From bridge to bridge thus, speaking other things
\nOf which my Comedy cares not to sing,
\nWe came along, and held the summit, when<\/p>\n
We halted to behold another fissure
\nOf Malebolge and other vain laments;
\nAnd I beheld it marvellously dark.<\/p>\n
As in the Arsenal of the Venetians
\nBoils in the winter the tenacious pitch
\nTo smear their unsound vessels o’er again,<\/p>\n
For sail they cannot; and instead thereof
\nOne makes his vessel new, and one recaulks
\nThe ribs of that which many a voyage has made;<\/p>\n
One hammers at the prow, one at the stern,
\nThis one makes oars, and that one cordage twists,
\nAnother mends the mainsail and the mizzen;<\/p>\n
Thus, not by fire, but by the art divine,
\nWas boiling down below there a dense pitch
\nWhich upon every side the bank belimed.<\/p>\n
I saw it, but I did not see within it
\nAught but the bubbles that the boiling raised,
\nAnd all swell up and resubside compressed.<\/p>\n
The while below there fixedly I gazed,
\nMy Leader, crying out: “Beware, beware!”
\nDrew me unto himself from where I stood.<\/p>\n
Then I turned round, as one who is impatient
\nTo see what it behoves him to escape,
\nAnd whom a sudden terror doth unman,<\/p>\n
Who, while he looks, delays not his departure;
\nAnd I beheld behind us a black devil,
\nRunning along upon the crag, approach.<\/p>\n
Ah, how ferocious was he in his aspect!
\nAnd how he seemed to me in action ruthless,
\nWith open wings and light upon his feet!<\/p>\n
His shoulders, which sharp-pointed were and high,
\nA sinner did encumber with both haunches,
\nAnd he held clutched the sinews of the feet.<\/p>\n
From off our bridge, he said: “O Malebranche,
\nBehold one of the elders of Saint Zita;
\nPlunge him beneath, for I return for others<\/p>\n
Unto that town, which is well furnished with them.
\nAll there are barrators, except Bonturo;
\nNo into Yes for money there is changed.”<\/p>\n
He hurled him down, and over the hard crag
\nTurned round, and never was a mastiff loosened
\nIn so much hurry to pursue a thief.<\/p>\n
The other sank, and rose again face downward;
\nBut the demons, under cover of the bridge,
\nCried: “Here the Santo Volto has no place!<\/p>\n
Here swims one otherwise than in the Serchio;
\nTherefore, if for our gaffs thou wishest not,
\nDo not uplift thyself above the pitch.”<\/p>\n
They seized him then with more than a hundred rakes;
\nThey said: “It here behoves thee to dance covered,
\nThat, if thou canst, thou secretly mayest pilfer.”<\/p>\n
Not otherwise the cooks their scullions make
\nImmerse into the middle of the caldron
\nThe meat with hooks, so that it may not float.<\/p>\n
Said the good Master to me: “That it be not
\nApparent thou art here, crouch thyself down
\nBehind a jag, that thou mayest have some screen;<\/p>\n
And for no outrage that is done to me
\nBe thou afraid, because these things I know,
\nFor once before was I in such a scuffle.”<\/p>\n
Then he passed on beyond the bridge’s head,
\nAnd as upon the sixth bank he arrived,
\nNeed was for him to have a steadfast front.<\/p>\n
With the same fury, and the same uproar,
\nAs dogs leap out upon a mendicant,
\nWho on a sudden begs, where’er he stops,<\/p>\n
They issued from beneath the little bridge,
\nAnd turned against him all their grappling-irons;
\nBut he cried out: “Be none of you malignant!<\/p>\n
Before those hooks of yours lay hold of me,
\nLet one of you step forward, who may hear me,
\nAnd then take counsel as to grappling me.”<\/p>\n
They all cried out: “Let Malacoda go;”
\nWhereat one started, and the rest stood still,
\nAnd he came to him, saying: “What avails it?”<\/p>\n
“Thinkest thou, Malacoda, to behold me
\nAdvanced into this place,” my Master said,
\n“Safe hitherto from all your skill of fence,<\/p>\n
Without the will divine, and fate auspicious?
\nLet me go on, for it in Heaven is willed
\nThat I another show this savage road.”<\/p>\n
Then was his arrogance so humbled in him,
\nThat he let fall his grapnel at his feet,
\nAnd to the others said: “Now strike him not.”<\/p>\n
And unto me my Guide: “O thou, who sittest
\nAmong the splinters of the bridge crouched down,
\nSecurely now return to me again.”<\/p>\n
Wherefore I started and came swiftly to him;
\nAnd all the devils forward thrust themselves,
\nSo that I feared they would not keep their compact.<\/p>\n
And thus beheld I once afraid the soldiers
\nWho issued under safeguard from Caprona,
\nSeeing themselves among so many foes.<\/p>\n
Close did I press myself with all my person
\nBeside my Leader, and turned not mine eyes
\nFrom off their countenance, which was not good.<\/p>\n
They lowered their rakes, and “Wilt thou have me hit him,”
\nThey said to one another, “on the rump?”
\nAnd answered: “Yes; see that thou nick him with it.”<\/p>\n
But the same demon who was holding parley
\nWith my Conductor turned him very quickly,
\nAnd said: “Be quiet, be quiet, Scarmiglione;”<\/p>\n
Then said to us: “You can no farther go
\nForward upon this crag, because is lying
\nAll shattered, at the bottom, the sixth arch.<\/p>\n
And if it still doth please you to go onward,
\nPursue your way along upon this rock;
\nNear is another crag that yields a path.<\/p>\n
Yesterday, five hours later than this hour,
\nOne thousand and two hundred sixty-six
\nYears were complete, that here the way was broken.<\/p>\n
I send in that direction some of mine
\nTo see if any one doth air himself;
\nGo ye with them; for they will not be vicious.<\/p>\n
Step forward, Alichino and Calcabrina,”
\nBegan he to cry out, “and thou, Cagnazzo;
\nAnd Barbariccia, do thou guide the ten.<\/p>\n
Come forward, Libicocco and Draghignazzo,
\nAnd tusked Ciriatto and Graffiacane,
\nAnd Farfarello and mad Rubicante;<\/p>\n
Search ye all round about the boiling pitch;
\nLet these be safe as far as the next crag,
\nThat all unbroken passes o’er the dens.”<\/p>\n
“O me! what is it, Master, that I see?
\nPray let us go,” I said, “without an escort,
\nIf thou knowest how, since for myself I ask none.<\/p>\n
If thou art as observant as thy wont is,
\nDost thou not see that they do gnash their teeth,
\nAnd with their brows are threatening woe to us?”<\/p>\n
And he to me: “I will not have thee fear;
\nLet them gnash on, according to their fancy,
\nBecause they do it for those boiling wretches.”<\/p>\n
Along the left-hand dike they wheeled about;
\nBut first had each one thrust his tongue between
\nHis teeth towards their leader for a signal;<\/p>\n
And he had made a trumpet of his rump.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I have erewhile seen horsemen moving camp,
\nBegin the storming, and their muster make,
\nAnd sometimes starting off for their escape;<\/p>\n
Vaunt-couriers have I seen upon your land,
\nO Aretines, and foragers go forth,
\nTournaments stricken, and the joustings run,<\/p>\n
Sometimes with trumpets and sometimes with bells,
\nWith kettle-drums, and signals of the castles,
\nAnd with our own, and with outlandish things,<\/p>\n
But never yet with bagpipe so uncouth
\nDid I see horsemen move, nor infantry,
\nNor ship by any sign of land or star.<\/p>\n
We went upon our way with the ten demons;
\nAh, savage company! but in the church
\nWith saints, and in the tavern with the gluttons!<\/p>\n
Ever upon the pitch was my intent,
\nTo see the whole condition of that Bolgia,
\nAnd of the people who therein were burned.<\/p>\n
Even as the dolphins, when they make a sign
\nTo mariners by arching of the back,
\nThat they should counsel take to save their vessel,<\/p>\n
Thus sometimes, to alleviate his pain,
\nOne of the sinners would display his back,
\nAnd in less time conceal it than it lightens.<\/p>\n
As on the brink of water in a ditch
\nThe frogs stand only with their muzzles out,
\nSo that they hide their feet and other bulk,<\/p>\n
So upon every side the sinners stood;
\nBut ever as Barbariccia near them came,
\nThus underneath the boiling they withdrew.<\/p>\n
I saw, and still my heart doth shudder at it,
\nOne waiting thus, even as it comes to pass
\nOne frog remains, and down another dives;<\/p>\n
And Graffiacan, who most confronted him,
\nGrappled him by his tresses smeared with pitch,
\nAnd drew him up, so that he seemed an otter.<\/p>\n
I knew, before, the names of all of them,
\nSo had I noted them when they were chosen,
\nAnd when they called each other, listened how.<\/p>\n
“O Rubicante, see that thou do lay
\nThy claws upon him, so that thou mayst flay him,”
\nCried all together the accursed ones.<\/p>\n
And I: “My Master, see to it, if thou canst,
\nThat thou mayst know who is the luckless wight,
\nThus come into his adversaries’ hands.”<\/p>\n
Near to the side of him my Leader drew,
\nAsked of him whence he was; and he replied:
\n“I in the kingdom of Navarre was born;<\/p>\n
My mother placed me servant to a lord,
\nFor she had borne me to a ribald knave,
\nDestroyer of himself and of his things.<\/p>\n
Then I domestic was of good King Thibault;
\nI set me there to practise barratry,
\nFor which I pay the reckoning in this heat.”<\/p>\n
And Ciriatto, from whose mouth projected,
\nOn either side, a tusk, as in a boar,
\nCaused him to feel how one of them could rip.<\/p>\n
Among malicious cats the mouse had come;
\nBut Barbariccia clasped him in his arms,
\nAnd said: “Stand ye aside, while I enfork him.”<\/p>\n
And to my Master he turned round his head;
\n“Ask him again,” he said, “if more thou wish
\nTo know from him, before some one destroy him.”<\/p>\n
The Guide: “Now tell then of the other culprits;
\nKnowest thou any one who is a Latian,
\nUnder the pitch?” And he: “I separated<\/p>\n
Lately from one who was a neighbour to it;
\nWould that I still were covered up with him,
\nFor I should fear not either claw nor hook!”<\/p>\n
And Libicocco: “We have borne too much;”
\nAnd with his grapnel seized him by the arm,
\nSo that, by rending, he tore off a tendon.<\/p>\n
Eke Draghignazzo wished to pounce upon him
\nDown at the legs; whence their Decurion
\nTurned round and round about with evil look.<\/p>\n
When they again somewhat were pacified,
\nOf him, who still was looking at his wound,
\nDemanded my Conductor without stay:<\/p>\n
“Who was that one, from whom a luckless parting
\nThou sayest thou hast made, to come ashore?”
\nAnd he replied: “It was the Friar Gomita,<\/p>\n
He of Gallura, vessel of all fraud,
\nWho had the enemies of his Lord in hand,
\nAnd dealt so with them each exults thereat;<\/p>\n
Money he took, and let them smoothly off,
\nAs he says; and in other offices
\nA barrator was he, not mean but sovereign.<\/p>\n
Foregathers with him one Don Michael Zanche
\nOf Logodoro; and of Sardinia
\nTo gossip never do their tongues feel tired.<\/p>\n
O me! see that one, how he grinds his teeth;
\nStill farther would I speak, but am afraid
\nLest he to scratch my itch be making ready.”<\/p>\n
And the grand Provost, turned to Farfarello,
\nWho rolled his eyes about as if to strike,
\nSaid: “Stand aside there, thou malicious bird.”<\/p>\n
“If you desire either to see or hear,”
\nThe terror-stricken recommenced thereon,
\n“Tuscans or Lombards, I will make them come.<\/p>\n
But let the Malebranche cease a little,
\nSo that these may not their revenges fear,
\nAnd I, down sitting in this very place,<\/p>\n
For one that I am will make seven come,
\nWhen I shall whistle, as our custom is
\nTo do whenever one of us comes out.”<\/p>\n
Cagnazzo at these words his muzzle lifted,
\nShaking his head, and said: “Just hear the trick
\nWhich he has thought of, down to throw himself!”<\/p>\n
Whence he, who snares in great abundance had,
\nResponded: “I by far too cunning am,
\nWhen I procure for mine a greater sadness.”<\/p>\n
Alichin held not in, but running counter
\nUnto the rest, said to him: “If thou dive,
\nI will not follow thee upon the gallop,<\/p>\n
But I will beat my wings above the pitch;
\nThe height be left, and be the bank a shield
\nTo see if thou alone dost countervail us.”<\/p>\n
O thou who readest, thou shalt hear new sport!
\nEach to the other side his eyes averted;
\nHe first, who most reluctant was to do it.<\/p>\n
The Navarrese selected well his time;
\nPlanted his feet on land, and in a moment
\nLeaped, and released himself from their design.<\/p>\n
Whereat each one was suddenly stung with shame,
\nBut he most who was cause of the defeat;
\nTherefore he moved, and cried: “Thou art o’ertakern.”<\/p>\n
But little it availed, for wings could not
\nOutstrip the fear; the other one went under,
\nAnd, flying, upward he his breast directed;<\/p>\n
Not otherwise the duck upon a sudden
\nDives under, when the falcon is approaching,
\nAnd upward he returneth cross and weary.<\/p>\n
Infuriate at the mockery, Calcabrina
\nFlying behind him followed close, desirous
\nThe other should escape, to have a quarrel.<\/p>\n
And when the barrator had disappeared,
\nHe turned his talons upon his companion,
\nAnd grappled with him right above the moat.<\/p>\n
But sooth the other was a doughty sparhawk
\nTo clapperclaw him well; and both of them
\nFell in the middle of the boiling pond.<\/p>\n
A sudden intercessor was the heat;
\nBut ne’ertheless of rising there was naught,
\nTo such degree they had their wings belimed.<\/p>\n
Lamenting with the others, Barbariccia
\nMade four of them fly to the other side
\nWith all their gaffs, and very speedily<\/p>\n
This side and that they to their posts descended;
\nThey stretched their hooks towards the pitch-ensnared,
\nWho were already baked within the crust,<\/p>\n
And in this manner busied did we leave them.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Silent, alone, and without company
\nWe went, the one in front, the other after,
\nAs go the Minor Friars along their way.<\/p>\n
Upon the fable of Aesop was directed
\nMy thought, by reason of the present quarrel,
\nWhere he has spoken of the frog and mouse;<\/p>\n
For ‘mo’ and ‘issa’ are not more alike
\nThan this one is to that, if well we couple
\nEnd and beginning with a steadfast mind.<\/p>\n
And even as one thought from another springs,
\nSo afterward from that was born another,
\nWhich the first fear within me double made.<\/p>\n
Thus did I ponder: “These on our account
\nAre laughed to scorn, with injury and scoff
\nSo great, that much I think it must annoy them.<\/p>\n
If anger be engrafted on ill-will,
\nThey will come after us more merciless
\nThan dog upon the leveret which he seizes,”<\/p>\n
I felt my hair stand all on end already
\nWith terror, and stood backwardly intent,
\nWhen said I: “Master, if thou hidest not<\/p>\n
Thyself and me forthwith, of Malebranche
\nI am in dread; we have them now behind us;
\nI so imagine them, I already feel them.”<\/p>\n
And he: “If I were made of leaded glass,
\nThine outward image I should not attract
\nSooner to me than I imprint the inner.<\/p>\n
Just now thy thoughts came in among my own,
\nWith similar attitude and similar face,
\nSo that of both one counsel sole I made.<\/p>\n
If peradventure the right bank so slope
\nThat we to the next Bolgia can descend,
\nWe shall escape from the imagined chase.”<\/p>\n
Not yet he finished rendering such opinion,
\nWhen I beheld them come with outstretched wings,
\nNot far remote, with will to seize upon us.<\/p>\n
My Leader on a sudden seized me up,
\nEven as a mother who by noise is wakened,
\nAnd close beside her sees the enkindled flames,<\/p>\n
Who takes her son, and flies, and does not stop,
\nHaving more care of him than of herself,
\nSo that she clothes her only with a shift;<\/p>\n
And downward from the top of the hard bank
\nSupine he gave him to the pendent rock,
\nThat one side of the other Bolgia walls.<\/p>\n
Ne’er ran so swiftly water through a sluice
\nTo turn the wheel of any land-built mill,
\nWhen nearest to the paddles it approaches,<\/p>\n
As did my Master down along that border,
\nBearing me with him on his breast away,
\nAs his own son, and not as a companion.<\/p>\n
Hardly the bed of the ravine below
\nHis feet had reached, ere they had reached the hill
\nRight over us; but he was not afraid;<\/p>\n
For the high Providence, which had ordained
\nTo place them ministers of the fifth moat,
\nThe power of thence departing took from all.<\/p>\n
A painted people there below we found,
\nWho went about with footsteps very slow,
\nWeeping and in their semblance tired and vanquished.<\/p>\n
They had on mantles with the hoods low down
\nBefore their eyes, and fashioned of the cut
\nThat in Cologne they for the monks are made.<\/p>\n
Without, they gilded are so that it dazzles;
\nBut inwardly all leaden and so heavy
\nThat Frederick used to put them on of straw.<\/p>\n
O everlastingly fatiguing mantle!
\nAgain we turned us, still to the left hand
\nAlong with them, intent on their sad plaint;<\/p>\n
But owing to the weight, that weary folk
\nCame on so tardily, that we were new
\nIn company at each motion of the haunch.<\/p>\n
Whence I unto my Leader: “See thou find
\nSome one who may by deed or name be known,
\nAnd thus in going move thine eye about.”<\/p>\n
And one, who understood the Tuscan speech,
\nCried to us from behind: “Stay ye your feet,
\nYe, who so run athwart the dusky air!<\/p>\n
Perhaps thou’lt have from me what thou demandest.”
\nWhereat the Leader turned him, and said: “Wait,
\nAnd then according to his pace proceed.”<\/p>\n
I stopped, and two beheld I show great haste
\nOf spirit, in their faces, to be with me;
\nBut the burden and the narrow way delayed them.<\/p>\n
When they came up, long with an eye askance
\nThey scanned me without uttering a word.
\nThen to each other turned, and said together:<\/p>\n
“He by the action of his throat seems living;
\nAnd if they dead are, by what privilege
\nGo they uncovered by the heavy stole?”<\/p>\n
Then said to me: “Tuscan, who to the college
\nOf miserable hypocrites art come,
\nDo not disdain to tell us who thou art.”<\/p>\n
And I to them: “Born was I, and grew up
\nIn the great town on the fair river of Arno,
\nAnd with the body am I’ve always had.<\/p>\n
But who are ye, in whom there trickles down
\nAlong your cheeks such grief as I behold?
\nAnd what pain is upon you, that so sparkles?”<\/p>\n
And one replied to me: “These orange cloaks
\nAre made of lead so heavy, that the weights
\nCause in this way their balances to creak.<\/p>\n
Frati Gaudenti were we, and Bolognese;
\nI Catalano, and he Loderingo
\nNamed, and together taken by thy city,<\/p>\n
As the wont is to take one man alone,
\nFor maintenance of its peace; and we were such
\nThat still it is apparent round Gardingo.”<\/p>\n
“O Friars,” began I, “your iniquitous. . .”
\nBut said no more; for to mine eyes there rushed
\nOne crucified with three stakes on the ground.<\/p>\n
When me he saw, he writhed himself all over,
\nBlowing into his beard with suspirations;
\nAnd the Friar Catalan, who noticed this,<\/p>\n
Said to me: “This transfixed one, whom thou seest,
\nCounselled the Pharisees that it was meet
\nTo put one man to torture for the people.<\/p>\n
Crosswise and naked is he on the path,
\nAs thou perceivest; and he needs must feel,
\nWhoever passes, first how much he weighs;<\/p>\n
And in like mode his father-in-law is punished
\nWithin this moat, and the others of the council,
\nWhich for the Jews was a malignant seed.”<\/p>\n
And thereupon I saw Virgilius marvel
\nO’er him who was extended on the cross
\nSo vilely in eternal banishment.<\/p>\n
Then he directed to the Friar this voice:
\n“Be not displeased, if granted thee, to tell us
\nIf to the right hand any pass slope down<\/p>\n
By which we two may issue forth from here,
\nWithout constraining some of the black angels
\nTo come and extricate us from this deep.”<\/p>\n
Then he made answer: “Nearer than thou hopest
\nThere is a rock, that forth from the great circle
\nProceeds, and crosses all the cruel valleys,<\/p>\n
Save that at this ’tis broken, and does not bridge it;
\nYou will be able to mount up the ruin,
\nThat sidelong slopes and at the bottom rises.”<\/p>\n
The Leader stood awhile with head bowed down;
\nThen said: “The business badly he recounted
\nWho grapples with his hook the sinners yonder.”<\/p>\n
And the Friar: “Many of the Devil’s vices
\nOnce heard I at Bologna, and among them,
\nThat he’s a liar and the father of lies.”<\/p>\n
Thereat my Leader with great strides went on,
\nSomewhat disturbed with anger in his looks;
\nWhence from the heavy-laden I departed<\/p>\n
After the prints of his beloved feet.<\/p>\n\n\t\t\t Candela Citations<\/h3>\n\t\t\t\t\t