Jerusalem Delivered
Page 274
XLII
But forced to retire from him at last,
The Pagan fleet the seas moist empire won,
His men with all their stuff and store in haste
Home to the camp with their commander run,
In skill, in wit, in cunning him surpassed
Yet never engineer beneath the sun,
Of carpenters an hundred large he brought,
That what their lord devised made and wrought.
XLII
Forced to retire then, to the Saracen
He yielded up dominion of the seas,
And from the ships now brought both arms and men
To the encampment as auxiliaries.
Nor could one, ‘mid the most intelligent,
His peer in knowledge of mechanics find;
With him a hundred minor workmen went,
To execute the plans that he designed.
XLIII.
Costui non solo incominciò a comporre
Catapulte, baliste, ed arieti;
Onde alle mura le difese torre
340 Possa, e spezzar le sode alte pareti;
Ma fece opra maggior: mirabil torre,
Ch’entro di pin tessuta era, e d’abeti;
E nelle cuoja avvolto ha quel di fuore,
344 Per ischermirsi da lanciato ardore.
XLIII
This man began with wondrous art to make,
Not rams, not mighty brakes, not slings alone,
Wherewith the firm and solid walls to shake,
To cast a dart, or throw a shaft or stone;
But framed of pines and firs, did undertake
To build a fortress huge, to which was none
Yet ever like, whereof he clothed the sides
Against the balls of fire with raw bull’s hides.
XLIII
He at once began, not only to compose
Balistae, catapults, and rams, and each
Machine that could with the high ramparts close,
Destroy their fences, and the bastions breach;
But made a greater work, a wondrous tower,
With planks of pine and fir enwove inside;
And to protect it from the fire-balls’ shower,
Without, wrapped up in swathes of moistened hide.
XLIV.
Si scommette la mole, e ricompone
Con sottili giunture in un congiunta:
E la trave che testa ha di montone
348 Dall’ime parti sue cozzando spunta.
Lancia dal mezzo un ponte: e spesso il pone
Sull’opposta muraglia a prima giunta:
E fuor da lei su per la cima n’esce
352 Torre minor, che in suso è spinta, e cresce.
XLIV
In mortices and sockets framed just,
The beams, the studs and puncheons joined he fast;
To beat the city’s wall, beneath forth brust
A ram with horned front, about her waist
A bridge the engine from her side out thrust,
Which on the wall when need she cast;
And from her top a turret small up stood,
Strong, surely armed, and builded of like wood.
XLIV
The fabric takes to pieces and unites,
With joints together joined by subtile art;
And a huge beam with ram’s head tipped, that fights
Ram-like, emerges from the lower part.
Midway leaps forth a bridge, and with such power,
As at first spring to reach the adverse wall;
And from the top shoots up a lesser tower,
That grows, forced upwards, and looks over all.
XLV.
Per le facili vie destra e corrente
Sovra ben cento sue volubil rote,
Gravida d’arme, e gravida di gente
356 Senza molta fatica ella gir puote.
Stanno le schiere in rimirando intente
La prestezza de’ fabbri, e l’arti ignote.
E due torri in quel punto anco son fatte,
360 Della prima ad immagine ritratte.
XLV
Set on an hundred wheels the rolling mass,
On the smooth lands went nimbly up and down,
Though full of arms and armed men it was,
Yet with small pains it ran, as it had flown:
Wondered the camp so quick to see it pass,
They praised the workmen and their skill unknown,
And on that day two towers they builded more,
Like that which sweet Clorinda burned before.
XLV
Voluble, on a hundred wheels, to glide
It ‘gan along the smoothened ways, and tho’
Pregnant with arms, pregnant with men inside,
Without much labour it appeared to go.
The troops stood watching, with astonied eyes,
The workmen’s quickness and dexterity,
When, lo! two other towers were seen to rise,
That of the first twin sisters seemed to be.
XLVI.
Ma non eran frattanto ai Saracini
L’opre, ch’ivi si fean, del tutto ascoste;
Perchè nell’alte mura ai più vicini
364 Lochi le guardie ad ispiar son poste.
Questi gran salmeríe d’orni e di pini
Vedean dal bosco esser condotte all’oste:
E machine vedean; ma non appieno
368 Riconoscer la forma indi potieno.
XLVI
Yet wholly were not from the Saracines
Their works concealed and their labors hid,
Upon that wall which next the camp confines
They placed spies, who marked all they did:
They saw the ashes wild and squared pines,
How to the tents, trailed from the grove, they slid:
And engines huge they saw, yet could not tell
How they were built, their forms they saw not well.
XLVI
Meanwhile the Christians’ doings were not altogether hidden from the Saracens,
Since, towards the nearest points, upon the wall
Were stationed guards to watch the Franks’ designs;
Great loads of pine and elm trees from the wood
They saw conducted to the Christian host;
Machines they saw, but not entirely could
Their form distinguish from their distant post
XLVII.
Fan lor machine anch’essi; e con molt’arte
Rinforzano le torri e la muraglia:
E l’alzaron così, da quella parte
372 Ov’è men’atta a sostener battaglia,
Che, a lor credenza, omai sforzo di Marte
Esser non può che ad espugnarla vaglia.
Ma sovra ogni difesa Ismen prepara
376 Copia di fochi inusitata e rara.
XLVII
Their engines eke they reared, and with great art
Repaired each bulwark, turret, port and tower,
And fortified the plain and easy part,
To bide the storm of every warlike stoure,
Till as they thought no sleight or force of Mart
To undermine or scale the same had power;
And false Ismeno gan new balls prepare
Of wicked fire, wild, wondrous, strange and rare.
XLVII
They, too, made engines, and with no less art
The towers and ramparts reinforced again,
And raised them up so, in whatever part
Ill-fitted seemed war’s fury to sustain,
That they believed the greatest force of Mars
Henceforth unable was to take the town;
But, beyond all defence, Ismene prepares
Strange fires upon the assailants to throw down.
XLVIII.
Mesce il Mago fellon zolfo e bitume,
Che dal lago di Sodoma ha raccolto,
E fu, credo, in Inferno: e dal gran fiume,
>
380 Che nove volte il cerchia, anco n’ha tolto;
Così fa che quel foco e puta e fume,
E che s’avventi, fiammeggiando, al volto.
E ben co’ feri incendj egli s’avvisa
384 Di vendicar la cara selva incisa.
XLVIII
He mingled brimstone with bitumen fell
Fetched from that lake where Sodom erst did sink,
And from that flood which nine times compassed hell
Some of the liquor hot he brought, I think,
Wherewith the quenchless fire he tempered well,
To make it smoke and flame and deadly stink:
And for his wood cut down, the aged sire
Would thus revengement take with flame and fire.
XLVIII
The wretch with sulphur did bitumen, mix,
Brought from the lake of Sodom; and to hell
Methinks he went, and from the river Styx,
That nine times girds it, was supplied as well.
Such smoke and stench he in the fire-balls wrought,
Which, burning hot, were darted in the face;
Well by those dread combustibles he thought
To avenge of his fell’d forest the disgrace.
XLIX.
Mentre il campo all’assalto, e la Cittade
S’apparecchia in tal modo alle difese;
Una colomba per l’aeree strade
388 Vista è passar sovra lo stuol Francese:
Che ne dimena i presti vanni, e rade
Quelle liquide vie con l’ali tese.
E già la messaggiera peregrina
392 Dall’alte nubi alla Città s’inchina;
XLIX
While thus the camp, and thus the town were bent,
These to assault, these to defend the wall,
A speedy dove through the clear welkin went,
Straight o’er the tents, seen by the soldiers all;
With nimble fans the yielding air she rent,
Nor seemed it that she would alight or fall,
Till she arrived near that besieged town,
Then from the clouds at last she stooped down:
XLIX
While thus the camp prepared for the assault,
And the beleaguered city for defence,
Lo! swiftly skimming the aerial vault,
A dove was seen to cross the Gallic tents:
Nor moved her pinions, but with outstretched wing
The pilgrim messenger came sailing down
Through the lush fields of air, as if to bring,
From the high clouds, a message to the town;
L.
Quando, di non so donde, esce un falcone
D’adunco rostro armato e di grand’ugna,
Che fra ‘l campo e le mura a lei s’oppone.
396 Non aspetta ella del crudel la pugna;
Quegli, d’alto volando, al padiglione
Maggior l’incalza, e par ch’omai l’aggiugna:
Ed al tenero capo il piede ha sovra;
400 Essa nel grembo al pio Buglion ricovra.
L
But lo, from whence I nolt, a falcon came,
Armed with crooked bill and talons long,
And twixt the camp and city crossed her game,
That durst nor bide her foe’s encounter strong;
But right upon the royal tent down came,
And there, the lords and princes great among,
When the sharp hawk nigh touched her tender head
In Godfrey’s lap she fell, with fear half dead:
L
When swooped a falcon — from I know not whence,
Armed with great talons and hooked beak, as tho’
To oppose her ‘twixt the city and the tents;
But she awaited not his cruel blow;
He, darting down, pursued her as she fled
To Godfred’s tent, and nearer, nearer drew;
His talons almost struck her gentle head,
When to the prince’s sheltering lap she flew.
LI.
La raccoglie Goffredo, e la difende:
Poi scorge, in lei guardando, estrania cosa.
Chè dal collo ad un filo avvinta pende
404 Rinchiusa carta, e sotto un’ala ascosa.
La disserra, e dispiega: e bene intende
Quella che in se contien non lunga prosa.
Al Signor di Giudea (dicea lo scritto)
408 Invia salute il Capitan d’Egitto.
LI
The duke received her, saved her, and spied,
As he beheld the bird, a wondrous thing,
About her neck a letter close was tied,
By a small thread, and thrust under her wing,
He loosed forth the writ and spread it wide,
And read the intent thereof, “To Judah’s king,”
Thus said the schedule, “honors high increase,
The Egyptian chieftain wisheth health and peace:
LI
Her he protected, as she frightened clung,
And saw, examining, a curious thing;
For from her neck, bound by a ribbon, hung
A folded letter hid beneath her wing;
He opes, unfolds it, and the not long whole
Of its contents completely comprehends.
‘To Judah’s lord’ (so ran the secret scroll)
‘The Egyptian captain health and greeting sends.
LII.
Non sbigottir, Signor: resisti e dura
Insino al quarto, o insino al giorno quinto;
Ch’io vengo a liberar coteste mura:
412 E vedrai tosto il tuo nemico vinto.
Questo il secreto fu che la scrittura,
In barbariche note, avea distinto,
Dato in custodia al portator volante:
416 Chè tai messi in quel tempo usò il Levante.
LII
“Fear not, renowned prince, resist, endure
Till the third day, or till the fourth at most,
I come, and your deliverance will procure,
And kill your coward foes and all their host.”
This secret in that brief was closed up sure,
Writ in strange language, to the winged post
Given to transport; for in their warlike need
The east such message used, oft with good speed.
LII
‘Do not despair, O king, resist, and wait
For four days longer, or for five at most,
When I will come these walls to liberate,
By conquering ‘neath them the besieging host.’
This was the secret which the missive bore,
In rude barbaric characters displayed,
And to the dove entrusted; for of yore
Such envoys letters in the East conveyed.
LIII.
Libera il Prence la colomba: e quella,
Che de’ secreti fu rivelatrice,
Come esser creda al suo Signor rubella,
420 Non ardì più tornar nunzia infelice.
Ma il sopran Duce i minor duci appella,
E lor mostra la carta, e così dice:
Vedete come il tutto a noi riveli
424 La provvidenza del Signor de’ Cieli.
LIII
The duke let go the captive dove at large,
And she that had his counsel close betrayed,
Traitress to her great Lord, touched not the marge
Of Salem’s town, but fled far thence afraid.
The duke before all those which had or charge
Or office high, the letter read, and said:
“See how the goodness of the Lord foreshows
The secret purpose of our crafty foes.
LIII
Prince Godfred set the captive turtle free,
Who having thus her master’s secrets bared,
To him a rebel deemed herself to be,
Nor to return, successless envoy, dared.
The greate
r chief did then the minor call,
Showed them the letter, and exclaimed: ‘Behold,
How the high providence of God has all
The foe’s designs to His believers told.
LIV.
Già più di ritardar tempo non parmi.
Nuova spianata or cominciar potrassi:
E fatica e sudor non si risparmi,
428 Per superar d’inverso l’Austro i sassi.
Duro fia si far colà strada all’armi:
Pur far si può; notato ho il loco e i passi.
E ben quel muro, che assicura il sito,
432 D’arme e d’opre men deve esser munito.
LIV
“No longer then let us protract the time,
But scale the bulwark of this fortress high,
Through sweat and labor gainst those rocks sublime
Let us ascend, which to the southward lie;
Hard will it be that way in arms to climb,
But yet the place and passage both know I,
And that high wall by site strong on that part,
Is least defenced by arms, by work and art.
LIV
‘We must no more, then, dally or delay,
But new approaches ‘gainst the heights commence,
Nor spare fatigue or trouble, that we may
O’ercome the crags that form the south’s defence;
Hard it may be to make a path there; still,
Make it we can: the ground is known to me;
Be sure that wall, protected by the hill,
With arms and works must less defended be.
LV.
Tu, Raimondo, vogl’io, che da quel lato
Con le machine tue le mura offenda.
Vuò, che dell’arme mie l’alto apparato
436 Contra la porta aquilonar si stenda;
Sì che il nemico il vegga, ed, ingannato,
Indi il maggior impeto nostro attenda.
Poi la gran torre mia, ch’agevol move,
440 Trascorra alquanto, e porti guerra altrove.
LV
“Thou, Raymond, on this side with all thy might
Assault the wall, and by those crags ascend,
My squadrons with mine engines huge shall fight
And gainst the northern gate my puissance bend,
That so our foes, beguiled with the sight,
Our greatest force and power shall there attend,
While my great tower from thence shall nimbly slide,
And batter down some worse defended side;
LV