Classic Poem

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,
Things native and outlandish things as well;
But never yet to such a monstrous blare
Did I see squadron moving or cohort,
Or ship by landmark or by noted star.
Now had we the ten demons for escort;
Ah, grisly company! but in the church
With saints, with gutlings in the tavern sort.
But all my gaze was on the pitch to search
The valley and its condition, and all those, black
Within it, that the bubbles scald and smirch.
As dolphins, when with arching of the back,
Making to mariners a sign, they bid
Take thought to save the ship from coming wrack,
So, of the pain a moment to be rid,
At whiles some sinners peered above the pitch,
And, in a less time than it lightens, hid.
And as, fringing the water of a ditch,
The frogs stand with their muzzles only out,
And all the rest of them is out of reach,
In such wise stood the sinners all about,
But soon as Beardabristle hastened near
Beneath the boiling slid in panic rout.
I saw, and my heart shakes yet with its fear,
One linger, as 'twill chance that in his nook
One frog remains while the others disappear.
And Houndscratcher up-caught him with his hook,
Being nearest, by his hair that from the slough
Dript tarry, and made him like an otter look.
The name of every fiend I knew by now,
So well I marked them when they first were sent,
And when they called each other, listened how.
" O Scarletfury, see that he be rent
And opened by thy talons, " all the band
Of those accursed cried with one consent.
And I: " O Master, if thou may'st, demand
Who is that lamentable wretch, whose hide
Is fallen into his adversary's hand. "
Thereon my Guide drew closer to his side,
Asking him whence he came; he, so implored,
" I am of the Kingdom of Navarre, " replied.
" My mother placed me as servant of a lord,
For she had borne me to a lewd wastrel
Who self and substance into pleasure poured.
With good King Tybalt then I went to dwell:
With jobbery there did I my purse equip,
For which I pay now in this heat of hell. "
And Swinewallow, at each side of whose lip
Tusks like a hog's projected hideous,
Made him to feel how one of them could rip.
Among malignant cats was come the mouse.
But Beardabristle closed him in embrace
And said: " Stand there, while I enfork him thus. "
And to my Master as he turned his face
" Ask on, " he said, " if more thou wouldest know,
Before another give him deadlier chase. "
The Guide therefore: " Now tell us, knowest thou
Any that is a Latian 'mid your throng
Beneath the pitch? " And he: " I left but now
One of those who to a neighbour isle belong.
Would he still covered me! then could I scorn
To tremble at the threat of claw and prong. "
And Furnacewind cried: " Too much we have borne! "
And with the darted grapnel seized his arm
So that a mangled sinew was off-torn.
Dragonspittle also to do his legs a harm
Had much a mind; but their decurion wheeled
With evil looks and smote them with alarm.
When into quiet they were somewhat quelled,
My Guide to him who still was all at gaze
Upon his wound, without delay appealed.
" Who is it whom thou didst quit, as thy word says,
To come ashore by such a luckless road? "
And he made answer: " Friar Gomita 'twas,
He of Gallura, vessel of every fraud,
Who held his master's enemies in fee
And did so to them that they all applaud.
Coin pouched he, and, as he says, let them go free;
Moreover in his other offices
No jobber small, but prince of jobbers he.
Don Michel Zanche of Logodoro is
With him; their gossip tongues each other match
In speaking of Sardinia without cease.
O me! that other grins, look, on the watch.
I would say more, but fear he longs to wreak
His fury upon me, and my scurf to scratch. "
And their great prefect turned him round to speak
To Farfarel, who rolled his eyes alight
With cruelty, saying: " Away, thou vulture-beak! "
" If you, " resumed that sinner still in fright,
" With folk of Tuscan or of Lombard race
Would hold speech, I will bring them into sight.
But let the Evil Claws retire a space,
That those who come may not their vengeance fear;
And I, still sitting in the self-same place,
One that I am, will gather seven here
By whistling as, when one of us gets out,
Our wont is to make signal to appear. "
Dogsnarler at that word raised up his snout
And shook his head, saying, " Hear that knave's device,
Who plots to cast himself to ground afoot. "
Whereat he who was rich in artifice
Replied: " Too much a knave am I indeed
When I my friends to greater pains entice. "
Hellequin burst forth eager and without heed
Of the others: " If thou drop upon thy feet,
I'll follow thee, not at a runner's speed,
But close above the pitch my wings will beat.
Leave we the height and to the bank resort
For screen, and see if thou our force defeat. "
O thou that readest, thou shalt hear new sport.
All turned their eyes now toward the further side,
He first who most had wished the scheme to thwart.
The Navarrese his moment well espied,
Planted his soles upon the ground, and sprung
In an instant free, and their attack defied.
Then each of them was with compunction stung.
He most through whom their pride had been abased,
Who leapt up with " I've got thee " on his tongue.
Little it availed him; wings were quite outpaced
By terror; and the other dived under,
And he still flying lifted clear his breast.
Not otherwise the duck, aware how near
The falcon is upon her, diveth quick,
And he returns up angry and baulked of her.
But Frostyharrow, furious at the trick,
Kept winging after him, glad in his spite
To have let the knave go, and a quarrel pick.
And when the barrator had slipt from sight
He turned his talons on his fellow-fiend
And gript they hung above the fosse in fight.
But a right sparrow-hawk, full grown, hot-spleened
To claw him well, was the other; and falling, both
In the middle of the boiling pool careened.
Immediately the heat unclutcht them both;
But to rise upward baffled all their wit,
So clogged their wings were with the tarry broth.
Beardabristle with the rest lamenting it
Made four fly over to the further shore
With all their hooks; and in a trice alit
This side and that, each at his post, the four.
They stretched their grapnels out to the limed pair
Whom the hot scum already had scalded sore.
Thus busily embroiled we left them there.