The Divine Comedy (Complete Annotated Edition). Dante Alighieri

I, because the thing surpass’d belief,

      Prompted him to this deed, which even now

      Myself I rue. But tell me, who thou wast;

      That, for this wrong to do thee some amends,

      In the upper world (for thither to return

      Is granted him) thy fame he may revive.”

      “That pleasant word of thine,” the trunk replied

      “Hath so inveigled me, that I from speech

      Cannot refrain, wherein if I indulge

      A little longer, in the snare detain’d,

Count it not grievous. I it was,2 who held

      Both keys to Frederick’s heart, and turn’d the wards,

      Opening and shutting, with a skill so sweet,

      That besides me, into his inmost breast

      Scarce any other could admittance find.

      The faith I bore to my high charge was such,

      It cost me the life-blood that warm’d my veins.

      The harlot, who ne’er turn’d her gloating eyes

      From Caesar’s household, common vice and pest

      Of courts, ’gainst me inflam’d the minds of all;

      And to Augustus they so spread the flame,

      That my glad honours chang’d to bitter woes.

      My soul, disdainful and disgusted, sought

      Refuge in death from scorn, and I became,

      Just as I was, unjust toward myself.

      By the new roots, which fix this stem, I swear,

      That never faith I broke to my liege lord,

      Who merited such honour; and of you,

      If any to the world indeed return,

      Clear he from wrong my memory, that lies

      Yet prostrate under envy’s cruel blow.”

      First somewhat pausing, till the mournful words

      Were ended, then to me the bard began:

      “Lose not the time; but speak and of him ask,

      If more thou wish to learn.” Whence I replied:

      “Question thou him again of whatsoe’er

      Will, as thou think’st, content me; for no power

      Have I to ask, such pity’ is at my heart.”

      He thus resum’d; “So may he do for thee

      Freely what thou entreatest, as thou yet

      Be pleas’d, imprison’d Spirit! to declare,

      How in these gnarled joints the soul is tied;

      And whether any ever from such frame

      Be loosen’d, if thou canst, that also tell.”

      Thereat the trunk breath’d hard, and the wind soon

      Chang’d into sounds articulate like these;

      Briefly ye shall be answer’d. When departs

      The fierce soul from the body, by itself

      Thence torn asunder, to the seventh gulf

      By Minos doom’d, into the wood it falls,

      No place assign’d, but wheresoever chance

      Hurls it, there sprouting, as a grain of spelt,

      It rises to a sapling, growing thence

      A savage plant. The Harpies, on its leaves

      Then feeding, cause both pain and for the pain

      A vent to grief. We, as the rest, shall come

      For our own spoils, yet not so that with them

      We may again be clad; for what a man

      Takes from himself it is not just he have.

      Here we perforce shall drag them; and throughout

      The dismal glade our bodies shall be hung,

      Each on the wild thorn of his wretched shade.”

      Attentive yet to listen to the trunk

      We stood, expecting farther speech, when us

      A noise surpris’d, as when a man perceives

      The wild boar and the hunt approach his place

      Of station’d watch, who of the beasts and boughs

      Loud rustling round him hears. And lo! there came

      Two naked, torn with briers, in headlong flight,

      That they before them broke each fan o’ th’ wood.

      “Haste now,” the foremost cried, “now haste thee death!”

      The’ other, as seem’d, impatient of delay

Exclaiming, “Lano!3 not so bent for speed

      Thy sinews, in the lists of Toppo’s field.”

      And then, for that perchance no longer breath

      Suffic’d him, of himself and of a bush

      One group he made. Behind them was the wood

      Full of black female mastiffs, gaunt and fleet,

      As greyhounds that have newly slipp’d the leash.

      On him, who squatted down, they stuck their fangs,

      And having rent him piecemeal bore away

      The tortur’d limbs. My guide then seiz’d my hand,

      And led me to the thicket, which in vain

      Mourn’d through its bleeding wounds: “O Giacomo

Of Sant’ Andrea!4 what avails it thee,”

      It cried, “that of me thou hast made thy screen?

      For thy ill life what blame on me recoils?”

      When o’er it he had paus’d, my master spake:

      “Say who wast thou, that at so many points

      Breath’st out with blood thy lamentable speech?”

      He answer’d: “Oh, ye spirits: arriv’d in time

      To spy the shameful havoc, that from me

      My leaves hath sever’d thus, gather them up,

      And at the foot of their sad parent-tree

Carefully lay them. In that city’5 I dwelt,

      Who for the Baptist her first patron chang’d,

      Whence he for this shall cease not with his art

      To work her woe: and if there still remain’d not

      On Arno’s passage some faint glimpse of him,

      Those citizens, who rear’d once more her walls

      Upon