They built their city over those dead bones, And, after her who first the place selected, Its people once within more crowded were, From Pinamonte had received deceit. No falsehood may the verity defraud." And I: "My master, thy discourses are To me so certain, and so take my faith, If any one note-worthy thou beholdest, Thrusts out his beard upon his swarthy shoulders Was, at the time when Greece was void of males, So that there scarce remained one in the cradle, the moment, gave An and with Calchas augur, In Aulis, when to sever the first cable. Eryphylus his name was, and so sings My lofty Tragedy in some part or other; 95 100 105 110 That knowest thou well, who knowest the whole of it. The next, who is so slender in the flanks, Of magical illusions knew the game. Who now unto his leather and his thread repents. Would fain have stuck, but he too late Behold the wretched ones, who left the needle, 115 120 The spool and rock, and made them fortune-tellers; But come now, for already holds the confines Of both the hemispheres, and under Seville And yesternight the moon was round already; Thou shouldst remember well it did not harm thee From time to time within the forest deep." Thus spake he to me, and we walked the while. 125 130 CANTO XXI. FROM bridge to bridge thus, speaking other things Of which my Comedy cares not to sing, We came along, and held the summit, when We halted to behold another fissure Of Malebolge and other vain laments; And I beheld it marvellously dark. As in the Arsenal of the Venetians Boils in the winter the tenacious pitch To smear their unsound vessels o'er again, For sail they cannot; and instead thereof One makes his vessel new, and one recaulks The ribs of that which many a voyage has made; One hammers at the prow, one at the stern, This one makes oars, and that one cordage twists, Thus, not by fire, but by the art divine, Was boiling down below there a dense pitch 5 10 15 I saw it, but I did not see within it Aught but the bubbles that the boiling raised, And all swell up and resubside compressed. The while below there fixedly I gazed, My Leader, crying out: "Beware, beware!" To see what it behoves him to escape, Running along upon the crag, approach. And how he seemed to me in action ruthless, His shoulders, which sharp-pointed were and high, A sinner did encumber with both haunches, And he held clutched the sinews of the feet. From off our bridge, he said: "O Malebranche, Behold one of the elders of Saint Zita; Plunge him beneath, for I return for others Unto that town, which is well furnished with them. All there are barrators, except Bonturo; 20 25 30 35 40 He hurled him down, and over the hard crag Turned round, and never was a mastiff loosened But the demons, under cover of the bridge, Immerse into the middle of the caldron The meat with hooks, so that it may not float. Apparent thou art here, crouch thyself down And for no outrage that is done to me Be thou afraid, because these things I know, For once before was I in such a scuffle." Then he passed on beyond the bridge's head, And as upon the sixth bank he arrived, Need was for him to have a steadfast front. 45 50 55 60 65 |