Such stroke of mighty blade a hill could cleave.
6
“Fondly he hopes the foe to hew in twain;
But Gaspar, sighting overhead the blade,
Runs in, and catcheth him with gripping strain:
’Twas a fair feat of skill and hardihead:
The Spaniard clippeth, yet doth not restrain
His boastful threat’ening, although conquerèd;
The forceful Portingall with short delay
Unarms his hands and leaps from out his way.
7
“Then, lest his foeman use such crafty mode
Himself had used, he deals stoccado-thrust:
In fine the broadsword in his bosom-blood
He bathes that naught to vengeance mote he trust.
Flieth the furious ghost and in the wood
Tartarean still blasphemes; relates his lust
For vengeance, who no more can scourge his quean,
While him Alecto scourgeth long and keen.
8
“The Spatha’s277 metal to the damnèd host
Ill-names he calleth heaping curses dread;
Which, when it entered not, his ducats lost,
And lost his life when it had enterèd.
Pluto to gar him pay Sin’s scot and cost,
Shows him the trait’orous ladye-friend who fled
’Joyed by his rival raining greedy kisses:—
He starts to strike them but the Shades he misses.”
Canto IV (after Stanza 44)
“Oh vain reflections’ guiling human sense!
How could this darkling error seal your sight?
How have ye hugged this gay and glad pretence
That lures to ’sanguined hate and baneful fight?
And now of bloodshed dour experience,
A sore dread trial of the deadly blight
Is shown to thee. And now when known thy lot
Thou shalt give counsel which thou tookest not.
2
“The corpses of the Cavaliers, our fone,
Fed the foul creatures of the field and wood:
The nearest fountains till some days were gone
Distilled their crystal black with human blood.
The meadow-shepherds, and the swains who wone
Upon the mountain, loathed the fulsome food,
The feral bird—which for a year and more,
Smackt of the gorgèd flesh and human gore.”
Canto IV (Stanza 49: varia lectio)
Pond’ering such mighty deeds of derring-do
Prophetick Proteus thus to Neptune cried:—
“I fear shall spring such Braves from Braves like these
Who the great sceptre of thy Reigns shall seize!”
2
“He gaineth now the Porte inexpugnable
Whereof the Traitor-Count278 first oped the gate,
In blood to wash the love inevitable
Fired in Rodrigo’s279 heart by hand of Fate.
Yet this was not the cause abominable
That wasted populous Hispanian State:
God for some hidden judgment gave command
The house be opened by Rodrigo’s hand.
3
“But now thou livest safe, O noble Spain!
(If knightly force can save its land a fall)
From other loss like this, from shame and stain,
Who for a Porter hast the Portingall.
This happy Fortune waited on the reign
Of King Joanné,280 who the bounding wall
Of Spanish-lond molested many years;
And conquerèd a higher crest uprears.”
Canto IV (Stanza 61: varia lectio)
“Of Venice, splendid in prosperity,
Venice, whereto the fisher peoples fled
From Gothic fury, and the cruelty
Of Attila, and built the pauper town
Now raised to rich estate and high renown.”
Canto IV (after Stanza 66)
“Nor chosen was sans justest cause and care
To fill the lofty throne of governance,
This King, whose noble heart and spirit rare
Pledgèd and promised highest esperance:
For him, there being no directer heir
And urgèd mostly by such confidence,
Joanné chose as heir to reign alone,
Having no son-inheritor to the throne.
Canto IV (after Stanza 86)
“There did we promise, if His mercy deign
To bear us safe where Phoebus bursts the womb,
Or to blind worlds we would His faith ordain,
Or headstrong Heathenesse to death would doom.
All for our Souls’ eternal health were fain
With pure, veracious shrift our Sprites t’ illume,
Whereby, though Her’eticks may its power decry,
Souls like the ren’ovate Phoenix heav’enward fly.
2
“Then to partake of Ghostly Meat we went,
By whose most gracious boon so many days,
Sans taste of other earthly nutriment,
Erst were sustained Elias and Moysès:
Bread, whose deep secrets ne thought eminent
Ne subtle lore, ne soaring fantasies
Shall ever fathom, ever plumb its might,
An to dark Reason Faith deny her light.”
Canto VI (after Stanza 7)
There, in sublime Italia, yawns a cave,
Secret and celebrate, Avernus hight,
Wherethrough the Trojan leader bold and brave
Gainèd Infernus-realm of gloomy Night.
And als this Antre easy adit gave,
By road untrod, to Ocean’s middle site,
The Sea-god Neptune’s proper tenement:
Now thither Bacchus ’gan the long descent.
Canto VI (after Stanza 24)
Dolour of fell Dislove hath no respect
For fault or for unfault on either part;
If what thou lovest lief thy love reject
Only some sore revenge shall salve the smart.
But say, What profit shall thy love expect,
When she thou lovest hath bestowed her heart?
How shall for others Love himself deny
When Love delights his foll’owers aye to fly?
Canto VI (after Stanza 40)
“What boots recounting feats and gestes notorious
Of cel’ebrate Capitaynes and grand campaigns,
Where vaunting Death boasts asp’erous might victorious
O’er alien will he bendeth as he fain ’is?
Let others sing and say the deeds memorious
Achieved by Conq’uerors on their battle-plains:
Let it be mine (if worlds will hear) to tell
How by a pair of eyes’ mere force I fell.”
2
No little pleasure to Velloso gave
So fair a subject watch and ward to ’guile,
For as dure warfare made him dour and brave,
So gentled Love his breast by soft’ening wile.
Such is the cunning of this Cupid-knave,
So Art with Nature can he reconcile,
While mortal hearts with blandness it endowereth,
Lovers with double pow’er his will empowereth.
3
“Recount” (quoth he), “recount of Love, fair Sir!
And of the wondrous chances Love befell,
Still his sharp arrows this sad bosom stir
That may not hurt of open wound dispel.”
With him agreed each watchful mariner,
That all and ev’ery, then and there, should tell
Their tales of Love, and how the ventures farèd:—
Thiswise its watch to keep the crew preparèd.
4
Then quoth Le’onardo: “Here let no man wot
From me to gather fables known of yore:
Whoso would quote the tears of alien lot
Himself exempted hath no tears in store.
Sith Love with magick eye-glance mortals smote
Those dearest en’emies mine smote none so sore
’Mid men as me; nor Pyramus nor him
Who from Abydos Helle’s stream did swim.
5
“Fortune, who vaunteth o’er the world her might
Already drave me far from Fatherland,
Where I long time had lived, sufficient quite
To lose a blessing which I held in hand.
Yes, free I lived; yet nought astounds my sprite
Save that
