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XXIII. Escape from the Malabranche. The Sixth Bolgia: Hypocrites. Catalano and Loderingo. Caiaphas.

       Table of Contents

      Silent, alone, and without company

       We went, the one in front, the other after,

       As go the Minor Friars along their way.

      Upon the fable of Aesop was directed

       My thought, by reason of the present quarrel,

       Where he has spoken of the frog and mouse;

      For 'mo' and 'issa' are not more alike

       Than this one is to that, if well we couple

       End and beginning with a steadfast mind.

      And even as one thought from another springs,

       So afterward from that was born another,

       Which the first fear within me double made.

      Thus did I ponder: "These on our account

       Are laughed to scorn, with injury and scoff

       So great, that much I think it must annoy them.

      If anger be engrafted on ill-will,

       They will come after us more merciless

       Than dog upon the leveret which he seizes,"

      I felt my hair stand all on end already

       With terror, and stood backwardly intent,

       When said I: "Master, if thou hidest not

      Thyself and me forthwith, of Malebranche

       I am in dread; we have them now behind us;

       I so imagine them, I already feel them."

      And he: "If I were made of leaded glass,

       Thine outward image I should not attract

       Sooner to me than I imprint the inner.

      Just now thy thoughts came in among my own,

       With similar attitude and similar face,

       So that of both one counsel sole I made.

      If peradventure the right bank so slope

       That we to the next Bolgia can descend,

       We shall escape from the imagined chase."

      Not yet he finished rendering such opinion,

       When I beheld them come with outstretched wings,

       Not far remote, with will to seize upon us.

      My Leader on a sudden seized me up,

       Even as a mother who by noise is wakened,

       And close beside her sees the enkindled flames,

      Who takes her son, and flies, and does not stop,

       Having more care of him than of herself,

       So that she clothes her only with a shift;

      And downward from the top of the hard bank

       Supine he gave him to the pendent rock,

       That one side of the other Bolgia walls.

      Ne'er ran so swiftly water through a sluice

       To turn the wheel of any land-built mill,

       When nearest to the paddles it approaches,

      As did my Master down along that border,

       Bearing me with him on his breast away,

       As his own son, and not as a companion.

      Hardly the bed of the ravine below

       His feet had reached, ere they had reached the hill

       Right over us; but he was not afraid;

      For the high Providence, which had ordained

       To place them ministers of the fifth moat,

       The power of thence departing took from all.

      A painted people there below we found,

       Who went about with footsteps very slow,

       Weeping and in their semblance tired and vanquished.

      They had on mantles with the hoods low down

       Before their eyes, and fashioned of the cut

       That in Cologne they for the monks are made.

      Without, they gilded are so that it dazzles;

       But inwardly all leaden and so heavy

       That Frederick used to put them on of straw.

      O everlastingly fatiguing mantle!

       Again we turned us, still to the left hand

       Along with them, intent on their sad plaint;

      But owing to the weight, that weary folk

       Came on so tardily, that we were new

       In company at each motion of the haunch.

      Whence I unto my Leader: "See thou find

       Some one who may by deed or name be known,

       And thus in going move thine eye about."

      And one, who understood the Tuscan speech,

       Cried to us from behind: "Stay ye your feet,

       Ye, who so run athwart the dusky air!

      Perhaps thou'lt have from me what thou demandest."

       Whereat the Leader turned him, and said: "Wait,

       And then according to his pace proceed."

      I stopped, and two beheld I show great haste

       Of spirit, in their faces, to be with me;

       But the burden and the narrow way delayed them.

      When they came up, long with an eye askance

       They scanned me without uttering a word.

       Then to each other turned, and said together:

      "He by the action of his throat seems living;

       And if they dead are, by what privilege

       Go they uncovered by the heavy stole?"

      Then said to me: "Tuscan, who to the college

       Of miserable hypocrites art come,

       Do not disdain to tell us who thou art."

      And I to them: "Born was I, and grew up

       In the great town on the fair river of Arno,

       And with the body am I've always had.

      But who are ye, in whom there trickles down

       Along your cheeks such grief as I behold?

       And what pain is upon you, that so sparkles?"

      And one replied to me: "These orange cloaks

       Are made of lead so heavy, that the weights

       Cause in this way their balances to creak.

      Frati Gaudenti were we, and Bolognese;

       I Catalano, and he Loderingo

       Named, and together taken by thy city,

      As the wont is to take one man alone,

       For maintenance of its peace; and we were such

       That still it is apparent round Gardingo."

      "O Friars," began I, "your iniquitous. . ."

       But said no more; for to mine eyes there rushed

       One crucified with three stakes on the ground.

      When me he saw, he writhed himself all over,

      

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