The Divine Comedy (Complete Annotated Edition). Dante Alighieri

please thee stay awhile. Thy utterance

      Declares the place of thy nativity

      To be that noble land, with which perchance

      I too severely dealt.” Sudden that sound

      Forth issu’d from a vault, whereat in fear

      I somewhat closer to my leader’s side

      Approaching, he thus spake: “What dost thou? Turn.

Lo, Farinata,3 there! who hath himself

      Uplifted: from his girdle upwards all

      Expos’d behold him.” On his face was mine

      Already fix’d; his breast and forehead there

      Erecting, seem’d as in high scorn he held

      E’en hell. Between the sepulchres to him

      My guide thrust me with fearless hands and prompt,

      This warning added: “See thy words be clear!”

      He, soon as there I stood at the tomb’s foot,

      Ey’d me a space, then in disdainful mood

      Address’d me: “Say, what ancestors were thine?”

      I, willing to obey him, straight reveal’d

      The whole, nor kept back aught: whence he, his brow

      Somewhat uplifting, cried: “Fiercely were they

      Adverse to me, my party, and the blood

From whence I sprang: twice4 therefore I abroad

      Scatter’d them.” “Though driv’n out, yet they each time

      From all parts,” answer’d I, “return’d; an art

      Which yours have shown, they are not skill’d to learn.”

      Then, peering forth from the unclosed jaw,

Rose from his side a shade,5 high as the chin,

      Leaning, methought, upon its knees uprais’d.

      It look’d around, as eager to explore

      If there were other with me; but perceiving

      That fond imagination quench’d, with tears

      Thus spake: “If thou through this blind prison go’st.

      Led by thy lofty genius and profound,

Where is my son?6 and wherefore not with thee?”

      I straight replied: “Not of myself I come,

      By him, who there expects me, through this clime

      Conducted, whom perchance Guido thy son

Had in contempt.”7 Already had his words

      And mode of punishment read me his name,

      Whence I so fully answer’d. He at once

      Exclaim’d, up starting, “How! said’st thou he HAD?

      No longer lives he? Strikes not on his eye

      The blessed daylight?” Then of some delay

      I made ere my reply aware, down fell

      Supine, not after forth appear’d he more.

      Meanwhile the other, great of soul, near whom

      I yet was station’d, chang’d not count’nance stern,

      Nor mov’d the neck, nor bent his ribbed side.

      “And if,” continuing the first discourse,

      “They in this art,” he cried, “small skill have shown,

      That doth torment me more e’en than this bed.

But not yet fifty times8 shall be relum’d

Her aspect, who reigns here Queen of this realm,9

      Ere thou shalt know the full weight of that art.

      So to the pleasant world mayst thou return,

      As thou shalt tell me, why in all their laws,

      Against my kin this people is so fell?”

“The slaughter10 and great havoc,” I replied,

      “That colour’d Arbia’s flood with crimson stain—

      To these impute, that in our hallow’d dome

Such orisons11 ascend.” Sighing he shook

      The head, then thus resum’d: “In that affray

      I stood not singly, nor without just cause

      Assuredly should with the rest have stirr’d;

But singly there I stood,12 when by consent

      Of all, Florence had to the ground been raz’d,

      The one who openly forbad the deed.”

      “So may thy lineage find at last repose,”

      I thus adjur’d him, “as thou solve this knot,

      Which now involves my mind. If right I hear,

      Ye seem to view beforehand, that which time

      Leads with him, of the present uninform’d.”

      “We view, as one who hath an evil sight,”

      He answer’d, “plainly, objects far remote:

      So much of his large spendour yet imparts

      The’ Almighty Ruler; but when they approach

      Or actually exist, our intellect

      Then wholly fails, nor of your human state

      Except what others bring us know we aught.

      Hence therefore mayst thou understand, that all

      Our knowledge in that instant shall expire,

      When on futurity the portals close.”

Then conscious of my fault,13 and by remorse

      Smitten, I added thus: “Now shalt thou say

      To him there fallen, that his offspring still

      Is to the living join’d; and bid him know,

      That if from answer silent I abstain’d,

      ’Twas that my thought was occupied intent

      Upon that error, which thy help hath solv’d.”

      But now my master summoning me back

      I heard, and with more eager haste besought

      The