No More Learning

In the east, at last, expected long in vain,
The wished for twilight streaked the horizon o'er;
And she her courser took, which on the ley
Was feeding, and rode forth to meet the day.

IX
Nor far had rode, ere from the greenwood-trees
She issued, where the dome was erst displayed;
And many days her with such witcheries
The evil-minded wizard had delayed.
Here she Astolpho found, who at full ease
A bridle for the Hippogryph had made,
And here was standing, thoughtful and in pain
To whom he should deliver Rabicane.

X
By chance she found him, as the cavalier
Had from the helm uncased his head to view;
So that when of the dingy forest clear,
Fair Bradamant her gentle cousin knew.
Him from afar she hailed with joyful cheer,
And now more nigh, to embrace the warrior flew;
And named herself, and raised her vizor high,
And let him plainly who she was espy.

XI
None could Astolpho have found any where
With whom to leave his horse with more content,
As knowing she would guard the steed with care,
And to his lord on his return present;
And he believed that Heaven had, in its care,
Duke Aymon's daughter for this pleasure sent.
Her was he wont with pleasure aye to see,
But now with more in his necessity.

XII
Embracing twice or thrice the cousins stand,
Fraternally, each other's neck, and they
Had of each other's welfare made demand
With much affection, ere the duke 'gan say;
"Would I now see the winged people's land,
Here upon earth I make too long delay. "
And opening to the dame the thought he brewed,
To her the flying horse Astolpho shewed.

XIII
But she scarce marvelled when above the plain
She saw the rising steed his wings unfold;
Since upon former time, with mastering rein.
On him had charged the dame that wizard old;
And made her eye and eyelid sorely strain,
So hard she gazed, his movements to behold;
The day that he bore off, with wonderous range,
Rogero on his journey, long and strange.

XIV
Astolpho says on her he will bestow
His Rabican; so passing swift of kind,
That, if the courser started when a bow
Was drawn, he left the feathered shaft behind;
And will as well his panoply forego,
That it may to Mount Alban be consigned:
And she for him preserve the martial weed;
Since of his arms he has no present need.

XV
Bent, since a course in air was to be flown,
That he, as best he can, will make him light.
Yet keeps the sword and horn; although alone
The horn from every risque might shield the knight:
But he the lance abandons, which the son
Of Galaphron was wont to bear in flight;
The lance, by which whoever in the course
Was touched, fell headlong hurtling from his horse.

XVI
Backed by Astolpho, and ascending slow,
The hippogryph through yielding aether flew;
And next the rider stirred the courser so,
That in a thought he vanished out of view.
Thus with his pilot does the patron go,
Fearing the gale and rock, till he is through
The reefs; then, having left the shore behind,
Hoists every sail, and shoots before the wind.

XVII
Bradamant, when departed was the peer,
Remained distressed in mind; since in what way
She knew not her good kinsman's warlike gear
And courser to Mount Alban to convey.
For on her heart, which they inflame and tear,
The warm desire and greedy will yet prey
To see the Child; whom she to find once more
At Vallombrosa thought, if not before.

XVIII
Here standing in suspense, by chance she spied
A churl, that came towards her on the plain,
Who, at her best, Astolpho's armour tied,
As best he might, and laid on Rabicane;
She next behind her bade the peasant guide
(One courser loaded and one loose) the twain.
Two were the steeds; for she had that before,
On which his horse from Pinnabel she bore.

XIX
To Vallombrosa to direct her way
She thought, in hopes to find Rogero there:
But, fearing evermore to go astray,
Knew not how thither she might best repair.
The churl had of the country small assay,
And, sure to be bewildered, wend the pair:
Yet at a venture thitherward she hies,
Where she believes the place of meeting lies.

XX
She here and there, as she her way pursued,
Turned, but found none to question of the road;
She saw at mid-day, issuing from the wood,
A fort, nor far removed was the abode,
Which on the summit of a mountain stood,
And to the lady like Mount Alban showed;
And was Mount Alban sure; in which repair
One of her brothers and her mother were.

XXI
She, when she recognized the place, became
Sadder at heart than I have power to say.
If she delays, discovered is the dame,
Nor thence will be allowed to wend her way:
If thence she wends not, of the amorous flame
Which so consumes her, she will be the prey,
Nor see Rogero more, nor compass aught
Which was at Vallombrosa to be wrought.

XXII
Some deal she doubted: then to turn her steed,
Resolved upon Mount Alban's castle near;
And, for she thence her way could deftly read,
Her course anew towards the abbey steer.
But Fortune, good or evil, had decreed
The maid, before she of the vale was clear,
Of one of her good brethren should be spied,
Alardo named, ere she had time to hide.

XXIII
He came from billeting the bands which lay
Dispersed about that province, foot and horse;
For the surrounding district, to obey
King Charlemagne, had raised another force.
Embraces brotherly and friendly say,
Salutes and kindly cheer, ensue of course;
And next into Mount Alban, side by side,
They, communing of many matters, ride.

XXIV
Bradamant enters Montalbano's seat,
Whom Beatrice had mourned, and vainly sought
Through spacious France: 'Tis here all welcome sweet,
The kiss and clasp of hand, she holds at nought,
While her a mother and a brother greet,
As the enamoured maid compares in thought
These with the loved Rogero's fond embrace;
Which time will never from her mind efface.

XXV
Because she could not go, one in her stead
To send to Vallombrosa she devised,
Who thither in the damsel's name should speed;
By whom should young Rogero be apprised
What kept her thence; and prayed, if prayer should need,
That there he for love would be baptised;
And next, as was concerned, would intend
What might their bridal bring to happy end.

XXVI
She purposed the same messenger should bear
As well to her Rogero his good steed;
Which he was ever wonted to hold dear,
Worthily dear; for sure so stout at need
And beauteous was no courser, far or near,
In land of Christian or of Paynim creed,
In occupation of the Gaul or Moor;
Except Baiardo good and Brigliador.

XXVII
Valiant Rogero, when too bold of sprite
He backed the hippogryph and soared in air,
Frontino left (Frontino he was hight),
Whom Bradamant then took into her care,
And to Mount Alban sent; and had him dight,
And nourished, at large cost, with plenteous fare;
Nor let be rode except at easy pace,
Hence was he ne'er so sleek or well in case.

XXVIII
Each damsel and each dame who her obeyed,
She tasked, together with herself, to sew,
With subtle toil; and with fine gold o'erlaid
A piece of silk of white and sable hue:
With this she trapt the horse; then chose a maid,
Old Callitrephia's daughter, from the crew;
Whose mother whilom Bradamant had nursed;
A damsel she in all her secrets versed.

XXIX
How graven in her heart Rogero lies,
A thousand times to her she had confessed;
And had extolled above the deities
The manners, worth, and beauty be possessed.
"No better messenger could I devise,"
(She said, and called the damsel from the rest,)
"Nor have I one, Hippalca mine, more sage
And sure than three, to do my embassage. "

XXX
Hippalca was the attendant damsel hight.
"Go," (says her lady, and describes the way)
And afterwards informs the maid aright
Of all which to Rogero she should say;
And why she at the abbey failed the knight,
Who must not to bad faith ascribe her stay,
But this to Fortune charge, that so decides,
Who, more than we ourselves, our conduct guides.

XXXI
She made the damsel mount upon a pad,
And put into her hand Frontino's rein;
And, if she met with one so rude or mad,
Who to deprive her of the steed were fain,
Her to proclaim who was his owner, bade,
As that which might suffice to make him sane.
For she believed there was no cavalier,
But that Rogero's name would make him fear.

XXXII
Of many and many things, whereof to treat
With good Rogero, in her stead, she showed;
Of which instructed well, her palfrey fleet
Hippalca stirred, nor longer there abode.
Through highway, field, and wood, a gloomy beat,
More than ten weary miles the damsel rode,
Ere any crossed her path on mischief bent,
Or even questioned witherward she went.

XXXIII
At noon of day, descending from a mount,
She in a streight and ill declivity,
Led by a dwarf, encountered Rodomont,
Who was afoot and harnessed cap-a-pee.
The Moor towards her raised his haughty front,
And straight blasphemed the eternal Hierarchy,
That horse, so richly trapped and passing fair,
He had not found in a knight-errant's care.

XXXIV
On the first courser he should find, the knight
Had sworn a solemn oath his hands to lay:
This was the first, nor he on steed could light
Fairer or fitter; yet to take away
The charger from a maid were foul despite.
Doubtful he stands, but covets sore the prey;
Eyes and surveys him, and says often, "Why
Is not as well the courser's master by? "

XXXV
"Ah! would be were! " to him the maid replied,
"For haply he would make thee change thy thought.
A better knight than thee the horse doth ride,
And vainly would his match on earth be sought. "
-- "Who tramples thus on other's fame? " -- he cried;
And she -- "Rogero" -- said, as she was taught.
Then Rodomont -- "The steed I may my own;
Since him a champion rides of such renown.

XXXVI
"If he, as you relate, be of such force,
That he surprises all beside in might,
I needs must pay the hire as well as horse;
And be this at the pleasure of the knight!
That I am Rodomont, to him discourse;
And, if indeed with me he lists to fight,
Me shall to find; in that I shine confest,
By my own light, in motion or at rest.

XXXVII
"I leave such vestige wheresoe'er I tread,
The volleyed thunder leaves not worse below. "
He had thrown back, over Frontino's head,
The courser's gilded reins, in saying so,
Backed him, and left Hippalca sore bested;
Who, bathed in tears, and goaded by her woe,
Cries shame on him, and threats the king with ill:
Rodomont hearkens not, and climbs the hill:

XXXVIII
Whither the dwarf conducts him on the trace
Of Doralice and Mandricardo bold.
Behind, Hippalca him in ceaseless chase,
Pursues with taunt and curses manifold.
What came of this is said in other place.
Turpin, by whom this history is told,
Here makes digression, and returns again
Thither, where faithless Pinnabel was slain.

XXXIX
Duke Aymon's daughter scarce had turned away
From thence, who on her track in haste had gone,
Ere thither by another path, astray,
Zerbino came, with that deceitful crone,
And saw the bleeding body where it lay:
And, though the warrior was to him unknown,
As good and courteous, felt his bosom swell,
With pity at that cruel sight and fell.

XL
Dead lay Sir Pinnabel, and bathed in gore;
From whom such streams of blood profusely flow,
As were a cause for wonderment, had more
Swords than a hundred joined to lay him low.
A print of recent footsteps to explore
The cavalier of Scotland was not slow;
Who took the adventure, in the hope to read
Who was the doer of the murderous deed.

XLI
The hag to wait was ordered by the peer,
Who would return to her in little space.
She to the body of the count drew near,
And with fixt eye examined every place;
Who willed not aught, that in her sight was dear,
The body of the dead should vainly grace;
As one who, soiled with every other vice,
Surpassed all womankind in avarice.

XLII
If she in any manner could have thought,
Or hoped to have concealed the intended theft,
The bleeding warrior's surcoat, richly wrought,
She would, together with his arms, have reft;
But at what might be safely hidden, caught,
And, grieved at heart, forewent the glorious weft.
Him of a beauteous girdle she undrest,
And this secured between a double vest.

XLIII
Zerbino after some short space came back,
Who vainly Bradamant had thence pursued
Through the green holt; because the beaten track
Was lost in many others in the wood;
And he (for daylight now began to lack)
Feared night should catch him 'mid those mountains rude,
And with the impious woman thence, in quest
Of inn, from the disastrous valley prest.

XLIV
A spacious town, which Altaripa hight,
Journeying the twain, at two miles' distance spy:
There stopt the pair, and halted for the night,
Which, at full soar, even now went up the sky:
Nor long had rested there ere, left and right,
They from the people heard a mournful cry;
And saw fast tears from every eyelid fall,
As if some cause of sorrow touched them all.

XLV
Zerbino asked the occasion, and 'twas said
Tidings had been to Count Anselmo brought,
That Pinnabel, his son, was lying dead
In a streight way between two mountains wrought.
Zerbino feigned surprise, and hung his head,
In fear lest he the assassin should be thought;
But well divined this was the wight he found
Upon his journey, lifeless on the ground.

XLVI
After some little time, the funeral bier
Arrives, 'mid torch and flambeau, where the cries
Are yet more thick, and to the starry sphere
Lament and noise of smitten hands arise;
And faster and from fuller vein the tear
Waters all cheeks, descending from the eyes;
But in a cloud more dismal than the rest,
Is the unhappy father's visage drest.

XLVII
While solemn preparation so was made
For the grand obsequies, with reverence due,
According to old use and honours paid,
In former age, corrupted by each new;
A proclamation of their lord allayed
Quickly the noise of the lamenting crew;
Promising any one a mighty gain
That should denounce by whom his son was slain.

XLVIII
From voice to voice, from one to other ear,
The loud proclaim they through the town declare;
Till this the wicked woman chanced to hear,
Who past in rage the tyger or the bear;
And hence the ruin of the Scottish peer,
Either in hatred, would the crone prepare,
Or were it she alone might boast to be,
In human form, without humanity;

XLIX
Or were it but to gain the promised prize; --
She to seek out the grieving county flew,
And, prefacing her tale in likely wise,
Said that Zerbino did the deed; and drew
The girdle forth, to witness to her lies;
Which straight the miserable father knew;
And on the woman's tale and token built
A clear assurance of Zerbino's guilt.

L
And, weeping, with raised hands, was heard to say,
He for his murdered son would have amends.
To block the hostel where Zerbino lay,
For all the town is risen, the father sends.
The prince, who deems his enemies away,
And no such injury as this attends,
In his first sleep is seized by Anselm's throng,
Who thinks he has endured so foul a wrong.

LI
That night in prison, fettered with a pair
Of heavy letters, is Zerbino chained.
For before yet the skies illuminated are,
The wrongful execution is ordained;
And in the place will he be quartered, where
The deed was done for which he is arraigned.
No other inquest is on this received;
It is enough that so their lord believed.

LII
When, the next morn, Aurora stains with dye
Red, white, and yellow, the clear horizon,
The people rise, to punish ("Death! " their cry)
Zerbino for the crime he has not done:
They without order him accompany,
A lawless multitude, some ride, some run.
I' the midst the Scottish prince, with drooping head,
Is, bound upon a little hackney, led.

LIII
But HE who with the innocent oft sides,
Nor those abandons who make him their stay,
For prince Zerbino such defence provides,
There is no fear that he will die to-day;
God thitherward renowned Orlando guides;
Whose coming for his safety paves the way:
Orlando sees beneath him on a plain
The youth to death conducted by the train.

LIV
With him was wended she, that in the cell,
Prisoned, Orlando found; that royal maid,
Child of Gallicia's king, fair Isabel,
Whom chance into the ruffians' power conveyed,
What time her ship she quitted, by the swell
Of the wild sea and tempest overlaid:
The damsel, who, yet nearer her heart-core
Than her own vital being, Zerbino wore.

LV
She had beneath Orlando's convoy strayed,
Since rescued from the cave. When on the plain
The damsel saw the motley troop arrayed,
She asked Orlando what might be the train?
"I know not," said the Count; and left the maid
Upon the height, and hurried towards the plain.
He marked Zerbino, and at the first sight
A baron of high worth esteemed the knight,

LVI
And asked him why and wherefore him they led
Thus captive, to Zerbino drawing near:
At this the doleful prince upraised his head,
And, having better heard the cavalier,
Rehearsed the truth; and this so well he said,
That he deserved the succour of the peer.
Well Sir Orlando him, by his reply,
Deemed innocent, and wrongly doomed to die.

LVII
And, after he had heard 'twas at the hest
Of Anselm, Count of Altaripa, done,
Was certain 'twas and outrage manifest,
Since nought but ill could spring from him; and one,
Moreover, was the other's foe profest,
From ancient hate and enmity, which run
In Clermont and Maganza's blood; a feud
With injuries, and death and shame pursued.

LVIII
Orlando to the rabble cried, "Untie
The cavalier, unless you would be slain. "
-- "Who deals such mighty blows? " -- one made reply,
That would be thought the truest of the train;
"Were he of fire who makes such bold defy,
We wax or straw, too haughty were the strain":
And charged with that the paladin of France.
Orlando at the losel couched his lance.

LIX
The shining armour which the chief had rent
From young Zerbino but the night before,
And clothed himself withal, poor succour lent
Against Orlando in that combat sore.
Against the churl's right cheek the weapon went:
It failed indeed his tempered helm to bore,
But such a shock he suffered in the strife,
As broke his neck, and stretched him void of life.

LX
All at one course, of other of the band,
With lance unmoved, he pierced the bosom through;
Left it; on Durindana laid his hand,
And broke into the thicket of the crew:
One head in twain he severed with the brand,
(While, from the shoulders lopt, another flew)
Of many pierced the throat; and in a breath
Above a hundred broke and put to death.

LXI
Above a third he killed, and chased the rest,
And smote, and pierced, and cleft, as he pursued.
Himself of helm or shield one dispossest;
One with spontoon or bill the champaign strewed
This one along the road, across it prest
A fourth; this squats in cavern or in wood.
Orlando, without pity, on that day
Lets none escape whom he has power to slay.

LXII
Of a hundred men and twenty, in that crew,
(So Turpin sums them) eighty died at least.
Thither Orlando finally withdrew,
Where, with a heart sore trembling in his breast,
Zerbino sat; how he at Roland's view
Rejoiced, in verse can hardly be exprest:
Who, but that he was on the hackney bound,
Would at his feet have cast himself to ground.

LXIII
While Roland, after he had loosed the knight,
Helped him to don his shining arms again;
Stript from those serjeants' captain, who had dight
Himself with the good harness, to his pain;
The prince on Isabella turned his sight,
Who had halted on the hill above the plain:
And, after she perceived the strife was o'er,
Nearer the field of fight her beauties bore.

LXIV
When young Zerbino at his side surveyed
The lady, who by him was held so dear;
The beauteous lady, whom false tongue had said
Was drowned, so often wept with many a tear,
As if ice at his heart-core had been laid,
Waxed cold, and some deal shook the cavalier;
But the chill quickly past, and he, instead,
Was flushed with amorous fire, from foot to head.

LXV
From quickly clipping her in his embrace,
Him reverence for Anglantes' sovereign stayed;
Because he thought, and held for certain case,
That Roland was a lover of the maid;
So past from pain to pain; and little space
Endured the joy which he at first assayed.
And worse he bore she should another's be,
Than hearing that the maid was drowned at sea.

LXVI
And worse he grieved, that she was with a knight
To whom he owed so much: because to wrest
The lady from his hand, was neither right,
Nor yet perhaps would prove an easy quest.
He, without quarrel, had no other wight
Suffered to part, of such a prize possest;
But would endure, Orlando (such his debt)
A foot upon his prostrate neck should set.

LXVII
The three in silence journey to a font,
Where they alight, and halt beside the well;
His helmet here undid the weary Count,
And made the prince too quit the iron shell.
The youth unhelmed, she sees her lover's front,
And pale with sudden joy grows Isabel:
Then, changing, brightened like a humid flower,
When the warm sun succeeds to drenching shower.

LXVIII
And without more delay or scruple, prest
To cast her arms about her lover dear;
And not a word could draw-forth from her breast,
But bathed his neck and face with briny tear.
Orlando, who remarked the love exprest,
Needing no more to make the matter clear,
Could not but, by these certain tokens, see
The could no other but Zerbino be.

LXIX
When speech returned, ere yet the maiden well
Had dried her cheeks from the descending tear,
She only of the courtesy could tell
Late shown her by Anglantes' cavalier.
The prince, who in one scale weighed Isabel,
Together with his life, esteemed as dear, --
Fell at Orlando's feet and him adored,
As to two lives at once by him restored.

LXX
Proffers and thanks had followed, with a round
Of courtesies between the warlike pair,
Had they not heard the covered paths resound,
Which overgrown with gloomy foliage were.
Upon their heads the helmet, late unbound,
They quickly place, and to their steeds repair;
And, lo! a knight and maid arrive, ere well
The cavaliers are seated in the sell.

LXXI
This was the Tartar Mandricardo, who
In haste behind the paladin had sped,
To venge Alzirdo and Manilard, the two
Whom good Orlando's valour had laid dead:
Though afterwards less eager to pursue,
Since he with him fair Doralice had led;
Whom from a hundred men, in plate and chain,
He, with a single staff of oak, had ta'en.

LXXII
Yet knew not that it was Anglantes' peer
This while, of whom he had pursued the beat;
Though that he was a puissant cavalier
By certain signals was he taught to weet.
More than Zerbino him he eyed, and, near,
Perused the paladin from head to feet;
Then finding all the tokens coincide,
"Thou art the man I seek," the paynim cried.

LXXIII
" 'Tis now ten days," to him the Tartar said,
"That thee I still have followed; so the fame
Had stung me, and in me such longing bred,
Which of thee to our camp of Paris came:
When, amid thousands by thy hand laid dead,
Scarce one alive fled thither, to proclaim
The mighty havoc made by thy good hand,
'Mid Tremisena's and Noritia's band.

LXXIV
"I was not, as I knew, in following slow
Both to behold thee, and to prove thy might;
And by the surcoat o'er thine arms I know,
(Instructed of thy vest) thou art the knight:
And if such cognizance thou didst not show,
And, 'mid a hundred, wert concealed from sight,
For what thou art thou plainly wouldst appear,
Thy worth conspicuous in thy haughty cheer. "

LXXV
"No one can say," to him Orlando cried,
"But that a valiant cavalier thou art:
For such a brave desire can ill reside,
'Tis my assurance, in a humble heart.
Since thou wouldst see me, would that thou inside,
Couldst as without, behold me! I apart
Will lay me helm, that in all points thy will
And purpose of thy quest I may fulfil.

LXXVI
"But when thou well hast scanned me with thine eye,
To that thine other wish as well attend:
It yet remains for thee to satisfy
The want, which leads thee after me to wend;
That thou mayest mark if, in my valour, I
Agree with that bold cheer thou so commend. "
-- "And now," (exclaimed the Tartar), "for the rest!
For my first want is thoroughly redrest. "

LXXVII
Orlando, all this while, from head to feet,
Searches the paynim with inquiring eyes:
Both sides, and next the pommel of his seat
Surveys, yet neither mace nor tuck espies;
And asks how he the combat will repeat,
If his good lance at the encounter flies.
-- "Take thou no care for that," replied the peer;
"Thus into many have I stricken fear.

LXXVIII
"I have an oath in Heaven to gird no blade,
Till Durindana from the count be won.
Pursuing whom, I through each road here strayed,
With him to reckon for more posts than one.
If thou wilt please to hear, my oath I made
When on my head I placed this morion:
Which casque, with all the other arms I bear,
A thousand years ago great Hector's were.

LXXIX
"To these good arms nought lacks beside the sword;
How it was stolen, to you I cannot say:
This now, it seems, is borne by Brava's lord,
And hence is he so daring in affray.
Yet well I trust, if I the warrior board,
To make him render his ill-gotten prey.
Yet more; I seek the champion with desire
To avenge the famous Agrican, my sire.

LXXX
"Him this Orlando slew by treachery,
I wot, nor could have slain in other wise. "
The count could bear no more, and, " 'Tis a lie! "
(Exclaims), "and whosoever says so, lies:
Him fairly did I slay; Orlando, I.
But what thou seekest Fortune here supplies;
And this the faulchion is, which thou has sought,
Which shall be thine if by thy valour bought.

LXXXI
"Although mine is the faulchion, rightfully,
Let us for it in courtesy contend;
Nor will I in this battle, that it be
More mine than thine, but to a tree suspend:
Bear off the weapon freely hence, if me
Thou kill or conquer. " As he made an end,
He Durindana from his belt unslung,
And in mid-field upon a sapling hung.

LXXXII
Already distant half the range of bow
Is from his opposite each puissant knight,
And pricks against the other, nothing slow
To slack the reins or ply the rowels bright.
Already dealt is either mighty blow,
Where the helm yields a passage to the sight.
As if of ice, the shattered lances fly,
Broke in a thousand pieces, to the sky.

LXXXIII
One and the other lance parforce must split,
In that the cavaliers refuse to bend;
The cavaliers, who in the saddle sit,
Returning with the staff's unbroken end.
The warriors, who with steed had ever smit,
Now, as a pair of hinds in rage contend
For the mead's boundary or river's right,
Armed with two clubs, maintain a cruel fight.

LXXXIV
The truncheons which the valiant champions bear,
Fail in the combat, and few blows resist;
Both rage with mightier fury, here and there,
Left without other weapon than the fist;
With this the desperate foes engage, and, where
The hand can grapple, plate and mail untwist.
Let none desire, to guard himself from wrongs,
A heavier hammer or more holding tongs.

LXXXV
How can the Saracen conclude the fray
With honour, which he haughtily had sought?
'Twere forty to waste time in an assay
Where to himself more harm the smiter wrought
Than to the smitten: in conclusion, they
Closed, and the paynim king Orlando caught,
And strained against his bosom; what Jove's son
Did by Antaeus, thinking to have done.

LXXXVI
Him griped athwart, he, in impetuous mood,
Would now push from him, now would closely strain;
And waxed so wroth that, in his heat of blood,
The Tartar little thought about his rein.
Firm in his stirrups self-collected stood
Roland, and watched his vantage to obtain;
He to the other courser's forehead slipt
His wary hand, and thence the bridle stript.

LXXXVII
The Saracen assays with all his might
To choak, and from the sell his foeman tear:
With either knee Orlando grasps it tight,
Nor can the Tartar more him, here or there.
But with the straining of the paynim knight,
The girts which hold his saddle broken are.
Scarce conscious of his fall, Orlando lies,
With feet i' the stirrups, tightening yet his thighs.

LXXXVIII
As falls a sack of armour, with such sound
Tumbled Orlando, when he prest the plain.
King Mandricardo's courser, when he found
His head delivered from the guiding rein,
Made off with him, unheeding what the ground,
Stumbling through woodland, or by pathway plain,
Hither and tither, blinded by his fear;
And bore with him the Tartar cavalier.

LXXXIX
The beauteous Doralice, who sees her guide
So quit the field, -- dismayed at his retreat,
And wonted in his succour to confide,
Her hackney drives behind his courser fleet:
The paynim rates the charger, in his pride,
And smites him oftentimes with hands and feet;
Threatening, as if he understood his lore;
And where he'd stop the courser, chafes him more.

XC
Not looking to his feet, by high or low,
The beast of craven kind, with headlong force
Three miles in rings had gone, and more would go,
But that into a fosse which stopt their course,
Not lined with featherbed or quilt below,
Tumble, reversed, the rider and his horse.
On the hard ground was Mandricardo thrown,
Yet neither spoiled himself, nor broke a bone:

XCI
Here stopt the horse; but him he could not guide,
Left without bit his motions to restrain.
Brimfull of rage and choler, at his side,
The Tartar held him, grappled by the mane.
"Put upon him" (to Mandricardo cried
His lady, Doralice) "my hackney's rein,
Since for the bridle I have little use;
For gentle is my palfrey, reined or loose. "

XCII
The paynim deems it were discourtesy
To accept the proffer by the damsel made.
But his through other means a rein will be;
Since Fortune, who his wishes well appaid,
Made thitherward the false Gabrina flee,
After she young Zerbino had betrayed:
Who like a she-wolf fled, which, as she hies,
At distance hears the hounds and hunters' cries.

XCIII
She had upon her back the gallant gear,
And the same youthful ornaments and vest,
Stript from the ill-taught damsel for her jeer,
That in her spoils the beldam might be drest,
And rode the horse that damsel backed whilere;
Who was among the choicest and the best.
Ere yet aware of her, the ancient dame
On Doralice and Mandricardo came.

XCIV
Stordilane's daughter and the Tartar king
Laugh at the vest of youthful show and shape,
Upon that ancient woman, figuring
Like monkey, rather say, like grandam ape.
From her the Saracen designs to wring
The rein, and does the deed: upon the rape
Of the crone's bridle, he, with angry cry,
Threatens and scares her horse, and makes him fly.

XCV
He flies and hurries through the forest gray
That ancient woman, almost dead with fear,
By hill and dale, by straight and crooked way,
By fosse and cliff, at hazard, there and here.
But it imports me not so much to say
Of her, that I should leave Anglantes' peer;
Who, from annoyance of a foe released,
The broken saddle at his ease re-pieced.

XCVI
He mounts his horse, and watches long, before
Departing, if the foe will re-appear;
Nor seeing puissant Mandricardo more,
At last resolves in search of him to steer.
But, as one nurtured well in courtly lore,
From thence departed not the cavalier,
Till he with kind salutes, in friendly strain,
Fair leaves had taken of the loving twain.

XCVII
At his departure waxed Zerbino woe,
And Isabella wept for sorrow: they
Had wended with him, but the count, although
Their company was fair and good, said nay;
Urging for reason, nought so ill could show
In cavalier, as, when upon his way
To seek his foeman out, to take a friend,
Who him with arms might succour or defend.

XCVIII
Next, if they met the Saracen, before
They should encounter him, besought them say,
That he, Orlando, would for three days more.
Waiting him, in that territory stay:
But, after that, would seek the flags which bore
The golden lilies, and King Charles' array.
That Mandricardo through their means might know,
If such his pleasure, where to find his foe.

XCIX
The lovers promised willingly to do
This, and whatever else he should command.
By different ways the cavaliers withdrew,
One on the right, and one on the left hand.
The count, ere other path he would pursue,
Took from the sapling, and replaced, his brand.
And, where he weened he might the paynim best
Encounter, thitherward his steed addrest.

C
The course in pathless woods, which, without rein,
The Tartar's charger had pursued astray,
Made Roland for two days, with fruitless pain,
Follow him, without tidings of his way.
Orlando reached a rill of crystal vein,
On either bank of which a meadow lay;
Which, stained with native hues and rich, he sees,
And dotted o'er with fair and many trees.

CI
The mid-day fervour made the shelter sweet
To hardy herd as well as naked swain;
So that Orlando, well beneath the heat
Some deal might wince, opprest with plate and chain.
He entered, for repose, the cool retreat,
And found it the abode of grief and pain;
And place of sojourn more accursed and fell,
On that unhappy day, than tongue can tell.

CII
Turning him round, he there, on many a tree,
Beheld engraved, upon the woody shore,
What as the writing of his deity
He knew, as soon as he had marked the lore.
This was a place of those described by me,
Whither ofttimes, attended by Medore,
From the near shepherd's cot had wont to stray
The beauteous lady, sovereign of Catay.

CIII
In a hundred knots, amid those green abodes,
In a hundred parts, their cyphered names are dight;
Whose many letters are so many goads,
Which Love has in his bleeding hear-core pight.
He would discredit in a thousand modes,
That which he credits in his own despite;
And would parforce persuade himself, that rhind
Other Angelica than his had signed.

CIV
"And yet I know these characters," he cried,
"Of which I have so many read and seen;
By her may this Medoro be belied,
And me, she, figured in the name, may mean. "
Feeding on such like phantasies, beside
The real truth, did sad Orlando lean
Upon the empty hope, though ill contented,
Which he by self-illusions had fomented.

CV
But stirred and aye rekindled it, the more
That he to quench the ill suspicion wrought,
Like the incautious bird, by fowler's lore,
Hampered in net or line; which, in the thought
To free its tangled pinions and to soar,
By struggling, is but more securely caught.
Orlando passes thither, where a mountain
O'erhangs in guise of arch the crystal fountain.

CVI
Splay-footed ivy, with its mantling spray,
And gadding vine, the cavern's entry case;
Where often in the hottest noon of day
The pair had rested, locked in fond embrace.
Within the grotto, and without it, they
Had oftener than in any other place
With charcoal or with chalk their names pourtrayed,
Or flourished with the knife's indenting blade.

CVII
Here from his horse the sorrowing County lit,
And at the entrance of the grot surveyed
A cloud of words, which seemed but newly writ,
And which the young Medoro's hand had made.
On the great pleasure he had known in it,
The sentence he in verses had arrayed;
Which in his tongue, I deem, might make pretence
To polished phrase; and such in ours the sense.

CVIII
"Gay plants, green herbage, rill of limpid vein,
And, grateful with cool shade, thou gloomy cave,
Where oft, by many wooed with fruitless pain,
Beauteous Angelica, the child of grave
King Galaphron, within my arms has lain;
For the convenient harbourage you gave,
I, poor Medoro, can but in my lays,
As recompence, for ever sing your praise.

CIX
"And any loving lord devoutly pray,
Damsel and cavalier, and every one,
Whom choice or fortune hither shall convey,
Stranger or native, -- to this crystal run,
Shade, caverned rock, and grass, and plants, to say,
Benignant be to you the fostering sun
And moon, and may the choir of nymphs provide,
That never swain his flock may hither guide!
"

CX
In Arabic was writ the blessing said,
Known to Orlando like the Latin tongue,
Who, versed in many languages, best read
Was in this speech; which oftentimes from wrong,
And injury, and shame, had saved his head,
What time he roved the Saracens among.
But let him boast not of its former boot,
O'erbalanced by the present bitter fruit.

CXI
Three times, and four, and six, the lines imprest
Upon the stone that wretch perused, in vain
Seeking another sense than was exprest,
And ever saw the thing more clear and plain;
And all the while, within his troubled breast,
He felt an icy hand his heart-core strain.
With mind and eyes close fastened on the block,
At length he stood, not differing from the rock.

CXII
Then well-nigh lost all feeling; so a prey
Wholly was he to that o'ermastering woe.
This is a pang, believe the experienced say
Of him who speaks, which does all griefs outgo.
His pride had from his forehead passed away,
His chin had fallen upon his breast below;
Nor found he, so grief barred each natural vent,
Moisture for tears, or utterance for lament.

CXIII
Stiffed within, the impetuous sorrow stays,
Which would too quickly issue; so to abide
Water is seen, imprisoned in the vase,
Whose neck is narrow and whose swell is wide;
What time, when one turns up the inverted base,
Towards the mouth, so hastes the hurrying tide,
And in the streight encounters such a stop,
It scarcely works a passage, drop by drop.

CXIV
He somewhat to himself returned, and thought
How possibly the thing might be untrue:
The some one (so he hoped, desired, and sought
To think) his lady would with shame pursue;
Or with such weight of jealously had wrought
To whelm his reason, as should him undo;
And that he, whosoe'er the thing had planned,
Had counterfeited passing well her hand.

CXV
With such vain hope he sought himself to cheat,
And manned some deal his spirits and awoke;
Then prest the faithful Brigliadoro's seat,
As on the sun's retreat his sister broke.
Nor far the warrior had pursued his beat,
Ere eddying from a roof he saw the smoke;
Heard noise of dog and kine, a farm espied,
And thitherward in quest of lodging hied.

CXVI
Languid, he lit, and left his Brigliador
To a discreet attendant: one undrest
His limbs, one doffed the golden spurs he wore,
And one bore off, to clean, his iron vest.
This was the homestead where the young Medore
Lay wounded, and was here supremely blest.
Orlando here, with other food unfed,
Having supt full of sorrow, sought his bed.

CXVII
The more the wretched sufferer seeks for ease,
He finds but so much more distress and pain;
Who every where the loathed hand-writing sees,
On wall, and door, and window: he would fain
Question his host of this, but holds his peace,
Because, in sooth, he dreads too clear, too plain
To make the thing, and this would rather shrowd,
That it may less offend him, with a cloud.

CXVIII
Little availed the count his self-deceit;
For there was one who spake of it unsought;
The sheperd-swain, who to allay the heat,
With which he saw his guest so troubled, thought:
The tale which he was wonted to repeat
-- Of the two lovers -- to each listener taught,
A history which many loved to hear,
He now, without reserve, 'gan tell the peer.

CXIX
How at Angelica's persuasive prayer,
He to his farm had carried young Medore,
Grievously wounded with an arrow; where,
In little space she healed the angry sore.
But while she exercised this pious care,
Love in her heart the lady wounded more,
And kindled from small spark so fierce a fire,
She burnt all over, restless with desire:

CXX
Nor thinking she of mightiest king was born,
Who ruled in the east, nor of her heritage,
Forced by too puissant love, had thought no scorn
To be the consort of a poor foot-page.
-- His story done, to them in proof was borne
The gem, which, in reward for harbourage,
To her extended in that kind abode,
Angelica, at parting, had bestowed.

CXXI
A deadly axe was this unhappy close,
Which, at a single stroke, lopt off the head;
When, satiate with innumerable blows,
That cruel hangman Love his hate had fed.
Orlando studied to conceal his woes;
And yet the mischief gathered force and spread,
And would break out parforce in tears and sighs,
Would he, or would be not, from mouth and eyes.

CXXII
When he can give the rein to raging woe,
Alone, by other's presence unreprest,
From his full eyes the tears descending flow,
In a wide stream, and flood his troubled breast.
'Mid sob and groan, he tosses to and fro
About his weary bed, in search of rest;
And vainly shifting, harder than a rock
And sharper than a nettle found its flock.

CXXIII
Amid the pressure of such cruel pain,
It past into the wretched sufferer's head,
That oft the ungrateful lady must have lain,
Together with her leman, on that bed:
Nor less he loathed the couch in his disdain,
Nor from the down upstarted with less dread,
Than churl, who, when about to close his eyes,
Springs from the turf, if he a serpent spies.

CXXIV
In him, forthwith, such deadly hatred breed
That bed, that house, that swain, he will not stay
Till the morn break, or till the dawn succeed,
Whose twilight goes before approaching day.
In haste, Orlando takes his arms and steed,
And to the deepest greenwood wends his way.
And, when assured that he is there alone,
Gives utterance to his grief in shriek and groan.

CXXV
Never from tears, never from sorrowing,
He paused; nor found he peace by night and day:
He fled from town, in forest harbouring,
And in the open air on hard earth lay.
He marvelled at himself, how such a spring
Of water from his eyes could stream away,
And breath was for so many sobs supplied;
And thus ofttimes, amid his mourning, cried.

CXXVI
"These are no longer real tears which rise,
And which I scatter from so full a vein.
Of tears my ceaseless sorrow lacked supplies;
They stopt when to mid-height scarce rose my pain.
The vital moisture rushing to my eyes,
Driven by the fire within me, now would gain
A vent; and it is this which I expend,
And which my sorrows and my life will end.

CXXVII
"No; these, which are the index of my woes,
These are not sighs, nor sighs are such; they fail
At times, and have their season of repose:
I feel, my breast can never less exhale
Its sorrow: Love, who with his pinions blows
The fire about my heart, creates this gale.
Love, by what miracle does thou contrive,
It wastes not in the fire thou keep'st alive?

CXXVIII
"I am not -- am not what I seem to sight:
What Roland was is dead and under ground,
Slain by that most ungrateful lady's spite,
Whose faithlessness inflicted such a wound.
Divided from the flesh, I am his sprite,
Which in this hell, tormented, walks its round,
To be, but in its shadow left above,
A warning to all such as thrust in love. "

CXXIX
All night about the forest roved the count,
And, at the break of daily light, was brought
By his unhappy fortune to the fount,
Where his inscription young Medoro wrought.
To see his wrongs inscribed upon that mount,
Inflamed his fury so, in him was nought
But turned to hatred, phrensy, rage, and spite;
Nor paused he more, but bared his faulchion bright;

CXXX
Cleft through the writing; and the solid block,
Into the sky, in tiny fragments sped.
Wo worth each sapling and the caverned rock,
Where Medore and Angelica were read!
So scathed, that they to shepherd or to flock
Thenceforth shall never furnish shade or bed.
And that sweet fountain, late so clear and pure,
From such tempestuous wrath was ill secure.

CXXXI
For he turf, stone, and trunk, and shoot, and lop,
Cast without cease into the beauteous source;
Till, turbid from the bottom to the top,
Never again was clear the troubled course.
At length, for lack of breath, compelled to stop,
(When he is bathed in sweat, and wasted force,
Serves not his fury more) he falls, and lies
Upon the mead, and, gazing upward, sighs.

CXXXII
Wearied and woe-begone, he fell to ground,
And turned his eyes toward heaven; nor spake he aught.
Nor ate, nor slept, till in his daily round
The golden sun had broken thrice, and sought
His rest anew; nor ever ceased his wound
To rankle, till it marred his sober thought.
At length, impelled by phrensy, the fourth day,
He from his limbs tore plate and mail away.

CXXXIII
Here was his helmet, there his shield bestowed;
His arms far off; and, farther than the rest,
His cuirass; through the greenwood wide was strowed
All his good gear, in fine; and next his vest
He rent; and, in his fury, naked showed
His shaggy paunch, and all his back and breast.
And 'gan that phrensy act, so passing dread,
Of stranger folly never shall be said.

CXXXIV
So fierce his rage, so fierce his fury grew,
That all obscured remained the warrior's sprite;
Nor, for forgetfulness, his sword he drew,
Or wonderous deeds, I trow, had wrought the knight:
But neither this, nor bill, nor axe to hew,
Was needed by Orlando's peerless might.
He of his prowess gave high proofs and full,
Who a tall pine uprooted at a pull.

CXXXV
He many others, with as little let
As fennel, wall-wort-stem, or dill, up-tore;
And ilex, knotted oak, and fir upset,
And beech, and mountain-ash, and elm-tree hoar.
He did what fowler, ere he spreads his net,
Does, to prepare the champaigne for his lore,
By stubble, rush, and nettle-stalk; and broke,
Like these, old sturdy trees and stems of oak.

CXXXVI
The shepherd swains, who hear the tumult nigh,
Leaving their flocks beneath the greenwood tree,
Some here some there across the forest hie,
And hurry thither, all, the cause to see.
-- But I have reached such point, my history,
If I o'erpass this bound, may irksome be;
And I my story will delay to end,
Rather than by my tediousness offend.


CANTO 24

ARGUMENT
Odorico's and Gabrina's guilt repaid,
Youthful Zerbino sets at large the train;
He in defence of good Orlando's blade,
Is afterwards by Mandricardo slain.
Isabel weeps; by Rodomont is made
War on the Tartar king, and truce again,
To succour Agramant and his array;
Who to the lilies are well-nigh a prey.


I
Let him make haste his feet to disengage,
Nor lime his wings, whom Love has made a prize;
For love, in fine, is nought but phrensied rage,
By universal suffrage of the wise:
And albeit some may show themselves more sage
Than Roland, they but sin in other guise.
For, what proves folly more than on this shelf,
Thus, for another, to destroy oneself?

II
Various are love's effects; but from one source
All issue, though they lead a different way.
He is, as 'twere, a forest, where parforce
Who enter its recess go astray;
And here and there pursue their devious course:
In sum, to you I, for conclusion, say;
He who grows old in love, besides all pain
Which waits such passion, well deserves a chain.

III
One here may well reproach me: "Brother, thou
Seest not thy faults, while thou dost others fit. "
-- I answer that I see mine plain enow,
In this my lucid interval of wit;
And strive and hope withal I shall forego
This dance of folly; but yet cannot quit,
As quickly as I would, the faults I own;
For my disease has reached the very bone.

IV
I in the other canto said before,
Orlando, furious and insensate wight,
Having torn off the arms and vest he wore,
And cast away from him his faulchion bright,
And up-torn trees, and made the forest hoar
And hollow cave resound, and rocky height,
Towards the noise some shepherds, on that side,
Their heavy sins or evil planets guide.

V
Viewing the madman's wonderous feats more near,
The frighted band of rustics turned and fled;
But they, in their disorder, knew not where,
As happens oftentimes in sudden dread.
The madman in a thought is in their rear,
Seizes a shepherd, and plucks off his head;
And this as easily as one might take
Apple from tree, or blossom from the brake.

VI
He by one leg the heavy trunk in air
Upheaved, and made a mace the rest to bray.
Astounded, upon earth he stretched one pair,
Who haply may awake at the last day.
The rest, who well awake at the last day.
The rest, who well advised and nimble are,
At once desert the field and scour away:
Nor had the madman their pursuit deferred,
Had he not turned already on their herd.

VII
By such examples warned, the rustic crew
Abandoned in the fields pick, scythe, and plough,
And to the roof of house and temple flew,
(For ill secure was elm or willow's bough,)
From hence the maniac's horrid rage they view;
Who, dealing kick, and bite, and scratch, and blow,
Horses and oxen slew, his helpless prey;
And well the courser ran who 'scaped that day.

VIII
Already might'st thou hear how loudly ring
The hubbub and the din, from neighbouring farms,
Outcry and horn, and rustic trumpeting;
And faster sound of bells; with various arms
By thousands, with spontoon, bow, spit, and sling.
Lo! from the hills the rough militia swarms.
As many peasants from the vale below,
To make rude war upon the madman go,

IX
As beats the wave upon the salt-sea shore,
Sportive at first, which southern wind has stirred,
When the next, bigger than what went before,
And bigger than the second, breaks the third;
And the vext water waxes evermore,
And louder on the beach the surf is heard:
The crowd, increasing so, the count assail,
And drop from mountain and ascend from dale.

X
Twice he ten peasants slaughtered in his mood,
Who, charging him in disarray, were slain;
And this experiment right clearly showed
To stand aloof was safest for the train.
Was none who from his body could draw blood;
For iron smote the impassive skin in vain.
So had heaven's King preserved the count from scathe,
To make him guardian of his holy faith.

XI
He would have been in peril on that day,
Had he been made of vulnerable mould;
And might have learned was 'twas to cast away
His sword, and, weaponless, so play the bold.
The rustic troop retreated from the fray,
Seeing no stroke upon the madman told.
Since him no other enemy attends,
Orlando to a neighbouring township wends.

XII
Since every one had left the place for dread,
No wight he found within it, small or great:
But here was homely food in plenty spread,
Victual, well sorting with the pastoral state.
Here, acorns undistinguishing from bread,
By tedious fast and fury driven to sate
His hunger, he employed his hand and jaw
On what he first discovered, cooked or raw.

XIII
Thence, repossest with the desire to rove,
He, through the land, did man and beast pursue;
And scowering, in his phrensy, wood and grove,
Took sometimes goat or doe of dappled hue:
Often with bear and with wild boar he strove,
And with his naked hand the brutes o'erthrew;
And gorging oftentimes the savage fare,
Swallowed the prey with all its skin and hair.

XIV
Now right, now left, he wandered, far and wide,
Throughout all France, and reached a bridge one day;
Beneath which ran an ample water's tide,
Of steep and broken banks: a turret gray
Was builded by the spacious river's side,
Discerned, from far and near, and every way.
What here he did I shall relate elsewhere,
Who first must make the Scottish prince my care.

XV
When Roland had departed on his quest,
Zerbino paused some deal; then, in his rear,
Slowly his steed by the same path addrest,
Which had been taken by Anglantes' peer;
Nor two miles on his way, I think, had prest,
When he beheld a captive cavalier,
Upon a sorry, little, hackney tied,
And by armed horseman watched on either side.

XVI
Zerbino speedily the prisoner knew,
And Isabel, as soon, when nigh surveyed.
This was Sir Odoric, the Biscayan, who,
Like wolf, the guardian of a lamb was made:
To whom, of all his friends esteemed most true,
Zerbino Isabella had conveyed;
Hoping, one hitherto by him found just,
Would now, as ever, have approved his trust.

XVII
Even then how all had chanced, with punctual lore,
Was Isabel relating to the knight;
How in the pinnace she was saved, before
The broken vessel sank at sea outright;
Odoric's assault; and next, how bandits bore
Her to the cavern, in a mountain dight.
Nor Isabella yet her tale has told,
When bound the malefactor they behold.

XVIII
The two that had Sir Odoric in their ward,
The royal damsel Isabella knew;
And deemed he was her lover and her lord,
That pricked beside the lady, fair of hue.
More; that the bearings on his shield record
The honours of the stem from which he grew;
And found, as better they observed his cheer,
They had judged rightly of the cavalier.

XIX
Lighting, with open arms and hurried pace,
They make towards Zerbino eagerly,
And, kneeling, with bare head, the prince embrace,
Where lord is clipt by one of less degree.
Zerbino, looking either in the face,
Knows one Corebo of Biscay to be,
And Sir Almonio, his co-mate; the pair
Charged, under Odoric, with the galley's care.

XX
Almonio cried, "Since God is pleased in the end,
Grammercy! Isabel should be with you;
My lord, I very clearly comprehend
I should deliver tidings, nothing new,
If I should now inform you why I wend
With this offender, whom with me you view.
Since she, who at his hands has suffered worst,
The story of his crimes will have rehearsed.

XXI
"How me that traitour duped thou hast not to learn,
What time he rid himself of me, nor how
Corebo, who would have avenged the scorn,
Intended to the damsel, was laid low;
But that which followed, upon my return,
By her unseen or heard, she cannot know,
So as to thee the story to have told;
The sequel of it then will I unfold.

XXII
"I seaward from the city, with a store
Of nags, collected in a hurry, fare;
Aye watchful, if the trace I can explore
Of those left far behind me; I repair
Thitherward; I arrive upon the shore,
The place where they were left; look everywhere;
Nor sign of them perceive upon that strand,
Except some steps, new-printed on the sand.

XXIII
"The steps I traced into the forest drear;
Nor far within the greenwood had I wound,
When guided by a noise which smote my ear,
I saw my comrade bleeding on the ground:
Of Isabel I asked the cavalier,
Of Odoric, and what hand had dealt his wound;
And thence departed, when the thing I knew,
Seeking the wretch these precipices through.

XXIV
"Wide circling still I go, and through that day
I find no other sign of him that fled;
At length return to where Corebo lay,
Who had the ground about him dyed so red,
That he, had I made little more delay,
A grave would have required, and, more than bed
And succour of the leech, to make him sound,
Craved priest and friar to lay him in the ground.

XXV
"I had him to the neighbouring city brought,
And boarded with a friendly host; and there
Corebo's cure in little time was wrought,
Beneath an old chirurgeon's skilful care.
This finished, having arms and horses brought,
We thence together to the court repair
Of King Alphonso of Biscay; where I
Find out the traitor, and to fight defy.

XXVI
"The monarch's justice, who fair field and free
Allowed us for the duel, and my right,
And Destiny to boot (for Destiny
Oftener makes conquest where she listeth, light)
So backed my arms, that felon was by me
Worsted, and made a prisoner in the fight.
Alphonso, having heard his guilt confessed,
Bade me dispose of him as liked me best.

XXVII
"Him would I neither loose, nor yet have slain,
But, as thou seest, in bonds to thee convey:
That whether he should be condemned to pain,
Or death, it should be thine his doom to say.
I, hearing thou wert with King Charlemagne,
Thither, in hope to find thee, took my way.
I thank my God, that thee upon this ground,
Where I least hoped to meet thee, I have found.

XXVIII
"As well I render thanks, that Isabel
I see restored to thee, I know not how,
Of whom, by reason of that traitor fell,
I deemed thou never more should'st tidings know. "
In silence prince Zerbino hears him tell
His story, gazing upon Odoric's brow,
In pity, more than hate, as he perpends
How foully such a goodly friendship ends.

XXIX
After Almonio had his tale suspended,
Astounded for a while the prince stood by;
Wondering, that he who least should have offended,
Had him requited with such treachery:
But, his long fit of admiration ended,
Waking from his amazement with a sigh,
Questioned the prisoner in the horsemen's hold,
It that was true the cavalier had told.

XXX
The faithless man alighted, and down fell
Upon his bended knees, and answered: "Sir,
All people that on middle earth do dwell,
Through weakness of their nature, sin and err.
One thing alone distinguishes the well
And evil doer; this, at every stir
Of least desire, submits, without a blow;
That arms, but yields as well to stronger foe.

XXXI
"Had I been charged some castle to maintain,
And, without contest, on the first assault,
Hoisted the banners of the hostile train,
-- For cowardice, or treason, fouler fault --
Upon my eyes (a well deserved pain)
Thou might'st have justly closed the darksome vault;
But, yielding to superior force, I read
I should not merit blame, but praise and meed.

XXXII
"The stronger is the enemy, the more
Easily is the vanquished side excused:
I could but faith maintain as, girded sore,
The leaguered fort to keep her faith is used;
Even so, with all the sense, with all the lore
By sovereign wisdom into me infused,
This I essayed to keep; but in the end,
To o'ermastering assault was forced to bend. "

XXXIII
So said Sir Odoric; and after showed
(Though 'twere too tedious to recount his suit)
Him no light cause had stirred, but puissant goad.
-- If ever earnestness of prayer could boot
To melt a heart that with resentment glowed,
-- If e'er humility produced good fruit,
It well might here avail; since all that best
Moves a hard heart, Sir Odoric now exprest.

XXXIV
Whether or no to venge such infamy,
Youthful Zerbino doubted: the review
Of faithless Odorico's treachery
Moved him to death the felon to pursue;
The recollection of the amity
So long maintained between them, with the dew
Of pity cooled the fury in his mind,
And him to mercy towards the wretch inclined.

XXXV
While Scotland's prince is doubting in such wise
To keep him captive, or to loose his chain;
Or to remove him from before his eyes,
By dooming him to die, or live in pain;
Loud neighing, thitherward the palfrey hies
From which the Tartar king had stript the rein;
And the old harridan, who had before
Nigh caused Zerbino's death, among them bore.

XXXVI
The horse, that had the others of that band
Heard at a distance, thither her conveyed.
Sore weeping came the old woman, and demand
For succour, in her trouble, vainly made.
Zerbino, when he saw her, raised his hand
To heaven, that had to him such grace displayed,
Giving him to decide that couple's fate;
The only two that had deserved his hate.

XXXVII
The wicked hag is kept, so bids the peer,
Until he is determined what to do:
He to cut off her nose and either ear
Now thought, and her as an example shew.
Next, 'twere far better, deemed the cavalier,
If to the vultures he her carcase threw:
He diverse punishments awhile revolved,
And thus the warrior finally resolved.

XXXVIII
He to his comrades turned him round, and said:
"To let the traitour live I am content,
Who, if full grace he has not merited,
Yet merits not to be so foully shent.
I, as I find his fault of Love was bred,
To give him life and liberty consent;
And easily we all excuses own,
When on commanding Love the blame is thrown.

XXXIX
"Often has Love turned upside down a brain
Of sounder wit than that to him assigned,
And led to mischief of far deeper stain,
Than has so outraged us. Let Odoric find
Pardon his offences; I the pain
Of these should justly suffer, who was blind;
Blind when I gave him such a trust, nor saw
How easily the fire consumes the straw. "

XL
"Then gazing upon Odoric, 'gan say:
"This is the penance I enjoin to thee;
That thou a year shalt with the beldam stay,
Nor ever leave this while her company;
But, roving or at rest, by night or day,
Shalt never for an hour without her be;
And her shall even unto death maintain
Against whoever threatens her with pain.

XLI
"I will, if so this woman shall command,
With whosoe'er he be, thou battle do.
I will this while that thou all France's land,
From city shalt to city, wander through. "
So says he: for as Odoric at his hand
Well merits death, for his foul trespass due,
This is a pitfall for his feet to shape,
Which it will be rare fortune if he 'scape.

XLII
So many women, many men betrayed,
And wronged by her, have been so many more,
Not without strife by knight shall he be stayed,
Who was beneath his care the beldam hoar.
So, for their crimes, shall both alike be paid;
She for her evil actions done before,
And he who wrongfully shall her defraud;
Nor far can go before he finds an end.

XLIII
To keep the pact Zerbino makes him swear
A mighty oath, under this penalty,
That should he break his faith, and anywhere
Into his presence led by fortune be,
Without more mercy, without time for prayer,
A cruel death shall wait him, as his fee.
Next by his comrades (so their lord commands)
Sir Odoric is unpinioned from his bands.

XLIV
Corebo frees the traitor in the end,
Almonio yielding, yet as ill content:
For much Zerbino's mercies both offend,
Which thus their so desired revenge prevent.
Thence, he disloyal to his prince and friend,
In company with that curst woman went.
What these befel Sir Turpin has not said,
But more I once in other author read.

XLV
This author vouches (I declare not who)
That hence they had not one day's journey wended,
When Odoric, to all pact, all faith, untrue,
For riddance of the pest to him commended,
About Gabrina's neck a halter threw,
And left her to a neighbouring elm suspended;
And in a year (the place he does not name)
Almonio by the traitor did the same.

XLVI
Zerbino, who the Paladin pursues,
And loath would be to lose the cavalier,
To his Scottish squadron of himself sends news,
Which for its captain well might stand in fear;
Almonio sends, and many matters shews,
Too long at full to be recited here;
Almonio sends, Corebo next; nor stayed
Other with him, besides the royal maid.

XLVII
So mighty is the love Zerbino bore,
Nor less than his the love which Isabel
Nursed for the valorous Paladin, so sore
He longed to know if that bold infidel
The Count had found, who in the duel tore
Him from his horse, together with the sell,
That he to Charles's camp, till the third day
Be ended, will not measure back his way.

XLVIII
This was the term for which Orlando said
He should wait him, who yet no faulchion wears;
Nor is there place the Count has visited,
But thither in his search Zerbino fares.
Last to those trees, upon whose bark was read
The ungrateful lady's writing, he repairs,
Little beside the road; and there finds all
In strange disorder, rock and water-fall.

XLIX
Far off, he saw that something shining lay,
And spied Orlando's corslet on the ground;
And next his helm; but not that head-piece gay
Which whilom African Almontes crowned:
He in the thicket heard a courser neigh,
And, lifting up his visage at the sound,
Saw Brigliadoro the green herbage browze,
With rein yet hanging at his saddle-bows.

L
For Durindane, he sought the greenwood, round,
Which separate from the scabbard met his view;
And next the surcoat, but in tatters, found;
That, in a hundred rags, the champaign strew.
Zerbino and Isabel, in grief profound,
Stood looking on, nor what to think they knew:
They of all matters else might think, besides
The fury which the wretched Count misguides.

LI
Had but the lovers seen a drop of blood,
They might have well believed Orlando dead:
This while the pair, beside the neighbouring flood,
Beheld a shepherd coming, pale with dread.
He just before, as on a rock he stood,
Had seen the wretch's fury; how he shed
His arms about the forest, tore his clothes,
Slew hinds, and caused a thousand other woes.

LII
Questioned by good Zerbino, him the swain
Of all which there had chanced, informed aright.
Zerbino marvelled, and believed with pain,
Although the proofs were clear: This as it might,
He from his horse dismounted on the plain,
Full of compassion, in afflicted plight;
And went about, collecting from the ground
The various relics which were scattered round.

LIII
Isabel lights as well; and, where they lie
Dispersed, the various arms uniting goes.
Lo! them a damsel joins, who frequent sigh
Heaves from her heart, and doleful visage shows.
If any ask me who the dame, and why
She mourns, and with such sorrow overflows;
I say 'twas Flordelice, who, bound in trace
Of her lost lover's footsteps, sought that place.

LIV
Her Brandimart had left disconsolate
Without farewell, i' the court of Charlemagne:
Who there expected him six months or eight; --
And lastly, since he came not there again,
From sea to sea, had sought her absent mate,
Through Alpine and through Pyrenean chain:
In every place had sought the warrior, save
Within the palace of Atlantes' grave.

LV
If she had been in that enchanted hold,
She might before have seen the cavalier
Wandering with Bradamant, Rogero bold,
Gradasso and Ferrau and Brava's peer.
But, when Astolpho chased the wizard old,
With the loud bugle, horrible to hear,
To Paris he returned; but nought of this
As yet was known to faithful Flordelice.

LVI
To Flordelice were known the arms and sword
(Who, as I say, by chance so joined the twain),
And Brigliadoro, left without his lord,
Yet bearing at the saddle-bow his rein:
She with her eyes the unhappy signs explored,
And she had heard the tidings of the swain,
Who had alike related, how he viewed
Orlando running frantic, in his mood.

LVII
Here prince Zerbino all the arms unites,
And hangs, like a fair trophy, on a pine.
And, to preserve them safe from errant knights,
Natives or foreigners, in one short line
Upon the sapling's verdant surface writes,
ORLANDO'S ARMS, KING CHARLES'S PALADINE.
As he would say, `Let none this harness move,
Who cannot with its lord his prowess prove! '

LVIII
Zerbino having done the pious deed,
Is bowning him to climb his horse; when, lo!
The Tartar king arrives upon the mead.
He, at the trophied pine-tree's gorgeous show,
Beseeches him the cause of this to read;
Who lets him (as rehearsed) the story know.
When, without further pause, the paynim lord
Hastes gladly to the pine, and takes the sword.

LIX
"None can (he said) the action reprehend,
Nor first I make the faulchion mine today;
And to its just possession I pretend
Where'er I find it, be it where it may.
Orlando, this not daring to defend,
Has feigned him mad, and cast the sword away;
But if the champion so excuse his shame,
This is no cause I should forego my claim.

LX
"Take it not thence," to him Zerbino cried,
"Nor think to make it thine without a fight:
If so thou tookest Hector's arms of pride,
By theft thou hadst them, rather than by right. "
Without more parley spurred upon each side.
Well matched in soul and valour, either knight.
Already echoed are a thousand blows;
Nor yet well entered are the encountering foes.

LXI
In scaping Durindane, a flame in show
(He shifts so quickly) is the Scottish lord.
He leaps about his courser like a doe,
Where'er the road best footing does afford.
And well it is that he should not forego
An inch of vantage; who, if once that sword
Smite him, will join the enamoured ghosts, which rove
Amid the mazes of the myrtle grove.

LXII
As the swift-footed dog, who does espy
Swine severed from his fellows, hunts him hard,
And circles round about; but he lies by
Till once the restless foe neglect his guard;
So, while the sword descends, or hangs on high,
Zerbino stands, attentive how to ward,
How to save life and honour from surprise;
And keeps a wary eye, and smites and flies.

LXIII
On the other side, where'er the foe is seen
To threaten stroke in vain, or make good,
He seems an Alpine wind, two hills between,
That in the month of March shakes leafy wood;
Which to the ground now bends the forest green.
Now whirls the broken boughs, at random strewed.
Although the prince wards many, in the end
One mighty stroke he cannot scape or fend.

LXIV
In the end he cannot scape one downright blow,
Which enters, between sword and shield, his breast,
As perfect was the plate and corslet, so
Thick was the steel wherein his paunch was drest:
But the destructive weapon, falling low,
Equally opened either iron vest;
And cleft whate'er it swept in its descent,
And to the saddle-bow, through cuirass, went.

LXV
And, but that somewhat short the blow descends,
It would Zerbino like a cane divide;
But him so little in the quick offends,
This scarce beyond the skin is scarified.
More than a span in length the wound extends;
Of little depth: of blood a tepid tide
To his feet descending, with a crimson line,
Stains the bright arms which on the warrior shine.

LXVI
'Tis so, I sometimes have been wont to view
A hand, more white than alabaster, part
The silver cloth, with ribbon red of hue;
A hand I often feel divide my heart.
Here little vantage young Zerbino drew
From strength and greater daring, and from art;
For in the temper of his arms and might,
Too much the Tartar king excelled the knight.

LXVII
The fearful stroke was mightier in show,
Than in effect, by which the Prince was prest;
So that poor Isabel, distraught with woe,
Felt her heart severed in her frozen breast.
The Scottish prince, all over in a glow,
With anger and resentment was possest,
And putting all his strength in either hand,
Smote full the Tartar's helmet with his brand.

LXVIII
Almost on his steed's neck the Tartar fell,
Bent by the weighty blow Zerbino sped;
And, had the helmet been unfenced by spell,
The biting faulchion would have cleft his head.
The king, without delay, avenged him well,
"Nor I for you till other season," said,
"Will keep this gift"; and levelled at his crest,
Hoping to part Zerbino to the chest.

LXIX
Zerbino, on the watch, whose eager eye
Waits on his wit, wheels quickly to the right;
But not withal so quickly, as to fly
The trenchant sword, which smote the shield outright,
And cleft from top to bottom equally;
Shearing the sleeve beneath it, and the knight
Smote on his arm; and next the harness rended,
And even to the champion's thigh descended.

LXX
Zerbino, here and there, seeks every way
By which to wound, nor yet his end obtains;
For, while he smites upon that armour gay,
Not even a feeble dint the coat retains.
On the other hand, the Tartar in the fray
Such vantage o'er the Scottish prince obtains,
Him he has wounded in seven parts or eight,
And reft his shield and half his helmet's plate.

LXXI
He ever wastes his blood; his energies
Fail, though he feels it not, as 't would appear;
Unharmed, the vigorous heart new force supplies
To the weak body of the cavalier.
His lady, during this, whose crimson dyes
Where chased by dread, to Doralice drew near,
And for the love of Heaven, the damsel wooed
To stop that evil and disastrous feud.

LXXII
Doralice, who as courteous was as fair,
And ill-assured withal, how it would end,
Willingly granted Isabella's prayer,
And straight to truce and peace disposed her friend,
As well Zerbino, by the other's care,
Was brought his vengeful anger to suspend;
And, wending where she willed, the Scottish lord
Left unachieved the adventure of the sword.

LXXIII
Fair Flordelice, who ill maintained descries
The goodly sword of the unhappy count,
In secret garden, and so laments the prize
Foregone, she weeps for rage, and smite her front:
She would move Brandimart to this emprize;
And, should she find him, and the fact recount,
Weens, for short season will the Tartar foe
Exulting in the ravished faulchion go.

LXXIV
Seeking him morn and evening, but in vain,
Flordelice after Brandimart did fare;
And widely wandered from him, who again
Already had to Paris made repair.
So far the damsel pricked by hill and plain,
She reached the passage of a river, where
She saw the wretched count; but what befel
The Scottish prince, Zerbino, let me tell.

LXXV
For to leave Durindana such misdeed
To him appeared, it past all other woes;
Though he could hardly sit upon his steed,
Though mighty loss of life-blood, which yet flows.
Now, when his anger and his heat secede,
After short interval, his anguish grows;
His anguish grows, with such impetuous pains,
He feels that life is ebbing from his veins.

LXXVI
For weakness can the prince no further hie,
And so beside a fount is forced to stay:
Him to assist the pitying maid would try,
But knows not what to do, not what to say.
For lack of comfort she beholds him die;
Since every city is too far away,
Where in this need she could resort to leech,
Whose succour she might purchase or beseech.