CANTO XXVIII

Who even with words untrammelled, though 'twere told
Over and over, could tell full the tale
Of blood and wounds before me now unrolled?
Truly there is no tongue that could avail,
Seeing that our speech and memory are small
And for so great a comprehension fail.
Nay, were it possible to assemble all
Who of old upon Apulia's fated soil

CANTO XXVII

Quieted now, the flame rose all upright,
Having no more to speak, and with the accord
Of the sweet poet was moving from our sight
When another, that came on behind it, toward
Its summit caused us to direct our eyes
Because of the wild sound that from it roared.
As the Sicilian bull, that with the cries
Of him (and it was justice) bellowed first

CANTO XXVI

Rejoice , Florence, because thy fame is flown
Over earth and sea, winging the heavenly vault,
And even through Hell's regions is it known.
Among the Thieves I found five of that fault
Thy citizens, whence shame comes to my cheek,
Nor thou thine honour greatly dost exalt.
But if the truth in dream of morning speak,
Thou shalt in short time feel what upon thee

CANTO XXV

When he had made an end, the thief exclaimed,
Raising his hands with both the figs on high:
" Take thou them, God; at thee, at thee they are aimed. "
Thenceforth the serpents were no enemy
To me; for round his neck, as if it hissed
Thou speak'st no more! one coiled and clung thereby.
Another about his arms began to twist
And tighten, prisoning him in front so fast,

CANTO XXIV

I N that part of the young year when the Sun
Beneath Aquarius warms his beaming locks
And toward the South the nights begin to run,
And when upon the ground the hoar-frost mocks
With likeness her white sister's effigy,
But soon are blurred that limner's pencilled strokes,
The peasant, who hath nothing now laid by,
Rises and looks and sees the fields and lanes

CANTO XXIII

Silent , lonely, and with no company,
One before and one after, as on their way
Journey the Minor Friars, journeyed we.
My thought, that lingered on the present fray,
Was turned to Aesop and his fable, where
The frog would the inveigled mouse betray.
For Yes and Yea make not a better pair
Than that with this case, if but with good heed

CANTO XXII

I HAVE seen horsemen moving camp to arm
For the assault, and mustering band by band,
And other whiles retiring at the alarm;
I have seen chargers stamp upon your land,
O Aretines, and foray sweep pell-mell,
The clash of tourneys, and the tilt-yard manned,
To trumpets now and now to beaten bell,
To drums and turret-beacons from afar,

CANTO XXI

From bridge to bridge we came, with other talk
Which to recite my Comedy hath no care,
Keeping the summit of the stony baulk.
Then stopt we, on Malebolge's following lair
To look, and other vain lamenting moil;
And marvellously dark I found it there.
As the Venetians in their arsenal boil
The lumps of pitch in winter, stiff as glue,

CANTO XX

New verses of new pangs must I compose
To fill the first book's twentieth canto and tell
Of the submerged spirits and their woes.
I was now stationed so that I could well
Look down into the new discovered deep
Bathed in the tears of anguish as they fell.
In the round valley I saw a people weep
As they came on, all silent, at the pace

CANTO XIX

O S IMON Magus , O lost wretches led,
By thee, who prostitute the things that need,
Being things of God, with goodness to be wed;
Who gape for gold and silver, mouths of greed!
For you now must the trumpet blow the doom,
For in the third chasm is your place decreed.
To the next hollow we had already come
And, mounted on the baulk, were in that part