Then stretched I forth my hand a little forward, And plucked a branchlet off from a great thorn; It recommenced its cry: "Why dost thou rend me? Men once we were, and now are changed to trees; At one of the ends, and from the other drips Both words and blood; whereat I let the tip My Sage made answer, "O thou wounded soul, Of some amends thy fame he may refresh And the trunk said: "So thy sweet words allure me, I am the one who both keys had in keeping Of Frederick's heart, and turned them to and fro So great, I lost thereby my sleep and pulses. Of Cæsar turned aside her strumpet eyes, Inflamed against me all the other minds, And they, inflamed, did so inflame Augustus, My spirit, in disdainful exultation, Thinking by dying to escape disdain, Made me unjust against myself, the just. I, by the roots unwonted of this wood, Do swear to you that never broke I faith Unto my lord, who was so worthy of honour; And to the world if one of you return, Let him my memory comfort, which is lying But speak, and question him, if more may please thee." Concerning what thou thinks't will satisfy me; To tell us in what way the soul is bound Within these knots; and tell us, if thou canst, The wind was into such a voice converted: When the exasperated soul abandons. It falls into the forest, and no part Is chosen for it; but where Fortune hurls it, It springs a sapling, and a forest tree; The Harpies, feeding then upon its leaves, But not that any one may them revest, We were attentive still unto the trunk, Thinking that more it yet might wish to tell us, In the same way as he is who perceives The boar and chase approaching to his stand, Who hears the crashing of the beasts and branches; And two behold! upon our left-hand side, 115 Naked and scratched, fleeing so furiously, That of the forest every fan they broke. He who was in advance: "Now help, Death, help! 120 Those legs of thine at joustings of the Toppo !" Behind them was the forest full of black She-mastiffs, ravenous, and swift of foot As greyhounds, who are issuing from the chain. On him who had crouched down they set their teeth, And him they lacerated piece by piece, Thereafter bore away those aching members. Thereat my Escort took me by the hand, And led me to the bush, that all in vain "O Jacopo," it said, "of Sant' Andrea, What helped it thee of me to make a screen? When near him had the Master stayed his steps, 130 135 He said: "Who wast thou, that through wounds so many 66 And he to us: "O souls, that hither come To look upon the shameful massacre That has so rent away from me my leaves, Gather them up beneath the dismal bush ; I of that city was which to the Baptist Forever with his art will make it sad. And were it not that on the pass of Arno Those citizens, who afterwards rebuilt it Upon the ashes left by Attila, In vain had caused their labour to be done. Of my own house I made myself a gibbet.” 140 145 150 CANTO XIV. BECAUSE the charity of my native place Constrained me, gathered I the scattered leaves, The second round is from the third, and where Clearly to manifest these novel things, I say that we arrived upon a plain, The dolorous forest is a garland to it All round about, as the sad moat to that; There close upon the edge we stayed our feet. The soil was of an arid and thick sand, Not of another fashion made than that Who all were weeping very miserably, Those who were going round were far the more, O'er all the sand-waste, with a gradual fall, Were raining down dilated flakes of fire, As of the snow on Alp without a wind. As Alexander, in those torrid parts Of India, beheld upon his host Flames fall unbroken till they reached the ground, Whence he provided with his phalanxes To trample down the soil, because the vapour Thus was descending the eternal heat, Whereby the sand was set on fire, like tinder Beneath the steel, for doubling of the dole. Without repose forever was the dance Of miserable hands, now there, now here, Shaking away from off them the fresh gleeds. "Master," began I, "thou who overcomest All things except the demons dire, that issued That I was questioning my Guide about him, And if he wearied out by turns the others And shot his bolts at me with all his might, Saying: "One of the Seven Kings was he Who Thebes besieged, and held, and seems to hold God in disdain, and little seems to prize him; Forth from the wood a little rivulet, Whose redness makes my hair still stand on end. As from the Bulicamë springs the brooklet, The sinful women later share among them, Were made of stone, and the margins at the side; "In all the rest which I have shown to thee Since we have entered in within the gate Whose threshold unto no one is denied, Nothing has been discovered by thine eyes So notable as is the present river, Which all the little flames above it quenches." These words were of my Leader; whence I prayed him "In the mid-sea there sits a wasted land," Said he thereafterward, "whose name is Crete, There is a mountain there, that once was glad 55 65 70 75 80 85 90 95 |