"Ye who so strain your breasts together, tell me,"
I said, "who are you"; and they bent their necks,
And when to me their faces they had lifted, 45
Their eyes, which first were only moist within,
Gushed o'er the eyelids, and the frost congealed
The tears between, and locked them up again.
Clamp never bound together wood with wood
So strongly; whereat they, like two he-goats, 50
Butted together, so much wrath o'ercame them.
And one, who had by reason of the cold
Lost both his ears, still with his visage downward,
Said: "Why dost thou so mirror thyself in us?
If thou desire to know who these two are, 55
The valley whence Bisenzio descends
Belonged to them and to their father Albert.
They from one body came, and all Caïna
Thou shalt search through, and shalt not find a shade
More worthy to be fixed in gelatine; 60
Not he in whom were broken breast and shadow
At one and the same blow by Arthur's hand;
Focaccia not; not he who me encumbers
So with his head I see no farther forward,
And bore the name of Sassol Mascheroni; 65
Well knowest thou who he was, if thou art Tuscan.
Page:Divine Comedy (Longfellow 1867) v1.djvu/220
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200
The Divine Comedy
