XXVIII
For he had sought and seen in youthful prime
Variety of manners and of lands,
In journeying from the most inclement clime
Of this our world to Ethiop’s burning sands;
And, like one buying knowledge for himself,
Had learned their language, usages, and rites;
In riper years was then received by Guelph,
And dearest deemed of his companion knights.
XXIX.
A tai messaggj l’onorata cura
Di richiamar l’alto campion si diede:
E gl’indrizzava Guelfo a quelle mura
228 Tra cui Boemondo ha la sua regia sede;
Chè per pubblica fama, e per sicura
Opinion ch’egli vi sia si crede.
Ma ‘l buon Romito che lor mal diretti
232 Conosce, entra fra loro, e tronca i detti;
XXIX
To these committed was the charge and care
To find and bring again the champion bold,
Guelpho commands them to the fort repair,
Where Boemond doth his seat and sceptre hold,
For public fame said that Bertoldo’s heir
There lived, there dwelt, there stayed; the hermit old,
That knew they were misled by false report,
Among them came, and parleyed in this sort:
XXIX
On such a pair the honoured duty falls
The knight to summon from his lone retreat;
And Guelph directed them to those far walls
In which Boëmondo has his royal seat;
Since from report, and general credence too,
They deemed the illustrious paladin was there:
But Peter, who the wrong directions knew,
Cut short their talk, and, with commanding air,
XXX.
E dice: o cavalier, seguendo il grido
Della fallace opinion volgare,
Duce seguite temerario e infido
236 Che vi fa gire indarno, e traviare.
Or d’Ascalona nel propinquo lido
Itene, dove un fiume entra nel mare.
Quivi fia che v’appaja uom nostro amico;
240 Credete a lui: ciò ch’ei diravvi, io ‘l dico.
XXX
“Sir knights,” quoth he, “if you intend to ride,
And follow each report fond people say,
You follow but a rash and truthless guide
That leads vain men amiss and makes them stray;
Near Ascalon go to the salt seaside,
Where a swift brook fails in with hideous sway,
An aged sire, our friend, there shall you find,
All what he saith, that do, that keep in mind.
XXX
‘Sir knights, pursuing the report,’ he cried,
‘Of common lying rumour, ye pursue
A rash, deceitful, and insidious guide,
That will mislead you from the proper clue.
Haste ye to Ascalon’s adjacent shores,
Where a stream enters the deep oceans brine;
There ye will meet with a great friend of ours;
Him trust — his sentiments are one with mine,
XXXI.
Ei molto per se vede; e molto intese
Del preveduto vostro alto viaggio,
Già gran tempo ha, da me: so che cortese
244 Altrettanto vi fia quanto egli è saggio.
Così lor disse; e più da lui non chiese
Carlo, o l’altro che seco iva messaggio;
Ma furo ubbidienti alle parole
248 Che spirito divin dettar gli suole.
XXXI
“Of this great voyage which you undertake,
Much by his skill, and much by mine advise
Hath he foreknown, and welcome for my sake
You both shall be, the man is kind and wise.”
Instructed thus no further question make
The twain elected for this enterprise,
But humbly yielded to obey his word,
For what the hermit said, that said the Lord.
XXXI
‘Much has he seen himself, much heard from me,
Of your foreseen adventurous emprise;
Long since I made it known to him, and he,
I know, is kind and courteous as he is wise.’
Thus spake the sage; nor Carlo questioned more,
Nor did his brother envoy hesitate,
But promptly both obeyed those words, whose lore
Heaven was itself accustomed to dictate.
XXXII.
Preser commiato, e sì il desio gli sprona
Che, senza indugio alcun posti in cammino,
Drizzaro il lor corso ad Ascalona,
252 Dove ai lidi si frange il mar vicino.
E non udian ancor come risuona
Il roco ed alto fremito marino,
Quando giunsero a un fiume, il qual di nuova
256 Acqua accresciuto è per novella piova;
XXXII
They took their leave, and on their journey went,
Their will could brook no stay, their zeal, no let;
To Ascalon their voyage straight they bent,
Whose broken shores with brackish waves are wet,
And there they heard how gainst the cliffs, besprent
With bitter foam, the roaring surges bet,
A tumbling brook their passage stopped and stayed,
Which late-fall’n rain had proud and puissant made,
XXXII
They then took leave; and zeal so spurred them on,
That off they started, and began to make,
Quick as they could, their way to Ascalon,
Upon whose coast the adjacent billows break;
Nor had they heard as yet the hollow roar
Announce the presence of the sounding main,
When they a river reached whose waters tore
Madly along, and were so swollen by rain,
XXXIII.
Sicchè non può capir dentro al suo letto,
E sen va più che stral corrente e presto.
Mentre essi stan sospesi, a lor, d’aspetto
260 Venerabile, appare un vecchio onesto
Coronato di faggio, in lungo e schietto
Vestir che di lin candido è contesto:
Scuote questi una verga, e il fiume calca
264 Co’ piedi asciutti, e contra il corso il valca.
XXXIII
So proud that over all his banks he grew,
And through the fields ran swift as shaft from bow,
While here they stopped and stood, before them drew
An aged sire, grave and benign in show,
Crowned with a beechen garland gathered new,
Clad in a linen robe that raught down low,
In his right hand a rod, and on the flood
Against the stream he marched, and dry shod yode.
XXXIII
That ev’n its bed could not contain the flood,
Which with more fleetness than an arrow ran.
While thus perplexed they were, before them stood
A worthy venerable-looking man,
With beech leaves crowned, and clad in simple suit,
Woven of snowy flax. He shook a rod,
And ‘gainst the current with unmoistened foot
Securely on the unyielding water trod.
XXXIV.
Siccome soglion là vicino al polo,
S’avvien che ‘l verno i fiumi agghiacci e indure,
Correr sul Ren le villanelle a stuolo
268 Con lunghi striscj, e sdrucciolar sicure,
Tal ei ne vien sovra l’instabil suolo
Di queste acque non gelide e non dure:
E tosto colà giunse, onde in lui fisse
272 Tenean le luci i due guerrieri, e disse:
XXXIV
As on the Rhene, when winter’s freezing cold
Cong
eals the streams to thick and hardened glass,
The beauties fair of shepherds’ daughters bold
With wanton windlays run, turn, play and pass;
So on this river passed the wizard old,
Although unfrozen soft and swift it was,
And thither stalked where the warriors stayed,
To whom, their greetings done, he spoke and said:
XXXIV
As near the pole in distant northern lands,
When winter’s frosts the flowing streams congeal,
Upon the Rhine the village girls in bands
Whisk o’er the surface with reliant heel;
Thus on the soft unstable soil did he
Of those not hard or frozen waters tread,
And soon arrived where the knights fixedly
Their eyes on him had bent, to whom he said:
XXXV.
Amici, dura e faticosa inchiesta
Seguite: e d’uopo è ben ch’altri vi guidi;
Chè il cercato guerrier lunge è da questa
276 Terra in paesi inospiti ed infidi.
Quanto, o quanto dell’opra anco vi resta!
Quanti mar correrete, e quanti lidi!
E convien che si stenda il cercar vostro
280 Oltre i confini ancor del mondo nostro.
XXXV
“Great pains, great travel, lords, you have begun,
And of a cunning guide great need you stand,
Far off, alas! is great Bertoldo’s son,
Imprisoned in a waste and desert land,
What soil remains by which you must not run,
What promontory, rock, sea, shore or sand
Your search must stretch before the prince be found,
Beyond our world, beyond our half of ground!
XXXV
‘A toilsome, hard inquiry ye pursue,
And in great need of other guidance stand;
Since, friends, the knight ye seek is far from you
In heathen and inhospitable lands.
Much — oh, how much! — remains to gain this end:
What seas to cross! what vast extent of shores!
For, know, your search is destined to extend
Beyond the confines of this world of ours.
XXXVI.
Ma non vi spiaccia entrar nelle nascose
Spelonche ov’ho la mia secreta sede:
Chè ivi udrete da me non lievi cose,
284 E ciò ch’a voi saper più si richiede.
Disse; e che lor dia loco all’acqua impose;
Ed ella tosto si ritira e cede:
E quinci e quindi, di montagna in guisa,
288 Curvata pende, e in mezzo appar divisa.
XXXVI
But yet vouchsafe to see my cell I pray,
In hidden caves and vaults though builded low,
Great wonders there, strange things I will bewray,
Things good for you to hear, and fit to know:”
This said, he bids the river make them way,
The flood retired, backward gan to flow,
And here and there two crystal mountains rise,
So fled the Red Sea once, and Jordan thrice.
XXXVI
‘But enter, àn ye please, my hidden cave,
And I will you my secret dwelling show,
Where matters ye shall hear of import grave,
And what is requisite ye both should know.’
He ceased, and bade the yielding lymph give place,
Which straight retired and hung on either side,
Like a curved mountain beetling o’er its base,
And thus a pathway to the knights supplied.
XXXVII.
Ei, presigli per man, nelle più interne
Profondità sotto quel rio lor mena.
Debile e incerta luce ivi si scerne,
292 Qual tra’ boschi di Cintia ancor non piena:
Ma pur gravide d’acque ampie caverne
Veggiono, onde tra noi sorge ogni vena,
La qual zampilli in fonte, o in fiume vago
296 Discorra, o stagni, o si dilati in lago.
XXXVII
He took their hands, and led them headlong down
Under the flood, through vast and hollow deeps,
Such light they had as when through shadows brown
Of thickest deserts feeble Cynthia peeps,
Their spacious caves they saw all overflown,
There all his waters pure great Neptune keeps,
And thence to moisten all the earth he brings
Seas, rivers, floods, lakes, fountains, wells and springs:
XXXVII
Taking them by the hand, he led each knight
Down to the lowest depths beneath the stream,
Where faintly glimmered an unsteady light,
Like that in woods, ere full is Cynthia’s beam;
Pregnant with water, spacious caves they spied,
Whence rise those teeming veins that thro’ the land
Leap into fountains, into rivers glide,
In marshes stagnate, or in lakes expand.
XXXVIII.
E veder ponno onde il Po nasca, ed onde
Idaspe, Gange, Eufrate, Istro derivi:
Onde esca pria la Tana: e non asconde
300 Gli occulti suoi principj il Nilo quivi.
Trovano un rio più sotto, il qual diffonde
Vivaci zolfi, e vaghi argenti e vivi.
Questi il Sol poi raffina, e il licor molle
304 Stringe in candide masse, e in auree zolle.
XXXVIII
Whence Ganges, Indus, Volga, Ister, Po,
Whence Euphrates, whence Tigris’ spring they view,
Whence Tanais, whence Nilus comes also,
Although his head till then no creature knew,
But under these a wealthy stream doth go,
That sulphur yields and ore, rich, quick and new,
Which the sunbeams doth polish, purge and fine,
And makes it silver pure, and gold divine.
XXXVIII
They saw the springs of Danube and the Po,
Whence Ganges and Hydaspes take their course,
Whence Tanais and swift Euphrates flow,
Nor hid the Nile its dark mysterious source.
Still deeper they another river found,
That living sulphur and quicksilver rolled,
Which by the sun were purified, and bound
In solid piles of silver and of gold.
XXXIX.
E miran d’ogni intorno al ricco fiume
Di care pietre il margine dipinto;
Onde, come a più fiaccole s’allume,
308 Splende quel loco, e ‘l fosco orror n’è vinto.
Quivi scintilla con ceruleo lume
Il celeste zaffiro, ed il giacinto:
Vi fiammeggia il carbonchio, e luce il saldo
312 Diamante, e lieto ride il bel smeraldo.
XXXIX
And all his banks the rich and wealthy stream
Hath fair beset with pearl and precious stone
Like stars in sky or lamps on stage that seem,
The darkness there was day, the night was gone,
There sparkled, clothed in his azure-beam,
The heavenly sapphire, there the jacinth shone,
The carbuncle there flamed, the diamond sheen,
There glistered bright, there smiled the emerald green.
XXXIX
The margin starred with many a precious stone,
Along that teeming river they beheld;
Whence, as if lit with myriad flambeaux, shone
The spot, and was the horrid gloom dispelled.
There sparkled, with heaven’s blue cerulean light,
Celestial sapphire and the jacinth; there
Glowed the carbuncle, blazed the diamond bright,
And emeralds smiled, the fairest of the fair.
XL.
Stupidi i Guerrier vanno, e
nelle nove
Cose sì tutto il lor pensier s’impiega,
Che non fanno alcun motto; alfin pur move
316 La voce Ubaldo, e la sua scorta prega:
Deh, Padre, dinne ove noi siamo: ed ove
Ci guidi: e tua condizion ne spiega;
Ch’io non so se ‘l ver miri, o sogno od ombra;
320 Così alto stupore il cor m’ingombra.
XL
Amazed the knights amid these wonders passed,
And fixed so deep the marvels in their thought,
That not one word they uttered, till at last
Ubaldo spake, and thus his guide besought:
“O father, tell me by what skill thou hast
These wonders done? and to what place us brought?
For well I know not if I wake or sleep,
My heart is drowned in such amazement deep.”
XL
Still on, bewildered, the two warriors went,
With thoughts so rapt with what they had descried,
That both were speechless from astonishment;
At length Ubaldo thus addressed their guide:
‘Tell us, O father, where we are, and where
Thou leadest us; say who and what thou art.
Do I dream or fancy? What these marvels are
I know not; stupor so confounds my heart.’
XLI.
Risponde: sete voi nel grembo immenso
Della terra che tutto in se produce.
Nè già potreste penetrar nel denso
324 Delle viscere sue senza me duce.
Vi scorgo al mio palagio, il qual accenso
Tosto vedrete di mirabil luce.
Nacqui io Pagan; ma poi nelle sante acque
328 Rigenerarmi a Dio per grazia piacque.
XLI
“You are within the hollow womb,” quoth he,
“Of fertile earth, the nurse of all things made,
And but you brought and guided are by me,
Her sacred entrails could no wight invade;
My palace shortly shall you splendent see,
With glorious light, though built in night and shade.
A Pagan was I born, but yet the Lord
To grace, by baptism, hath my soul restored.
XLI
‘Ye,’ he replied, ‘are in the spacious womb
Of mother Earth, that all things doth create;
Nor can ye more into her bowels’ gloom,
Without my aid and guidance, penetrate.
I lead you to my palace home, a place
Which soon ye’ll see illumed with wondrous lights;
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