The divine comedy · Dante Alighieri
CANTO XXVIII
Who, e’en in words unfetter’d, might at full Tell of the wounds and blood that now I saw, Though he repeated oft the tale? No tongue So vast a theme could equal, speech and thought Both impotent alike. If in one band Collected, stood the people all, who e’er Pour’d on Apulia’s happy soil their blood, Slain by the Trojans, and in that long war When of the rings the measur’d booty made A pile so high, as Rome’s historian writes Who errs not, with the multitude, that felt The grinding force of Guiscard’s Norman steel, And those the rest, whose bones are gather’d yet At Ceperano, there where treachery Branded th’ Apulian name, or where beyond Thy walls, O Tagliacozzo, without arms The old Alardo conquer’d; and his limbs One were to show transpierc’d, another his Clean lopt away; a spectacle like this Were but a thing of nought, to the hideous sight Of the ninth chasm. A rundlet, that hath lost Its middle or side stave, gapes not so wide, As one I mark’d, torn from the chin throughout Down to the hinder passage: ’twixt the legs Dangling his entrails hung, the midriff lay Open to view, and wretched ventricle, That turns th’ englutted aliment to dross. Whilst eagerly I fix on him my gaze, He ey’d me, with his hands laid his breast bare, And cried; “Now mark how I do rip me! lo!
“And there instruct the twain, whom Fano boasts Her worthiest sons, Guido and Angelo, That if ’t is giv’n us here to scan aright The future, they out of life’s tenement Shall be cast forth, and whelm’d under the waves Near to Cattolica, through perfidy Of a fell tyrant. ’Twixt the Cyprian isle And Balearic, ne’er hath Neptune seen An injury so foul, by pirates done Or Argive crew of old. That one-ey’d traitor (Whose realm there is a spirit here were fain His eye had still lack’d sight of) them shall bring To conf’rence with him, then so shape his end, That they shall need not ’gainst Focara’s wind Offer up vow nor pray’r.” I answering thus: “Declare, as thou dost wish that I above May carry tidings of thee, who is he, In whom that sight doth wake such sad remembrance?” Forthwith he laid his hand on the cheek-bone Of one, his fellow-spirit, and his jaws Expanding, cried: “Lo! this is he I wot of; He speaks not for himself: the outcast this Who overwhelm’d the doubt in Caesar’s mind, Affirming that delay to men prepar’d Was ever harmful. “Oh how terrified Methought was Curio, from whose throat was cut The tongue, which spake that hardy word. Then one Maim’d of each hand, uplifted in the gloom The bleeding stumps, that they with gory spots Sullied his face, and cried: ‘Remember thee Of Mosca, too, I who, alas! exclaim’d, “The deed once done there is an end,” that prov’d A seed of sorrow to the Tuscan race.”
I added: “Ay, and death to thine own tribe.” Whence heaping woe on woe he hurried off, As one grief-stung to madness. But I there Still linger’d to behold the troop, and saw Things, such as I may fear without more proof To tell of, but that conscience makes me firm, The boon companion, who her strong breast-plate Buckles on him, that feels no guilt within And bids him on and fear not. Without doubt I saw, and yet it seems to pass before me, A headless trunk, that even as the rest Of the sad flock pac’d onward. By the hair It bore the sever’d member, lantern-wise Pendent in hand, which look’d at us and said, “Woe’s me!” The spirit lighted thus himself, And two there were in one, and one in two. How that may be he knows who ordereth so. When at the bridge’s foot direct he stood, His arm aloft he rear’d, thrusting the head Full in our view, that nearer we might hear The words, which thus it utter’d: “Now behold This grievous torment, thou, who breathing go’st To spy the dead; behold if any else Be terrible as this. And that on earth Thou mayst bear tidings of me, know that I Am Bertrand, he of Born, who gave King John The counsel mischievous. Father and son I set at mutual war. For Absalom And David more did not Ahitophel, Spurring them on maliciously to strife. For parting those so closely knit, my brain Parted, alas! I carry from its source, That in this trunk inhabits. Thus the law Of retribution fiercely works in me.”
Text from Project Gutenberg, public domain in the United States.