Inferno: Canto XXVIII

Could any, even in words unclogged by rhyme
Recount the wounds that now I saw, and blood,
Although he aimed at it time after time?

Here every tongue must fail of what it would,
Because our human speech and powers of thought
To grasp so much come short in aptitude.

If all the people were together brought
Who in Apulia, land distressed by fate,
Made lamentation for the bloodshed wrought

By Rome; and in that war procrastinate
When the large booty of the rings was won,
As Livy writes whose every word has weight;

With those on whom such direful deeds were done
When Robert Guiscard they as foes assailed;
And those of whom still turns up many a bone

At Ceperan, where each Apulian failed
In faith; and those at Tagliacozzo strewed,
Where old Alardo, not by arms, prevailed;

And each his wounds and mutilations showed,
Yet would they far behind by those be left
Who had the vile Ninth Bolgia for abode.

No cask, of middle stave or end bereft,
E'er gaped like one I saw the rest among,
Slit from the chin all downward to the cleft.

Between his legs his entrails drooping hung;
The pluck and that foul bag were evident
Which changes what is swallowed into dung.

And while I gazed upon him all intent,
Opening his breast his eyes on me he set,
Saying: 'Behold, how by myself I'm rent!

See how dismembered now is Mahomet!
Ali in front of me goes weeping too;
With visage from the chin to forelock split.

By all the others whom thou seest there grew
Scandal and schism while yet they breathed the day;
Because of which they now are cloven through.

There stands behind a devil on the way,
Us with his sword thus cruelly to trim:
He cleaves again each of our company

As soon as we complete the circuit grim;
Because the wounds of each are healed outright
Or e'er anew he goes in front of him.

But who art thou that peerest from the height,
It may be putting off to reach the pain
Which shall the crimes confessed by thee requite?'

'Death has not seized him yet, nor is he ta'en
To torment for his sins,' my Master said;
'But, that he may a full experience gain,

By me, a ghost, 'tis doomed he should be led
Down the Infernal circles, round on round;
And what I tell thee is the truth indeed.'

A hundred shades and more, to whom the sound
Had reached, stood in the moat to mark me well,
Their pangs forgot; so did the words astound.

'Let Fra Dolcin provide, thou mayst him tell--
Thou, who perchance ere long shalt sunward go--
Unless he soon would join me in this Hell,

Much food, lest aided by the siege of snow
The Novarese should o'er him victory get,
Which otherwise to win they would be slow.'

While this was said to me by Mahomet
One foot he held uplifted; to the ground
He let it fall, and so he forward set

Next, one whose throat was gaping with a wound,
Whose nose up to the brows away was sheared
And on whose head a single ear was found,

At me, with all the others, wondering peered;
And, ere the rest, an open windpipe made,
The outside of it all with crimson smeared.

'O thou, not here because of guilt,' he said;
'And whom I sure on Latian ground did know
Unless by strong similitude betrayed,

Upon Pier da Medicin bestow
A thought, shouldst thou revisit the sweet plain
That from Vercelli slopes to Marcabò.

And make thou known to Fano's worthiest twain--
To Messer Guido and to Angiolel--
They, unless foresight here be wholly vain,

Thrown overboard in gyve and manacle
Shall drown fast by Cattolica, as planned
By treachery of a tyrant fierce and fell.

Between Majolica and Cyprus strand
A blacker crime did Neptune never spy
By pirates wrought, or even by Argives' hand.

The traitor who is blinded of an eye,
Lord of the town which of my comrades one
Had been far happier ne'er to have come nigh,

To parley with him will allure them on,
Then so provide, against Focara's blast
No need for them of vow or orison.'

And I: 'Point out and tell, if wish thou hast
To get news of thee to the world conveyed,
Who rues that e'er his eyes thereon were cast?'

On a companion's jaw his hand he laid,
And shouted, while the mouth he open prised:
''Tis this one here by whom no word is said.

He quenched all doubt in Cæsar, and advised--
Himself an outlaw--that a man equipped
For strife ran danger if he temporised.'

Alas, to look on, how downcast and hipped
Curio, once bold in counsel, now appeared;
With gorge whence by the roots the tongue was ripped.

Another one, whose hands away were sheared,
In the dim air his stumps uplifted high
So that his visage was with blood besmeared,

And, 'Mosca, too, remember!' loud did cry,
'Who said, ah me! "A thing once done is done!"
An evil seed for all in Tuscany.'

I added: 'Yea, and death to every one
Of thine!' whence he, woe piled on woe, his way
Went like a man with grief demented grown.

But I to watch the gang made longer stay,
And something saw which I should have a fear,
Without more proof, so much as even to say,

But that my conscience bids me have good cheer--
The comrade leal whose friendship fortifies
A man beneath the mail of purpose clear.

I saw in sooth (still seems it 'fore mine eyes),
A headless trunk; with that sad company
It forward moved, and on the selfsame wise.

The severed head, clutched by the hair, swung free
Down from the fist, yea, lantern-like hung down;
Staring at us it murmured: 'Wretched me!'

A lamp he made of head-piece once his own;
And he was two in one and one in two;
But how, to Him who thus ordains is known.

Arrived beneath the bridge and full in view,
With outstretched arm his head he lifted high
To bring his words well to us. These I knew:

'Consider well my grievous penalty,
Thou who, though still alive, art visiting
The people dead; what pain with this can vie?

In order that to earth thou news mayst bring
Of me, that I'm Bertrand de Born know well,
Who gave bad counsel to the Younger King.

I son and sire made each 'gainst each rebel:
David and Absalom were fooled not more
By counsels of the false Ahithophel.

Kinsmen so close since I asunder tore,
Severed, alas! I carry now my brain
From what it grew from in this trunk of yore:

And so I prove the law of pain for pain.'