And I pray’d God to grant what He had will’d.
There were they vanquish’d, and betook themselves
Unto the bitter passages of flight.
I mark’d the hunt, and waxing out of bounds
In gladness, lifted up my shameless brow,
And like the merlin cheated by a gleam,
Cried, “It is over. Heav’n! fear
thee not.”
Upon my verge of life I wish’d for peace
With God; nor repentance had supplied
What I did lack of duty, were it not
The hermit Piero, touch’d with charity,
In his devout orisons thought on me.
“But who art thou that question’st of
our state,
Who go’st to my belief, with lids unclos’d,
And breathest in thy talk?”—“Mine
eyes,” said I,
“May yet be here ta’en from me; but not
long;
For they have not offended grievously
With envious glances. But the woe beneath
Urges my soul with more exceeding dread.
That nether load already weighs me down.”
She thus: “Who then amongst us here aloft
Hath brought thee, if thou weenest to return?”
“He,” answer’d I, “who standeth
mute beside me.
I live: of me ask therefore, chosen spirit,
If thou desire I yonder yet should move
For thee my mortal feet.”—“Oh!”
she replied,
“This is so strange a thing, it is great sign
That God doth love thee. Therefore with thy
prayer
Sometime assist me: and by that I crave,
Which most thou covetest, that if thy feet
E’er tread on Tuscan soil, thou save my fame
Amongst my kindred. Them shalt thou behold
With that vain multitude, who set their hope
On Telamone’s haven, there to fail
Confounded, more shall when the fancied stream
They sought of Dian call’d: but they who
lead
Their navies, more than ruin’d hopes shall mourn.”
“Say who is he around our mountain winds,
Or ever death has prun’d his wing for flight,
That opes his eyes and covers them at will?”
“I know not who he is, but know thus much
He comes not singly. Do thou ask of him,
For thou art nearer to him, and take heed
Accost him gently, so that he may speak.”
Thus on the right two Spirits bending each
Toward the other, talk’d of me, then both
Addressing me, their faces backward lean’d,
And thus the one began: “O soul, who yet
Pent in the body, tendest towards the sky!
For charity, we pray thee’ comfort us,
Recounting whence thou com’st, and who thou
art:
For thou dost make us at the favour shown thee
Marvel, as at a thing that ne’er hath been.”
“There stretches through the midst of Tuscany,”
I straight began: “a brooklet, whose well-head
Springs up in Falterona, with his race
Not satisfied, when he some hundred miles
Hath measur’d. From his banks bring, I
this frame.
To tell you who I am were words misspent:
For yet my name scarce sounds on rumour’s lip.”
