon as it pours downward.\u2014The cord thrown into the\nabyss.\n\n\nNow was I in a place where the resounding of the water that was falling\ninto the next circle was heard, like that hum which the beehives make,\nwhen three shades together separated themselves, running, from a troop\nthat was passing under the rain of the bitter torment. They came toward\nus, and each cried out, \u201cStop thou, that by thy garb seemest to us to\nbe one from our wicked city!\u201d\n\nAh me! what wounds I saw upon their limbs, recent and old, burnt in by\nthe flames. Still it grieves me for them but to remember it.\n\nTo their cries my Teacher gave heed; he turned his face toward me, and\n\u201cNow wait,\u201d he said; \u201cto these one should be courteous, and were it not\nfor the fire that the nature of the place shoots out, I should say that\nhaste better befitted thee than them.\u201d\n\nThey began again, when we stopped, the old verse, and when they had\nreached us they made a wheel of themselves all three. As champions\nnaked and oiled are wont to do, watching their hold and their vantage,\nbefore they come to blows and thrusts, thus, wheeling, each directed\nhis face on me, so that his neck in contrary direction to his feet was\nmaking continuous journey.\n\n\u201cAh! if the misery of this shifting sand bring us and our prayers into\ncontempt,\u201d began one, \u201cand our darkened and blistered aspect, let our\nfame incline thy mind to tell us who thou art, that so securely\nplantest thy living feet in Hell. He whose tracks thou seest me\ntrample, though he go naked and singed, was of greater state than thou\nthinkest. Grandson he was of the good Gualdrada; his name was\nGuidoguerra, and in his life he did much with counsel, and with the\nsword. The other who treads the sand behind me is Tegghiaio Aldobrandi,\nwhose fame should be welcome in the world above. And I, who am set with\nthem on the cross, was Jacopo Rusticucci,[1] and surely my savage wife\nmore than aught else injures.\n\n[1] Concerning Tegghiaio and Rusticucci Dante had enquired of Ciacco,\nCanto vi. They and Guido Guerra were illustrious citizens of Florence\nin the thirteenth century. Their deeds are recorded by Villani and\nRicordano Malespini. The good Gualdrada, famed for her beauty and her\nmodesty, was the daughter of Messer Bellincione Berti, referred to in\nCantos w. and wi. of Paradise as one of the early worthies of the city.\nSee O. Villani, Cronica. V. xxxvii.\n\n\nIf I could have been sheltered from the fire I would have cast myself\nbelow among them, and I think that the Teacher would have permitted it;\nbut because I should have been scorched and baked, fear overcame my\ngood will that made me greedy to embrace them. Then I began: \u201cNot\ncontempt, but grief, did your condition fix within me, so that slowly\nwill it be all divested, soon as this my Lord said words to me by which\nI understood that such folk as ye are might be coming. Of your city I\nam; and always your deeds and honored names have I retraced and heard\nwith affection. I leave the gall and go for the sweet fruits promised\nme by my veracious Leader; but far as the centre needs must I first\ndescend.\u201d\n\n\u201cSo may thy soul long direct thy limbs,\u201d replied he then, \u201cand so may\nthy fame shine after thee, say if courtesy and valor abide in our city\nas they were wont, or if they have quite gone forth from it? For\nGuglielmo Borsiere,[1] who is in torment with us but short while, and\ngoes yonder with our companions, afflicts us greatly with his words.\u201d\n\n[1] Nothing is known from contemporary record of Borsiere, but\nBoccaccio tells a story of him in the Decameron, giorn. i. nov. 8.\n\n\n\u201cThe new people and the sudden gains[1] have generated pride and\nexcess, Florence, in thee, so that already thou weepest thereat.\u201d Thus\ncried I with face uplifted. And the three, who understood that for\nanswer, looked one at the other, as men look at hearing truth.\n\n[1] Florence had grown rapidly in population and in wealth during the\nlast years of the thirteenth century.\n\n\n\u201cIf other times it costeth thee so little,\u201d replied they all, \u201cto\nsatisfy others, happy thou that thus speakest at thy pleasure.\nTherefore, if thou escapest from these dark places, and returnest to\nsee again the beautiful stars, when it shall rejoice thee to say, \u2018I\nhave been,\u2019 mind thou speak of us unto the people.\u201d Then they broke the\nwheel, and in flying their swift legs seemed wings.\n\nNot an amen could have been said so quickly as they had disappeared;\nwherefore it seemed good to my Master to depart. I followed him, and we\nhad gone little way before the sound of the water was so near to us,\nthat had we spoken we scarce had heard. As that river on the left slope\nof the Apennine, which, the first from Monte Veso toward the east, has\nits proper course,\u2014which is called Acquacheta up above, before it sinks\nvalleyward into its low bed, and at Forli no longer has that name,[1]\n\u2014reverberates from the alp in falling with a single leap there above\nSan Benedetto, where there ought to be shelter for a thousand;[2] thus\ndown from a precipitous bank we found that dark-tinted water\nresounding, so that in short while it would have hurt the ears.\n\n[1] At Forli the river is called the Montone; it was the first of the\nrivers on the left of the Apennines that had its course to the sea; the\nothers before it being tributaries of the Po, which rises on Monte\nVeso.\n\n\n[2] These last words are obscure, and none of the commentators explain\nthem satisfactorily.\n\n\nI had a cord girt around me, and with it I had once thought to take the\nleopard of the dappled skin.[1] After I had loosed it wholly from me,\neven as my Leader had commanded me, I reached it to him wound up and\ncoiled. Whereon he turned toward the right, and somewhat far from the\nedge threw it down into that deep abyss. \u201cAnd surely some strange thing\nmust needs respond,\u201d said I to myself, \u201cto the strange signal which the\nMaster so follows with his eye.\u201d\n\n[2] The leopard of the dappled skin, which had often turned back Dante\nfrom the Mountain to the Dark Wood (see Canto i.); the type of sensual\nsin. The cord is the type of religions asceticism, of which the poet no\nlonger has need. The meaning of its use as a signal is not apparent.\n\n\nAh! how cautious men ought to be near those who see not only the act,\nbut with their wisdom look within the thoughts. He said to me: \u201cSoon\nwill come up that which I await, and what thy thought is dreaming must\nsoon discover itself unto thy sight.\u201d\n\nTo that truth which has the aspect of falsehood ought one always to\nclose his lips so far as he can, because without fault it causes\nshame;[1] but here I cannot be silent, and by the notes of this comedy,\nReader, I swear to thee,\u2014so may they not be void of lasting grace,\u2014that\nI saw through that thick and dark air a shape come swimming upwards\nmarvelous to every steadfast heart; like as he returns who goes down\nsometimes to loose an anchor that grapples either a rock or other thing\nthat in the sea is hid, who stretches upward, and draws in his feet.\n\n[1] Because the narrator is falsely taxed with falsehood.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XVII.\n\n\nThird round of the Seventh Circle: of those who have done violence to\nArt.\u2014Geryon.\u2014The Usurers.\u2014Descent to the Eighth Circle.\n\n\n\u201cBehold the wild beast with the pointed tail, that passes mountains,\nand breaks walls and weapons; behold him that infects all the\nworld.\u201d[1] Thus began my Leader to speak to me; and he beckoned to him\nthat he should come to shore near the end of the trodden marbles.[2]\nAnd that loathsome image of fraud came onward, and landed his head and\nhis body, but drew not his tail upon the bank. His face was the face of\na just man (so benignant was its skin outwardly), and of a serpent all\nthe trunk beside; he had two paws, hairy to the armpits; his back and\nbreast and both his sides were painted with nooses and circles. With\nmore colors of woof and warp Tartars or Turks never made cloth, nor\nwere such webs woven by Arachne.\n\n[1] Dante makes Geryon the type and image of Fraud, thus allegorizing\nthe triple form (forma tricorperis umbrae: Aeneid vi. 289; tergemini\nGeryonae; Id. viii. 292) ascribed to him by the ancient poets.\n\n\n[2] The stony margin of Phlegethon, on which Virgil and Dante have\ncrossed the sand.\n\n\nAs sometimes boats lie on the shore, so that they are partly in water\nand partly on the ground, and as yonder, among the gluttonous Germans,\nthe beaver settles himself to make his war,[1] so lay that worst of\nbeasts upon the rim that closes in the sand with stone. In the void all\nhis tail was quivering, twisting upwards its venomous fork, which like\na scorpion\u2019s armed the point.\n\n[1] With his tail in the water to catch his prey, as was popularly\nbelieved.\n\n\nThe Leader said: \u201cNow needs must our way bend a little toward that\nwicked beast that is couching there.\u201d Therefore we descended on the\nright hand and took ten steps upon the verge quite to avoid the sand\nand flame. And when we had come to it, I see, a little farther on,\npeople sitting upon the sand near to the void place.[1]\n\n[1] These people are the third class of sinners punished in this round\nof the Seventh Circle, those who have done violence to Art, the\nusurers. (See Canto xi.)\n\n\nHere the Master said to me: \u201cIn order that thou mayst bear away\ncomplete experience of this round, now go and see their condition. Let\nthy discourse there be brief. Till thou returnest I will speak with\nthis one, that he may concede to us his strong shoulders.\u201d\n\nThus, still up by the extreme head of that seventh circle, all alone, I\nwent where the sad people were sitting. Through the eyes their woe was\nbursting forth. This way and that they helped with their hands,\nsometimes against the vapors,[1] and sometimes against the hot soil.\nNot otherwise do the dogs in summer, now with muzzle, now with paw,\nwhen they are bitten either by fleas, or flies, or gadflies. When I set\nmy eyes on the face of some on whom the woeful fire falls, not one of\nthem I recognized;[2] but I perceived that from the neck of each was\nhanging a pouch, that had a certain color and a certain device,[3] and\nthereupon it seems their eyes feed. And as I looking come among them, I\nsaw upon a yellow purse azure that had the face and bearing of a\nlion.[4] Then as the current of my look proceeded I saw another, red as\nblood, display a goose whiter than butter. And one, who had his little\nwhite bag marked with an azure and pregnant sow,[5] said to me, \u201cWhat\nart thou doing in this ditch? Now get thee gone, and since thou art\nstill alive, know that my neighbor, Vitaliano, will sit here at my left\nside. With these Florentines am I, a Paduan; often they stun my ears\nshouting, \u201cLet the sovereign cavalier come who will bring the pouch\nwith the three goats.\u201d[1] Then he twisted his mouth, and stuck out his\ntongue, like an ox that licks his nose.\n\n[1] The falling flames.\n\n\n[2] Dante thus indicates that they were not worthy to be known.\n\n\n[3] The blazon of their arms, by which Dante learns who they are.\n\n\n[4] This was the device of the Gianfigliazzi, a Guelph family of\nFlorence; the next was that of the Ubriachi, Ghibellines, also of\nFlorence.\n\n\n[5] Arms of the Scrovigni of Padua.\n\n\n[6] One Giovanni Buiamonte of Florence, \u201cwho surpassed all others of\nthe time in usury,\u201d says Benvenuto da Imola.\n\n\nAnd I, fearing lest longer stay might vex him who had admonished me to\nstay but little, turned back from these weary souls. I found my Leader,\nwho had already mounted upon the croup of the fierce animal, and he\nsaid to me, \u201cNow be strong and courageous; henceforth the descent is by\nsuch stairs;[1] mount thou in front, for I wish to be between, so that\nthe tail cannot do thee harm.\u201d\n\n[1] Not by foot, nor by boat as heretofore, but carried by living\nministers of Hell.\n\n\nAs is he who hath the shivering fit of the quartan so near that his\nnails are already pallid, and he is all of a tremble only looking at\nthe shade, such I became at these words uttered. But his reproaches\nwrought shame in me, which in presence of a good lord makes a servant\nstrong.\n\nI seated myself on those huge shoulders. I wished to speak thus, \u201cTake\nheed that thou embrace me,\u201d but the voice came not as I had thought.\nBut he who other time had succored me, in other peril, soon as I\nmounted, clasped and sustained me with his arms: and he said, \u201cGeryon,\nmove on now; let the circles be wide, and the descending slow; consider\nthe strange burden that thou hast.\u201d\n\nAs a little vessel goeth from its place, backward, backward, so he\nthence withdrew; and when he felt himself quite at play, he turned his\ntail to where his breast had been, and moved it, stretched out like an\neel, and with his paws gathered the air to himself. Greater fear I do\nnot think there was when Phaethon abandoned the reins, whereby heaven,\nas is still apparent, was scorched; nor when the wretched Icarus felt\nhis flanks unfeathering through the melting of the wax, his father\nshouting to him, \u201cIll way thou holdest,\u201d than mine was, when I saw that\nI was in the air on every side, and saw every sight vanished, except\nthat of the beast. He goes along swimming very slowly, wheels and\ndescends, but I perceive it not, save by the wind upon my face, and\nfrom below.\n\nI heard now on the right hand the gorge making beneath us a horrible\nroar; wherefore I stretch out my head, with my eyes downward. Then I\nbecame more afraid to lean over, because I saw fires and heard laments;\nwhereat I, trembling, wholly cowered back. And I saw then, what I had\nnot seen before, the descending and the wheeling, by the great evils\nthat were drawing near on diverse sides.\n\nAs the falcon which has been long on wing, that, without sight of lure\nor bird, makes the falconer say, \u201cAh me, thou stoopest!\u201d descends\nweary, there whence he had set forth swiftly, through a hundred\ncircles, and lights far from his master, disdainful and sullen; so\nGeryon set us at the bottom, at the very foot of the scarped rock, and,\ndisburdened of our persons, darted away as arrow from the bowstring.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XVIII.\n\n\nEighth Circle: the first pit: panders and seducers.\u2014Venedico\nCaccianimico.\u2014Jason.\u2014Second pit: false flatterers.\u2014Alessio\nInterminei.\u2014Thais.\n\n\nThere is a place in Hell called Malebolge, all of stone of the color of\niron, as is the encircling wall that surrounds it. Right in the middle\nof this field malign yawns an abyss exceeding wide and deep, the\nstructure of which I will tell of in its place. That belt, therefore,\nwhich remains between the abyss and the foot of the high bank is\ncircular, and it has its ground divided into ten valleys. Such an\naspect as where, for guard of the walls, many moats encircle castles,\nthe place where they are presents, such image did these make here. And\nas in such strongholds from their thresholds to the outer bank are\nlittle bridges, so from the base of the precipitous wall started crags\nwhich traversed the dykes and the moats far as the abyss that collects\nand cuts them off.\n\nIn this place, shaken off from the back of Geryon, we found ourselves;\nand the Poet held to the left, and I moved on behind. On the right hand\nI saw new sorrow, new torments, and new scourgers, with which the first\npit[1] was replete. At its bottom were the sinners naked. This side the\nmiddle they came facing us; on the farther side with us, but with\nswifter pace. As the Romans, because of the great host in the year of\nJubilee,[2] have taken means upon the bridge for the passage of the\npeople, who on one side all have their front toward the Castle,[3] and\ngo to Saint Peter\u2019s, and on the other toward the Mount.[4]\n\n[1] Bolgia, literally, budget, purse, sack, here used for circular\nvalley, or pit.\n\n\n[2] The year 1299-1300, from Christmas to Easter.\n\n\n[3] Of Sant\u2019 Angelo.\n\n\n[4] The Capitoline.\n\n\nAlong the gloomy rock, on this side and on that, I saw horned demons\nwith great scourges, who were beating them cruelly from behind. Ah! how\nthey made them lift their heels at the first blows; truly not one\nwaited for the second, or the third.\n\nWhile I was going on, my eyes encountered one, and I said straightway,\n\u201cEre now for sight of him I have not fasted;\u201d wherefore to shape him\nout I stayed my feet, and the sweet Leader stopped with ire, and\nassented to my going somewhat back. And that scourged one thought to\nconceal himself by lowering his face, but little it availed him, for I\nsaid: \u201cO thou that castest thine eye upon the ground, if the features\nthat thou bearest are not false, thou art Venedico Caccianimico; but\nwhat brings thee unto such pungent sauces?\u201d\n\nAnd he to me, \u201cUnwillingly I tell it, but thy clear speech compels me,\nwhich makes me recollect the olden world. I was he who brought the\nbeautiful Ghisola[1] to do the will of the Marquis, how ever the\nshameful tale may be reported. And not the only Bolognese do I weep\nhere, nay, this place is so full of them, that so many tongues are not\nnow taught between Savena and the Reno to say sipa;[2] and if of this\nthou wishest pledge or testimony, bring to mind our avaricious heart.\u201d\nAs he spoke thus a demon struck him with his scourge and said, \u201cBegone,\npandar, here are no women for coining.\u201d\n\n[1] His own sister; the unseemly tale is known only through Dante and\nhis fourteenth-century commentators, and the latter, while agreeing\nthat the Marquis was one of the Esti of Ferrara, do not agree as to\nwhich of them he was.\n\n\n[2] Bologna lies between the Savena and the Reno; sipa is the Bolognese\nform of sia, or si.\n\n\nI rejoined my Escort; then with few steps we came to where a crag\njutted from the bank.[1] Easily enough we ascended it, and turning to\nthe right[2] upon its ridge, from those eternal circles we departed.\n\n[1] Forming a bridge, thrown like an arch across the pit.\n\n\n[2] The course of the Poets, which has mostly been to the left through\nthe upper Circles, is now generally to proceed straight across the\nlower Circles where Fraud is punished. They had been going to the left\nat the foot of the precipice, and consequently turn to the right to\nascend the bridge. The allegorical intention in the direction of their\ncourse is evident.\n\n\nWhen we were there where it opens below to give passage to the\nscourged, the Leader said, \u201cStop, and let the sight strike on thee of\nthese other miscreants, of whom thou hast not yet seen the face,\nbecause they have gone along in the same direction with us.\u201d\n\nFrom the ancient bridge we looked at the train that was coining toward\nus from the other side, and which the whip in like manner drives on.\nThe good Master, without my asking, said to me, \u201cLook at that great one\nwho is coming, and seems not to shed a tear for pain. What royal aspect\nhe still retains! He is Jason, who by courage and by wit despoiled the\nColchians of their ram. He passed by the isle of Lemnos, after the\nundaunted women pitiless had given all their males to death. There with\ntokens and with ornate words he deceived Hypsipyle, the maiden, who\nfirst had deceived all the rest. There he left her pregnant, and alone;\nsuch sin condemns him to such torment; and also for Medea is vengeance\ndone. With him goes whoso in such wise deceives. And let this suffice\nto know of the first valley, and of those that it holds in its fangs.\u201d\n\nNow we were where the narrow path sets across the second dyke, and\nmakes of it shoulders for another arch. Here we heard people moaning in\nthe next pit, and snorting with their muzzles, and with their palms\nbeating themselves. The banks were encrusted with a mould because of\nthe breath from below that sticks on them, and was making quarrel with\nthe eyes and with the nose. The bottom is so hollowed out that no place\nsufficeth us for seeing it, without mounting on the crest of the arch\nwhere the crag rises highest. Hither we came, and thence, down in the\nditch, I saw people plunged in an excrement that seemed as if it\nproceeded from human privies.\n\nAnd while I am searching down there with my eye, I saw one with his\nhead so foul with ordure that it was not apparent whether he were\nlayman or clerk. He shouted to me, \u201cWhy art so greedy to look more at\nme than at the other filthy ones?\u201d And I to him, \u201cBecause, if I\nremember rightly, ere now I have seen thee with dry hair, and thou art\nAlessio Interminei of Lucca[1]; therefore I eye thee more than all the\nrest.\u201d And he then, beating his pate, \u201cDown here those flatteries\nwherewith my tongue was never cloyed have submerged me.\u201d\n\n[1] Of him nothing is known but what these words tell.\n\n\nHereupon my Leader, \u201cMind thou push thy sight a little farther forward\nso that with thine eyes thou mayest quite reach the face of that dirty\nand disheveled creature, who is scratching herself there with her nasty\nnails, and now is crouching down and now standing on foot. She is Thais\nthe prostitute, who answered her paramour when he said, \u2018Have I great\nthanks from thee?\u2019\u2014\u2018Nay, marvelous.\u2019\u201d[1] And herewith let our sight be\nsatisfied.\n\n[1] These words are derived from Terence, Eunuchus, act iii. sc. 1.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XIX.\n\n\nEighth Circle third pit: simonists.\u2014Pope Nicholas III.\n\n\nOh Simon Magus! Oh ye his wretched followers, who, rapacious, do\nprostitute for gold and silver the things of God that ought to be the\nbrides of righteousness, now it behoves for you the trumpet sound,\nsince ye are in the third pit!\n\nAlready were we come to the next tomb,[1] mounted on that part of the\ncrag which just above the middle of the ditch hangs plumb. Oh Supreme\nWisdom, how great is the art that Thou displayest in Heaven, on Earth,\nand in the Evil World! and how justly doth Thy Power distribute!\n\n[1] The next bolgia or pit.\n\n\nI saw along the sides, and over the bottom, the livid stone full of\nholes all of one size, and each was circular. They seemed to me not\nless wide nor larger than those that in my beautiful Saint John are\nmade as place for the baptizers [1] one of which, not many years ago, I\nbroke for sake of one who was stifling in it; and be this the seal to\nundeceive all men. Forth from the mouth of each protruded the feet of a\nsinner, and his legs up to the calf, and the rest was within. The soles\nof all were both on fire, wherefore their joints quivered so violently\nthat they would have snapped withes and bands. As the flaming of things\noiled is wont to move only on the outer surface, so was it there from\nthe heels to the toes.\n\n[1] \u201cMy beautiful Saint John\u201d is the Baptistery at Florence. In Dante\u2019s\ntime the infants, born during the year, were all here baptized by\nimmersion, mostly on the day of St. John Baptist, the 24th of June.\nThere was a large circular font in the middle of the church, and around\nit in its marble wall were four cylindrical standing-places for the\npriests, closed by doors, to protect them from the pressure of the\ncrowd.\n\n\n\u201cWho is he, Master, that writhes, quivering more than the others his\nconsorts,\u201d said I, \u201cand whom a ruddier flame is sucking?\u201d And he to me,\n\u201cIf thou wilt that I carry thee down there by that bank which slopes\nthe most,[1] from him thou shalt know of himself and of his wrongs.\u201d\nAnd I, \u201cWhatever pleaseth thee even so is good to me. Thou art Lord,\nand knowest that I part me not from thy will, and thou knowest that\nwhich is unspoken.\u201d\n\n[1] The whole of the Eighth circle slopes toward the centre, so that\nthe inner wall of each bolgia is lower, and is less sharply inclined\nthan the outer.\n\n\nThen we went upon the fourth dyke, turned, and descended on the left\nhand, down to the bottom pierced with holes, and narrow. And the good\nMaster set me not down yet from his haunch, till he brought me to the\ncleft of him who was thus lamenting with his shanks.\n\n\u201cO whoe\u2019er thou art, that keepest upside down, sad soul, planted like a\nstake,\u201d I began to say, \u201cspeak, if thou canst.\u201d I was standing like the\nfriar who confesses the perfidious assassin,[1] who, after he is fixed,\nrecalls him, in order to delay his death.\n\n[1] Such criminals were not infrequently punished by being set, head\ndownwards, in a hole in which they were buried alive.\n\n\nAnd he[1] cried out, \u201cArt thou already standing there? Art thou already\nstanding there, Boniface? By several years the record lied to me. Art\nthou so quickly sated with that having, for which thou didst not fear\nto seize by guile the beautiful Lady,[2] and then to do her outrage?\u201d\n\n[1] This is Nicholas III., pope from 1277 to 1280; he takes Dante to be\nBoniface VIII., but Boniface was not to die till 1303. Compare what\nNicholas says of \u201cthe record\u201d with Farinata\u2019s statement, in Canto X,\nconcerning the foresight of the damned.\n\n\n[2] The Church, to which Boniface did outrage in many forms; but worst\nby his simoniacal practices.\n\n\nSuch I became as those that, not comprehending that which is replied to\nthem, stand as if mocked, and know not what to answer.\n\nThen Virgil said, \u201cTell him quickly, I am not he, I am not he thou\nthinkest.\u201d And I answered as was enjoined on me; whereat the spirit\nquite twisted his feet. Thereafter, sighing and with tearful voice, he\nsaid to me, \u201cThen what dost thou require of me? If to know who I am\nconcerneth thee so much that thou hast crossed the bank therefor, know\nthat I was vested with the Great Mantle; and verily I was a son of the\nShe-Bear,[1] so eager to advance the cubs, that up there I put wealth,\nand here myself, into the purse. Beneath my head are stretched the\nothers that preceded me in simony, flattened through the fissures of\nthe rock. There below shall I likewise sink, when he shall come whom I\nbelieved thou wert, then when I put to thee the sudden question; but\nalready the time is longer that I have cooked my feet, and that I have\nbeen thus upside down, than he will stay planted with red feet; for\nafter him will come, of uglier deed, from westward, a shepherd without\nlaw,[2] such as must cover him and me again. A new Jason will he be, of\nwhom it is read in Maccabees;[3] and as to that one his king was\ncompliant, so unto this he who rules France shall be.\u201d[4]\n\n[1] Nicholas was of the Orsini family.\n\n\n[2] Clement V., who will come from Avignon, and in a little more than\nten years after the death of Boniface. Nicholas had already \u201ccooked his\nfeet\u201d for twenty years. The prophecy of the death of Clement after a\nshorter time affords an indication that this canto was not written\nuntil after 1314, the year of his death.\n\n\n[3] The story of Jason, \u201cthat ungodly wretch and no high-priest\u201d who\nbought the high-priesthood from King Antiochus, is told in 2 Maccabees\niv. Its application to the Pope was plain.\n\n\n[4] \u201cHe who rules France\u201d was Philip the Fair.\n\n\nI know not if here I was too audacious that I only answered him in this\nstrain, \u201cPray now tell me how much treasure our Lord desired of Saint\nPeter before he placed the keys in his keeping? Surely he required\nnothing save \u2018Follow me.\u2019 Nor did Peter or the others require of\nMatthias gold or silver, when he was chosen to the place which the\nguilty soul had lost. Therefore stay thou, for thou art rightly\npunished, and guard well the ill-gotten money that against Charles[1]\nmade thee to be bold. And were it not that reverence for the Supreme\nKeys that thou heldest in the glad life still forbiddeth me, I would\nuse words still more grave; for your avarice saddens the world,\ntrampling down the good and exalting the bad. Of you shepherds the\nEvangelist was aware, when she that sitteth upon the waters was seen by\nhim to fornicate with kings: that woman that was born with the seven\nheads, and from the ten horns had evidence, so long as virtue pleased\nher spouse.[2] Ye have made you a god of gold and silver: and what\ndifference is there between you and the idolater save that he worships\none and ye a hundred? Ah Constantine! of how much ill was mother, not\nthy conversion, but that dowry which the first rich Father received\nfrom thee!\u201d[3]\n\n[1] Charles of Anjou, of whom Nicholas III, was the enemy. He was\ncharged with having been bribed to support the attempt to expel the\nFrench from Sicily, which began with the Sicilian Vespers in 1282.\n\n\n[2] Dante deals freely with the figures of the Apocalypse: Revelation\nvii. The woman here stands for the Church; her seven heads may be\ninterpreted as the Seven Sacraments, and her ten horns as the\nCommandments; her spouse is the Pope.\n\n\n[3] The reference is to the so-called Donation of Constantine, the\nreality of which was generally accepted till long after Dante\u2019s time.\n\n\nAnd, while I was singing these notes to him, whether anger or\nconscience stung him, he violently quivered with both feet. I believe,\nforsooth, that it had pleased my Leader, with so contented look be\nlistened ever to the sound of the true words uttered. Thereupon with\nboth his arms he took me, and when he had me wholly on his breast,\nremounted on the way by which he had descended. Nor did he tire of\nholding me clasped till he had borne me up to the summit of the arch\nwhich is the passage from the fourth to the fifth dyke. Here softly he\nlaid down his burden, softly because of the ragged and steep crag, that\nwould be a difficult pass for goats. Thence another great valley was\ndiscovered to me.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XX.\n\n\nEighth Circle: fourth pit: diviners, soothsayers, and\nmagicians.\u2014Amphiaraus.\u2014Tiresias.\u2014Aruns.\u2014Manto.\u2014 Eurypylus.\u2014 Michael\nScott.\u2014Asdente.\n\n\nOf a new punishment needs must I make verses, and give matetial to the\ntwentieth canto of the first lay, which is of the submerged.[1]\n\n[1] Plunged into the misery of Hell.\n\n\nI was now wholly set on looking into the disclosed depth that was\nbathed with tears of anguish, and I saw folk coming, silent and\nweeping, through the circular valley, at the pace at which lltanies go\nin this world. As my sight descended deeper among them, each appeared\nmarvelously distorted from the chin to the beginning of the chest; for\ntoward their reins their face was turned, and they must needs go\nbackwards, because they were deprived of looking forward. Perchance\nsometimes by force of palsy one has been thus completely twisted, but I\nnever saw it, nor do I think it can be.\n\nSo may God let thee, Reader, gather fruit from thy reading, now think\nfor thyself how I could keep my face dry, when near by I saw our image\nso contorted that the weeping of the eyes bathed the buttocks along the\ncleft. Truly I wept, leaning on one of the rocks of the hard crag, so\nthat my Guide said to me, \u201cArt thou also one of the fools? Here pity\nliveth when it is quite dead.[1]\n\nWho is more wicked than he who feels compassion at the Divine Judgment?\nLift up thy head, lift up, and see him[2] for whom the earth opened\nbefore the eyes of the Thebans, whereon they shouted all, \u2018Whither art\nthou rushing, Amphiaraus? Why dost thou leave the war?\u2019 And he stopped\nnot from falling headlong down far as Minos, who seizes hold of every\none. Look, how he has made a breast of his shoulders! Because he wished\nto see too far before him, he looks behind and makes a backward path.\n\n[1] It is impossible to give the full significance of Dante\u2019s words in\na literal translation, owing to the double meaning of pieta in the\noriginal. Qui viva la pieta quando e ben morta. That is: \u201cHere liveth\npiety when pity is quite dead.\u201d\n\n\n[2] One of the seven kings who besieged Thebes, augur and prophet.\nDante found his story in Statius, Thebais, viii. 84.\n\n\n\u201cSee Tiresias,[1] who changed his semblance, when from a male he became\na female, his members all of them being transformed; and afterwards was\nobliged to strike once more the two entwined serpents with his rod, ere\nhe could regain his masculine plumage. Aruns[2] is he that to this\none\u2019s belly has his back, who on the mountains of Luni (where grubs the\nCarrarese who dwells beneath), amid white marbles, had a cave for his\nabode, whence for looking at the stars and the sea his view was not cut\noff.\n\n[1] The Theban soothsayer. Dante had learned of him from Ovid., Metam.,\niii. 320 sqq., as well as from Statius.\n\n\n[2] An Etruscan haruspex of whom Lucan tells,\u2014Arens incoluit desertae\nmoenia Lanae. Phars. i. 556.\n\n\n\u201cAnd she who with her loose tresses covers her breasts, which thou dost\nnot see, and has on that side all her hairy skin, was Manto,[1] who\nsought through many lands, then settled there where I was born; whereof\nit pleases me that thou listen a little to me. After her father had\ndeparted from life, and the city of Bacchus had become enslaved, long\nwhile she wandered through the world. Up in fair Italy lies a lake, at\nfoot of the alp that shuts in Germany above Tyrol, and it is called\nBenaco.[2] Through a thousand founts, I think, and more, between Garda\nand Val Camonica, the Apennine is bathed by the water which settles in\nthat lake. Midway is a place where the Trentine Pastor and he of\nBrescia and the Veronese might each give his blessing if he took that\nroad.[3] Peschiera, fortress fair and strong, sits to confront the\nBrescians and Bergamasques, where the shore round about is lowest.\nThither needs must fall all that which in the lap of Benaco cannot\nstay, and it becomes a river down through the verdant pastures. Soon as\nthe water gathers head to run, no longer is it called Benaco, but\nMincio, far as Governo, where it falls into the Po. No long course it\nhath before it finds a plain, on which it spreads, and makes a marsh,\nand is wont in summer sometimes to be noisome. Passing that way, the\ncruel virgin saw a land in the middle of the fen without culture and\nbare of inhabitants. There, to avoid all human fellowship, she stayed\nwith her servants to practice her arts, and lived, and left there her\nempty body. Afterward the men who were scattered round about gathered\nto that place, which was strong because of the fen which surrounded it.\nThey built the city over those dead hones, and for her, who first had\nchosen the place, they called it Mantua, without other augury. Of old\nits people were more thick within it, before the stupidity of Casalodi\nhad been tricked by Pinamonte.[4] Therefore I warn thee, that if thou\never hearest otherwise the origin of my town, no falsehood may defraud\nthe truth.\u201d\n\n[1] The daughter of Tiresias, of whom Statius, Ovid, and Virgil all\ntell.\n\n\n[2] Now Lago di Garda.\n\n\n[3] Where the three dioceses meet.\n\n\n[4] The Count of Casalodi, being lord of Mantua about 1276, gave ear to\nthe treacherous counsels of Messer Pinamonte de Buonacorsi, and was\ndriven, with his friends, from the city.\n\n\nAnd I, \u201cMaster, thy discourses are so certain to me, and so lay hold on\nmy faith, that the others would be to me as dead embers. But tell me of\nthe people who are passing, if thou seest any one of them worthy of\nnote; for only unto that my mind reverts.\u201d\n\nThen he said to me, \u201cThat one, who from his cheek stretches his beard\nupon his dusky shoulders, was an augur when Greece was so emptied of\nmales that they scarce remained for the cradles, and with Calchas at\nAulis he gave the moment for cutting the first cable. Eurypylus was his\nname, and thus my lofty Tragedy sings him in some place;[1] well\nknowest thou this, who knowest the whole of it. That other who is so\nsmall in the flanks was Michael Scott,[2] who verily knew the game of\nmagical deceptions. See Guido Bonatti,[3] see Asdente,[4] who now would\nwish he had attended to his leather and his thread, but late repents.\nSee the forlorn women who left the needle, the spool, and the spindle,\nand became fortune-tellers; they wrought spells with herb and with\nimage.\n\n[1] Suspensi Eurypylum scitantem oracula Phoebi  Mittimus. Aeneid, ii.\n112.\n\n\n[2] A wizard of such dreaded fame\n That, when in Salamanca\u2019s cave\n Him listed his magic wand to wave,\n The bells would ring in Notre Dame.\n Lay of the Lost Minstrel, Canto ii.\n\n\n[3] A famous astrologer of Forli, in the thirteenth century.\n\n\n[4] Dante, in the Canvito, trattato iv. c. 16, says that if NOBLE meant\nbeing widely known, then \u201cAsdente, the shoemaker of Parma, would be\nmore noble than any of his fellow-citizens.\u201d\n\n\n\u201cBut come on now, for already Cain with his thorns[1] holds the\nconfines of both the hemispheres, and touches the wave below Seville.\nAnd already yesternight was the moon round; well shouldst thou remember\nit, for it did thee no harm sometimes in the deep wood.\u201d Thus he spoke\nto me, and we went on the while.\n\n[1] The Man in the Moon, according to an old popular legend.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XXI.\n\n\nEighth Circle: fifth pit: barrators.\u2014A magistrate of Lucca.\u2014The\nMalebranche.\u2014Parley with them.\n\n\nSo from bridge to bridge we went, speaking other things, which my\nComedy careth not to sing, and held the summit, when we stopped to see\nthe next cleft of Malebolge and the next vain lamentations; and I saw\nit wonderfully dark.\n\nAs in the Arsenal of the Venetians, in winter, the sticky pitch for\nsmearing their unsound vessels is boiling, because they cannot go to\nsea, and, instead thereof, one builds him a new bark, and one caulks\nthe sides of that which hath made many a voyage; one hammers at the\nprow, and one at the stern; another makes oars, and another twists the\ncordage; and one the foresail and the mainsail patches,\u2014so, not by\nfire, but by divine art, a thick pitch was boiling there below, which\nbelimed the bank on every side. I saw it, but saw not in it aught but\nthe bubbles which the boiling raised, and all of it swelling up and\nagain sinking compressed.\n\nWhile I was gazing down there fixedly, my Leader, saying, \u201cTake heed!\ntake heed!\u201d drew me to himself from the place where I was standing.\nThen I turned as one who is slow to see what it behoves him to fly, and\nwhom a sudden fear unnerves, and delays not to depart in order to see.\nAnd I saw behind us a black devil come running up along the crag. Ah!\nhow fell he was in aspect, and how rough he seemed to me in action,\nwith wings open, and light upon his feet! His shoulder, which was sharp\nand high, was laden by a sinner with both haunches, the sinew of whose\nfeet he held clutched. \u201cO Malebranche[1] of our bridge,\u201d he said, \u201clo,\none of the Ancients of Saint Zita[2] put him under, for I return again\nto that city, which I have furnished well with them; every man there is\na barrator,[3] except Bonturo:[4] there, for money, of No they make\nAy.\u201d He hurled him down, and along the hard crag he turned, and never\nmastiff loosed was in such haste to follow a thief.\n\n[1] Malebranche means Evil-claws.\n\n\n[2] One of the chief magistrates of Lucca, whose special protectress\nwas Santa Zita.\n\n\n[3] A corrupt official, selling justice or office for bribes; in\ngeneral, a peculator or cheat.\n\n\n[4] Ironical.\n\n\nThat one sank under, and came up back uppermost, but the demons that\nhad shelter of the bridge cried out, \u201cHere the Holy Face[1] avails not;\nhere one swims otherwise than in the Serchio;[2] therefore, if thou\ndost not want our grapples, make no show above the pitch.\u201d Then they\nstruck him with more than a hundred prongs, and said, \u201cCovered must\nthou dance here, so that, if thou canst, thou mayst swindle secretly.\u201d\nNot otherwise cooks make their scullions plunge the meat with their\nhooks into the middle of the cauldron, so that it may not float.\n\n[1] An image of Christ upon the cross, ascribed to Nicodemus, still\nvenerated at Lucca.\n\n\n[2] The river that runs not far from Lucca.\n\n\nThe good Master said to me, \u201cIn order that it be not apparent that thou\nart here, crouch down behind a splinter, that may afford some screen to\nthee, and at any offense that may be done to me be not afraid, for I\nhave knowledge of these things, because another time I was at such a\nfray.\u201d\n\nThen he passed on beyond the head of the bridge, and when he arrived\nupon the sixth bank, he had need of a steadfast front. With such fury\nand with such storm, as dogs run out upon the poor wretch, who of a\nsudden begs where he stops, they came forth from under the little\nbridge, and turned against him all their forks. But he cried out, \u201cBe\nno one of you savage; ere your hook take hold of me, let one of you\ncome forward that he may hear me, and then take counsel as to grappling\nme.\u201d All cried out, \u201cLet Malacoda[1] go!\u201d Whereon one moved, and the\nrest stood still; and he came toward him, saying, \u201cWhat doth this avail\nhim?\u201d \u201cThinkest thou, Malacoda, to see me come here,\u201d said my Master,\n\u201csafe hitherto from all your hindrances, except by Will Divine and fate\npropitious? Let us go on, for in Heaven it is willed that I show\nanother this savage road.\u201d Then was his arrogance so fallen that he let\nthe hook drop at his feet, and said to the rest, \u201cNow let him not be\nstruck.\u201d\n\n[1] Wicked tail.\n\n\nAnd my Leader to me, \u201cO thou that sittest cowering among the splinters\nof the bridge, securely now return to me.\u201d Whereat I moved and came\nswiftly to him. And the devils all pressed forward, so that I feared\nthey would not keep their compact. And thus I once saw the\nfoot-soldiers afraid, who came out under pledge from Caprona,[1] seeing\nthemselves among so many enemies. I drew with my whole body alongside\nmy Leader, and turned not mine eyes from their look, which was not\ngood. They lowered their forks, and, \u201cWilt thou that I touch him on the\nrump?\u201d said one to the other, and they answered, \u201cYes, see thou nick it\nfor him.\u201d But that demon who was holding speech with my Leader turned\nvery quickly and said, \u201cStay, stay, Scarmiglione!\u201d\n\n[1] In August, 1290, the town of Caprona, on the Arno, surrendered to\nthe Florentine troops, with whom Dante was serving.\n\n\nThen he said to us, \u201cFurther advance along this crag there cannot be,\nbecause the sixth arch lies all shattered at the bottom. And if to go\nforward still is your pleasure, go on along this rocky bank; near by is\nanother crag that affords a way. Yesterday, five hours later than this\nhour, one thousand two hundred and sixty-six years were complete since\nthe way was broken here.[1] I am sending thitherward some of these of\nmine, to see if any one is airing himself; go ye with them, for they\nwill not be wicked. Come forward, Alichino and Calcabrina,\u201d began he to\nsay, \u201cand thou, Cagnazzo; and do thou, Barbariccia, guide the ten. Let\nLibicocco come also, and Draghignazzo, tusked Ciriatto, and\nGraffiacane, and Farfarello, and mad Rubicante. Search round about the\nboiling pitch; let these be safe far as the next crag, that all\nunbroken goes over these dens.\u201d\n\n[1] By the earthquake at the death of the Saviour.\n\n\n\u201cO me! Master, what is it that I see?\u201d said I; \u201cpray let us go alone\nwithout escort, if thou knowest the way, for I desire it not for\nmyself. If thou art as wary as thou art wont to be, dost thou not see\nthat they show their teeth, and threaten harm to us with their brows?\u201d\nAnd he to me, \u201cI would not have thee afraid. Let them grin on at their\nwill, for they are doing it at the boiled wretches.\u201d\n\nUpon the left bank they wheeled round, but first each had pressed his\ntongue with his teeth toward their leader for a signal, and he had made\na trumpet of his rump.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XXII.\n\n\nEighth Circle: fifth pit: barrators.\u2014Ciampolo of Navarre.\u2014Fra\nGomita.\u2014Michaci Zanche.\u2014Fray of the Malebranche.\n\n\nI have seen of old horsemen moving camp, and beginning an assault, and\nmaking their muster, and sometimes setting forth on their escape; I\nhave seen runners through your land, O Aretines, and I have seen\nfreebooters starting, tournaments struck and jousts run, at times with\ntrumpets, and at times with bells, with drums, and with signals from\nstrongholds, and with native things and foreign,\u2014but never with so\nstrange a pipe did I see horsemen or footmen set forth, or ship by sign\nof land or star.\n\nWe went along with the ten demons. Ah, the fell company! but in the\nchurch with saints, and in the tavern with gluttons. Ever on the pitch\nwas I intent, to see every aspect of the pit, and of the people that\nwere burning in it.\n\nAs dolphins, when, by the arching of their back, they give a sign to\nsailors that they take heed for the safety of their vessel, so, now and\nthen, to alleviate his pain, one of the sinners showed his back and hid\nin less time than it lightens. And as at the edge of the water of a\nditch the frogs stand with only their muzzle out, so that they conceal\ntheir feet and the rest of their bulk, thus stood on every side the\nsinners; but as Barbariccia approached so did they draw back beneath\nthe boiling. I saw, and still my heart shudders at it, one waiting,\njust as it happens that one frog stays and another jumps. And\nGraffiacane, who was nearest over against him, hooked him by his pitchy\nlocks, and drew him up so that he seemed to me an otter. I knew now the\nname of every one of them, so had I noted them when they were chosen,\nand when they had called each other I had listened how. \u201cO Rubicante,\nsee thou set thy claws upon him so thou flay him,\u201d shouted all the\naccursed ones together.\n\nAnd I, \u201cMy Master, see, if thou canst, that thou find out who is the\nluckless one come into the hands of his adversaries.\u201d My Leader drew up\nto his side, asked him whence he was, and he replied, \u201cI was born in\nthe kingdom of Navarre; my mother placed me in service of a lord, for\nshe had borne me to a ribald, destroyer of himself and of his\nsubstance. Afterward I was of the household of the good King\nThibault;[1] there I set myself to practice barratry, for which I pay\nreckoning in this heat.\u201d\n\n[1] Probably Thibault II., the brother-in-law of St Louis, who\naccompanied him on his last disastrous crusade, and died on his way\nhome in 1270.\n\n\nAnd Ciriatto, from whose mouth protruded on either side a tusk, as in a\nboar, made him feel how one of them rips. Among evil cats the mouse had\ncome; but Barbariccia clasped him in his arms, and said, \u201cStand off,\nwhile I enfork him,\u201d and to my Master turned his face. \u201cAsk,\u201d said he,\n\u201cif thou desirest to know more from him, before some other undo him.\u201d\nThe Leader, \u201cNow, then, tell of the other sinners; knowst thou any one\nunder the pitch who is Italian?\u201d And he, \u201cI parted short while since\nfrom one who was a neighbor to it; would that with him I still were\ncovered so that I might not fear claw or hook.\u201d And Libicocco said, \u201cWe\nhave borne too much,\u201d and seized his arm with his grapple so that,\ntearing, he carried off a sinew of it. Draghignazzo, also, he wished to\ngive him a clutch down at his legs, whereat their decurion turned round\nabout with evil look.\n\nWhen they were a little appeased, my Leader, without delay, asked him\nwho still was gazing at his wound, \u201cWho was he from whom thou sayest\nthou madest in parting to come to shore?\u201d And he replied, \u201cIt was\nBrother Gomita, he of Gallura,[1] vessel of all fraud, who held the\nenemies of his lord in hand, and dealt so with them that they all\npraise him for it. Money he took, and let them smoothly off, so he\nsays; and in other offices besides he was no little barrator, but\nsovereign. With him frequents Don Michael Zanche of Logodoro,[2] and in\ntalking of Sardinia their tongues feel not weary. O me! see ye that\nother who is grinning: I would say more, but I fear lest he is making\nready to scratch my itch.\u201d And the grand provost, turning to\nFarfarello, who was rolling his eyes as if to strike, said, \u201cGet thee\naway, wicked bird!\u201d\n\n[1] Gallura, one of the four divisions of Sardinia, called judicatures,\nmade by the Pisans, after their conquest of the island. The lord of\nGomita was the gentle Judge Nino, whom Dante meets in Purgatory. Gomita\nwas hung for his frauds.\n\n\n[2] Logodoro was another of the judicatures of Sardinia. Don Michael\nZanche was a noted man, but of his special sins little or nothing has\nbeen recorded by the chroniclers.\n\n\n\u201cIf you wish to see or to hear Tuscans or Lombards,\u201d thereon began\nagain the frightened one, \u201cI will make them come; but let the\nMalebranche stand a little withdrawn, so that they may not be afraid of\ntheir vengeance, and I, sitting in this very place, for one that I am,\nwill make seven of them come, when I shall whistle as is our wont to do\nwhenever one of us comes out.\u201d Cagnazzo at this speech raised his\nmuzzle, shaking his head, and said, \u201cHear the knavery he has devised\nfor throwing himself under!\u201d Whereon he who had snares in great plenty\nanswered, \u201cToo knavish am I, when I procure for mine own companions\ngreater sorrow.\u201d Alichino held not in, and, in opposition to the\nothers, said to him, \u201cIf thou dive, I will not come behind thee at a\ngallop, but I will beat my wings above the pitch; let the ridge be\nleft, and be the bank a shield, to see if thou alone availest more than\nwe.\u201d\n\nO thou that readest! thou shalt hear new sport. Each turned his eyes to\nthe other side, he first who had been most averse to doing it. The\nNavarrese chose well his time, planted his feet firmly on the ground,\nand in an instant leaped, and from their purpose freed himself. At\nthis, each of them was pricked with shame, but he most who was the\ncause of the loss; wherefore he started and cried out, \u201cThou art\ncaught.\u201d But little it availed, for wings could not outstrip fear. The\none went under, and the other, flying, turned his breast upward. Not\notherwise the wild duck on a sudden dives when the falcon comes close,\nand he returns up vexed and baffled. Calcabrina, enraged at the flout,\nkept flying behind him, desirous that the sinner should escape, that he\nmight have a scuffle; and when the barrator had disappeared he turned\nhis talons upon his companion, and grappled with him above the ditch.\nBut the other was indeed a sparrowhawk full grown to gripe him well,\nand both fell into the midst of the boiling pool. The heat was a sudden\nungrappler, but nevertheless there was no rising from it, they had\ntheir wings so glued. Barbariccia, grieving with the rest of his troop,\nmade four of them fly to the other side with all their forks, and very\nquickly, this side and that, they descended to their post. They\nstretched out their hooks toward the belimed ones, who were already\nbaked within the crust: and we left them thus embroiled.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XXIII.\n\n\nEighth Circle. Escape from the fifth pit.\u2014The sixth pit: hypocrites, in\ncloaks of gilded lead.\u2014Jovial Friars. \u2014Caiaphas.\u2014Annas.\u2014Frate Catalano.\n\n\nSilent, alone, and without company, we went on, one before, the other\nbehind, as the Minor friars go along the way. My thought was turned by\nthe present brawl upon the fable of Aesop, in which he tells of the\nfrog and the mole; for NOW and THIS INSTANT are not more alike than the\none is to the other, if beginning and end are rightly coupled by the\nattentive mind.[1] And as one thought bursts out from another, so from\nthat then sprang another which made my first fear double. I reflected\nin this wise: These through us have been flouted, and with such harm\nand mock as I believe must vex them greatly; if anger to ill-will be\nadded, they will come after us more merciless than the dog upon the\nleveret which he snaps.\n\n[1] \u201cSed dices forsan, lector,\u201d says Benvenuto da Imola, \u201cnescio per me\nvidere quomodo istae duae fictiones habeant inter se tantam\nconvenientam. Ad quod respondeo, quod passus vere est fortis.\u201d The\npoint seems to be that, the frog having deceitfully brought the mole to\ntrouble and death, the mole declares, \u201cme vindicabit major,\u201d and the\neagle swoops down and devours the frog as well as the dead mole. The\ncomparison is not very close except in the matter of anticipated\nvengeance.\n\n\nAlready I was feeling my hair all bristling with fear, and was\nbackwards intent, when I said, \u201cMaster, if thou concealest not thyself\nand me speedily, I am afraid of the Malebranche; we have them already\nbehind us, and I so imagine them that I already feel them.\u201d And he, \u201cIf\nI were of leaded glass,[1] I should not draw thine outward image more\nquickly to me than thine inward I receive. Even now came thy thoughts\namong mine, with similar action and with similar look, so that of both\none sole design I made. If it be that the right bank lieth so that we\ncan descend into the next pit, we shall escape the imagined chase.\u201d\n\n[1] A mirror.\n\n\nNot yet had he finished reporting this design, when I saw them coming\nwith spread wings, not very far off, with will to take us. My Leader on\na sudden took me, as a mother who is wakened by the noise, and near her\nsees the kindled flames, who takes her son and flies, and, having more\ncare of him than of herself, stays not so long as only to put on a\nshift. And down from the ridge of the hard bank, supine he gave himself\nto the sloping rock that closes one of the sides of the next pit. Never\nran water so swiftly through a duct, to turn the wheel of a land-mill,\nwhen it approaches near est to the paddles, as my Master over that\nborder, bearing me along upon his breast, as his own son, and not as\nhis companion. Hardly had his feet reached the bed of the depth below,\nwhen they were on the ridge right over us; but here there was no fear,\nfor the high Providence that willed to set them as ministers of the\nfifth ditch deprived them all of power of departing thence.\n\nThere below we found a painted people who were going around with very\nslow steps, weeping, and in their semblance weary and vanquished. They\nhad cloaks, with hoods lowered before their eyes, made of the same cut\nas those of the monks in Cluny. Outwardly they are gilded, so that it\ndazzles, but within all lead, and so heavy that Frederick put them on\nof straw.[1] Oh mantle wearisome for eternity!\n\n[1] The leaden cloaks which the Emperor Frederick II. caused to be put\non criminals, who were then burned to death, were light as straw in\ncomparison with these.\n\n\nWe turned, still ever to the left hand, along with them, intent on\ntheir sad plaint. But because of the weight that tired folk came so\nslowly that we had fresh company at every movement of the haunch.\nWherefore I to my Leader, \u201cSee that thou find some one who may be known\nby deed or name, and so in going move thy eyes around.\u201d And one who\nunderstood the Tuscan speech cried out behind us, \u201cStay your feet, ye\nwho run thus through the dusky air; perchance thou shalt have from me\nthat which thou askest.\u201d Whereon the Leader turned and said, \u201cAwait,\nand then according to his pace proceed.\u201d I stopped, and saw two show,\nby their look, great haste of mind to be with me, but their load\ndelayed them, and the narrow way.\n\nWhen they had come up, somewhile, with eye askance,[1] they gazed at me\nwithout a word; then they turned to each other, and said one to the\nother, \u201cThis one seems alive by the action of his throat; and if they\nare dead, by what privilege do they go uncovered by the heavy stole?\u201d\nThen they said to me, \u201cO Tuscan, who to the college of the wretched\nhypocrites art come, disdain not to tell who thou art.\u201d And I to them,\n\u201cI was born and grew up on the fair river of Arno, at the great town,\nand I am in the body that I have always had. But ye, who are ye, in\nwhom such woe distills, as I see, down your cheeks? and what punishment\nis on you that so sparkles?\u201d And one of them replied to me, \u201cThe orange\nhoods are of lead so thick that the weights thus make their scales to\ncreak. Jovial Friars[2] were we, and Bolognese; I Catalano, and he\nLoderingo named, and together taken by thy city, as one man alone is\nwont to be taken, in order to preserve its peace; and we were such as\nstill is apparent round about the Gardingo.\u201d I began, \u201cO Friars, your\nevil\u201d\u2014but more I said not, for there struck mine eyes one crucified\nwith three stakes on the ground. When me he saw he writhed all over,\nblowing into his beard with sighs: and the Friar Catalano, who observed\nit, said to me, \u201cThat transfixed one, whom thou lookest at, counseled\nthe Pharisees that it was expedient to put one man to torture for the\npeople. Crosswise and naked is he on the path, as thou seest, and he\nfirst must feel how much whoever passes weighs. And in such fashion his\nfather-in-law is stretched in this ditch, and the others of that\nCouncil which for the Jews was seed of ill.\u201d[3] Then I saw Virgil\nmarvelling over him that was extended on a cross so vilely in eternal\nexile. Thereafter he addressed this speech to the Friar, \u201cMay it not\ndisplease thee, so it be allowed thee, to tell us if on the right hand\nlies any opening whereby we two can go out without constraining any of\nthe Black Angels to come to deliver us from this deep.\u201d He answered\nthen, \u201cNearer than thou hopest is a rock that from the great encircling\nwall proceeds and crosses all the savage valleys, save that at this one\nit is broken, and does not cover it. Ye can mount up over the ruin that\nslopes on the side, and heaps up at the bottom.\u201d The Leader stood a\nlittle while with bowed head, then said, \u201cIll he reported the matter,\nhe who hooks the sinners yonder.\u201d[4] And the Friar, \u201cI once heard tell\nat Bologna vices enough of the devil, among which I heard that he is\nfalse, and the father of lies.\u201d Then the Leader with great steps went\non, disturbed a little with anger in his look; whereon I departed from\nthe heavily burdened ones, following the prints of the beloved feet.\n\n[1] They could not raise their heads for a straight look.\n\n\n[2] Brothers of the order of Santa Maria, established in 1261, with\nknightly vows and high intent. From their free life the name of \u201cJovial\nFriars\u201d was given to the members of the order. After the battle of\nMontaperti (1260) the Ghibellines held the upper hand in Florence for\nmore than five years. The defeat and death of Manfred early in 1266, at\nthe battle of Benevento, shook their power and revived the hopes of the\nGuelphs. As a measure of compromise, the Florentine Commune elected two\npodestas, one from each party; the Guelph was Catalano de\u2019 Malavolti,\nthe Ghibelline, Loderingo degli Andalo, both from Bologna. They were\nbelieved to have joined hands for their own gain, and to have favored\nthe reviving power of the Guelphs. In the troubles of the year the\nhouses of the Uberti, a powerful Ghibelline family, were burned. They\nlay in the region of the city called the Gardingo, close to the Palazzo\nVecchio.\n\n\n[3] Annas \u201cwas father in law to Caiaphas, which was the high priest\nthat same year. Now Caiaphas was he, which gave counsel to the Jews,\nthat it was expedient that one man should die for the people.\u201d John\nxviii. 13-14; id. xi. 47-50.\n\n\n[4] Malacoda had told him that he would find a bridge not far off by\nwhich to cross this sixth bolgia.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XXIV.\n\n\nEighth Circle. The poets climb from the sixth pit.\u2014 Seventh pit, filled\nwith serpents, by which thieves are tormented.\u2014Vanni Fucci.\u2014Prophecy of\ncalamity to Dante.\n\n\nIn that part of the young year when the sun tempers his locks beneath\nAquarius,[1] and now the nights decrease toward half the day,[2] when\nthe hoar frost copies on the ground the image of her white sister,[3]\nbut the point of her pen lasts little while, the rustic, whose\nprovision fails \u201cgets up and sees the plain all whitened o\u2019er, whereat\nhe strikes his thigh, returns indoors, and grumbles here and there,\nlike the poor wretch who knows not what to do; again goes out and picks\nup hope again, seeing the world to have changed face in short while,\nand takes his crook and drives forth his flock to pasture\u201d: in like\nmanner the Master made me dismayed, when I saw his front so disturbed,\nand in like manner speedily arrived the plaster for the hurt. For when\nwe came to the ruined bridge, the Leader turned to me with that sweet\nlook which I first saw at the foot of the mount.[4] He opened his arms,\nafter some counsel taken with himself, looking first well at the ruin,\nand laid hold of me. And as one who acts and considers, who seems\nalways to be ready beforehand, so lifting me up toward the top of a\ngreat rock, he took note of another splinter, saying, \u201cSeize hold next\non that, but try first if it is such that it may support thee.\u201d It was\nno way for one clothed in a cloak, for we with difficulty, he light and\nI pushed up, could mount from jag to jag. And had it not been that on\nthat precinct the bank was shorter than on the other side, I do not\nknow about him, but I should have been completely overcome. But because\nall Malebolge slopes toward the opening of the lowest abyss, the site\nof each valley is such that one side rises and the other sinks.[5] We\ncame, however, at length, up to the point where the last stone is\nbroken off. The breath was so milked from my lungs when I was up that I\ncould no farther, but sat me down on first arrival.\n\n[1] Toward the end of winter.\n\n\n[2] Half of the twenty-four hours.\n\n\n[3] The frost copies the look of the snow, but her pen soon loses its\ncut, that is, the white frost soon vanishes.\n\n\n[4] The hill of the first Canto, at the foot of which Virgil had\nappeared to Dante.\n\n\n[5] The level of the whole circle slopes toward the central deep, so\nthat the inner side of each pit is of less height than the outer.\n\n\n\u201cNow it behoves thee thus to put off sloth,\u201d said the Master, \u201cfor,\nsitting upon down or under quilt, one attains not fame, without which\nhe who consumes his life leaves of himself such trace on earth as smoke\nin air, or in water the foam. And therefore rise up, conquer the\nexhaustion with the spirit that conquers every battle, if by its heavy\nbody it be not dragged down. A longer stairway needs must be ascended;\nit is not enough from these to have departed; if thou understandest me,\nnow act so that it avail thee.\u201d Then I rose up, showing myself\nfurnished better with breath than I felt, and said, \u201cGo on, for I am\nstrong and resolute.\u201d\n\nUp along the crag we took the way, which was rugged, narrow, and\ndifficult, and far steeper than the one before. I was going along\nspeaking in order not to seem breathless, and a voice, unsuitable for\nforming words, came out from the next ditch. I know not what it said,\nthough I was already upon the back of the arch that crosses here; but\nhe who was speaking seemed moved to anger. I had turned downwards, but\nliving eyes could not go to the bottom, because of the obscurity.\nWherefore I said, \u201cMaster, see that thou go on to the next girth, and\nlet us descend the wall, for as from hence I hear and do not\nunderstand, so I look down and shape out nothing.\u201d \u201cOther reply,\u201d he\nsaid, \u201cI give thee not than doing, for an honest request ought to be\nfollowed by the deed in silence.\u201d\n\nWe descended the bridge at its head, where it joins on with the eighth\nbank, and then the pit was apparent to me. And I saw therewithin a\nterrible heap of serpents, and of such hideous look that the memory\nstill curdles my blood. Let Libya with her sand vaunt herself no more;\nfor though she brings forth chelydri, jaculi, and phareae, and cenchri\nwith amphisboena, she never, with all Ethiopia, nor with the land that\nlies on the Red Sea, showed either so many plagues or so evil.\n\nAmid this cruel and most dismal store were running people naked and in\nterror, without hope of hole or heliotrope.[1] They had their hands\ntied behind with serpents, which fixed through the reins their tail and\ntheir head, and were knotted up in front.\n\n[1] A precious stone, of green color, spotted with red, supposed to\nmake its wearer invisible.\n\n\nAnd lo! at one, who was on our side, darted a serpent that transfixed\nhim there where the neck is knotted to the shoulders. Nor _O_ nor _I_\nwas ever so quickly written as he took fire and burned, and all ashes\nit behoved him to become in falling. And when upon the ground he lay\nthus destroyed, the dust drew together of itself, and into that same\none instantly returned. Thus by the great sages it is affirmed that the\nPhoenix dies, and then is reborn when to her five hundredth year she\ndraws nigh. Nor herb nor grain she feeds on in her life, but only on\ntears of incense and on balsam, and nard and myrrh are her last\nwinding-sheet.\n\nAnd as he who falls and knows not how, by force of demon that drags him\nto ground, or of other attack that seizeth the man; when he arises and\naround him gazes, all bewildered by the great anguish that he has\nsuffered, and in looking sighs, such was that sinner after he had\nrisen. Oh power of God! how just thou art that showerest down such\nblows for vengeance!\n\nThe Leader asked him then who he was; whereon he answered, \u201cI rained\nfrom Tuscany short time ago into this fell gullet. Bestial life, and\nnot human, pleased me, like a mule that I was. I am Vanni Fucci, beast,\nand Pistoia was my fitting den.\u201d And I to my Leader, \u201cTell him not to\nbudge, and ask what sin thrust him down here, for I have seen him a man\nof blood and rages.\u201d And the sinner who heard dissembled not, but\ndirected toward me his mind and his face, and was painted with dismal\nshame. Then he said, \u201cMore it grieves me, that thou hast caught me in\nthe misery where thou seest me, than when I was taken from the other\nlife. I cannot refuse that which thou demandest. I am put so far down\nbecause I was robber of the sacristy with the fair furnishings, and\nfalsely hitherto has it been ascribed to another.[1] But that thou\nenjoy not this sight, if ever thou shalt be forth of these dark places,\nopen thine ears to my announcement and hear.[2] Pistoia first strips\nitself of the Black, then Florence renovates her people and her\ncustoms. Mars draws a flame from Val di Magra wrapped in turbid clouds,\nand with impetuous and bitter storm shall it be opposed upon Campo\nPiceno, where it shall suddenly rend the mist, so that every White\nshall thereby be smitten. And this have I said because it must grieve\nthee.\u201d\n\n[1] Vanni Fucci robbed the rich sacristy of the Church of St. James,\nthe cathedral of Pistoia. Suspicion of the crime fell upon others, who,\nthough innocent, were put to torture and hung for it.\n\n\n[2] The following verses refer under their dark imagery to the two\nparties, the Black and the White, introduced from Pistoia, by which\nFlorence was divided in the early years of the fourteenth century, and\nto their fightings. The prophecy is dismal to Dante, because it was\nwith the Whites, whose overthrow Vanni Fucci foretells, that his own\nfortunes were linked.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XXV.\n\n\nEighth Circle: seventh pit: fraudulent thieves.\u2014Cacus.\u2014Agnel\nBrunelleschi and others.\n\n\nAt the end of his words the thief raised his hands with both the\nfigs,[1] crying, \u201cTake that, God! for at thee I square them.\u201d\nThenceforth the serpents were my friends, for then one coiled around\nhis neck, as if it said, \u201cI will not that thou say more,\u201d and another\nround his arms and bound them up anew, clinching itself so in front\nthat he could not give a shake with them. Ah Pistoia! Pistoia! why dost\nthou not decree to make ashes of thyself, so that thou mayest last no\nlonger, since in evil-doing thou surpassest thine own seed?[2] Through\nall the dark circles of Hell I saw no spirit against God so proud, not\nhe who fell at Thebes down from the walls.[3] He fled away and spake no\nword more.\n\n[1] A vulgar mode of contemptuous defiance, thrusting out the fist with\nthe thumb between the first and middle finger.\n\n\n[2] According to tradition, Pistoia was settled by the followers of\nCatiline who escaped after his defeat.\n\n\n[3] Capaneus; see Canto xiv.\n\n\nAnd I saw a Centaur full of rage come crying out, \u201cWhere is, where is\nthat obdurate one?\u201d I do not think Maremma has so many snakes as he had\nupon his croup up to where our semblance begins. On his shoulders\nbehind the nape a dragon with open wings was lying upon him, and it\nsets on fire whomsoever it encounters. My Master said, \u201cThis is Cacus,\nwho beneath the rock of Mount Aventine made oftentimes a lake of blood.\nHe goes not on one road with his brothers because of the fraudulent\ntheft he committed of the great herd that was in his neighborhood;\nwherefor his crooked deeds ceased under the club of Hercules, who\nperhaps dealt him a hundred blows with it, and he felt not ten.\u201d\n\nWhile he was so speaking, and that one had run by, lo! three spirits\ncame below us, of whom neither I nor my Leader was aware till when they\ncried out, \u201cWho are ye?\u201d whereon our story stopped, and we then\nattended only unto them. I did not recognize them, but it happened, as\nit is wont to happen by chance, that one must needs name the other,\nsaying, \u201cCianfa, where can he have stayed?\u201d Whereupon I, in order that\nthe Leader should attend, put my finger upward from my chin to my nose.\n\nIf thou art now, Reader, slow to credit that which I shall tell, it\nwill not be a marvel, for I who saw it hardly admit it to myself. As I\nwas holding my brow raised upon them, lo! a serpent with six feet darts\nin front of one, and grapples close to him. With his middle feet he\nclasped his paunch, and with his forward took his arms, then struck his\nfangs in one and the other cheek. His hinder feet he stretched upon the\nthighs, and put his tail between the two, and behind bent it up along\nthe reins. Ivy was never so bearded to a tree, as the horrible beast\nthrough the other\u2019s limbs entwined his own. Then they stuck together as\nif they had been of hot wax, and mingled their color; nor one nor the\nother seemed now that which it was; even as before the flame, up along\nthe paper a dark color proceeds which is not yet black, and the white\ndies away. The other two were looking on, and each cried, \u201cO me!\nAgnello, how thou changest! Lo, now thou art neither two nor one! Now\nwere the two heads become one, when there appeared to us two\ncountenances mixed in one face wherein the two were lost. Of four[1]\nstrips the two arms were made; the thighs with the legs, the belly and\nthe chest became members that were never seen before. Each original\naspect there was cancelled; both and neither the perverse image\nappeared, and such it went away with slow step.\n\n[1] The two fore feet of the dragon and the two arms of the man were\nmelted into two strange arms.\n\n\nAs the lizard under the great scourge of the dog days, changing from\nhedge to hedge, seems a flash, if it crosses the way, so seemed, coming\ntoward the belly of the two others, a little fiery serpent, livid, and\nblack as a grain of pepper. And that part whereby our nourishment is\nfirst taken it transfixed in one of them, then fell down stretched out\nbefore him. The transfixed one gazed at it, but said nothing; nay\nrather, with feet fixed, he yawned even as if sleep or fever had\nassailed him. He looked at the serpent, and that at him; one through\nhis wound, the other through his mouth, smoked violently, and their\nsmoke met. Let Lucan henceforth be silent, where he tells of the\nwretched Sabellus, and of Nasidius, and wait to hear that which now is\nuttered. Let Ovid be silent concerning Cadmus and Arethusa, for if,\npoetizing, he converts him into a serpent and her into a fountain, I\nenvy him not; for two natures front to front never did he transmute, so\nthat both the forms were prompt to exchange their matter. To one\nanother they responded by such rules, that the serpent made his tail\ninto a fork, and the wounded one drew together his feet. The legs and\nthe very thighs with them so stuck together, that in short while the\njuncture made no sign that was apparent. The cleft tail took on the\nshape that was lost there, and its skin became soft, and that of the\nother hard. I saw the arms draw in through the armpits, and the two\nfeet of the beast which were short lengthen out in proportion as those\nshortened. Then the hinder feet, twisted together, became the member\nthat man conceals, and the wretched one from his had two[1] stretched\nforth.\n\n[1] Hinder feet.\n\n\nWhile the smoke is veiling both with a new color, and generates hair on\nthe one, and from the other strips it, one rose up, and the other fell\ndown, not however turning aside their pitiless lights,[1] beneath which\neach was changing his visage. He who was erect drew his in toward the\ntemples, and, from the excess of material that came in there, issued\nthe ears on the smooth cheeks; that which did not run backwards but was\nretained, of its superfluity made a nose for the face, and thickened\nthe lips so far as was needful. He who was lying down drives his muzzle\nforward, and draws in his ears through his skull, as the snail doth his\nhorns. And his tongue, which erst was united and fit for speech,\ncleaves itself, and the forked one of the other closes up; and the\nsmoke stops. The soul that had become a brute fled hissing along the\nvalley, and behind him the other speaking spits. Then he turned upon\nhim his new shoulders, and said to the other,[2] \u201cI will that Buoso[3]\nrun, as I have done, groveling along this path.\u201d\n\n[1] Glaring steadily at each other.\n\n\n[2] The third of the three spirits, the only one unchanged.\n\n\n[3] Buoso is he who has become a snake.\n\n\nThus I saw the seventh ballast[1] change and rechange, and here let the\nnovelty be my excuse, if my pen straggle[2] a little. And although my\neyes were somewhat confused, and my mind bewildered, those could not\nflee away so covertly but that I clearly distinguished Puccio\nSciancato, and he it was who alone, of the three companions that had\nfirst come, was not changed; the other[3] was he whom thou, Gaville,\nweepest.\n\n[1] The ballast,\u2014the sinners in the seventh bolgia.\n\n\n[2] Run into unusual detail.\n\n\n[3] One Francesco Guerelo de\u2019 Cavalcanti, who was slain by men of the\nlittle Florentine town of Gaville, and for whose death cruel vengeance\nwas taken. The three who had first come were the three Florentine\nthieves, Agnello, Buoso, and Puccio. Cianfa Donati had then appeared as\nthe serpent with six feet, and had been incorporated with Agnello.\nLastly came Guercio Cavalcanti as a little snake, and changed form with\nBuoso.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XXVI.\n\n\nEighth Circle: eighth pit fraudulent counselors.\u2014Ulysses and Diomed.\n\n\nRejoice, Florence, since thou art so great that over sea and land thou\nbeatest thy wings, and thy name is spread through Hell. Among the\nthieves I found five such, thy citizens, whereat shame comes to me, and\nthou unto great honor risest not thereby. But, if near the morning one\ndreams the truth, thou shalt feel within little time what Prato, as\nwell as others, craves for thee.[1] And if now it were, it would not be\ntoo soon. Would that it were so! since surely it must be; for the more\nit will weigh on me the more I age.\n\n[1] If that which I foresee is not a vain dream, the calamities which\nthine enemies crave for thee will soon be felt.\n\n\nWe departed thence, and up along the stairs that the bourns[1] had made\nfor our descent before, my Leader remounted and dragged me. And\npursuing the solitary way mid the splinters and rocks of the crag, the\nfoot without the hand sped not. Then I grieved, and now I grieve again\nwhen I direct my mind to what I saw; and I curb my genius more than I\nam wont, that it may not run unless virtue guide it; so that if a good\nstar, or better thing, has given me of good, I may not grudge it to\nmyself.\n\n[1] The projections of the rocky wall.\n\n\nAs the rustic who rests him on the bill in the season when he that\nbrightens the world keepeth his face least hidden from us, what time\nthe fly yieldeth to the gnat,[1] sees many fireflies down in the\nvalley, perhaps there where he makes his vintage and ploughs,\u2014with as\nmany flames all the eighth pit was resplendent, as I perceived soon as\nI was there where the bottom became apparent. And as he[2] who was\navenged by the bears saw the chariot of Elijah at its departure, when\nthe horses rose erect to heaven, and could not so follow it with his\neyes as to see aught save the flame alone, even as a little cloud,\nmounting upward: thus each[3] was moving through the gulley of the\nditch, for not one shows its theft, and every flame steals away a\nsinner.[4]\n\n[1] That is, in the summer twilight. Elisha.\n\n\n[2] Kings ii. 9-24.\n\n\n[3] Of those flames.\n\n\n[4] Within each flame a sinner was concealed.\n\n\nI was standing on the bridge, risen up to look, so that if I had not\ntaken hold of a rock I should have fallen below without being pushed.\nAnd the Leader, who saw me thus attent, said, \u201cWithin these fires are\nthe spirits; each is swathed by that wherewith he is enkindled.\u201d \u201cMy\nMaster,\u201d I replied, \u201cby hearing thee am I more certain, but already I\ndeemed that it was so, and already I wished to say to thee, Who is in\nthat fire that cometh so divided at its top that it seems to rise from\nthe pyre on which Eteocles was put with his brother?\u201d[1] He answered\nme, \u201cThere within are tormented Ulysses and Diomed, and thus together\nthey go in punishment, as of old in wrath.[2] And within their flame\nthey groan for the ambush of the horse that made the gate, whence the\ngentle seed of the Romans issued forth. Within it they lament for the\nartifice whereby the dead Deidamia still mourns for Achilles, and there\nfor the Palladium they bear the penalty.\u201d \u201cIf they can speak within\nthose sparkles,\u201d said I, \u201cMaster, much I pray thee, and repray that the\nprayer avail a thousand, that thou make not to me denial of waiting\ntill the horned flame come hither; thou seest that with desire I bend\nme toward it.\u201d And he to me, \u201cThy prayer is worthy of much praise, and\ntherefore I accept it, but take heed that thy tongue restrain itself.\nLeave speech to me, for I have conceived what thou wishest, for,\nbecause they are Greeks, they would be shy, perchance, of thy\nwords.\u201d[3]\n\n[1] Eteocles and Polynices, sons of Oedipus and Jocaste, who,\ncontending at the siege of Thebes, slew each other. Such was their\nmutual hate that, when their bodies were burned on the same funeral\npile, the flames divided in two.\n\n\n \u2014ezundant diviso vertice flammae\n Alternosque apices abrupta luce coruscant.\n Statius, Thebaid, xii, 431-2.\n\n[2] Against the Trojans. It was through the stratagem of the wooden\nhorse that Troy was destroyed, and Aeneas thus compelled to lead forth\nhis followers who became the seed of the Romans. Deidamia was the wife\nof Achilles, who slew herself for grief at his desertion and departure\nfor Troy, which had been brought about by the deceit of Ulysses and\nDiomed. The Palladium was the statue of Athena, on which the safety of\nTroy depended, stolen by the two heroes.\n\n\n[3] The ancient heroes might be averse to talking with a man of the\nstrange modern world.\n\n\nWhen the flame had come there where it seemed to my Leader time and\nplace, in this form I heard him speak to it: \u201cO ye who are two within\none fire, if I deserved of you while I lived, if I deserved of you much\nor little, when in the world I wrote the lofty verses, move not, but\nlet one of you tell us, where, having lost himself, he went away to\ndie.\u201d The greater horn of the ancient flame began to waver, murmuring,\neven as a flame that the wind wearies. Then moving its tip hither and\nthither, as it had been the tongue that would speak, it cast forth a\nvoice, and said,\u2014\n\n\u201cWhen I departed from Circe, who had retained me more than a year there\nnear to Gaeta, before Aeneas had so named it, neither fondness for my\nson, nor piety for my old father, nor the due love that should have\nmade Penelope glad, could overcome within me the ardor that I had to\ngain experience of the world, and of the vices of men, and of their\nvalor. But I put forth on the deep, open sea, with one vessel only, and\nwith that little company by which I had not been deserted. One shore\nand the other[1] I saw as far as Spain, far as Morocco and the island\nof Sardinia, and the rest which that sea bathes round about. I and my\ncompanions were old and slow when we came to that narrow strait where\nHercules set up his bounds, to the end that man may not put out\nbeyond.[2] On the right hand I left Seville, on the other already I had\nleft Ceuta. \u2018O brothers,\u2019 said I, \u2018who through a hundred thousand\nperils have reached the West, to this so little vigil of your senses\nthat remains be ye unwilling to deny, the experience, following the\nsun, of the world that hath no people. Consider ye your origin; ye were\nnot made to live as brutes, but for pursuit of virtue and of\nknowledge.\u2019 With this little speech I made my companions so eager for\nthe road that hardly afterwards could I have held them back. And\nturning our stern to the morning, with our oars we made wings for the\nmad flight, always gaining on the left hand side. The night saw now all\nthe stars of the other pole, and ours so low that it rose not forth\nfrom the ocean floor. Five times rekindled and as many quenched was the\nlight beneath the moon, since we had entered on the deep pass, when\nthere appeared to us a mountain dim through the distance, and it\nappeared to me so high as I had not seen any. We rejoiced thereat, and\nsoon it turned to lamentation, for from the strange land a whirlwind\nrose, and struck the fore part of the vessel. Three times it made her\nwhirl with all the waters, the fourth it made her stern lift up, and\nthe prow go down, as pleased Another, till the sea had closed over us.\u201d\n\n[1] Of the Mediterranean.\n\n\n[2] Piu oltre non; the famous Ne plus ultra, adopted as his motto by\nCharles V.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XXVII.\n\n\nEighth Circle: eighth pit fraudulent counselors.\u2014Guido da Montefeltro.\n\n\nNow was the flame erect and quiet, through not speaking more, and now\nwas going from us, with the permission of the sweet poet, when another\nthat was coming behind it made us turn our eyes to its tip, by a\nconfused sound that issued forth therefrom. As the Sicilian\nbull[1]\u2014that bellowed first with the plaint of him (and that was right)\nwho had shaped it with his file\u2014was wont to bellow with the voice of\nthe sufferer, so that, although it was of brass, yet it appeared\ntransfixed with pain, thus, through not at first having way or outlet\nfrom the fire, the disconsolate words were converted into its language.\nBut when they had taken their course up through the point, giving it\nthat vibration which the tongue had given in their passage, we heard\nsay, \u201cO thou, to whom I direct my voice, thou that wast just speaking\nLombard,[2] saying, \u2018Now go thy way, no more I urge thee,\u2019 although I\nmay have arrived perchance somewhat late, let it not irk thee to stop\nto speak with me, behold, it irks not me, and I am burning. If thou but\nnow into this blind world art fallen from that sweet Italian land\nwhence I bring all my sin, tell me if the Romagnuoli have peace or war;\nfor I was from the mountains there between Urbino and the chain from\nwhich Tiber is unlocked.\u201d[3]\n\n[1] The brazen bull of Phalaris, tyrant of Agrigentum, made to hold\ncriminals to be burned within it. Perillus, its inventor, was the first\nto suffer. So these sinners are wrapped in the flames which their\nfraudulent counsels had prepared for them.\n\n\n[2] Lombard, because the words were those of Virgil, whose \u201cparents\nwere Lombards,\u201d and in speaking he had used a form peculiar to the\nLombard dialect.\n\n\n[3] It is the spirit of the Ghibelline count, Guido da Montefeltro, a\nfamous freebooting captain, who speaks.\n\n\nI was still downward attent and leaning over when my Leader touched me\non the side, saying, \u201cSpeak thou, this is an Italian.\u201d And I, who even\nnow had my answer ready, without delay began to speak, \u201cO soul, that\nart hidden there below, thy Romagna is not, and never was, without war\nin the hearts of her tyrants, but open war none have I left there now.\nRavenna is as it hath been for many years; the eagle of Polenta[1] is\nbrooding there, so that he covers Cervia with his wings. The city[2]\nthat made erewhile the long struggle, and of the French a bloody heap,\nfinds itself again beneath the green paws. And the old mastiff and the\nnew of Verrucchio,[3] who made the ill disposal of Montagna, make an\nanger of their teeth there where they are wont. The little lion of the\nwhite lair[4] governs the city of Lamone and of Santerno, and changes\nside from summer to winter. And she[5] whose flank the Savio bathes,\neven as she sits between the plain and the mountain, lives between\ntyranny and a free state. Now who thou art, I pray thee that thou tell\nus; be not harder than another hath been,[6] so may thy name in the\nworld hold front.\u201d\n\n[1] Guido Novello da Polenta had been lord of Ravenna since 1275. He\nwas father of Francesca da Rimini, and a friend of Dante. His shield\nbore an eagle, gules, on a field, or. Cervia is a small town on the\ncoast, not far from Ravenna.\n\n\n[2] Forli, where in 1282 Guido da Montefeltro had defeated, with great\nslaughter, a troop, largely of French soldiers, sent against him by\nPope Martin III. It was now ruled by the Ordelaffi, whose shield, party\nper fess, bore on its upper half, or, a demilion, vert.\n\n\n[3] Malatesta, father and son, rulers of Rimini; father and brother of\nthe husband and of the lover of Francesca da Rimim. They had cruelly\nput to death Montagna di Parcitade, the head of the Ghibellines of\nRimini; and they ruled as tyrants, sucking the blood of their subjects.\n\n\n[4] This is Maghinardo da Susinana, who bore a lion azure on a field\nargent.\n\n\n[5] The city of Cesena.\n\n\n[6] Refuse not to answer me as I have answered thee.\n\n\nAfter the fire had somewhat roared according to its fashion, the sharp\npoint moved this way and that, and then gave forth this breath: \u201cIf I\ncould believe that my answer might be to a person who should ever\nreturn unto the world, this flame would stand without more quiverings;\nbut inasmuch as, if I hear truth, never from this depth did any living\nman return, without fear of infamy I answer thee.\n\n\u201cI was a man of arms, and then became a cordelier, trusting, thus girt,\nto make amends; and surely my trust had been fulfilled but for the\nGreat Priest,[1] whom may ill betide! who set me back into my first\nsins; and how and wherefore, I will that thou hear from me. While I was\nthat form of bone and flesh that my mother gave me, my works were not\nleonine, but of the fox. The wily practices, and the covert ways, I\nknew them all, and I so plied their art that to the earth\u2019s end the\nsound went forth. When I saw me arrived at that part of my age where\nevery one ought to strike the sails and to coil up the ropes, what erst\nwas pleasing to me then gave me pain, and I yielded me repentant and\nconfessed. Alas me wretched! and it would have availed. The Prince of\nthe new Pharisees having war near the Lateran,[2]\u2014and not with Saracens\nnor with Jews, for every enemy of his was Christian, and none of them\nhad been to conquer Acre,[3] nor a trafficker in the land of the\nSoldan,\u2014regarded in himself neither his supreme office, nor the holy\norders, nor in me that cord which is wont to make those girt with it\nmore lean; but as Constantine besought Sylvester within Soracte to cure\nhis leprosy,[4] so this one besought me as master to cure his proud\nfever. He asked counsel of me, and I kept silence, because his words\nseemed drunken. And then he said to me, \u2018Let not thy heart mistrust;\nfrom now I absolve thee, and do thou teach me to act so that I may\nthrow Palestrina to the ground. Heaven can I lock and unlock, as thou\nknowest; for two are the keys that my predecessor held not dear.\u2019 Then\nhis grave arguments pushed me to where silence seemed to me the worst,\nand I said, \u2018Father, since thou washest me of that sin wherein I now\nmust fall, long promise with short keeping will make thee triumph on\nthe High Seat.\u2019 Francis[5] came for me afterwards, when I was dead, but\none of the Black Cherubim said to him, \u2018Bear him not away; do me not\nwrong; he must come down among my drudges because he gave the\nfraudulent counsel, since which till now I have been at his hair; for\nhe who repents not cannot be absolved, nor can repentance and will\nexist together, because of the contradiction that allows it not.\u2019 O\nwoeful me! how I shuddered when he took me, saying to me, \u2018Perhaps thou\ndidst not think that I was a logician.\u2019 To Minos he bore me; and he\ntwined his tail eight times round his hard back, and, after he had\nbitten it in great rage, he said, \u2018This is one of the sinners of the\nthievish fire.\u2019 Therefore I, where thou seest, am lost, and going thus\nrobed I rankle.\u201d When he had thus completed his speech the flame,\nsorrowing, departed, twisting and flapping its sharp horn.\n\n[1] Boniface VIII.\n\n\n[2] With the Colonna family, whose stronghold was Palestrina.\n\n\n[3] Not one had been a renegade, to help the Saracens at the siege of\nAcre in 1291.\n\n\n[4] It was for this service that Constantine was supposed to have made\nSylvester \u201cthe first rich Father.\u201d See Canto xiv. His predecessor,\nCelestine V., had renounced the papacy.\n\n\n[5] St. Francis came for his soul, as that of one of the brethren of\nhis Order.\n\n\nWe passed onward, I and my Leader, along the crag, far as upon the next\narch that covers the ditch in which the fee is paid by those who,\nsowing discord, win their burden.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XXVIII.\n\n\nEighth Circle: ninth pit: sowers of discord and schism.\u2014Mahomet and\nAli.\u2014Fra Dolcino.\u2014Pier da Medicina.\u2014Curio.\u2014Mosca.\u2014Bertrau de Born.\n\n\nWho, even with words unfettered,[1] could ever tell in full of the\nblood and of the wounds that I now saw, though many times narrating?\nEvery tongue assuredly would come short, by reason of our speech and\nour memory that have small capacity to comprise so much.\n\n[1] In prose.\n\n\nIf all the people were again assembled, that of old upon the fateful\nland of Apulia lamented for their blood shed by the Trojans,[1] and in\nthe long war that made such high spoil of the rings,[2] as Livy writes,\nwho erreth not; with those that, by resisting Robert Guiscard,[3] felt\nthe pain of blows, and the rest whose bones are still heaped up at\nCeperano,[4] where every Apullian was false, and there by\nTagliacozzo,[5] where without arms the old Alardo conquered,\u2014and one\nshould show his limb pierced through, and one his lopped off, it would\nbe nothing to equal the grisly mode of the ninth pit.\n\n[1] The Romans, descendants of the Trojans.\n\n\n[2] The spoils of the battle of Canon, in the second Punic War.\n\n\n[3] The Norman conqueror and Duke of Apulia. He died in 1085.\n\n\n[4] Where, in 1266, the leaders of the army of Manfred, King of Apulia\nand Sicily, treacherously went over to Charles of Anjou.\n\n\n[5] Here, in 1265, Conradin, the nephew of Manfred, was defeated and\ntaken prisoner. The victory was won by a stratagem devised by Count\nErard de Valery.\n\n\nTruly cask, by losing mid-board or cross-piece, is not so split open as\none I saw cleft from the chin to where the wind is broken: between his\nlegs were hanging his entrails, his inner parts were visible, and the\ndismal sack that makes ordure of what is swallowed. Whilst all on\nseeing him I fix myself, he looked at me, and with his hands opened his\nbreast, saying, \u201cNow see how I rend myself, see how mangled is Mahomet.\nAli[1] goeth before me weeping, cleft in the face from chin to\nforelock; and all the others whom thou seest here were, when living,\nsowers of scandal and of schism, and therefore are they so cleft. A\ndevil is here behind, that adjusts us so cruelly, putting again to the\nedge of the sword each of this crew, when we have turned the doleful\nroad, because the wounds are closed up ere one passes again before him.\nBut thou, who art thou, that musest on the crag, perchance to delay\ngoing to the punishment that is adjudged on thine own accusations?\u201d[2]\n\u201cNor death hath reached him yet,\u201d replied my Master, \u201cnor doth sin lead\nhim to torment him; but, in order to give him full experience, it\nbehoves me, who am dead, to lead him through Hell down here, from\ncircle to circle; and this is true as that I speak to thee.\u201d\n\n[1] Cousin and son-in-law of Mahomet, and himself the head of a schism.\n\n\n[2] When the soul appears before Minos, every sin is confessed. See\nCanto V.\n\n\nMore than a hundred there were that, when they heard him, stopped in\nthe ditch to look at me, forgetting the torment in their wonder. \u201cNow,\nsay to Fra Dolcino,[1] then, thou who perchance shalt shortly see the\nsun, if he wish not soon to follow me here, so to arm himself with\nsupplies that stress of snow bring not the victory to the Novarese,\nwhich otherwise to gain would not be easy\u201d:\u2014after he had lifted one\nfoot to go on Mahomet said to me these words, then on the ground he\nstretched it to depart.\n\n[1] A noted heretic and reformer, who for two years maintained himself\nin Lombardy against the forces of the Pope, but finally, being reduced\nby famine in time of snow, in 1307, was taken captive and burnt at\nNovara.\n\n\nAnother who had his throat pierced and his nose cut off up under his\nbrows, and had but one ear only, having stopped to look in wonder with\nthe rest, before the rest opened his gullet, which outwardly was all\ncrimson, and said, \u201cO thou whom sin condemns not, and whom of old I saw\nabove in the Latian land, if too great resemblance deceive me not,\nremember Pier da Medicina[1] if ever thou return to see the sweet plain\nthat from Vercelli slopes to Marcabb, and make known to the two best of\nFano, to Messer Guido and likewise to Angiolello,[2] that, if foresight\nhere be not vain, they will be cast forth from their vessel and drowned\nnear to the Cattolica, by treachery of a fell tyrant. Between the\nislands of Cyprus and Majorca Neptune never saw so great a crime, not\nof the pirates, nor of the Argolic people. That traitor who sees only\nwith one eye, and holds the city from sight of which one who is here\nwith me would fain have fasted,[3] will make them come to parley with\nhim; then will act so that against the wind of Focara[4] they will not\nneed or vow or prayer.\u201d And I to him, \u201cShow to me and declare, if thou\nwishest that I carry up news of thee, who is he of the bitter\nsight?\u201d[5] Then he put his hand on the jaw of one of his companions,\nand opened the mouth of him, crying, \u201cThis is he, and he speaks not;\nthis outcast stifled the doubt in Caesar, by affirming that the man\nprepared always suffered harm from delay.\u201d Oh, how dismayed, with his\ntongue slit in his gorge, seemed to me Curio,[6] who in speech had been\nso hardy!\n\n[1] Medicina is a town in the Bolognese district. Piero was a fosterer\nof discord.\n\n\n[2] Guido del Cassero and Angiolello da Cagnano, treacherously drowned\nby order of the one-eyed Malatestino, lord of Rimini.\n\n\n[3] The city of Rimini, which Curio would wish never to have seen.\n\n\n[4] A high foreland near the Cattolica, between Rimini and Fano, whence\noften fell dangerous squalls.\n\n\n[5] He to whom the sight of Rimini had been bitter.\n\n\n[6] Curio the Tribune, banished from Rome, fled to Caesar delaying to\ncross the Rubicon, and urged him on, with the argument, according to\nLucan, \u201cTolle moras, semper nocuit differre paratis.\u201d Phars. i. 281.\n\n\nAnd one who had both hands lopped off, lifting the stumps through the\nmurky air so that the blood made his face foul, cried out, \u201cThou shalt\nremember Mosca,[1] too, who said, alas! \u2018Thing done has an end,\u2019 which\nwas the seed of ill for the Tuscan people.\u201d And I added thereto, \u201cAnd\ndeath to thine own race.\u201d Whereat he, accumulating woe on woe, went\naway like a person sad and distracted.\n\n[1] In 1215 one of the Buondelmonti, plighted to a maiden of the\nAmidei, broke faith, and engaged himself to a damsel of the Donati. The\nfamily of the girl who had been thus slighted took counsel how to\navenge the affront, and Mosca de\u2019 Lamberti gave the ill advice to\nmurder the young Buondelmonte. The murder was the beginning of long woe\nto Florence, and of the division of her people into Guelphs and\nGhibellines.\n\n\nBut I remained to look at the crowd, and I saw a thing that I should be\nafraid, without more proof, only to tell, were it not that conscience\nreassures me, the good companion that emboldens man under the hauberk\nof feeling himself pure. I saw in truth, and still I seem to see it, a\ntrunk without a head going along even as the others of the dismal flock\nwere going. And it was holding the cut-off head by its hair, dangling\nin hand like a lantern. And it gazed on us, and said, \u201cO me!\u201d Of itself\nit was making for itself a lamp; and they were two in one, and one in\ntwo. How it can be He knows who so ordains. When it was right at the\nfoot of the bridge, it lifted its arm high with the whole head, in\norder to approach its words to us, which were, \u201cNow see the dire\npunishment, thou that, breathing, goest seeing the dead: see thou if\nany other is great as this! And that thou mayest carry news of me, know\nthat I am Bertran de Born,[1] he that gave to the young king the ill\nencouragements. I made father and son rebellious to each other.\nAhithophel did not more with Absalom and with David by his wicked\ngoadings. Because I divided persons so united, I bear my brain, alas!\ndivided from its source which is in this trunk. Thus retaliation is\nobserved in me.\u201d\n\n[1] The famous troubadour who incited the young Prince Henry to\nrebellion against his father, Henry II. of England. The prince died in\n1183.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XXIX.\n\n\nEighth Circle ninth pit.\u2014Geri del Bello.\u2014Tenth pit: falsifiers of all\nsorts.\u2014Griffolino of Arezzo.\u2014Capocchio.\n\n\nThe many people and the diverse wounds had so inebriated mine eyes that\nthey were fain to stay for weeping. But Virgil said to me, \u201cWhat art\nthou still watching? why is thy sight still fixed down there among the\ndismal mutilated shades? Thou hast not done so at the other pits;\nconsider if thou thinkest to count them, that the valley circles two\nand twenty miles; and already the moon is beneath our feet; the time is\nlittle now that is conceded to us, and other things are to be seen than\nthou seest.\u201d \u201cIf thou hadst,\u201d replied I thereupon, \u201cattended to the\nreason why I was looking perhaps thou wouldst have permitted me yet to\nstay.\u201d\n\nMeanwhile my Leader went on, and I behind him went, already waking\nreply, and adding, \u201cWithin that cavern where I just now was holding my\neyes so fixedly, I think that a spirit of my own blood weeps the sin\nthat down there costs so dear.\u201d Then said the Master, \u201cLet not thy\nthought henceforth reflect on him; attend to other thing, and let him\nthere remain, for I saw him at the foot of the little bridge pointing\nat thee, and threatening fiercely with his finger, and I heard him\ncalled Geri del Bello.[1] Thou wert then so completely engaged on him\nwho of old held Hautefort[2] that thou didst not look that way till he\nhad departed.\u201d \u201cO my Leader,\u201d said I, \u201cthe violent death which is not\nyet avenged for him by any who is sharer in the shame made him\nindignant, wherefore, as I deem, he went on without speaking to me, and\nthereby has he made me pity him the more.\u201d\n\n[1] A cousin or uncle of Dante\u2019s father, of whom little is known but\nwhat may be inferred from Dante\u2019s words and from the place he assigns\nhim in Hell.\n\n\n[2] Bertran de Born, lord of Hautefort.\n\n\nThus we spake far as the place on the crag which first shows the next\nvalley, if more light were there, quite to the bottom. When we were\nabove the last cloister of Malebolge so that its lay brothers could\nappear to our sight, divers lamentations pierced me, that had their\narrows barbed with pity; wherefore I covered my ears with my hands.\n\nSuch pain as there would be if, between July and September, from the\nhospitals of Valdichiana and of Maremma and of Sardinia[1] the sick\nshould all be in one ditch together, such was there here; and such\nstench came forth therefrom, as is wont to come from putrescent limbs.\nWe descended upon the last bank of the long crag, ever to the left\nhand, and then my sight became more vivid down toward the bottom, where\nthe ministress of the High Lord\u2014infallible Justice\u2014punishes the\nfalsifiers whom on earth she registers.\n\n[1] Unhealthy regions, noted for the prevalence of malarial fevers in\nsummer.\n\n\nI do not think it was a greater sorrow to see the whole people in Egina\nsick, when the air was so full of pestilence that the animals, even to\nthe little worm, all fell dead (and afterwards the ancient people,\naccording as the poets hold for sure, were restored by seed of ants),\nthan it was to see the spirits languishing in different heaps through\nthat dark valley. This one over the belly, and that over the shoulders\nof another was lying, and this one, crawling, was shifting himself\nalong the dismal path. Step by step we went without speech, looking at\nand listening to the sick, who could not lift their persons.\n\nI saw two seated leaning on each other, as pan is leaned against pan to\nwarm, spotted from head to foot with scabs; and never did I see\ncurrycomb plied by a boy for whom his lord is waiting nor by one who\nkeeps awake unwillingly, as each often plied the bite of his nails upon\nhimself, because of the great rage of his itching which has no other\nrelief. And the nails dragged down the scab, even as a knife the scales\nof bream or of other fish that may have them larger.\n\n\u201cO thou, that with thy fingers dost dismail thyself,\u201d began my Leader\nunto one of them, \u201cand who sometimes makest pincers of them, tell me if\nany Latian[1] is among those who are here within: so may thy nails\nsuffice thee eternally for this work.\u201d \u201cLatians are we whom here thou\nseest so defaced, both of us,\u201d replied one weeping, \u201cbut thou, who art\nthou that hast asked of us?\u201d And the Leader said, \u201cI am one that\ndescends with this living man down from ledge to ledge, and I intend to\nshow Hell to him.\u201d Then their mutual support was broken; and trembling\neach turned to me, together with others that heard him by rebound. The\ngood Master inclined himself wholly toward me, saying, \u201cSay to them\nwhat thou wilt;\u201d and I began, since he was willing, \u201cSo may memory of\nyou not steal away in the first world from human minds, but may it live\nunder many suns, tell me who ye are, and of what race; let not your\ndisfiguring and loathsome punishment fright you from disclosing\nyourselves unto me.\u201d \u201cI was from Arezzo,\u201d replied one of them,[2] \u201cand\nAlbero of Siena had me put in the fire; but that for which I died\nbrings me not here. True it is that I said to him, speaking in jest, I\nknew how to raise myself through the air in flight, and he, who had\nvain desire and little wit, wished that I should show him the art, and\nonly because I did not make him Daedalus, made me be burned by one[3]\nthat held him as a son; but to the last pit of the ten, for the alchemy\nthat I practiced in the world, Minos, to whom it is not allowed to err,\ncondemned me.\u201d And I said to the Poet, \u201cNow was ever people so vain as\nthe Sienese? surely not so the French by much.\u201d Whereon the other\nleprous one, who heard me, replied to my words, \u201cExcept[4] Stricca who\nknew how to make moderate expenditure, and Niccolo, who first invented\nthe costly custom of the clove[5] in the garden where such seed takes\nroot; and except the brigade in which Caccia of Asciano wasted his\nvineyard and his great wood, and the Abbagliato showed his wit. But\nthat thou mayest know who thus seconds thee against the Sienese, so\nsharpen thine eye toward me that my face may answer well to thee, so\nshalt thou see that I am the shade of Capocchio, who falsified the\nmetals by alchemy; and thou shouldst recollect, if I descry thee\naright, how I was a good ape of nature.\u201d\n\n[1] Italian.\n\n\n[2] This is supposed to be one Griffolino, of whom nothing is known but\nwhat Dante tells.\n\n\n[3] The Bishop of Siena.\n\n\n[4] Ironical; these youths all being members of the company known as\nthe brigata godereccia or spendereccia, the joyous or spendthrift\nbrigade.\n\n\n[5] The use of rich and expensive spices in cookery.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XXX.\n\n\nEighth Circle: tenth pit: falsifiers of all sorts.\u2014Myrrha.\u2014Gianni\nSchicchi.\u2014Master Adam.\u2014Sinon of Troy.\n\n\nAt the time when Juno was wroth because of Semele against the Theban\nblood, as she showed more than once, Athamas became so insane, that\nseeing his wife come laden on either hand with her two sons, cried out,\n\u201cSpread we the nets, so that I may take the lioness and the young lions\nat the pass,\u201d and then he stretched out his pitiless talons, taking the\none who was named Learchus, and whirled him and struck him on a rock;\nand she drowned herself with her other burden. And when Fortune turned\ndownward the all-daring loftiness of the Trojans, so that together with\nthe kingdom the king was undone, Hecuba, sad, wretched, and captive,\nwhen she saw Polyxena dead, and woeful descried her Polydorus on the\nsea-bank, frantic, barked like a dog,\u2014to such degree had grief\ndistraught her mind.\n\nBut neither the furies of Thebes, nor the Trojan, were ever seen toward\nany one so cruel, whether in goading beasts or human limbs,[1] as I saw\ntwo shades pallid and naked who, biting, were running in the way that a\nboar does when from the sty he breaks loose. One came at Capocchio, and\non the nape of his neck struck his teeth, so that dragging him he made\nhis belly scratch along the solid bottom. And the Aretine,[2] who\nremained trembling, said to me, \u201cThat goblin is Gianni Schicchi, and\nrabid he goes thus maltreating others.\u201d \u201cOh,\u201d said I to him, \u201cso may\ntime other not fix his teeth on thee, let it not weary thee to tell who\nit is ere it start hence.\u201d And he to me, \u201cThat is the ancient soul of\nprofligate Myrrha, who became her father\u2019s lover beyond rightful love.\nShe came to sinning with him by falsifying herself in another\u2019s form,\neven as the other, who goes off there, undertook, in order to gain the\nlady of the herd,[3] to counterfeit Buoso Donati, making a will and\ngiving to the will due form.\u201d\n\n[1] No mad rages were ever so merciless as those of these furious\nspirits.\n\n\n[2] Griffolino.\n\n\n[3] Buoso Donati had died without making a will, whereupon his nephew\nsuborned Gianni Schicchi to personate the dead man in bed, and to\ndictate a will in his favor. This Gianni did, but with a clause leaving\nto himself a favorite mare of Buoso\u2019s, the best in all Tuscany.\n\n\nAnd after the two rabid ones upon whom I had kept my eye had\ndisappeared, I turned it to look at the other miscreants. I saw one\nmade in fashion of a lute, had he but only had his groin cut off at the\npart where man is forked. The heavy hydropsy which, with the humor that\nit ill digests, so unmates the members that the face corresponds not\nwith the belly, was making him hold his lips open as the hectic does,\nwho for thirst turns one toward his chin, the other upward.\n\n\u201cOh ye, who are without any punishment, and I know not why, in the\ndismal world,\u201d said he to us, \u201clook and attend to the misery of Master\nAdam. Living, I had enough of what I wished, and now, alas! I long for\na drop of water. The rivulets that from the green hills of the\nCasentino descend into the Arno, making their channels cool and soft,\nstand ever before me, and not in vain; for their image dries me up far\nmore than the disease which strips my face of flesh. The rigid justice\nthat scourges me draws occasion from the place where I sinned to put my\nsighs the more in flight. There is Romena, where I falsified the alloy\nstamped with the Baptist,[1] for which on earth I left my body burned.\nBut if here I could see the wretched soul of Guido or of Alessandro, or\nof their brother,[2] for Fount Branda[3] I would not give the sight.\nOne of them is here within already, if the rating shades who go around\nspeak true. But what does it avail me who have my limbs bound? If I\nwere only yet so light that in a hundred years I could go an inch, I\nshould already have set out along the path, seeking for him among this\ndisfigured folk, although it circles round eleven miles, and is not\nless than half a mile across. Because of them I am among such a family;\nthey induced me to strike the forms that had full three carats of base\nmetal.\u201d And I to him, \u201cWho are the two poor wretches that are smoking\nlike a wet hand in winter, lying close to your confines on the right?\u201d\n\u201cHere I found them,\u201d he answered, \u201cwhen I rained down into this trough,\nand they have not since given a turn, and I do not believe they will\ngive one to all eternity. One is the false woman that accused Joseph,\nthe other is the false Sinon the Greek, from Troy; because of their\nsharp fever they throw out such great reek.\u201d\n\n[1] The florin which bore on the obverse the figure of John the\nBaptist, the protecting saint of Florence.\n\n\n[2] Counts of Romena.\n\n\n[3] The noted fountain in Siena, or perhaps one in Romena.\n\n\nAnd one of them who took it ill perchance at being named so darkly,\nwith his fist struck him on his stiff paunch; it sounded as if it were\na drum; and Master Adam struck him on the face with his arm that did\nnot seem less hard, saying to him, \u201cThough, because of my heavy limbs,\nmoving hence be taken from me, I have an arm free for such need.\u201d\nWhereon he replied, \u201cWhen thou wast going to the fire thou hadst it not\nthus ready, but so and more thou hadst it when thou wast coining.\u201d And\nthe hydropic, \u201cThou sayst true in this, but thou wast not so true a\nwitness there where thou wast questioned of the truth at Troy.\u201d \u201cIf I\nspake false, thou didst falsify the coin,\u201d said Sinon, \u201cand I am here\nfor a single sin, and thou for more than any other demon.\u201d \u201cRemember,\nperjured one, the horse,\u201d answered he who had the puffed up paunch,\n\u201cand be it ill for thee that the whole world knows it.\u201d \u201cAnd be ill for\nthee the thirst which cracks thy tongue,\u201d said the Greek, \u201cand the\nputrid water that makes thy belly thus a hedge before thine eyes.\u201d Then\nthe coiner, \u201cSo yawns thy mouth for its own harm as it is wont, for if\nI am thirsty, and humor stuffs me out, thou hast the burning, and the\nhead that pains thee, and to lick the mirror of Narcissus thou wouldst\nnot want many words of invitation.\u201d\n\nTo listen to them was I wholly fixed, when the Master said to me, \u201cNow\nthen look, for it wants but little that I quarrel with thee.\u201d When I\nheard him speak to me with anger, I turned me toward him with such\nshame that still it circles through my memory. And as is he that dreams\nof his harm, and, dreaming, desires to dream, so that that which is he\ncraves as if it were not, such I became, not being able to speak, for I\ndesired to excuse myself, and I was indeed excusing myself, and did not\nthink that I was doing it. \u201cLess shame doth wash away a greater fault\nthan thine hath been,\u201d said the Master; therefore disburden thyself of\nall regret, and make reckoning that I am always at thy side, if again\nit happen that fortune find thee where people are in similar brawl; for\nthe wish to hear it is a base wish.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XXXI.\n\n\nThe Giants around the Eighth Circle.\u2014Nimrod.\u2014Ephialtes.\u2014Antaeus sets\nthe Poets down in the Ninth Circle.\n\n\nOne and the same tongue first stung me, so that it tinged both my\ncheeks, and then supplied the medicine to me. Thus do I hear[1] that\nthe lance of Achilles and of his father was wont to be cause first of a\nsad and then of a good gift. We turned our back to the wretched\nvalley,[2] up along the bank that girds it round, crossing without any\nspeech. Here it was less than night and less than day, so that my sight\nwent little forward; but I heard a horn sounding so loud that it would\nhave made every thunder faint, which directed my eyes, following its\ncourse counter to it,[3] wholly to one place.\n\n[1] Probably from Ovid, who more than once refers to the magic power of\nthe spear which had been given to Peleus by Chiron. Shakespeare too had\nheard of it, and applies it, precisely as Dante does, to one\n\n\n  Whose smile and frown, like to Achilles\u2019 spear,\n  Is able with the charge to kill and cure.\n      2 Henry VI. v. i.\n\n[2] The tenth and last pit.\n\n\n[3] My eyes went in the direction whence the sound came.\n\n\nAfter the dolorous rout when Charlemagne lost the holy gest, Roland\nsounded not so terribly.[1] Shortwhile did I carry my head turned\nthitherward, when it seemed to me I saw many high towers; whereon I,\n\u201cMaster, say, what city is this?\u201d And he to me, \u201cBecause too far away\nthou peerest through the darkness, it happens that thou dost err in thy\nimagining. Thou shalt see well, if thou arrivest there, how much the\nsense at distance is deceived; therefore somewhat more spur thyself\non.\u201d Then tenderly he took me by the hand, and said, \u201cBefore we go\nfurther forward, in order that the fact may seem less strange to thee,\nknow that they are not towers, but giants, and they are in the abyss[2]\nround about the bank, from the navel downward, one and all of them.\u201d\n\n[1] At Roncesvalles.\n\n\n Rollanz ad mis l\u2019olifan a sa buche,\n Empeint le bien, par grant vertut le sunet.\n Halt sunt li pui e la voiz est mult lunge,\n Granz xxx. liwes l\u2019oirent-il respundre,\n Carles l\u2019oit e ses cumpaignes tutes.\n\n Chanson de Roland, 1753-57.\n\n[2] The central deep of Hell, dividing the eighth circle from the\nninth,\u2014the lowest.\n\n\nAs when the mist is dissipating, the look little by little shapes out\nwhat the vapor that thickens the air conceals, so, as I pierced the\ngross and dark air as we drew nearer and nearer to the verge, error\nfled from me and fear grew upon me. For as above its circular enclosure\nMontereggione[1] crowns itself with towers, so with half their body the\nhorrible giants, whom Jove still threatens from heaven when he\nthunders, betowered the bank that surrounds the abyss.\n\n[1] The towers of Montereggione in ruin still crown its broken wall,\nand may be seen from the railroad not far from Siena, on the way to\nFlorence.\n\n\nAnd I discerned now the face of one, his shoulders, and his breast, and\ngreat part of his belly, and down along his sides both his arms.\nNature, surely, when she left the art of such like creatures, did\nexceeding well in taking such executers from Mars; and if she repent\nnot of elephants and of whales, he who looks subtly holds her more just\nand more discreet therefor;[1] for where the faculty of the mind is\nadded to evil will and to power, the human race can make no defense\nagainst it. His face seemed to me long and huge as the pine-cone[2] of\nSt. Peter at Rome, and in its proportion were his other bones; so that\nthe bank, which was an apron from his middle downward, showed of him\nfully so much above, that to reach to his hair three Frieslanders[3]\nwould have made ill vaunt. For I saw of him thirty great palms down\nfrom the place where one buckles his cloak.\n\n[1] For no longer creating giants.\n\n\n[2] Of bronze, that came from the Mausoleum of Hadrian, and in Dante\u2019s\ntime stood in the fore-court of St. Peter\u2019s, and is now in the Vatican\ngardens.\n\n\n[3] Supposed to be tall men.\n\n\n\u201cRaphel mai amech zabi almi,\u201d the fierce mouth, to which sweeter psalms\nwere not befitting, began to cry. And my Leader toward him, \u201cFoolish\nsoul! Keep to thy horn, and with that vent thyself when anger or other\npassion touches thee; seek at thy neck, and thou wilt find the cord\nthat holds it tied, O soul confused! and see it lying athwart thy great\nbreast.\u201d Then he said to me, \u201cHe himself accuses himself; this is\nNimrod, because of whose evil thought the world uses not one language\nonly. Let us leave him, and let us not speak in vain, for so is every\nlanguage to him, as his to others, which to no one is known.\u201d\n\nThen turning to the left, we pursued our way, and at a crossbow\u2019s shot\nwe found the next, far more fierce and larger. Who the master was for\nbinding him I cannot tell; but he had his right arm fastened behind,\nand the other in front, by a chain that held him entwined from the neck\ndownward, so that upon his uncovered part it was wound as far as the\nfifth coil. \u201cThis proud one wished to make trial of his power against\nthe supreme Jove,\u201d said my Leader, \u201cwherefore he has such reward;\nEphialtes[1] is his name, and he made his great endeavors when the\ngiants made the Gods afraid; the arms which he plied he moves\nnevermore.\u201d\n\n[1] Iphimedeia bore to Poseidon two sons, \u201cbut they were short- lived,\ngodlike Otus and far-famed Ephialtes whom the fruitful Earth nourished\nto be the tallest and much the most beautiful of mortals except\nrenowned Orion, for at nine years old they were nine cubits in breadth,\nand nine fathoms tall. They even threatened the immortals, raising the\ndin of tumultuous war on Olympus, and strove to set Ossa upon Olympus\nand wood-clad Pelion upon Ossa, in order to scale heaven. But Jove\ndestroyed them both.\u201d Odyssey, xi. 306-317.\n\n\nAnd I to him, \u201cIf it may be, I should like my eyes to have experience\nof the huge Briareus.\u201d[1] Whereon he answered, \u201cThou shalt see Antaeus\nclose at hand here, who speaks, and is unbound,[2] and will set us at\nthe bottom of all sin. Him whom thou wishest to see is much farther on,\nand is bound and fashioned like this one, save that he seems more\nferocious in his look.\u201d\n\n[1] \u201cHim of the hundred hands whom the Gods call Briareus.\u201d Iliad, i.\n402.\n\n\n[2] Because he took no part in the war of his brethren against the\nGods. What Dante tells of him is derived from Lucan, Pharsalia, iv. 597\nsqq.\n\n\nNever was earthquake so mighty that it shook a tower as violently as\nEphialtes was quick to shake himself. Then more than ever did I fear\ndeath; and there had been no need of more than the fright, if I had not\nseen his bonds. We then proceeded further forward, and came to Antaeus,\nwho full five ells, besides his head, issued forth from the cavern. \u201cO\nthou that, in the fateful valley which made Scipio the heir of glory\nwhen Hannibal and his followers turned their backs, didst bring of old\na thousand lions for booty,\u2014and it still seems credible that hadst thou\nbeen at the high war of thy brothers, the sons of the Earth would have\nconquered,\u2014set us below, and disdain thou not to do so, where the cold\nlocks up Cocytus. Make us not go to Tityus, nor to Typhon;[1] this one\ncan give of that which here is longed for;[2] therefore stoop, and curl\nnot thy snout. He yet can restore fame to thee in the world; for he is\nliving, and still expects long life, if Grace doth not untimely call\nhim to itself.\u201d Thus said the Master; and he in haste stretched out\nthose hands, whose strong grip Hercules once felt, and took my Leader.\nVirgil, when he felt himself taken up, said to me, \u201cCome hither so that\nI take thee.\u201d Then he made one bundle of himself and me. As beneath its\nleaning side, the Carisenda[3] seems to look when a cloud is going over\nso that the tower hangs counter to it, thus seemed Antaeus to me that\nstood attent to see him bend; and it was a moment when I could have\nwished to go by another road. But lightly on the bottom that swallows\nLucifer with Judas he set us down; nor, thus bent, did he there make\nstay, and like a mast in a ship he raised himself.\n\n[1] Lucan (Phars. iv. 600), naming these giants, says they were less\nstrong than Antaeus; wherefore there is subtle flattery in these words\nof Virgil.\n\n\n[2] To be remembered on earth.\n\n\n[3] The more inclined of the two famous leaning towers at Bologna. As\nthe cloud goes over it, the tower seems to bend to meet it. So\nColeridge in his Ode to Dejection:\n\n\n And those thin clouds above, in flakes and bars,\n That give sway their motion to the stars.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XXXII.\n\n\nNinth Circle: traitors. First ring: Caina.\u2014Counts of Mangona.\u2014Camicion\nde\u2019 Pazzi.\u2014Second ring: Antenora.\u2014Bocca degli Abati.\u2014Buoso da\nDuera.\u2014Count Ugolino.\n\n\nIf I had rhymes both harsh and raucous, such as would befit the dismal\nhole on which thrust[1] all the other rocks, I would press out the\njuice of my conception more fully; but since I have them not, not\nwithout fear I bring myself to speak; for to describe the bottom of the\nwhole universe is no enterprise to take up in jest, nor a tongue that\ncries mamma or babbo. But may those Dames aid my verse who aided\nAmphion to close in Thebes; so that from the fact the speech be not\ndiverse.\n\n[1] Rest their weight.\n\n\nO populace miscreant above all, that art in the place whereof to speak\nis hard, better had ye been here[1] or sheep or goats!\n\n[1] On earth.\n\n\nWhen we were down in the dark abyss beneath the feet of the giant, but\nfar lower, and I was gazing still at the high wall, I heard say to me,\n\u201cBeware how thou steppest; take heed thou trample not with thy soles\nthe heads of the wretched weary brethren.\u201d Whereat I turned, and saw\nbefore me, and under my feet, a lake which through frost had semblance\nof glass and not of water.\n\nThe Danube in Austria makes not for its current so thick a veil in\nwinter, nor the Don yonder under the cold sky, as there was here; for\nif Tambernich[1] had fallen thereupon, or Pietrapana,[2] it would not\neven at the edge have given a creak. And as to croak the frog lies with\nmuzzle out of the water, what time[3] oft dreams the peasant girl of\ngleaning, so, livid up to where shame appears,[4] were the woeful\nshades within the ice, setting their teeth to the note of the stork.[5]\nEvery one held his face turned downward; from the mouth the cold, and\nfrom the eyes the sad heart compels witness of itself among them.\n\n[1] A mountain, the locality of which is unknown.\n\n\n[2] One of the Toscan Apennines.\n\n\n[3] In summer.\n\n\n[4] Up to the face.\n\n\n[5] Chattering with cold.\n\n\nWhen I had looked round awhile, I turned to my feet, and saw two so\nclose that they had the hair of their heads mixed together. \u201cTell me,\nye who so press tight your breasts,\u201d said I, \u201cwho are ye?\u201d And they\nbent their necks, and after they had raised their faces to rue, their\neyes, which before were moist only within, gushed up through the lids,\nand the frost bound the tears between them, and locked them up again.\nClamp never girt board to board so strongly; wherefore they like two he\ngoats butted together, such anger overcame them.\n\nAnd one who had lost both his ears through the cold, still with his\nface downward, said to me, \u201cWhy dost thou so mirror thyself on us? If\nthou wouldst know who are these two, the valley whence the Bisenzio\ndescends belonged to their father Albert, and to them.[1] From one body\nthey issued, and all Caina[2] thou mayst search, and thou wilt not find\nshade more worthy to be fixed in ice; not he whose breast and shadow\nwere broken by one and the same blow by the hand of Arthur;[3] not\nFocaccia;[4] not he who encumbers me with his head, so that I cannot\nsee beyond, and was named Sassol Mascheroni:[5] if thou art Tuscan,\nwell knowest thou now who he was. And that thou mayst not put me to\nmore speech, know that I was Camicion de\u2019 Pazzi,[6] and I await Carlino\nthat he may exonerate me.\u201d\n\n[1] They were of the Alberti, counts of Mangona, in Tuscany, and had\nkilled each other.\n\n\n[2] The first division of this ninth and lowest circle of Hell.\n\n\n[3] Mordred, the traitorous son of Arthur.\n\n\n[4] From the crimes of Focaccia, a member of the great Cancellieri\nfamily of Pistoia, began the feud of the Black and the White factions,\nwhich long raged in Pistoia and in Florence.\n\n\n[5] A Florentine who murdered his nephew for an inheritance.\n\n\n[6] A murderer of one of his kinsmen, whose crime was surpassed by that\nof Carlino de\u2019 Pazzi, who, in 1302, betrayed a band of the Florentine\nexiles who had taken refuge in a stronghold of his in Valdarno.\n\n\nThen I saw a thousand faces made currish by the cold, whence shuddering\ncomes to me, and will always come, at frozen pools.\n\nAnd while we were going toward the centre[1] to which tends every\nweight, and I was trembling in the eternal shade, whether it was will\nor destiny, or fortune I know not, but, walking among the heads, I\nstruck my foot hard in the face of one. Wailing he cried out to me,\n\u201cWhy dost thou trample me? If thou comest not to increase the vengeance\nof Mont\u2019 Aperti, why dost thou molest me?\u201d And I, \u201cMy Master, now wait\nhere for me, so that I may free me from a doubt by means of this one,\nthen thou shalt make me hasten as much as thou wilt.\u201d The Leader\nstopped, and I said to that shade who was bitterly blaspheming still,\n\u201cWho art thou that thus railest at another?\u201d \u201cNow thou, who art thou,\nthat goest through the Antenora,\u201d[2] he answered, \u201csmiting the cheeks\nof others, so that if thou wert alive, it would be too much?\u201d \u201cAlive I\nam, and it may be dear to thee,\u201d was my reply, \u201cif thou demandest fame,\nthat I should set thy name amid the other notes.\u201d And he to me, \u201cFor\nthe contrary do I long; take thyself hence, and give me no more\ntrouble, for ill thou knowest to flatter on this plain.\u201d Then I took\nhim by the hair of the crown, and said, \u201cIt shall needs be that thou\nname thyself, or that not a hair remain upon thee here.\u201d Whereon he to\nme, \u201cThough thou strip me of hair, I will not tell thee who I am, nor\nwill I show it to thee if a thousand times thou fallest on my head.\u201d\n\n[1] The centre of the earth.\n\n\n[2] The second division of the ninth circle; so named after the Trojan\nwho, though of good repute in Homer, was charged by a later tradition\nwith having betrayed Troy.\n\n\nI already had his hair twisted in my hand, and had pulled out more than\none shock, he barking, with his eyes kept close down, when another\ncried out, \u201cWhat ails thee, Bocca?[1] Is it not enough for thee to make\nmusic with thy jaws, but thou must bark? What devil has hold of thee?\u201d\n\u201cNow,\u201d said I, \u201cI would not have thee speak, accursed traitor, for to\nthy shame will I carry true news of thee.\u201d \u201cBegone,\u201d he answered, \u201cand\nrelate what thou wilt, but be not silent, if from here within thou\ngoest forth, of him who now had his tongue so ready. He weeps here the\nmoney of the French; I saw, thou canst say, him of Duera,[2] there\nwhere the sinners stand cooling. Shouldst thou be asked who else was\nthere, thou hast at thy side that Beccheria[3] whose gorget Florence\ncut. Gianni del Soldanier[4] I think is farther on with Ganellon[5] and\nTribaldello,[6] who opened Faenza when it was sleeping.\u201d\n\n[1] Bocca degli Abati, the most noted of Florentine traitors, who in\nthe heat of the battle of Mont\u2019 Aperti, in 1260, cut off the hand of\nthe standard-bearer of the cavalry, so that the standard fell, and the\nGuelphs of Florence, disheartened thereby, were put to rout with\nfrightful slaughter.\n\n\n[2] Buoso da Duera of Cremona, who, for a bribe, let pass near Parma,\nwithout resistance, the cavalry of Charles of Anjou, led by Gui de\nMontfort to the conquest of Naples in 1265.\n\n\n[3] Tesauro de\u2019 Beccheria, Abbot of Vallombrosa, and Papal Legato,\nbeheaded by the Florentines in 1258, because of his treacherous\ndealings with the exiled Ghibellines.\n\n\n[4] A Ghibelline leader, who, after the defeat of Manfred in 1266,\nplotted against his own party.\n\n\n[5] Ganellon, the traitor who brought about the defeat at Roncesvalles.\n\n\n[6] He betrayed Faenza to the French, in 1282.\n\n\nWe had now parted from him when I saw two frozen in one hole, so that\nthe head of one was a hood for the other. And as bread is devoured in\nhunger, so the uppermost one set his teeth upon the other where the\nbrain joins with the nape. Not otherwise Tydeus gnawed for spite the\ntemples of Menalippus than this one did the skull and the other parts.\n\u201cO thou! that by so bestial a sign showest hatred against him whom thou\ndost eat, tell me the wherefore,\u201d said I, \u201cwith this compact, that if\nthou rightfully of him complainest, I, knowing who ye are, and his sin,\nmay yet recompense thee for it in the world above, if that with which I\nspeak be not dried up.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XXXIII.\n\n\nNinth circle: traitors. Second ring: Antenora.\u2014Count Ugolino.\u2014Third\nring Ptolomaea.\u2014Brother Alberigo. Branca d\u2019 Oria.\n\n\nFrom his savage repast that sinner raised his mouth, wiping it with the\nhair of the head that he had spoiled behind: then he began, \u201cThou\nwillest that I renew a desperate grief that oppresses my heart already\nonly in thinking ere I speak of it. But, if my words are to be seed\nthat may bear fruit of infamy for the traitor whom I gnaw, thou shalt\nsee me speak and weep at once. I know not who thou art, nor by what\nmode thou art come down hither, but Florentine thou seemest to me truly\nwhen I hear thee. Thou hast to know that I was the Count Ugolino and he\nthe Archbishop Ruggieri.[1] Now will I tell thee why I am such a\nneighbor. That by the effect of his evil thoughts, I, trusting to him,\nwas taken and then put to death, there is no need to tell. But that\nwhich thou canst not have heard, namely, how cruel was my death, thou\nshalt hear, and shalt know if he hath wronged me.\n\n[1] In July, 1288, Ugolino della Gherardesca, Count of Donoratico, head\nof a faction of the Guelphs in Pisa, in order to deprive Nino of\nGallura, head of the opposing faction, of the lordship of the city,\ntreacherously joined forces with the Archbishop Ruggieri degli\nUbaldini, head of the Ghibellines, and drove Nino and his followers\nfrom the city. The archbishop thereupon took advantage of the weakening\nof the Guelphs and excited the populace against Ugolino, charging him\nwith having for a bribe restored to Florence and Lucca some of their\ntowns of which the Pisans had made themselves masters. He, with his\nfollowers, attacked Count Ugolino in his house, took him prisoner, with\ntwo of his sons and two of his grandsons, and shut them up in the Tower\nof the Gualandi, where in the following March, on the arrival of Count\nGuido da Montefeltro (see Canto xvii), as Captain of Pisa, they were\nstarved to death.\n\n\n\u201cA narrow slit in the mew, which from me has the name of Famine, and in\nwhich others yet must be shut up, had already shown me through its\nopening many moons, when I had the bad dream that rent for me the veil\nof the future. \u201cThis one appeared to me master and lord, chasing the\nwolf and his whelps upon the mountain[1] for which the Pisans cannot\nsee Lucca. With lean, eager, and trained hounds, Gualandi with Sismondi\nand with Lanfranchi[2] he had put before him at the front. After short\ncourse, the father and his sons seemed to me weary, and it seemed to me\nI saw their flanks torn by the sharp fangs.\n\n[1] Monte San Giuliano.\n\n\n[2] Three powerful Ghibelline families of Pisa.\n\n\n\u201cWhen I awoke before the morrow, I heard my sons, who were with me,\nwailing in their sleep, and asking for bread. Truly thou art cruel if\nalready thou grievest not, thinking on what my heart foretold; and if\nthou weepest not, at what art thou wont to weep? Now they were awake,\nand the hour drew near when food was wont to be brought to us, and\nbecause of his dream each one was apprehensive. And I heard the door\nbelow of the horrible tower locking up; whereat I looked on the faces\nof my sons without saying a word. I wept not, I was so turned to stone\nwithin. They wept; and my poor little Anselm said, \u2018Thou lookest so,\nfather, what aileth thee?\u2019 Yet I did not weep; nor did I answer all\nthat day, nor the night after, until the next sun came out upon the\nworld. When a little ray entered the woeful prison, and I discerned by\ntheir four faces my own very aspect, both my hands I bit for woe; and\nthey, thinking I did it through desire of eating, of a sudden rose, and\nsaid, \u2018Father, it will be far less pain to us if thou eat of us; thou\ndidst clothe us with this wretched flesh, and do thou strip it off.\u2019 I\nquieted me then, not to make them more sad: that day and the next we\nall stayed dumb. Ah, thou hard earth! why didst thou not open? After we\nhad come to the fourth day, Gaddo threw himself stretched out at my\nfeet, saying, \u2018My father, why dost thou not help me?\u2019 Here he died:\nand, even as thou seest me, I saw the three fall one by one between the\nfifth day and the sixth; then I betook me, already blind, to groping\nover each, and two days I called them after they were dead: then\nfasting had more power than grief.\u201d\n\nWhen he had said this, with his eyes distorted, he seized again the\nwretched skull with his teeth, that were strong as a dog\u2019s upon the\nbone.\n\nAh Pisa! reproach of the people of the fair country where the si doth\nsound,[1] since thy neighbors are slow to punish thee, let Caprara and\nGorgona[2] move and make a hedge for Arno at its mouth, so that it\ndrown every person in thee; for if Count Ugolino had repute of having\nbetrayed thee in thy towns, thou oughtest not to have set his sons on\nsuch a cross. Their young age, thou modern Thebes! made Uguccione and\nthe Brigata innocent, and the other two that the song names above.\n\n[1] Italy, whose language Dante calls il volgare di ci. (Convito, i.\n10.)\n\n\n[2] Two little islands not far from the mouth of the Arno, on whose\nbanks Pisa lies.\n\n\nWe passed onward to where the ice roughly enswathes another folk, not\nturned downward, but all upon their backs. Their very weeping lets them\nnot weep, and the pain that finds a barrier on the eyes turns inward to\nincrease the anguish; for the first tears form a block, and like a\nvisor of crystal fill all the cup beneath the eyebrow.\n\nAnd although, because of the cold, as from a callus, all feeling had\nleft its abode in my face, it now seemed to me I felt some wind,\nwherefore I, \u201cMy Master, who moves this? Is not every vapor[1] quenched\nhere below?\u201d Whereon he to me, \u201cSpeedily shalt thou be where thine eye\nshall make answer to thee of this, beholding the cause that rains down\nthe blast.\u201d\n\n[1] Wind being supposed to be cansed by the action of the sun on the\nvapors of the atmosphere.\n\n\nAnd one of the wretches of the cold crust cried out to us, \u201cO souls so\ncruel that the last station is given to you, lift from my eyes the hard\nveils, so that I may vent the grief that swells my heart, a little ere\nthe weeping re-congeal!\u201d Wherefore I to him, \u201cIf thou wilt that I\nrelieve thee, tell me who thou art, and if I rid thee not, may it be\nmine to go to the bottom of the ice.\u201d He replied then, \u201cI am friar\nAlberigo;[1] I am he of the fruits of the bad garden, and here I\nreceive a date for a fig.\u201d[2] \u201cOh!\u201d said I to him; \u201cart thou now\nalready dead?\u201d And he to me, \u201cHow it may go with my body in the world\nabove I bear no knowledge. Such vantage hath this Ptolomaea[3] that\noftentime the soul falls hither ere Atropos hath given motion to it.[4]\nAnd that thou may the more willingly scrape the glassy tears from my\nface, know that soon as the soul betrays, as I did, its body is taken\nfrom it by a demon, who thereafter governs it until its time be all\nrevolved. The soul falls headlong into this cistern, and perchance the\nbody of the shade that here behind me winters still appears above; thou\noughtest to know him if thou comest down but now. He is Ser Branca d\u2019\nOria,[5] and many years have passed since he was thus shut up.\u201d \u201cI\nthink,\u201d said I to him, \u201cthat thou deceivest me, for Branca d\u2019 Oria is\nnot yet dead, and he eats, and drinks, and sleeps, and puts on\nclothes.\u201d \u201cIn the ditch of the Malebranche above,\u201d he said, \u201cthere\nwhere the tenacious pitch is boiling, Michel Zanche had not yet arrived\nwhen this one left in his own stead a devil in his body, and in that of\none of his near kin, who committed the treachery together with him. But\nnow stretch out hither thy hand; open my eyes for me.\u201d And I opened\nthem not for him, and to be rude to him was courtesy.\n\n[1] Alberigo de\u2019 Manfredi, of Faenza; one of the Jovial Friars (see\nCanto xxiii). Having received a blow from one of his kinsmen, he\npretended to forgive it, and invited him and his son to a feast. Toward\nthe end of the meal he gave a preconcerted signal by calling out,\n\u201cBring the fruit,\u201d upon which his emissaries rushed in and killed the\ntwo guests. The \u201cfruit of Brother Alberigo\u201d became a proverb.\n\n\n[2] A fig is the cheapest of Tuscan fruits; the imported date is more\ncostly.\n\n\n[3] The third ring of ice, named for that Ptolemy of Jericho who slew\nhis father-in-law, the high-priest Simon, and his sons (1 Maccabees wi.\n11-16).\n\n\n[4] That is, before its life on earth is ended.\n\n\n[5] Murderer, in 1275, of his father-in-law, Michel Zanche. Already\nheard of in the fifth pit (Canto xxii. 88).\n\n\nAh Genoese! men strange to all morality and full of all corruption, why\nare ye not scattered from the world? For with the worst spirit of\nRomagna I found one of you such that for his deeds in soul he is bathed\nin Cocytus, and in body he seems still alive on earth.\n\n\n\n\nCANTO XXXIV.\n\n\nNinth Circle: traitors. Fourth ring: Judecca.\u2014Lucifer.\u2014Judas, Brutus\nand Cassius.\u2014Centre of the universe.\u2014Passage from Hell.\u2014Ascent to the\nsurface of the Southern Hemisphere.\n\n\n\u201cVexilla regis prodeunt inferni,[1] toward us; therefore look in\nfront,\u201d said my Master; \u201cif thou discernest him.\u201d As a mill that the\nwind turns seems from afar when a thick fog breathes, or when our\nhemisphere grows dark with night, such a structure then it seemed to me\nI saw.\n\n[1] \u201cThe banners of the King of Hell advance.\u201d Vexilla Regis prodeunt\nare the first words of a hymn in honor of the Cross, sung at vespers on\nthe Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross and on Monday of Holy\nWeek.\n\n\nThen, because of the wind, I drew me behind my Leader; for there was no\nother shelter. I was now, and with fear I put it in verse, there[1]\nwhere the shades were wholly covered, and showed through like a straw\nin glass. Some are lying; some stand erect, this on his head, and that\non his soles; another like a bow inverts his face to his feet.\n\n[1] In the fourth, innermost ring of ice of the ninth circle, the\nJudecca.\n\n\nWhen we had gone so far forward that it pleased my Master to show me\nthe creature that had the fair semblance, from before me he took\nhimself and made me stop, saying, \u201cBehold Dis, and behold the place\nwhere it is needful that with fortitude thou arm thee.\u201d How I became\nthen chilled and hoarse, ask it not, Reader, for I write it not,\nbecause all speech would be little. I did not die, and I did not remain\nalive. Think now for thyself, if thou hast grain of wit, what I became,\ndeprived of one and the other.\n\nThe emperor of the woeful realm from his midbreast issued forth from\nthe ice; and I match better with a giant, than the giants do with his\narms. See now how great must be that whole which corresponds to such\nparts. If he was as fair as he now is foul, and against his Maker\nlifted up his brow, surely may all tribulation proceed from him. Oh how\ngreat a marvel it seemed to me, when I saw three faces on his head! one\nin front, and that was red; the others were two that were joined to\nthis above the very middle of each shoulder, and they were joined\ntogether at the place of the crest; and the right seemed between white\nand yellow, the left was such to sight as those who come from where the\nNile flows valleyward. Beneath each came forth two great wings, of size\nbefitting so huge a bird. Sails of the sea never saw I such. They had\nno feathers, but their fashion was of a bat; and he was flapping them\nso that three winds went forth from him, whereby Cocytus was all\ncongealed. With six eyes he was weeping, and over three chins trickled\nthe tears and bloody drivel. With each mouth he was crushing a sinner\nwith his teeth, in manner of a brake, so that he thus was making three\nof them woeful. To the one in front the biting was nothing to the\nclawing, so that sometimes his spine remained all stripped of skin.\n\n\u201cThat soul up there which has the greatest punishment,\u201d said the\nMaster, \u201cis Judas Iscariot, who has his head within, and plies his legs\noutside. Of the other two who have their heads down, he who hangs from\nthe black muzzle is Brutus; see how he writhes and says no word; and\nthe other is Cassius, who seems so large-limbed. But the night is\nrising again, and now we must depart, for we have seen the whole.\u201d\n\nAs was his pleasure, I clasped his neck, and he took opportunity of\ntime and place, and when the wings were opened wide he caught hold on\nthe shaggy flanks; from shag to shag he then descended between the\nbushy hair and the frozen crusts. When we were just where the thigh\nturns on the thick of the haunch, my Leader, with effort and stress of\nbreath, turned his head where he had his shanks, and clambered by the\nhair as a man that ascends, so that I thought to return again to hell.\n\n\u201cCling fast hold,\u201d said the Master, panting like one weary, \u201cfor by\nsuch stairs it behoves to depart from so much evil.\u201d Then he came forth\nthrough the opening of a rock, and placed me upon its edge to sit; then\nstretched toward me his cautious step.\n\nI raised my eyes, and thought to see Lucifer as I had left him, and I\nsaw him holding his legs upward. And if I then became perplexed, let\nthe dull folk think it that see not what that point is that I had\npassed.[1]\n\n[1] This point is the centre of the universe; when Virgil had turned\nupon the haunch of Lucifer, the passage had been made from one\nhemisphere of the earth\u2014the inhabited and known hemisphere\u2014 to the\nother where no living men dwell, and where the only land is the\nmountain of Purgatory. In changing one hemisphere for the other there\nis a change of time of twelve hours. A second Saturday morning begins\nfor the poets, and they pass nearly as long a time as they have been in\nHell, that is, twenty-four hours, in traversing the long and hard way\nthat leads through the new hemisphere on which they have just entered.\n\n\n\u201cRise up,\u201d said the Master, \u201con thy feet; the way is long and the road\nis difficult, and already the sun unto mid-tierce[1] returns.\u201d\n\n[2] Tierce is the church office sung at the third hour of the day, and\nthe name is given to the first three hours after sunrise. Midtierce\nconsequently here means about half-past seven o\u2019clock. In Hell Dante\nnever mentions the sun to mark division of time, but now, having issued\nfrom Hell, Virgil marks the hour by a reference to the sun.\n\n\nIt was no hallway of a palace where we were, but a natural dungeon that\nhad a bad floor, and lack of light. \u201cBefore I tear me from the abyss,\u201d\nsaid I when I had risen up, \u201cmy Master, speak a little to me to draw me\nout of error. Where is the ice? and this one, how is he fixed thus\nupside down? and how in such short while has the sun from eve to morn\nmade transit?\u201d And he to me, \u201cThou imaginest that thou still art on the\nother side of the centre where I laid hold on the hair of the guilty\nWorm that pierces the world. On that side wast thou so long as I\ndescended; when I turned thou didst pass the point to which from all\nparts whatever has weight is drawn; and thou art now arrived beneath\nthe hemisphere opposite to that which the great dry land covers, and\nbeneath whose zenith the Man was slain who was born and lived without\nsin. Thou hast thy feet upon the little sphere which forms the other\nface of the Judecca. Here it is morning when there it is evening; and\nhe who made for us a stairway with his hair is still fixed even as he\nwas before. Upon this side he fell down from heaven, and the earth,\nwhich before was spread out here, through fear of him made of the sea a\nveil, and came to your hemisphere; and perchance to flee from him that\nland[1] which on this side appears left here this empty space and\nupward ran back.\u201d\n\n[1] The Mount of Purgatory.\n\n\nA place is there below, stretching as far from Beelzebub as his tomb\nextends,[1] which not by sight is known, but by the sound of a rivulet\nthat here descends along the hollow of a rock that it has gnawed with\nits course that winds and little falls. My Leader and I entered through\nthat hidden way, to return to the bright world. And without care, to\nhave any repose, we mounted up, he first and I second, till through a\nround opening I saw of those beauteous things which heaven bears, and\nthence we came forth to see again the stars.\n\n[1] Hell is his tomb; this vacant dark passage through the opposite\nhemisphere is, of course, of the same depth as Hell from surface to\ncentre.","title":"The Divine Comedy, Volume 1, Hell","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":48308}