Inferno Xxiii
INFERNO XXIII
Silent, alone, and unescorted →
we went on, one in front, the other following,
3 as Friars Minor walk along the roads.
The brawl played out before our eyes →
put me in mind of Aesop’s fable
6 in which he told the tale of frog and mouse,
for ‘issa’ and ‘mo’ are not more like in meaning
than one case and the other, if we compare
9 with circumspection their beginnings and their ends.
Just as one thought issues from another,
so, from the first, another now was born
12 that made me twice as fearful as before.
I thought, ’It’s our fault they have been cheated,
and with such hurt and shame
15 I’m sure it must enrage them.
‘If rage is added to their malice,
they will pursue us still more cruelly
18 than the hound that sets his fangs into a hare.’
I could feel my scalp go taut with fear →
and kept my thoughts fixed just behind me
21 as I spoke: ‘Master, can’t you quickly
‘hide yourself and me? I am in terror
of the Malebranche; I sense them there behind us,
24 imagine them so clear I almost hear them.’
And he: ‘If I were made of leaded glass →
I could not reflect your outward likeness
27 in less time than I grasp the one inside you.
’Just now your thought commingled with my own,
alike in attitude and aspect,
30 so that of both I’ve formed a single plan.
‘If the slope there to the right allows us
to make our way into the other ditch,
33 we shall escape the chase we both envision.’
Before he finished telling me his plan →
I saw them coming, wings outspread,
36 closing in to catch us.
My leader in a moment snatched me up, →
like a mother who, awakened by the hubbub
39 before she sees the flames that burn right near her,
snatches up her child and flees,
and, more concerned for him than for herself,
42 does not delay to put a shift on.
Down from the rim of that stony bank,
supine, he slid along the sloping rock
45 that forms one border of the next crevasse.
Never did water, as it nears the paddles, →
rush down along the sluices
48 cut through earth to turn a millwheel
more swiftly than my master down that bank,
bearing me along clasped to his breast
51 as if I were his child, not his companion.
No sooner had he touched the bottom with his feet →
than the devils were above us on the ridge.
54 Yet now we had no cause for feeling fear,
for high Providence, which made them
wardens of the fifth crevasse,
57 deprives them of the power to leave it.
Down there we came upon a lacquered people →
who made their round, in tears, with listless steps.
60 They seemed both weary and defeated.
The cloaks they wore cut like the capes →
sewn for the monks at Cluny,
63 had cowls that hung down past their eyes.
Gilded and dazzling on the outside, →
within they are of lead, so ponderous
66 that those imposed by Frederick would seem but straw. →
Oh what a toilsome cloak to wear forever!
Once more we turned to the left, then went along
69 beside them, intent upon their wretched wailing.
Their burden made that weary people
move so slowly we had new companions
72 each time we set one foot before the other.
And I said to my leader: ‘Cast your eyes
this way and that as we walk on.
75 See if you know the names or deeds of any.’
And one of them, having heard my Tuscan speech, →
cried out behind us: ‘Stay your feet,
78 you who hasten through this sullen air.
‘I perhaps can answer what you asked.’
At that my leader turned around to say:
81 ‘Wait a moment, then continue at his pace.’
I stopped and noticed two whose looks
showed haste of mind to reach me,
84 but their load and the narrow way detained them.
When they came near they looked at me askance
for a while, without uttering a word,
87 until they turned to one another, saying:
‘The way his throat moves, this one must be alive.
And if they are dead, what gives them the right
90 to go uncovered by the heavy stole?’
and then to me: ‘O Tuscan, who have come
to this assembly of sad hypocrites, →
93 do not disdain to tell us who you are.’
‘In the great city, by the fair river Arno,’
I said to them, ’I was born and raised,
96 and I am here in the body that was always mine.
‘But who are you in whom I see distilled
the misery running down your cheeks in tears?
99 And what is the grief you bear that glitters so?’
And one of them answered: ‘Our golden cloaks
are made of lead, and they’re so dense,
102 like scales we creak beneath their weight. →
‘We were Jovial Friars, born in Bologna. →
My name was Catalano, his, Loderingo. →
105 Your city made the two of us a pair,
‘where usually a single man was chosen,
to keep the peace within, and we were such
108 that all around Gardingo the ruins can be seen.’
I began: ‘O Friars, your evil deeds …’ →
but said no more, for one there caught my eye, →
111 fixed cross-wise to the ground by three short stakes.
Seeing me, he writhed all over,
blowing sighs into his beard,
114 and Fra Catalano, observing this, said:
‘That man you see nailed down
advised the Pharisees it was the better course
117 that one man should be martyred for the people.
’He is stretched out naked, as you see, →
across the path. It is his lot to feel
120 the weight of each who passes.
‘Just so his father-in-law is racked with us →
down here and with the others of the council
123 that was a seed of evil for the Jews.’
I saw that Virgil marveled at the sight →
of this shape stretched as on a cross,
126 so ignoble in his eternal exile.
Then he addressed the friar with these words:
‘May it please you, if it is permitted,
129 to say if on our right there is a passage
‘by which we two might leave this place
without requiring help from some black angels →
132 to pluck us from these depths.’
And he replied: ’Nearer than you hope there lies →
a rocky ridge that crosses all the savage valleys
135 from the farthest circle inward.
‘It has fallen only here and fails to reach across.
You can clamber up the sloping rubble
138 that lies upon the bottom and piles up along the side.’
My leader stood a while, his head bent down, then said:
‘He who rips the sinners in the other ditch
141 misled us in his picture of this place.’
And the friar: ‘At one time in Bologna I heard tell →
of the Devil’s many vices, and I heard
144 he is a liar and the father of all lies.’
At that my leader stalked off with long strides, →
a moment’s look of anger on his face.
And so I left those overburdened souls
148 to follow in the imprints of his cherished feet.