ribald, destroyer of himself and of his substance. Afterward I was of the household of the good King Thibault;1 there I set myself to practice barratry, for which I pay reckoning in this heat."
And Ciriatto, from whose mouth protruded on either side a tusk, as in a boar, made him feel how one of them rips. Among evil cats the mouse had come; but Barbariccia clasped him in his arms, and said, "Stand off, while I enfork him," and to my Master turned his face. "Ask," said he, "if thou desirest to know more from him, before some other undo him." The Leader, "Now, then, tell of the other sinners; knowst thou any one under the pitch who is Italian?" And he, "I parted short while since from one who was a neighbor to it; would that with him I still were covered so that I might not fear claw or hook." And Libicocco said, "We have borne too much," and seized his arm with his grapple so that, tearing, he carried off a sinew of it. Draghignazzo, also, he wished to give him a clutch down at his legs, whereat their decurion turned round about with evil look.
When they were a little appeased, my Leader, without delay, asked him who still was gazing at his wound, "Who was he from whom thou sayest thou madest in parting to come to shore?" And he replied, "It was Brother Gomita, he of Gallura,2 vessel of all fraud, who held the enemies of his lord in hand, and dealt so with them that they all praise him for it. Money he took, and let them smoothly off, so he says; and in other offices besides he was no little barrator, but sovereign. With him frequents Don Michael Zanche of Logodoro,3 and in talking of Sardinia their tongues feel not weary. O me! see ye that other who is grinning: I would say more, but I fear lest he is making ready to scratch my itch." And the grand provost, turning to Farfarello, who was rolling his eyes as if to strike, said, "Get thee away, wicked bird!"
"If you wish to see or to hear Tuscans or Lombards," thereon began again the frightened one, "I will make them come; but let the Malebranche stand a little withdrawn, so that they may not be afraid of their vengeance, and I, sitting in this very place, for one that I am, will make seven of them come, when I shall whistle as is our wont to do whenever one of us comes out." Cagnazzo at this speech raised his muzzle, shaking his head, and said, "Hear the knavery he has devised for throwing himself under!" Whereon he who had snares in great plenty answered, "Too knavish am I, when I procure for mine own companions greater sorrow." Alichino held not in, and, in opposition to the others, said to him, "If thou dive, I will not come behind thee at a gallop, but I will beat my wings above the pitch; let the ridge be left, and be the bank a shield, to see if thou alone availest more than we."
O thou that readest! thou shalt hear new sport. Each turned his eyes to the other side, he first who had been most averse to doing it. The Navarrese chose well his time, planted his feet firmly on the ground, and in an instant leaped, and from their purpose freed himself. At this, each of them was pricked with shame, but he most who was the cause of the loss; wherefore he started and cried out, "Thou art caught." But little it availed, for wings could not outstrip fear. The one went under, and the other, flying, turned his breast upward. Not otherwise the wild duck on a sudden dives when the falcon comes close, and he returns up vexed and baffled. Calcabrina, enraged at the flout, kept flying behind him, desirous that the sinner should escape, that he might have a scuffle; and when the barrator had disappeared he turned his talons upon his companion, and grappled with him above the ditch. But the other was indeed a sparrowhawk full grown to gripe him well, and both fell into the midst of the boiling pool. The heat was a sudden ungrappler, but nevertheless there was no rising from it, they had their wings so glued. Barbariccia, grieving with the rest of his troop, made four of them fly to the other side with all their forks, and very quickly, this side and that, they descended to their post. They stretched out their hooks toward the belimed ones, who were already baked within the crust: and we left them thus embroiled.
Footnotes
1 Probably Thibault II., the brother-in-law of St Louis, who accompanied him on his last disastrous crusade, and died on his way home in 1270.
2 Gallura, one of the four divisions of Sardinia, called judicatures, made by the Pisans, after their conquest of the island. The lord of Gomita was the gentle Judge Nino, whom Dante meets in Purgatory. Gomita was hung for his frauds.
3 Logodoro was another of the judicatures of Sardinia. Don Michael Zanche was a noted man, but of his special sins little or nothing has been recorded by the chroniclers.
Canto XXIII
Eighth Circle. Escape from the fifth pit.—The sixth pit: hypocrites, in cloaks of gilded lead.—Jovial Friars. —Caiaphas.—Annas.—Frate Catalano.
Silent, alone, and without company, we went on, one before, the other behind, as the Minor friars go along the way. My thought was turned by the present brawl upon the fable of Aesop, in which he tells of the frog and the mole; for NOW and THIS INSTANT are not more alike than the one is to the other, if beginning and end are rightly coupled by the attentive mind.1 And as one thought bursts out from another, so from that then sprang another which made my first fear double. I reflected in this wise: These through us have been flouted, and with such harm and mock as I believe must vex them greatly; if anger to ill-will be added, they will come after us more merciless than the dog upon the leveret which he snaps.
Already I was feeling my hair all bristling with fear, and was backwards intent, when I said, "Master, if thou concealest not thyself and me speedily, I am afraid of the Malebranche; we have them already behind us, and I so imagine them that I already feel them." And he, "If I were of leaded glass,2 I should not draw thine outward image more quickly to me than thine inward I receive. Even now came thy thoughts among mine, with similar action and with similar look, so that of both one sole design I made. If it be that the right bank lieth so that we can descend into the next pit, we shall escape the imagined chase."
Not yet had he finished reporting this design, when I saw them coming with spread wings, not very far off, with will to take us. My Leader on a sudden took me, as a mother who is wakened by the noise, and near her sees the kindled flames, who takes her son and flies, and, having more care of him than of herself, stays not so long as only to put on a shift. And down from the ridge of the hard bank, supine he gave himself to the sloping rock that closes one of the sides of the next pit. Never ran water so swiftly through a duct, to turn the wheel of a land-mill, when it approaches near est to the paddles, as my Master over that border, bearing me along upon his breast, as his own son, and not as his companion. Hardly had his feet reached the bed of the depth below, when they were on the ridge right over us; but here there was no fear, for the high Providence that willed to set them as ministers of the fifth ditch deprived them all of power of departing thence.
There below we found a painted people who were going around with very slow steps, weeping, and in their semblance weary and vanquished. They had cloaks, with hoods lowered before their eyes, made of the same cut as those of the monks in Cluny. Outwardly they are gilded, so that it dazzles, but within all lead, and so heavy that Frederick put them on of straw.3 Oh mantle wearisome for eternity!
We turned, still ever to the left hand, along with them, intent on their sad plaint. But because of the weight that tired folk came so slowly that we had fresh
