Classic Poem

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
The others, and even Prato, thirst to wreak.
If it were now, not too soon would it be.
Since come it must, I would that come it were,
For, with each year, heavier it is for me.
Thence we departed; and by that same stair
Which served for our descent, of ledges frayed,
My Guide climbed back, and me with him up-bare.
And as our solitary way we made
Among the juts and splinters of the scarp,
The foot sped not without the hand to aid.
Then did I grieve, and grief returneth sharp,
Seeing what I saw in memory, and I rein
More than of wont my genius, lest it warp
And run where Virtue is not to constrain,
So that if good star or aught better still
Have thus enriched me, I may not lose the gain.
Like fire-flies that the peasant on the hill
Reposing in that season, when he who shines
To light our world his face doth least conceal,
At the hour when fly to humming gnat resigns,
Sees glimmering down along the valley broad,
There, where, it may be, he toils among the vines, —
So numerous the flames in the Eighth Chasm glowed
Down all its depth, laid open to mine eyes
Soon as I came to where the bottom showed.
As he who avenged him by the bears saw rise
The fiery chariot that Elijah bore
With horses mounting straight into the skies,
For follow it with his eyes he could not more
Than to behold only the flame serene
Like to a little cloud above him soar,
Thus moved along the throat of that ravine
Each flame, for what it stole it doth not show,
And within each a sinner is, unseen.
I stood upon the bridge, rising tip-toe.
Had I not caught a rock and on it leant
I should have fallen, without thrust or blow.
The Guide, who saw me gazing thus attent,
Said: " Within these fires are the spirits confined,
Burned by the shroud within which they are pent. "
" Master, " I answered, " this had I divined
Myself already, which thou makest plain.
And ev'n now was the question in my mind:
Who is in that fire which comes so torn in twain
As if it rose above the pyre that hearsed
Eteocles beside his brother slain? "
He answered me: " Ulysses there is cursed,
And with him Diomed; as in wrath erewhile
Together, so together now amerced.
They in their flame, tormented for old guile,
Bemoan the Horse whose wooden ambuscade
The gentle seed of Romans did exile.
And they lament the wrong, whereby the shade
Of Deidamia for Achilles rues;
And for Palladium stolen are they paid. "
" If they within those sparks a voice can use,
Master, " I said, " I pray thee of thy grace —
A thousand times I'll pray thee, if thou refuse —
Forbid me not to tarry in this place
Until the horned flame blow hitherward:
See, toward it how the longing bends my face. "
And he to me: " The thing thou hast implored
Deserveth praise: and for that cause thy need
Is answered: yet refrain thy tongue from word.
Leave me to speak, for well thy wish I read.
But they, since they were Greeks, might turn aside,
It may be, and thy voice disdain to heed. "
When that the fire had come, where to my Guide
Time and the place seemed fit, I heard him frame
His speech upon this manner, as he cried:
" O ye who are two within a single flame,
If any merit I of you have won,
If merit, much or little, had my name,
When the great verse I made beneath the sun,
Move not, but let the one of you be heard
Tell where he went to perish, being undone. "
The greater horn of the ancient flame was stirred
To shudder and make a murmur, like a fire
When in the wind it struggles and is blurred,
Then tossed upon a flickering crest yet higher,
As it had been a tongue that spoke, it cast
A voice forth from the strength of its desire,
Saying: " When I from Circe broke at last,
Who more than a year by Gaeta (before
Aeneas had so named it) held me fast,
Not sweet son, nor revered old father, nor
The long-due love which was to have made glad
Penelope for all the pain she bore,
Could conquer the inward hunger that I had
To master earth's experience, and to attain
Knowledge of man's mind, both the good and bad.
But I put out on the deep, open main
With one ship only, and with that little band
Which chose not to desert me; far as Spain,
Far as Morocco, either shore I scanned.
Sardinia's isle I coasted, steering true,
And the isles of which that water bathes the strand.
I and my crew were old and stiff of thew
When, at the narrow pass, we could discern
The marks that Hercules set far in view
That none should dare beyond, or further learn.
Already I had Sevilla on the right,
And on the larboard Ceuta lay astern.
" Brother," I said, " who manfully, despite
Ten thousand perils, have attained the West,
In the brief vigil that remains of light
To feel in, stoop not to renounce the quest
Of what may in the sun's path be essayed,
The world that never mankind hath possessed.
Think on the seed ye spring from! Ye were made
Not to live life of brute beasts of the field
But follow virtue and knowledge unafraid."
With such few words their spirit so I steel'd,
That I thereafter scarce could have contained
My comrades from the voyage, had I willed.
And, our poop turned to where the Morning reigned,
We made, for the mad flight, wings of our oars,
And on the left continually we gained.
By now the Night beheld within her course
All stars of the other pole, and ours so low,
It was not lifted from the ocean-floors.
Five times beneath the moon rekindled slow
The light had been, and quenched as oft, since we
Broached the hard issue we were sworn to know,
When there arose a mountain in the sea,
Dimm'd by the distance: loftier than aught
That ever I beheld, it seemed to be.
Then we rejoiced; but soon to grief were brought.
A storm came out of the strange land, and found
The ship, and violently the forepart caught.
Three times it made her to spin round and round
With all the waves; and, as Another chose,
The fourth time, heaved the poop up, the prow drowned,
Till over us we heard the waters close. "