The Divine Comedy (Complete Annotated Edition). Dante Alighieri

safety lead them, where the other crag

      Uninterrupted traverses the dens.”

      I then: “O master! what a sight is there!

      Ah! without escort, journey we alone,

      Which, if thou know the way, I covet not.

      Unless thy prudence fail thee, dost not mark

      How they do gnarl upon us, and their scowl

      Threatens us present tortures?” He replied:

      “I charge thee fear not: let them, as they will,

      Gnarl on: ’t is but in token of their spite

      Against the souls, who mourn in torment steep’d.”

      To leftward o’er the pier they turn’d; but each

      Had first between his teeth prest close the tongue,

      Toward their leader for a signal looking,

      Which he with sound obscene triumphant gave.

      Footnotes

1 “From Caprona.” The surrender of the castle of Caprona to the combined forces of Florence and Lucca, on condition that the garrison should march out in safety, to which event Dante was a witness, took place in 1290. See G. Villani, Hist. lib. vii. c. cxxxvi

2 “Yesterday.” This passage fixes the era of Dante’s descent at Good Friday, in the year 1300 (thirty-four years from our blessed Lord’s incarnation being added to 1266), and at the thirty-fifth year of our Poet’s age. See Canto i. v. I. The awful event alluded to, the Evangelists inform us, happened “at the ninth hour,” that is, our sixth, when “the rocks were rent,” and the convulsion, according to Dante, was felt even in the depths of Hell. See Canto xii. v. 38.

      Canto XXII

       Table of Contents

      ARGUMENT.—Virgil and Dante proceed, accompanied by the Demons, and see other sinners of the same description in the same gulf. The device of Ciampolo, one of these, to escape from the Demons, who had laid hold on him.

      IT hath been heretofore my chance to see

      Horsemen with martial order shifting camp,

      To onset sallying, or in muster rang’d,

      Or in retreat sometimes outstretch’d for flight;

      Light-armed squadrons and fleet foragers

      Scouring thy plains, Arezzo! have I seen,

      And clashing tournaments, and tilting jousts,

      Now with the sound of trumpets, now of bells,

      Tabors, or signals made from castled heights,

      And with inventions multiform, our own,

      Or introduc’d from foreign land; but ne’er

      To such a strange recorder I beheld,

      In evolution moving, horse nor foot,

      Nor ship, that tack’d by sign from land or star.

      With the ten demons on our way we went;

      Ah fearful company! but in the church

      With saints, with gluttons at the tavern’s mess.

      Still earnest on the pitch I gaz’d, to mark

      All things whate’er the chasm contain’d, and those

      Who burn’d within. As dolphins, that, in sign

      To mariners, heave high their arched backs,

      That thence forewarn’d they may advise to save

      Their threaten’d vessels; so, at intervals,

      To ease the pain his back some sinner show’d,

      Then hid more nimbly than the lightning glance.

      E’en as the frogs, that of a wat’ry moat

      Stand at the brink, with the jaws only out,

      Their feet and of the trunk all else concealed,

      Thus on each part the sinners stood, but soon

      As Barbariccia was at hand, so they

      Drew back under the wave. I saw, and yet

      My heart doth stagger, one, that waited thus,

      As it befalls that oft one frog remains,

      While the next springs away: and Graffiacan,

      Who of the fiends was nearest, grappling seiz’d

      His clotted locks, and dragg’d him sprawling up,

      That he appear’d to me an otter. Each

      Already by their names I knew, so well

      When they were chosen, I observ’d, and mark’d

      How one the other call’d. “O Rubicant!

      See that his hide thou with thy talons flay,”

      Shouted together all the cursed crew.

      Then I: “Inform thee, master! if thou may,

      What wretched soul is this, on whom their hand

      His foes have laid.” My leader to his side

      Approach’d, and whence he came inquir’d, to whom

Was answer’d thus: “Born in Navarre’s domain1

      My mother plac’d me in a lord’s retinue,

      For she had borne me to a losel vile,

      A spendthrift of his substance and himself.

The good king Thibault2 after that I serv’d,

      To peculating here my thoughts were turn’d,

      Whereof I give account in this dire heat.”

      Straight Ciriatto, from whose mouth a tusk

      Issued on either side, as from a boar,

      Ript him with one of these. ’Twixt evil claws

      The mouse had fall’n: but Barbariccia cried,

      Seizing him with both arms: “Stand thou apart,

      While I do fix him on my prong transpierc’d.”

      Then added, turning to my guide his face,

      “Inquire of him, if more thou wish to learn,

      Ere he again be rent.” My leader thus:

      “Then tell us of the partners in thy guilt;

      Knowest thou any sprung of Latian land

      Under the tar?” — “I parted,” he replied,

      “But now from one, who sojourn’d not far thence;

      So were I under shelter now with him!

      Nor hook nor talon then should scare me more.” — .

      “Too long we suffer,” Libicocco cried,