Данте Алигьери – Inferno (страница 21)

And unto me he said: “Turn thee; what dost thou?

Behold there Farinata who has risen;

From the waist upwards wholly shalt thou see him.”

I had already fixed mine eyes on his,

And he uprose erect with breast and front

E’en as if Hell he had in great despite.

And with courageous hands and prompt my Leader

Thrust me between the sepulchres towards him,

Exclaiming, “Let thy words explicit be.”

As soon as I was at the foot of his tomb

Somewhat he eyed me, and, as if disdainful,

Then asked of me, “Who were thine ancestors?”

I, who desirous of obeying was,

Concealed it not, but all revealed to him;

Whereat he raised his brows a little upward.

Then said he: “Fiercely adverse have they been

To me, and to my fathers, and my party;

So that two several times I scattered them.”

“If they were banished, they returned on all sides,”

I answered him, “the first time and the second;

But yours have not acquired that art aright.”

Then there uprose upon the sight, uncovered

Down to the chin, a shadow at his side;

I think that he had risen on his knees.

Round me he gazed, as if solicitude

He had to see if some one else were with me,

But after his suspicion was all spent,

Weeping, he said to me: “If through this blind

Prison thou goest by loftiness of genius,

Where is my son? and why is he not with thee?”

And I to him: “I come not of myself;

He who is waiting yonder leads me here,

Whom in disdain perhaps your Guido had.”

His language and the mode of punishment

Already unto me had read his name;

On that account my answer was so full.

Up starting suddenly, he cried out: “How

Saidst thou,—he had? Is he not still alive?

Does not the sweet light strike upon his eyes?”

When he became aware of some delay,

Which I before my answer made, supine

He fell again, and forth appeared no more.

But the other, magnanimous, at whose desire

I had remained, did not his aspect change,

Neither his neck he moved, nor bent his side.

“And if,” continuing his first discourse,

“They have that art,” he said, “not learned aright,

That more tormenteth me, than doth this bed.

But fifty times shall not rekindled be

The countenance of the Lady who reigns here,

Ere thou shalt know how heavy is that art;

And as thou wouldst to the sweet world return,

Say why that people is so pitiless

Against my race in each one of its laws?”

Whence I to him: “The slaughter and great carnage

Which have with crimson stained the Arbia, cause

Such orisons in our temple to be made.”

After his head he with a sigh had shaken,

“There I was not alone,” he said, “nor surely

Without a cause had with the others moved.

But there I was alone, where every one

Consented to the laying waste of Florence,

He who defended her with open face.”

“Ah! so hereafter may your seed repose,”

I him entreated, “solve for me that knot,