| 1 |
“Behold the beast with the pointed tail, that passes through mountains and pierces walls and armor! Behold the one that makes the whole world stink!” |
| 4 |
So my leader began speaking to me; and he gestured to it to come ashore near the end of our marble pathway. |
| 7 |
And that filthy image of fraud came over and beached its head and chest, but did not draw up its tail as far as the bank. |
| 10 |
Its face was that of a just man, so kindly seemed its outer skin, and the rest of its torso was that of a serpent; |
| 13 |
it had two paws, hairy to the armpits; it had back and breast and both sides painted with knots and little wheels: |
| 16 |
with more colors, in weave and embroidery, did never Tartars nor Turks make cloths, nor did Arachne string the loom for such tapestries. |
| 19 |
As skiffs lie on the shore at times, partly in water and partly on land, and as there among the drunken Germans |
| 22 |
the beaver positions itself to wage its war: so the wicked beast rested on the rim of stone that encloses the sand. |
| 25 |
In the emptiness all its tail was wriggling, twisting upward the poisoned fork that armed its tip like a scorpion’s. |
| 28 |
My leader said: “Now our path must bend a little toward the evil beast that lies over there.” |
| 31 |
Therefore we descended toward the right breast and made ten paces to the edge, to be well beyond the sand and the flames. |
| 34 |
And when we had reached it, a little further, on the sand, I see people sitting near the empty place. |
| 37 |
There my master said to me: “That you may carry away full experience of this subcircle, go, and see their behavior. |
| 40 |
Let your speech there be brief; until you return, I will speak with this beast, that it may grant us its strong shoulders.” |
| 43 |
So once more along the outer edge of that seventh circle I walked all alone, where the mournful people were sitting. |
| 46 |
Through their eyes burst forth their pain; here, there, they sought remedy with their hands at times against the fire, at times against the hot ground; |
| 49 |
not otherwise do the dogs behave in the summer, now with muzzle, now with foot, when they are bitten by fleas or gnats or horseflies. |
| 52 |
When I turned my eyes to their faces, on which the painful fire falls down, I recognized none; but I perceived |
| 55 |
that from the neck of each hung a bag of a special color, with a special emblem, and their eyes seem to feed there. |
| 58 |
And as I come gazing among them, on a yellow purse I saw blue that had the shape and bearing of a lion. |
| 61 |
Then, proceeding further with my scrutiny, I saw another, red as blood, displaying a goose whiter than butter. |
| 64 |
And one who had his little white sack signed with a fat blue sow, said to me: “What are you doing in this ditch? |
| 67 |
Now go away; and since you are alive, too, know that my neighbor Vitaliano will sit here at my left flank. |
| 70 |
With these Florentines I am a Paduan: often they thunder in my ears shouting, ‘Let the reigning knight come down, |
| 73 |
who will bring the bag with the three goats.’” Here he twisted his mouth and stuck out his tongue, like an ox licking its snout. |
| 76 |
And I, fearing lest a longer stay might displease him who had warned me to be brief, turned back, away from those weary souls. |
| 79 |
I found my leader had climbed already onto the fierce animal’s rump, and he told me: “Now be strong and bold: |
| 82 |
henceforth we descend by stairs like these. Mount in front, for I wish to be between, so that its tail can do no harm.” |
| 85 |
Like one whose fit of the quartan fever is so close that his nails are already pale and he trembles all over merely looking at the shade: |
| 88 |
so I became at the words I heard; but shame made its threats, that makes a servant bold in the presence of a good lord. |
| 91 |
I positioned myself on those monstrous shoulders; “Yes,” I wanted to say, but my voice did not come as I expected: “Be sure to hold me.” |
| 94 |
But he, who had supported me at other times, in other dangers, as soon as I mounted clasped and braced me with his arms; |
| 97 |
and he said: “Geryon, now move; make your wheelings large, your descent slow: consider the new weight you carry.” |
| 100 |
As a little boat moves from its place backward, backward, so he moved thence; and when he felt himself entirely free, |
| 103 |
he turned his tail where his breast had been, and, extending it, he moved it like an eel’s, and gathered the air to himself with his paws. |
| 106 |
I believe there was no greater fear when Phaethon abandoned the reins, so that the sky was scorched, as still appears, |
| 109 |
nor when the wretched Icarus felt his loins unfeathering because of the heated wax, as his father shouted to him, “You’re on a bad course!” |
| 112 |
than was mine, when I saw that I was in the air on every side, and every sight put out save that of the beast. |
| 115 |
It goes along swimming slowly, slowly; it wheels and descends, but I perceive its motion only by the wind on my face from below. |
| 118 |
I could already hear at my right hand the torrent making a horrible roar beneath us, and so I lean out my head, looking down. |
| 121 |
Then I became more afraid of falling, for I saw fires and heard weeping; so that all trembling I huddled back. |
| 124 |
And then I saw what I had not seen before, our descending and turning against the great evils that came closer on every side. |
| 127 |
As when a falcon has been long on the wing and, without seeing lure or prey, makes the falconer say, “Oh me, you are coming down!” |
| 130 |
descending weary to the place it swiftly left, with a hundred circlings, and lands far from its master, full of disdain and spite: |
| 133 |
so Geryon placed us on the bottom, at the very foot of the vertical rock, and, our persons unloaded, |
| 136 |
disappeared like the notch from the bowstring. |
