The Divine Comedy — Dante Alighieri

CANTO xxrx. Dante still lingem, gazing on the maimed spirits in the ninth valley, in anticipation of seeing there a relation who had been murdered, and whose death his family had not avenged. He then follows Virgil over the ridge which crowns the last ward of Malebolge, in which are punished fabifiers of various descriptions. Descending into the valley, he finds them afflicted with fearful diseases, and discourses with two alchemists, Grif olino of Arezzo and Capocchio of Siena. The various wounds and people crowded deep, As if with drunkenness my eyes did blear, That they were anxious but to rest and weep. But Virgil said to me : " At what do peer ? Wherefore your vision does it still so strain * Downwards amongst those shadows, maimed and drear P In the other valleys you were not so fain. Think, if you would their number calculate. Twenty-two miles encircles this domain. The moon already is beneath our feet, ^® And little of our granted time does bide. And there is more to see than you do weet." ** If you had only," straightway I replied, ** Perceived the reason why that gaze was bent. Perchance to tarry you had not denied." '* He moved in part, and I behind him went. My leader having given his reply, I added yet : " Within that cavern pent, On which I kept my eyes so fixedly, I think a spirit of my blood does wail 20 The crime which costs below such misery." Then said my master : " Let not grief assail Your thoughts concerning hira from henceforth more. Think of the rest ; let him remain in bale. For I beheld him stand our bridge before, ^ With threatening finger point you to the host. Geri del Bello was the name he bore. You were entirely at that time engrost On him who Altaforte's keep did hold. So that you look'dst not there till he was lost." ^ Line 27. Geri del BeUo was a kinsman of the poet's, and assassinated by one of the Sacchetti family. It is clear that Dante considered the reproach of the spirit that his death had not been avenged by any of them who shared the shame of it to be a just one. Line 29. Bertram, Viscomte of Hautefort.

110 HELL.. Cahto XXIX. " O leader mine, the violent death and bold, "Which has not been avenged as yet," I said, " By any who with him this shame does hold, Made him disdainful, hence away he sped, Without addressing me, as now I think More pity towards him hence in me is bred.' Thus did we speak imtil we reached the brink, Which from the rock the other vale would show. Did not the light from its abysses shrink. When we were on that cloister, the last woe Of Malebolge, so that to our sight All its lay brothers might be seen below. Various lamentings on me darting smite, Whose arrows were so barbed with misery That with my hands my ears I closed outright. Such dolor as would be, if 'twixt July And drear September, from each hospital Of Yaldichiana and Maremma nigh. The sick within one pit were gathered all ; Such was there here, and rose such odour rank As wont to rise from limbs that rot and crawl. Then downwards we descended the last bank Of the long bridge, and leftwards still we slant. And then my vision with more clearness sank Down to the bottom, where the ministrant Of the Most High, Justice in&llible, The falsifiers punish in that haunt. I think not that a sadder sight befell When in Egina all the people sickened, What time the air was faVL of plagues so fell That even on the beasts death's harvest thickened, Down to the worm, and the human race revives From seed of ants miracidously quickened. According as the poet world believes. Than 'twas to witness in that valley black The spirits languish in their various sheaves. This on his belly, that upon his back. One on the other lav, one on all four Shifted his place along that wretched track. Line 48. The valley through which rans the river Ghianawas in those times as unhealthy in autumn as the pestilential swamps of the Maremma on the coast of Tuscany. Line 59. All the inhabitants of Egina having died of plagoe, the king obtained from Jupiter that a large ants' nest should be changed into men to repeople his island. Ovid's " Metam.," book vii.

Canto XXIX. HELL. Ill Without a word we slowlj journeyed o'er, ''" Listening and ever gazing on the sick, Who could not raise their bodies from the floor. Two saw I 'gainst each other placed oblique, As in the kitchen pan 'gainst pan is laid, Prom head to foot with dry scabs spotted thick. '* I never saw a currycomb so frayed By stable lad beneath his master's eye, Or when unwillingly from sleep delayed. As each one aye his nails' keen bite did ply Upon himself, through madness that assails ^^ From the wild itching without remedy. And so there downwards peeled the scabs, their nails, As does a knife the coat of a sardine Or otiier fish furnished with larger scales. ** You witJi your fingers who your mail do skin," Began my leader unto one of these, " -£id often tum'st them into pincers keen, Tell me if any 'mid these companies Is Latin, so I pray your naU may last In this its task tlurough the eternities." ^* We are Italian, whom you seest aghast, Both of us here," the one with wails replied ; ** But who art you who from us this have askt ?" " I'm one who here descends," my leader cried, " With this a living man from round to round ®* I purpose Hell to show him as his guide." Then was their mutual support unbound, And each one turned to me in trembling fear. With all the rest, who'd heard at the rebound. My gentle master unto me drew near. Saying : " Whate'er you wishest to them speak,'* And I at once obeyed his dictate clear. " So that your memory may not grow weak In himian minds upon the primal earth, But that for many years it life may take, ^^ Tell me now who you are, and of what birth. Let not your weary pain, undignified, . Deter you from your story setting forth." ** I was D'Arezzo," one of them replied. '* Albero of Siena sent me to the flame, ^^^ But here I am not doomed for what I died. Line 109. Grifolino d'Areszo was burnt at the stake by a bishop of Siena as a necromancer on the instijcation of a nephew of the latter, Albero, for the simple reason given in the text.