The Vision, or Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise of Dante Alighieri . on a forest, where no track Of steps had worn a way. Not verdant there The foliage, but of dusky hue ; not light The boughs and tapering, but with knares deformed And matted thick : fruits there were none, but thorns Instead, with venom filled. Less sharp than these, Less intricate the brakes, wherein abide Those animals, that hate the cultured fields. Betwixt Corneto and Cecinas stream. 10 i Canto xiii] HELL 43 Here the brute Harpies make their nest, the sameWho from the Strophades the Trojan bandDrove with dire boding of their
The Vision, or Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise of Dante Alighieri . on a forest, where no track Of steps had worn a way. Not verdant there The foliage, but of dusky hue ; not light The boughs and tapering, but with knares deformed And matted thick : fruits there were none, but thorns Instead, with venom filled. Less sharp than these, Less intricate the brakes, wherein abide Those animals, that hate the cultured fields. Betwixt Corneto and Cecinas stream. 10 i Canto xiii] HELL 43 Here the brute Harpies make their nest, the sameWho from the Strophades the Trojan bandDrove with dire boding of their future are their pennons, of the human formTheir necli and countenance, armed with talons keenThe feet, and the huge belly fledge with sit and wail on the drear mystic wood. The kind instructor in these words began : Ere farther thou proceed, know thou art nowI th second round, and shalt be, till thou comeUpon the horrid sand : look therefore wellAround thee, and such things thou shalt would my speech discredit. On all sides 20. I heard sad plainings breathe, and none could see From whom they might have issued. In amaze Fast bound I stood. He, as it seemed, believed That I had thought so many voices came From some amid those thickets close concealed, And thus his speech resumed : If thou lop off A single twig from one of those ill plants, 30 The thought thou hast conceived shall vanish quite. Thereat a little stretching forth my a great wilding gathered I a straight the trunk exclaimed ; Why pluckst thou me ? Then, as the dark blood trickled down its words it added: Wherefore tearst me thus ?Is there no touch of mercy in thy breast ?Men once were we, that now are rooted here. 44 THE VISION OF DANTE [Canto xiii Thy hand might well have spared us, had we been The souls of serpents. As a brand yet green, 40 That burning at one end from the other sends A groaning sound, and hisses with the wind That forces out its way
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