The Divine Comedy — Dante Alighieri

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182 HELL. Cahto XXXIV. And came unto our hemisphere : maybe To fly from him, it left this empty space, *^ And formed a mount above, as there you'lt see." From Beelzebub remote, there is a place Which to such deeps below its grave extends, That not by sight, but by the sound we trace. Made by a rivulet which there descends Through a rock's fissure, the rock worn away By its current, with it gently sloping wends. My chief and I by that mysterious way Entered, the world of light again to find : i^or with the thought of rest did we delay. But clambered up, he first, and I behind. Until I witnessed through that rpunded bore The things so fair athwart the heavens that shined. And issued thence to see the stars once more. Line 126. The moniitain of Purgatory, placed by Dante in mid-oceani in the Antipodes.

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PURGATORY.

CANTO I. Dante describes the calm delight he experienced at issuing to the tender light of early morning from the black night of Hell. The poets meet the shade of Gato of Utica, the appointed guardian of the mountain of Purgatory. On his direction they proce^ to the seashore, and there Virgil washes from Dante's face with dew the stains of Hell, and girds him with the reeds that grow there. To steer o'er fairer waters hoists her sail Henceforth the little vessel of my brain, That leaves behind such cruel sea of bale. And I will sing now of that second reign In which the human spirit grows clear, * And worthy to ascend to Heaven's domain. But here dead Poesy must reappear, O sacred Muses, since I'm wholly your, And Oalliopea must assist me here, With her sweet sounds accompanying the line, ^® At which the miserable magpies felt Their crime so great, they pardon ne'er could win. The dulcet hues of orient sapphire melt, And gathered all into serenest light Of the pure air unto the farthest belt, ^ So that my eyes returned to new delight. Soon as I issued from the lethal air. Which had oppressed my breast and dimmed my sight. Aye dedicate to love, the planet fair Made all the Eastern sky iiTadiate smile, ^ The Pisces veiling, who escort her there. Unto the right I turned and gazed awhile On the other Pole, and saw four glorious stars, Ne'er seen since Eden's vale was lost by guile. Line 11. The daughters of Pierius, who, having challenged the Muses to sing against them, were changed into magpies at their presumptuous failure. Line 23. The four stars intended by the poet are the four cardinal virtues, as he tells us in Canto XXXI. Dante places the terrestrial Eden on the top

134 PURGATORY. Cahto I. Heaven seems to revel in their flaming cars ; ^ O widowed North, how is your glory sheared Since that sweet vision Nature from you bars ! As from their gaze my eyes at length I veered Towards the other Pole a little thrown, There, where the Wain ere now had disappeared, ^ I saw beside me there an old man lone. Worthy of every reverence in his air. More than a father claims from a son. His beard was long, and mixed with whitened hair, Like to the hoary locks that graced his head, '' And on his breast in double folds fell fair. The rays of those four stars so holy shed Their glory on his face, and so adorn, That him I saw as 'twere the sun overhead. " Who then are you who 'gainst yon river lorn *^ Prom the eternal prison take your flight?" Speaking there moved his beard with honour worn : " Who here has guided you ? or who was light ? Issuing outwards from the night profound, Which ever makes black the infernal pit. ** Are thus the laws of the abyss unbound ? Or does new counsel now in Heaven arise That souls condemned should wander to my ground P" My leader me with tender hands did seize, And with his words, and hands, and signs the same, ^ In reverent posture bent my limbs and eyes ; Then answered : " Of myself I never came. A lady wended from the sky, whose prayer For him my company in aid did claim. But since 'tis your desire that I declare " More fully our condition, truly dight. My will to oppose your own would never dare. This one has not yet seen his latest night. But by his madness death was near effected. And very little time was left for flight. ** As I have said, for this I was directed To save him, and there was no other way Than this one which I took, and him protected. To him the impious race I did display, And now intend to show those spirits here, » Who purge themselves of sin beneath your sway. of his mountain of Fnrgatory, from whence the firstparenta eaw these stars, sinoe unseen by man, in the other hemisphere, llie oonstellafcion of the Southern Cross most have appeared to the first voyagers in the Southeni Ocean, the same stars which Dante saw in vision.