| 1 |
In that part of the youthful year when the sun tempers its locks under Aquarius and already the nights are moving south, |
| 4 |
when on the ground the frost copies the image of her white sister, but her pen retains its temper only briefly, |
| 7 |
the peasant, his provisions running short, rises to look, and sees the fields all white; and he strikes his thigh, |
| 10 |
goes back in his house, and complains here and there, like a wretch who knows not what to do; then he goes forth again and stores hope in his wicker basket again, |
| 13 |
seeing the face of the world has changed in a short time; and he takes his crook and drives the little sheep forth to pasture: |
| 16 |
so my master made me lose confidence, when I saw his brow so clouded, and just as quickly he applied the plaster to the wound; |
| 19 |
for, when we came to the ruined bridge, my leader turned to me with the sweet expression I first saw at the foot of the mountain. |
| 22 |
After first having taken counsel with himself by examining the ruin carefully, he opened his arms and took hold of me. |
| 25 |
And like one who uses judgment as he acts, always seeming to look ahead, so, carrying me up to the top |
| 28 |
of one rock, he would look to another great splinter, saying: “Pull yourself up to that one next, but first test whether it will hold your weight”. |
| 31 |
It was not a path for anyone wearing a cloak, since only with difficulty, though he was light and I was pushed from below, were we able to climb from outcrop to outcrop. |
| 34 |
And were it not that there the wall was shorter than on the other side, I do not know about him, but I would have been quite overcome; |
| 37 |
but because all Malebolge slopes toward the opening of the lowest pit, the nature of each valley requires |
| 40 |
that one wall be steep, the other low. Finally we reached the point where the last rock had broken off. |
| 43 |
My breath was so milked from my lungs when I arrived there that I could go no further, but rather sat down as soon as we arrived. |
| 46 |
“From now on you will have to cast off sloth in this way,” said my master, “for one does not gain fame sitting on down cushions, or while under coverlets; |
| 49 |
and whoever consumes his life without fame leaves a mark of himself on earth like smoke in the air or foam in water. |
| 52 |
And therefore stand up; conquer your panting with the spirit that conquers in every battle, if it does not let the heavy body crush it down. |
| 55 |
A longer ladder must we climb; it is not enough to have left those others behind. If you understand me, now act so that it may help you”. |
| 58 |
I stood up then, pretending to be better furnished with breath than I felt, and said: “Go, for I am strong and bold”. |
| 61 |
Up along the ridge we took our way, which was jagged, narrow, and difficult, and much steeper than the last. |
| 64 |
I was speaking as I went, so as not to seem feeble; and then a voice came from the next ditch, unapt to form words. |
| 67 |
I do not know what it said, although I was already mounting the arch that crosses there, but the speaker seemed to be moved to anger. |
| 70 |
I was looking downward, but my sharp eyes could not attain the bottom, because of the dark; and I: “Master, when you reach |
| 73 |
the next belt, let us descend from the ridge; for as from here I hear but cannot understand, so I look down but make nothing out”. |
| 76 |
“No other reply,” he said, “do I give than action; for a virtuous request should be obeyed without discussion”. |
| 79 |
We came down from the bridgehead where it joins the eighth bank, and then the pouch was made manifest to me; |
| 82 |
and I saw within it a terrible crowding of serpents, and of such a strange kind that the memory still curdles my blood. |
| 85 |
Let Libya brag of its sands no more; for if it produces chelydri, jaculi, and phareae, and chenchres with amphisbaenae, |
| 88 |
never did it show so many pestilences nor so poisonous, together with all Ethiopia and what lies beyond the Red Sea. |
| 91 |
Amid this harsh and savage plenty were running naked, terrified people, without hope of a crevice or a heliotrope: |
| 94 |
their hands were bound behind them with snakes; these thrust through the loins their tails and heads and were knotted in front. |
| 97 |
And behold, a serpent hurled itself at one near our bank and transfixed him where the neck is knotted to the shoulders. |
| 100 |
Neither O nor I has ever been written so fast as he caught fire and burned and was all consumed, falling, to ashes; |
| 103 |
and when he was on the ground, destroyed, the dust gathered together by itself and instantly became the same one again. |
| 106 |
Thus the great sages profess that the Phoenix dies and is reborn, when it approaches its five hundredth year; |
| 109 |
in its life it eats neither grass nor grain but only tears of incense and of balsam, and nard and myrrh are its winding sheet. |
| 112 |
And like one who falls, he knows not how, by the force of a demon that pulls him to the earth or of some other occlusion that can bind a man, |
| 115 |
when he stands up he gazes about all dismayed by the great anguish he has suffered, and sighs as he looks: |
| 118 |
such was the sinner when he stood up. Oh the power of God, how severe it is, what torrents of punishment it pours forth! |
| 121 |
My leader then asked him who he was; and he replied: “I rained down from Tuscany, not long ago, into this fierce throat. |
| 124 |
Bestial life pleased me, not human, mule that I was; I am Vanni Fucci the beast, and Pistoia was a worthy lair for me”. |
| 127 |
And I to my leader: “Tell him not to sneak off, and ask him what sin drove him down here; for I saw him a bloody, wrathful man”. |
| 130 |
And the sinner, who heard, did not feign, but turned to me his mind and his face and was covered with sad shame; |
| 133 |
then he said: “It pains me more to be caught in the wretchedness where you see me than when I was taken from the other life. |
| 136 |
I cannot refuse what you ask: I am placed so far down because I stole the beautiful appointments from the sacristy, |
| 139 |
and it was falsely blamed on others. But lest you joy in seeing me, if you ever get out of these dark places, |
| 142 |
open your ears to my message, and listen. Pistoia first thins itself of Blacks; then Florence makes new its laws and people. |
| 145 |
Mars draws from Val di Magra a hot wind wrapped in roiling clouds, and with impetuous, bitter violence |
