THE DIVINE COMEDY: Inferno, Purgatorio & Paradiso (3 Classic Translations in One Edition). Dante Alighieri
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СКАЧАТЬ style="font-size:15px;">       Presented me so lav'd, and with their arm

       They each did cover me. "Here are we nymphs,

       And in the heav'n are stars. Or ever earth

       Was visited of Beatrice, we

       Appointed for her handmaids, tended on her.

       We to her eyes will lead thee; but the light

       Of gladness that is in them, well to scan,

       Those yonder three, of deeper ken than ours,

       Thy sight shall quicken." Thus began their song;

       And then they led me to the Gryphon's breast,

       While, turn'd toward us, Beatrice stood.

       "Spare not thy vision. We have stationed thee

       Before the emeralds, whence love erewhile

       Hath drawn his weapons on thee." As they spake,

       A thousand fervent wishes riveted

       Mine eyes upon her beaming eyes, that stood

       Still fix'd toward the Gryphon motionless.

       As the sun strikes a mirror, even thus

       Within those orbs the twofold being, shone,

       For ever varying, in one figure now

       Reflected, now in other. Reader! muse

       How wond'rous in my sight it seem'd to mark

       A thing, albeit steadfast in itself,

       Yet in its imag'd semblance mutable.

       Full of amaze, and joyous, while my soul

       Fed on the viand, whereof still desire

       Grows with satiety, the other three

       With gesture, that declar'd a loftier line,

       Advanc'd: to their own carol on they came

       Dancing in festive ring angelical.

       "Turn, Beatrice!" was their song: "O turn

       Thy saintly sight on this thy faithful one,

       Who to behold thee many a wearisome pace

       Hath measur'd. Gracious at our pray'r vouchsafe

       Unveil to him thy cheeks: that he may mark

       Thy second beauty, now conceal'd." O splendour!

       O sacred light eternal! who is he

       So pale with musing in Pierian shades,

       Or with that fount so lavishly imbued,

       Whose spirit should not fail him in th' essay

       To represent thee such as thou didst seem,

       When under cope of the still-chiming heaven

       Thou gav'st to open air thy charms reveal'd.

       Mine eyes with such an eager coveting,

       Were bent to rid them of their ten years' thirst,

       No other sense was waking: and e'en they

       Were fenc'd on either side from heed of aught;

       So tangled in its custom'd toils that smile

       Of saintly brightness drew me to itself,

       When forcibly toward the left my sight

       The sacred virgins turn'd; for from their lips

       I heard the warning sounds: "Too fix'd a gaze!"

       Awhile my vision labor'd; as when late

       Upon the' o'erstrained eyes the sun hath smote:

       But soon to lesser object, as the view

       Was now recover'd (lesser in respect

       To that excess of sensible, whence late

       I had perforce been sunder'd) on their right

       I mark'd that glorious army wheel, and turn,

       Against the sun and sev'nfold lights, their front.

       As when, their bucklers for protection rais'd,

       A well-rang'd troop, with portly banners curl'd,

       Wheel circling, ere the whole can change their ground:

       E'en thus the goodly regiment of heav'n

       Proceeding, all did pass us, ere the car

       Had slop'd his beam. Attendant at the wheels

       The damsels turn'd; and on the Gryphon mov'd

       The sacred burden, with a pace so smooth,

       No feather on him trembled. The fair dame

       Who through the wave had drawn me, companied

       By Statius and myself, pursued the wheel,

       Whose orbit, rolling, mark'd a lesser arch.

       Through the high wood, now void (the more her blame,

       Who by the serpent was beguil'd) I past

       With step in cadence to the harmony

       Angelic. Onward had we mov'd, as far

       Perchance as arrow at three several flights

       Full wing'd had sped, when from her station down

       Descended Beatrice. With one voice

       All murmur'd "Adam," circling next a plant

       Despoil'd of flowers and leaf on every bough.

       Its tresses, spreading more as more they rose,

       Were such, as 'midst their forest wilds for height

       The Indians might have gaz'd at. "Blessed thou!

       Gryphon, whose beak hath never pluck'd that tree

       Pleasant to taste: for hence the appetite

       Was warp'd to evil." Round the stately trunk

       Thus shouted forth the rest, to whom return'd

       The СКАЧАТЬ