Of ocean was the dolorous one aware,

Out of her senses like a dog she barked,
So much the anguish had her mind distorted;
But not of Thebes the furies nor the Trojan
Were ever seen in any one so cruel

In goading beasts, and much more human members,

As I beheld two shadows pale and naked,

Who, biting, in the manner ran along

That a boar does, when from the sty turned loose.
Ong to Capocchio came, and by the nape

Seized with its teeth his neck, so that in dragging
It made his belly grate the solid bottom.
And the Aretine, who trembling had remained,

Said to me: "That mad sprite is Gianni Schicchi,
And raving goes thus harrying other people."
"O," said I to him, "so may not the other

Set teeth on thee, let it not weary thee
To tell us who it is, ere it dart hence."
And he to me: "That is the ancient ghost

Of the nefarious Myrrha, who became
Beyond all rightful love her father's lover.
She came to sin with him after this manner,
By counterfeiting of another's form;
As he who goeth yonder undertook,
That he might gain the lady of the herd,
To counterfeit in himself Buoso Donati,
Making a will and giving it due form."

And after the two maniacs had passed

On whom I held mine eye, I turned it back
To look upon the other evil-born.

If he had only had the groin cut off

I saw one made in fashion of a lute,

Just at the point at which a man is forked.

The heavy dropsy, that so disproportions

The limbs with humours, which it ill concocts,
That the face corresponds not to the belly,

Compelled him so to hold his lips apart

As does the hectic, who because of thirst
One tow'rds the chin, the other upward turns.

"O ye, who without any torment are,

And why I know not, in the world of woe,"
He said to us, "behold, and be attentive

Unto the misery of Master Adam ;

I had while living much of what I wished,
And now, alas! a drop of water crave.

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The rivulets, that from the verdant hills

Of Cassentin descend down into Arno, Making their channels to be cold and moist, Ever before me stand, and not in vain ;

For far more doth their image dry me up
Than the disease which strips my face of flesh.
The rigid justice that chastises me

Draweth occasion from the place in which
I sinned, to put the more my sighs in flight.
There is Romena, where I counterfeited

The currency imprinted with the Baptist,
For which I left my body burned above.
But if I here could see the tristful soul

Of Guido, or Alessandro, or their brother,
For Branda's fount I would not give the sight.
One is within already, if the raving

Shades that are going round about speak truth;
But what avails it me, whose limbs are tied?
If I were only still so light, that in

A hundred years I could advance one inch,
I had already started on the way,
Seeking him out among this squalid folk,
Although the circuit be eleven miles,
And be not less than half a mile across.

For them am I in such a family;

They did induce me into coining florins,
Which had three carats of impurity."

And I to him: "Who are the two poor wretches
That smoke like unto a wet hand in winter,
Lying there close upon thy right-hand confines?'
"I found them here," replied he, "when I rained
Into this chasm, and since they have not turned,
Nor do I think they will for evermore.
One the false woman is who accused Joseph,

The other the false Sinon, Greek of Troy;
From acute fever they send forth such reek."
And one of them, who felt himself annoyed

At being, peradventure, named so darkly, Smote with the fist upon his hardened paunch. It gave a sound, as if it were a drum ;

And Master Adam smote him in the face,
With arm that did not seem to be less hard,
Saying to him: "Although be taken from me

All motion, for my limbs that heavy are,
I have an arm unfettered for such need."

Whereat he answer made: "When thou didst go
Unto the fire, thou hadst it not so ready:

But hadst it so and more when thou wast coining."
The dropsical: "Thou sayest true in that;

But thou wast not so true a witness there, Where thou wast questioned of the truth at Troy." "If I spake false, thou falsifiedst the coin,"

Said Sinon ; "and for one fault I am here, And thou for more than any other demon." "Remember, perjurer, about the horse,"

He made reply who had the swollen belly,
"And rueful be it thee the whole world knows it."
"Rueful to thee the thirst be wherewith cracks

Thy tongue," the Greek said, “and the putrid water
That hedges so thy paunch before thine eyes."
Then the false-coiner: "So is gaping wide

Thy mouth for speaking evil, as 'tis wont;
Because if I have thirst, and humour stuff me,
Thou hast the burning and the head that aches,

And to lick up the mirror of Narcissus

Thou wouldst not want words many to invite thee."

In listening to them was I wholly fixed,

When said the Master to me : "Now just look,
For little wants it that I quarrel with thee."

When him I heard in anger speak to me,

I turned me round towards him with such shame
That still it eddies through my memory.

And as he is who dreams of his own harm,

Who dreaming wishes it may be a dream, So that he craves what is, as if it were not; Such I became, not having power to speak,

For to excuse myself I wished, and still Excused myself, and did not think I did it. "Less shame doth wash away a greater fault,"

The Master said, "than this of thine has been ;
Therefore thyself disburden of all sadness,
And make account that I am aye beside thee,

If e'er it come to pass that fortune bring thee
Where there are people in a like dispute;
For a base wish it is to wish to hear it."

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CANTO XXXI.

ONE and the selfsame tongue first wounded me,
So that it tinged the one cheek and the other,
And then held out to me the medicine;
Thus do I hear that once Achilles' spear,

His and his father's, used to be the cause
First of a sad and then a gracious boon.
We turned our backs upon the wretched valley,
Upon the bank that girds it round about,
Going across it without any speech.
There it was less than night, and less than day,
So that my sight went little in advance ;"

But I could hear the blare of a loud horn,
So loud it would have made each thunder faint,
Which, counter to it following its way,
Mine eyes directed wholly to one place.
After the dolorous discomfiture

When Charlemagne the holy emprise lost,
So terribly Orlando sounded not.

Short while my head turned thitherward I held
When many lofty towers I seemed to see,
Whereat I: "Master, say, what town is this?"
And he to me: "Because thou peerest forth

Athwart the darkness at too great a distance,
It happens that thou errest in thy fancy.

Well shalt thou see, if thou arrivest there,

How much the sense deceives itself by distance;
Therefore a little faster spur thee on."

Then tenderly he took me by the hand,

And said: "Before we farther have advanced,
That the reality may seem to thee

Less strange, know that these are not towers, but giants,

And they are in the well, around the bank,

From navel downward, one and all of them."

As, when the fog is vanishing away,

Little by little doth the sight refigure

Whate'er the mist that crowds the air conceals,

So, piercing through the dense and darksome air,
More and more near approaching tow'rd the verge,
My error fled, and fear came over me;

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Because as on its circular parapets

Montereggione crowns itself with towers,

E'en thus the margin which surrounds the well

With one half of their bodies turreted

The horrible giants, whom Jove menaces

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E'en now from out the heavens when he thunders.

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And I of one already saw the face,

Shoulders, and breast, and great part of the belly, And down along his sides both of the arms. Certainly Nature, when she left the making

Of animals like these, did well indeed, By taking such executors from Mars; And if of elephants and whales she doth not

Repent her, whosoever looketh subtly

More just and more discreet will hold her for it;

For where the argument of intellect

Is added unto evil will and power,

No rampart can the people make against it.

His face appeared to me as long and large

As is at Rome the pine-cone of Saint Peter's,
And in proportion were the other bones;

So that the margin, which an apron was

Down from the middle, showed so much of him
Above it, that to reach up to his hair

Three Frieslanders in vain had vaunted them ;
For I beheld thirty great palms of him

Down from the place where man his mantle buckles.

"Raphael mai amech izabi almi,"

Began to clamour the ferocious mouth,

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To which were not befitting sweeter psalms.

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And unto him my Guide: "Soul idiotic,

Keep to thy horn, and vent thyself with that,
When wrath or other passion touches thee.
Search round thy neck, and thou wilt find the belt
Which keeps it fastened, O bewildered soul,
And see it, where it bars thy mighty breast."
Then said to me: "He doth himself accuse;

This one is Nimrod, by whose evil thought
One language in the world is not still used.
Here let us leave him and not speak in vain ;
For even such to him is every language
As his to others, which to none is known."
Therefore a longer journey did we make,

Turned to the left, and a crossbow-shot oft
We found another far more fierce and large.