Harvard Classics Volume 20. Golden Deer Classics

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СКАЧАТЬ his own thought, he opened wide his arm

      And took me up. As one, who, while he works,

      Computes his labor’s issue, that he seems

      Still to foresee the effect; so lifting me

      Up to the summit of one peak, he fix’d

      His eye upon another. “Grapple that,”

      Said he, “but first make proof, if it be such

      As will sustain thee.” For one capt with lead

      This were no journey. Scarcely he, though light,

      And I, though onward push’d from crag to crag,

      Could mount. And if the precinct of this coast

      Were not less ample than the last, for him

      I know not, but my strength had surely fail’d.

      But Malebolge all toward the mouth

      Inclining of the nethermost abyss,

      The site of every valley hence requires,

      That one side upward slope, the other fall.

      At length the point from whence the utmost stone

      Juts down, we reach’d; soon as to that arrived,

      So was the breath exhausted from my lungs

      I could no further, but did seat me there.

      “Now needs thy best of man;” so spake my guide:

      “For not on downy plumes, nor under shade

      Of canopy reposing, fame is won;

      Without which whosoe’r consumes his days,

      Leaveth such vestige of himself on earth,

      As smoke in air or foam upon the wave.

      Thou therefore rise: vanquish thy weariness

      By the mind’s effort, in each struggle form’d

      To vanquish, if she suffer not the weight

      Of her corporeal frame to crush her down.

      A longer ladder yet remains to scale.

      From these to have escaped sufficeth not,

      If well thou note me, profit by my words.”

      I straightway rose, and show’d myself less spent

      That I in truth did feel me. “On,” I cried,

      “For I am stout and fearless.” Up the rock

      Our way we held, more rugged than before,

      Narrower, and steeper far to climb. From talk

      I ceased not, as we journey’d, so to seem

      Least faint; whereat a voice from the other foss

      Did issue forth, for utterance suited ill.

      Though on the arch that crosses there I stood,

      What were the words I knew not, but who spake

      Seem’d moved in anger. Down I stoop’d to look;

      But my quick eye might reach not to the depth

      For shrouding darkness; wherefore thus I spake:

      “To the next circle, teacher, bend thy steps,

      And from the wall dismount we; for as hence

      I hear and understand not, so I see

      Beneath, and naught discern.” “I answer not,”

      Said he, “but by the deed. To fair request

      Silent performance maketh best return.”

      We from the bridge’s head descended, where

      To the eighth mound it joins; and then, the chasm

      Opening to view, I saw a crowd within

      Of serpents terrible, so strange of shape

      And hideous, that remembrance in my veins

      Yet shrinks the vital current. Of her sands

      Let Libya vaunt no more: if Jaculus,

      Pareas and Chelyder be her brood,

      Cenchris and Amphisbæna, plagues so dire

      Or in such numbers swarming ne’er she show’d,

      Not with all Ethiopia, and whate’er

      Above the Erythræan sea is spawn’d.

      Amid this dread exuberance of woe

      Ran naked spirits wing’d with horrid fear,

      Nor hope had they of crevice where to hide,

      Or heliotrope to charm them out of view.

      With serpents were their hands behind them bound,

      Which through their reins infix’d the tail and head,

      Twisted in folds before. And lo! on one

      Near to our side, darted an adder up,

      And, where the neck is on the shoulders tied,

      Transpierced him. Far more quickly than e’er pen

      Wrote O or I, he kindled, burn’d, and changed

      To ashes all, pour’d out upon the earth.

      When there dissolved he lay, the dust again

      Uproll’d spontaneous, and the self-same form

      Instant resumed. So mighty sages tell,

      The Arabian Phoenix, when five hundred years

      Have well-nigh circled, dies, and springs forthwith

      Renascent: blade nor herb throughout his life

      He tastes, but tears of frankincense alone

      And odorous amomum: swaths of nard

      And myrrh his funeral shroud. As one that falls,

      He knows not СКАЧАТЬ