Those legs of thine at joustings of the Toppo!"

And then, perchance because his breath was failing.
He grouped himself together with a bush.

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
Was weeping from its bloody lacerations.

"O Jacopo," it said, "of Sant' Andrea,

What helped it thee of me to make a screen?
What blame have I in thy nefarious life?"

When near him had the Master stayed his steps,

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He said: "Who wast thou, that through wounds so many
Art blowing out with blood thy dolorous speech ?"

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
Changed its first patron, wherefore he for this

Forever with his art will make it sad.

And were it not that on the pass of Arno
Some glimpses of him are remaining stili,

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."

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CANTO XIV.

BECAUSE the charity of my native place

Constrained me, gathered I the scattered leaves,
And gave them back to him, who now was hoarse.
Then came we to the confine, where disparted

The second round is from the third, and where
A horrible form of Justice is beheld.

Clearly to manifest these novel things,
I say that we arrived upon a plain,
Which from its bed rejecteth every plant;

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

Which by the feet of Cato once was pressed.
Vengeance of God, O how much oughtest thou
By each one to be dreaded, who doth read
That which was manifest unto mine eyes!
Of naked souls beheld I many herds,

Who all were weeping very miserably,
And over them seemed set a law diverse.
Supine upon the ground some folk were lying;
And some were sitting all drawn up together,
And others went about continually.

Those who were going round were far the more,

And those were less who lay down to their torment, But had their tongues more loosed to lamentation. 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 Better extinguished was while it was single; 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
Against us at the entrance of the gate,
Who is that mighty one who seems to heed not
The fire, and lieth lowering and disdainful,
So that the rain seems not to ripen him?"
And he himself, who had become aware

That I was questioning my Guide about him,
Cried: "Such as I was living, am I, dead!
If Jove should weary out his smith, from whom
He seized in anger the sharp thunderbolt,
Wherewith upon the last day I was smitten,

And if he wearied out by turns the others
In Mongibello at the swarthy forge,
Vociferating, 'Help, good Vulcan, help!'
Even as he did there at the fight of Phlegra,

And shot his bolts at me with all his might,
He would not have thereby a joyous vengeance."
Then did my Leader speak with such great force,
That I had never heard him speak so loud :
"O Capaneus, in that is not extinguished
Thine arrogance, thou punished art the more;
Not any torment, saving thine own rage,
Would be unto thy fury pain complete."
Then he turned round to me with better lip,

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;
But, as I said to him, his own despites
Are for his breast the fittest ornaments.
Now follow me, and mind thou do not place
As yet thy feet upon the burning sand,
But always keep them close unto the wood."
Speaking no word, we came to where there gushes
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,
So downward through the sand it went its way.

The bottom of it, and both sloping banks,

Were made of stone, and the margins at the side;
Whence I perceived that there the passage was.

"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

That he would give me largess of the food,
For which he had given me largess of desire.

"In the mid-sea there sits a wasted land,"

Said he thereafterward, "whose name is Crete,
Under whose king the world of old was chaste.

There is a mountain there, that once was glad

With waters and with leaves, which was called Ida;
Now 'tis deserted, as a thing worn out.

Rhea once chose it for the faithful cradle

Of her own son; and to conceal him better,
Whene'er he cried, she there had clamours made.
A grand old man stands in the mount erect,

Who holds his shoulders turned tow'rds Damietta,
And looks at Rome as if it were his mirror.
His head is fashioned of refined gold,

And of pure silver are the arms and breast;
Then he is brass as far down as the fork.
From that point downward all is chosen iron,

Save that the right foot is of kiln-baked clay, And more he stands on that than on the other. Each part, except the gold, is by a fissure

Asunder cleft, that dripping is with tears, Which gathered together perforate that cavern. From rock to rock they fall into this valley;

Acheron, Styx, and Phlegethon they form ; Then downward go along this narrow sluice Unto that point where is no more descending.

They form Cocytus; what that pool may be
Thou shalt behold, so here 'tis not narrated."
And I to him: "If so the present runnel

Doth take its rise in this way from our world,
Why only on this verge appears it to us?"
And he to me: "Thou knowest the place is round,
And notwithstanding thou hast journeyed far,
Still to the left descending to the bottom,
Thou hast not yet through all the circle turned.
Therefore if something new appear to us,
It should not bring amazement to thy face."
And I again: "Master, where shall be found

Lethe and Phlegethon, for of one thou'rt silent,
And sayest the other of this rain is made?"
"In all thy questions truly thou dost please me,"
Replied he; "but the boiling of the red
Water might well solve one of them thou makest.
Thou shalt see Lethe, but outside this moat,

There where the souls repair to lave themselves,
When sin repented of has been removed."

Then said he: "It is time now to abandon

The wood; take heed that thou come after me; A way the margins make that are not burning, And over them all vapours are extinguished."

CANTO XV.

Now bears us onward one of the hard margins,
And so the brooklet's mist o'ershadows it,
From fire it saves the water and the dikes.
Even as the Flemings, 'twixt Cadsand and Bruges,
Fearing the flood that tow'rds them hurls itself,
Their bulwarks build to put the sea to flight;
And as the Paduans along the Brenta,

To guard their villas and their villages,
Or ever Chiarentana feel the heat;
In such similitude had those been made,
Albeit not so lofty nor so thick,

Whoever he might be, the master made them.
Now were we from the forest so remote,

I could not have discovered where it was,
Even if backward I had turned myself,
When we a company of souls encountered,
Who came beside the dike, and every one
Gazed at us, as at evening we are wont
To eye each other under a new moon,

And so towards us sharpened they their brows
As an old tailor at the needie's eye.

Thus scrutinised by such a family,

By some one I was recognised, who scized

My garment's hem, and cried out, "What a marvel !"
And I, when he stretched forth his arm to me,

On his baked aspect fastened so mine eyes,
That the scorched countenance prevented not

His recognition by my intellect;

And bowing down my face unto his own,

I made reply, "Are you here, Ser Brunetto?"
And he : May't not displease thee, O my son,
If a brief space with thee Brunetto Latini

Backward return and let the trail go on."
I said to him: "With all my power I ask it;
And if you wish me to sit down with you,
I will, if he please, for I go with him."
"O son," he said, "whoever of this herd

A moment stops, lies then a hundred years,
Nor fans himself when smiteth him the fire.

४

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