Books: Orlando Furioso

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XCVII
Small profit and much peril would succeed
From any fight he should with her maintain,
(And he advised him) as the better deed,
To leave that wretched caitiff to his pain;
And albeit but a simple nod should need
To free him, from that nod he should refrain.
In that the monarch would do ill to force
Even-handed Justice from her destined course.

XCVIII
"Thou to the fierce Marphisa may'st apply
To leave his trial (he pursued) to thee,
With promise, her in this to satisfy
And to suspend him from the gallows-tree:
And even should the maid thy prayer deny,
Let her in every wish contented be:
And rather than that she desert thy side,
Let her hang him and every thief beside."

XCIX
Right willingly King Agramant gave way
To King Sobrino's counsel sage and staid;
And let renowned Marphisa wend her way,
Nor scathed he, nor let scathe, that martial maid,
Neither endured that any her should pray;
And heaven knows with what courage he obeyed
That wise advice, to calm such ruder strife
And quarrel, as throughout his camp were rife.

C
At this mad Discord laughed, no more in fear
That any truce or treaty should ensue;
And scowered the place of combat there and here,
Nor could stand still, for pleasure at the view.
Pride gamboled and rejoiced with her compeer,
And on the fire fresh food and fuel threw,
And shouted so that Michael in the sky
Knew the glad sign of conquest in that cry.

CI
Paris-town rocked, and turbid ran the flood
Of Seine at that loud voice, that horrid roar;
And, so it echo rang in Arden's wood,
Beasts left their caverns in that forest hoar.
Alp and Cevenne's mountain-solitude,
And Blois, and Arles, and Rouen's distant shore,
Rhine, Rhone, and Saone, and Garonne, heard the pest;
Scared mothers hugged their children to their breast.

CII
Five have set up their rest, resolved to be
The first their different quarrels to conclude:
And tangled so is one with other plea,
That ill Apollo's self could judge the feud.
To unravel that first cause of enmity
The king began -- the strife which had ensued,
Because of beauteous Doralice, between
The king of Scythia and her Algerine.

CIII
King Agramant oft moved, between the pair,
Now here now there, to bring them to accord;
Now there now here, admonishing that pair,
Like faithful brother and like righteous lord:
But when he found that neither would forbear,
Deaf and rebellious to his royal word,
Nor would consent that lady to forego,
The cause of strife, in favour of his foe,

CIV
As his best lore, at length the monarch said,
And to obey his sentence both were fain;
That he who was by her preferred, should wed
The beauteous daughter of King Stordilane:
And that what was established on his head
Should not be changed, to either's loss or gain.
The compromise was liked on either side,
Since either hoped she would for him decide.

CV
The mighty king of Sarza, who long space
Before the Tartar, had loved Doralice,
(Who had preferred that sovereign to such grace
As modest lady may, nor do amiss)
Believed, when she past sentence on the case,
She must pronounce what would ensure his bliss.
Nor thus alone King Rodomont conceived,
But all the Moorish host with him believed.

CVI
All know what exploits wrought by him had been
For her in joust and war; they all unsound
And weak King Mandricardo's judgment ween;
But he, who oft was with her on their round,
And oftener private with the youthful queen,
What time the tell-tale sun was under ground,
He, knowing well how sure he was to speed,
Laughed at the silly rabble's idle creed.

CVII
They, after, ratify the king's award,
Between his hands, and next the suitors twain
Before that damsel go, that on the sward
Fixing her downcast eyes, in modest vein,
Avows her preference of the Tartar lord;
At which sore wondering stand the paynim train;
And Rodomont remains so sore astound,
He cannot raise his visage from the ground.

CVIII
But wonted anger chasing shame which dyed
The Sarzan's face all over, he arraigned
The damsel's sentence, of the faulchion, tied
About his manly waist, the handle strained,
And in the king's and others' hearing cried:
"By this the question shall be lost or gained;
And not by faithless woman's fickle thought,
Which thither still inclines, where least it ought."

CIX
Kind Mandricardo on his feet once more,
Exclaims, "And be it as it pleases thee."
So that ere yet the vessel made the shore
Unploughed remained a mighty space of sea;
But that this king reproved the Sarzan sore,
Ruling that to appeal upon that plea
No more with Mandricardo could avail,
And made the moody Sarzan strike his sail.

CX
Branded with double scorn, before those peers,
By noble Agramant, whose sovereign sway
He, as in loyal duty bound, reveres,
And by his lady on the selfsame day,
There will no more the monarch of Algiers
Abide, but of his band -- a large array --
Two serjeants only for his service takes,
And with that pair the paynim camp forsakes.

CXI
As the afflicted bull who has foregone
His heifer, nor can longer warfare wage,
Seeks out the greenwood-holt and stream most lone,
Or sands at distance from his pasturage;
There ceases not, in sun or shade to moan;
Yet not for that exhales his amorous rage:
So parts, constrained his lady to forego,
The king of Argier, overwhelmed with woe.

CXII
Rogero moved, his courser to regain,
And had already donned his warlike gear,
Then recollecting, that on listed plain
At Mandricardo he must couch the spear,
Followed not Rodomont, but turned his rein,
To end his quarrel with the Tartar, ere
He met in combat Sericana's lord
Within close barriers, for Orlando's sword.

CXIII
To have Frontino ravished in his sight,
And be unable to forbid the deed,
He sorely grieves; but, when he shall that fight
Have done, resolves he will regain the steed;
But Sacripant, whom, like the youthful knight,
No quarrels in the Moor's pursuit impede,
And who was unengaged in other quest,
Upon the Sarzan's footsteps quickly prest;

CXIV
And would have quickly joined him that was gone,
But for the chance of an adventure rare;
Which him detained until the day was done,
And made him lose the track of Ulien's heir:
A woman who had fallen into the Saone,
And who without his help had perished there,
The warrior drowning in that water found,
And stemmed the stream and dragged the dame aground.

CXV
When afterwards he would remount the sell,
From him his restless charger broke astray,
Who fled before his lord till evening fell,
Nor lightly did the king that courser stay.
At last he caught him; but no more could spell
Where he had wandered from the beaten way:
Two hundred miles he roved, 'twist hill and plain,
Ere he came up with Rodomont again.

CXVI
How he by Sacripant was overtaken,
And fought by him, to his discomfit sore,
And how he lost his courser, how was taken,
I say not now, who have to say before,
With what disdain and with what anger shaken,
Against his liege and love, the Sarzan Moor
Forth from the Saracen cantonments sped,
And what he of the one and other said.

CXVII
Wherever that afflicted paynim goes,
He fills the kindling air with sighs that burn;
And Echo oft, for pity of his woes,
With him from hollow rock is heard to mourn:
"O female mind! how lightly ebbs and flows
Your fickle mood," (he cries,) "aye prone to turn!
Object most opposite to kindly faith!
Lost, wretched man, who trusts you to his scathe!

CXVIII
"Neither my love nor length of servitude,
Though by a thousand proofs to you made clear,
Had power even so to fix your faithless mood,
That you at least so lightly should not veer:
Nor am I quitted, because less endued
With worth than Mandricardo I appear;
Nor for your conduct cause can I declare,
Save this alone, that you a woman are.

CXIX
"I think that nature and an angry God
Produced thee to the world, thou wicked sex,
To be to man a plague, a chastening rod;
Happy, wert thou not present to perplex.
So serpent creeps along the grassy sod;
So bear and ravening wolf the forest vex;
Wasp, fly, and gad-fly buzz in liquid air,
And the rich grain lies tangled with the tare.

CXX
"Why has not bounteous Nature willed that man
Should be produced without the aid of thee,
As we the pippin, pear, and service can
Engraft by art on one another's tree?
But she directs not all by certain plan;
Rather, upon a nearer view, I see,
In naming her, she ill can act aright,
Since Nature is herself a female hight.

CXXI
"Yet be not therefore proud and full of scorn
Women, because man issues from your seed;
For roses also blossom on the thorn,
And the fair lily springs from loathsome weed.
Despiteous, proud, importunate, and lorn
Of love, of faith, of counsel, rash in deed,
With that, ungrateful, cruel and perverse,
And born to be the world's eternal curse!"

CXXII
These plaints and countless others to the wind
Poured forth the paynim knight, to fury stirred;
Now easing in low tone his troubled mind,
And now in sounds which were at distance heard,
In shame and in reproach of womankind;
Yet certes he from sober reason erred:
For we may deem a hundred good abound,
Where one or two perchance are evil found.

CXXIII
Though none for whom I hitherto have sighed
-- Of those so many -- have kept faith with me,
All with ingratitude, or falsehood dyed
I deem not, I accuse my destiny.
Many there are, and have been more beside
Unmeriting reproach: but if there be,
'Mid hundreds, one or two of evil way,
My fortune wills that I should be their prey.

CXXIV
Yet will I make such search before I die,
Rather before my hair shall wax more white,
That haply on some future day, even I
Shall say, "That one has kept her promise plight."
And should not the event my trust belie,
(Nor am I hopeless) I with all my might
Will with unwearied pain her praise rehearse
With pen and ink and voice, in prose and verse.

CXXV
The Saracen, whom rage no less profound
Against his sovereign lord than lady swayed,
And who of reason thus o'erpast the bound,
And ill of one and of the other said,
Would fain behold that monarch's kingdom drowned
With such a tempest, with such scathe o'erlaid,
As should in Africk every house aggrieve,
Nor one stone standing on another leave.

CXXVI
And would that from his realm, in want and woe,
King Agramant a mendicant should wend;
That through his means the monarch, brought thus low,
His fathers' ancient seat might reascend:
And thus he might the fruit of fealty show,
And make his sovereign see, a real friend
Was aye to be preferred in wrong or right,
Although the world against him should unite;

CXXVII
And thus the Saracen pours forth his moan,
With rage against his liege and love possest;
And on his way is by long journeys gone,
Giving himself and courser little rest.
The following day or next, upon the Saone
He finds himself, who has his course addrest
Towards the coast of Provence, with design
To his African domain to cross the brine.

CXXVIII
From bank to bank the stream was covered o'er
With boat of little burden, which conveyed,
For the supply of the invading Moor,
Victual, from many places round purveyed:
Since even from Paris to the pleasant shore
Of Acquamorta, all his rule obeyed;
And -- fronting Spain -- whate'er of level land
Was seen, extending on the better hand.

CXXIX
The victual, disembarked from loaded barge,
Was laid on sumpter-horse or ready wain;
And sent, with escort to protect the charge,
Where barges could not come; about the plain,
Fat herds were feeding on the double marge,
Brought thither from the march of either reign;
And, by the river-side, at close of day,
In different homesteads lodged, the drovers lay.

CXXX
The king of Argier (for the dusky air
Of night began upon the world to close)
Here listened to a village-landlord's prayer,
That in his inn besought him to repose.
-- His courser stalled -- the board with plenteous fare
Is heaped, and Corsic wine and Grecian flows;
For, in all else a Moor, the Sarzan drank
Of the forbidden vintage like a Frank.

CXXXI
To warlike Rodomont, with goodly cheer
And kindlier mien, the landlord honour paid;
For he the port of an illustrious peer
In his guest's lofty presence saw pourtrayed.
But, sore beside himself, the cavalier
Had scarce his heart within him, which had strayed
To her -- whilere his own -- in his despite;
Nor word escaped the melancholy knight.

CXXXII
Mine host, most diligent in his vocation
Of all the trade who throughout France were known,
(In that he had, 'mid strange and hostile nation,
And every chance of warfare, kept his own)
-- Prompt to assist him in his occupation,
Some of his kin had called; whereof was none
Who dared before the warrior speak of aught,
Seeing that paynim mute and lost in thought.

CXXXIII
From thought to thought the Sarzan's fancy flies,
Himself removed from thence a mighty space,
Who sits so bent, and with such downcast eyes,
He never once looks any in the face.
Next, after silence long, and many sighs,
As if deep slumber had but then given place,
His spirits he recalls, his eyelids raises,
And on the family and landlord gazes.

CXXXIV
Then silence broke, and with a milder air,
And visage somewhat less disturbed, applied
To him, the host, and those by-standers there,
To know if any to a wife were tied;
And landlord and attendants, -- that all were,
To Sarza's moody cavalier replied:
He asked what each conceited of his spouse,
And if he deemed her faithful to her vows.

CXXXV
Except mine host, those others were agreed
That chaste and good their consorts they believed.
-- "Think each man as he will, but well I read,"
(The landlord said,) "You fondly are deceived:
Your rash replies to one conclusion lead,
That you are all of common sense bereaved;
And so too must believe this noble knight,
Unless he would persuade us black is white.

CXXXVI
"Because, as single is that precious bird
The phoenix, and on earth there is but one,
So, in this ample world, it is averred,
One only can a woman's treason shun.
Each hopes alike to be that wight preferred,
The victor who that single palm has won.
-- How is it possible that what can fall
To one alone, should be the lot of all?

CXXXVII
"Erewhile I made the same mistake as you,
And that more dames than one were virtuous thought,
Until a gentleman of Venice, who,
For my good fortune, to this inn was brought,
My ignorance by his examples true
So ably schooled, he better wisdom taught.
Valerio was the name that stranger bore;
A name I shall remember evermore.

CXXXVIII
"Of wives and mistresses the treachery
Was known to him, with all their cunning lore.
He, both from old and modern history,
And from his own, was ready with such store,
As plainly showed that none to modesty
Could make pretension, whether rich or poor;
And that, if one appeared of purer strain,
'Twas that she better hid her wanton vein.

CXXXIX
"He of his many tales, among the rest,
(Whereof a third is from my memory gone)
So well one story in my head imprest,
It could not be more firmly graved in stone:
And what I thought and think, would be professed
For that ill sex, I ween by every one
Who heard; and, Sir -- if pleased to lend an ear --
To their confusion yon that tale shall hear."

CXL
"What could'st thou offer which could better please
At present" (made reply the paynim knight)
"Than sample, chosen from thine histories,
Which hits the opinion that I hold, aright?
That I may hear thee speak with better ease
Sit so, that I may have thee in my sight."
But in the following canto I unfold
What to King Rodomont the landlord told.

CANTO 28

ARGUMENT
To whatsoever evil tongue can tell
Of womankind King Rodomont gives ear;
Then journeys homeward; but that infidel
Finds by the way a place he holds more dear.
Here him new love inflames for Isabel;
But so the wishes of the cavalier
A friar impedes, who with that damsel wends,
Him by a cruel death the felon ends.

I
Ladies, and all of you that ladies prize,
Afford not, for the love of heaven, an ear
To this, the landlord's tale, replete with lies,
In shame and scorn of womankind; though ne'er
Was praise or fame conveyed in that which flies
From such a caitiff's tongue; and still we hear
The sottish rabble all things rashly brand,
And question most what least they understand.

II
Omit this canto, and -- the tale untold --
My story will as clear and perfect be;
I tell it, since by Turpin it is told,
And not in malice or in rivalry:
Besides, that never did my tongue withhold
Your praises, how you are beloved by me
To you I by a thousand proofs have shown,
Vouching I am, and can but be, your own.

III
Let him who will, three leaves or four pass-by,
Nor read a line; or let him, who will read,
As little of that landlord's history,
As of a tale or fiction, make his creed.
But to my story: -- When his auditory
He saw were waiting for him to proceed,
And that a place was yielded him, o'eright
The cavalier, he 'gan his tale recite:

IV
"Astolpho that the Lombard sceptre swayed,
Who was King Monacho, his brother's heir,
By nature with such graces was purveyed,
Few e'er with him in beauty could compare:
Such scarce Apelles' pencil had pourtrayed,
Zeuxis', or worthier yet, if worthier were:
Beauteous he was, and so by all was deemed,
But far more beauteous he himself esteemed.

V
"He not so much rejoiced that he in height
Of grandeur was exalted o'er the rest,
And that, for riches, subjects, and for might,
Of all the neighbouring kings he was the best,
As that, superior to each other wight,
He beauty was throughout the world confest.
This pleased the monarch, who the praise conferred,
As that wherein he most delighted, heard.

VI
"Faustus Latinus, one of his array,
Who pleased the king, a Roman cavalier,
Hearing ofttimes Astolpho now display
The beauties of his hand, now of his cheer,
And, questioned by that monarch, on a day,
If ever in his lifetime, far or near,
He any of such beauty had espied,
To him thus unexpectedly replied:

VII
"Faustus to him replied: `By what I see,
And what I hear, is said by every one,
Few are there that in beauty rival thee;
And rather I those few confine to one:
Jocundo is that one, my brother he;
And well I ween that, saving him alone,
Thou leavest all in beauty far behind;
But I in him thy peer and better find.'

VIII
"Impossible Astolpho deemed the thing,
Who hitherto had thought the palm his own;
And such a longing seized the Lombard king
To know that youth whose praises so were blown,
He prest, till Faustus promised him to bring
The brother praised by him, before his throne,
Though 'twould be much if thither he repaired,
(The courier added) and the cause declared:

IX
"Because the youth had ne'er been known to measure,
In all his life, a single pace from Rome;
But, on what Fortune gave him, lived at leisure,
Contented in his own paternal dome;
Nor had diminished nor encreased the treasure,
Wherewith his father had endowed that home;
And he more distant would Paris deem
Than Tanais another would esteem;

X
"And that a greater difficulty were
To tear Jocundo from his consort; who
Was by such love united to that fair,
No other will but hers the husband knew:
Yet at his sovereign's hest he would repair
To seek the stripling, and his utmost do.
The suit with offers and with gifts was crowned,
Which for that youth's refusal left no ground.

XI
"Faustus set forth, and, after few days' ride,
Reached Rome, and his paternal mansion gained:
There with entreaties so the brother plied,
He to that journey his consent obtained;
And wrought so well (though difficult to guide)
Silent even young Jocundo's wife remained;
He showing her what good would thence ensue,
Besides what gratitude would be her due.

XII
"Jocundo names a time to wend his way,
And servingmen meanwhile purveys and steeds;
And a provision makes of fair array;
For beauty borrows grace from glorious weeds.
Beside him or about him, night and day,
Aye weeping, to her lord the lady reads;
She knows not how she ever can sustain
So long an absence, and not die with pain.

XIII
"For the mere thought produced such misery,
It seemed from her was ravished her heart's core.
-- `Alas! my love (Jocundo cried) let be
Thy sorrows' -- weeping with her evermore --
`So may this journey prosper! as to thee
Will I return ere yet two months are o'er;
Nor by a day o'erpass the term prescribed,
Though me the king with half his kingdom bribed.'

XIV
"This brought his troubled consort small content:
She that the period was too distant said,
And that 'twould be a mighty wonderment,
If her, at his return, he found not dead.
The grief which, day and night, her bosom rent,
Was such, that lady neither slept nor fed:
So that for pity oft the youth repented
He to his brother's wishes had consented.

XV
"She from her neck unloosed a costly chain
That a gemmed cross and holy reliques bore;
Which one, a pilgrim of Bohemia's reign,
Had gathered upon many a distant shore;
Him did her sire in sickness entertain,
Returning from Jerusalem of yore;
And hence was made that dying pilgrim's heir:
This she undoes, and gives her lord to wear;

XVI
"And round his neck entreats him, for her sake,
That chain in memory of herself to wind:
Her gift the husband is well pleased to take;
Not that a token needs his love to bind:
For neither time, nor absence, e'er will shake,
Nor whatsoever fortune is behind,
Her memory, which, rooted fast and deep,
He still has kept, and after death will keep.

XVII
"The night before that morning streaked the sky,
Fixt for his journey, to his sore dismay,
Her husband deemed that in his arms would die
The wife from whom he was to wend his way.
She slumbered not: to her a last goodbye
He bade, while yet it lacked an hour of day,
Mounted his nag, and on his journey sped;
While his afflicted spouse returned to bed.

XVIII
"Jocundo was not two miles on his road,
When he that jewelled cross recalled to mind;
Which he beneath his pillow had bestowed,
And, through forgetfulness, had left behind.
`Alas! (the youth bethought him) in what mode
Shall I excuse for my omission find,
So that from this my consort shall not deem
I little her unbounded love esteem?

XIX
"He pondered an excuse; then weened' twould be
Of little value, if it were exprest
By page or other -- save his embassy
He did himself; his brother he addrest;
` -- Now to Baccano ride you leisurely,
And there at the first inn set-up your rest;
For I must back to Rome without delay;
But trust to overtake you by the way.

XX
" `No other but myself my need could do.
Doubt not but I shall speedily be back.'
-- No servant took he, but, with an adieu,
Jocundo, at a trot, wheeled round his hack,
And when that cavalier the stream was through,
The rising sun 'gan chase the dusky rack.
At home he lighted, sought his bed, and found
The consort he had quitted sleeping sound.

XXI
"He, without saying aught, the curtains drew,
And, what he least believed, within espied;
For he beneath the quilt, his consort true
And chaste, saw sleeping at a stripling's side.
Forthwith Jocundo that adulterer knew,
By practice, of his features certified,
In that he was a footboy in his train,
Nourished by him, and come of humble strain.

XXII
"To imagine his distress and wonderment,
And warrant it, that other may believe,
Is better than to make the experiment,
And, like this wretch, the cruel proof receive:
By anger stirred, it was his first intent
To draw his sword, and both of life bereave;
But love, which spite himself, he entertained
For that ungrateful woman, him restrained.

XXIII
"You see if like a vassal he obeyed
This ribald Love, who left him not the force
To wake her, lest to know her guilt surveyed,
Should in his consort's bosom move remorse.
As best he could, he forth in silence made,
The stair descended, and regained his horse.
Goaded by Love, he goads his steed again,
And ere they reach their inn rejoins his train.

XXIV
"His change of mien to all was manifest;
All saw his heart was heavy; yet not one,
Mid these, in any sort, the reason guessed,
Nor read the secret woe which caused his moan;
All thought he had to Rome his steps addrest,
Woe to the town, surnamed of horns, had gone.
That Love has caused the mischief all surmise,
Though none of them conjectures in what wise.

XXV
"His brother weened he was in grief immersed
For his deserted wife: he, on his side,
For other reason, inly chafed and cursed,
-- That she was but too well accompanied.
Meanwhile, with swelling lips and forehead pursed,
The ground that melancholy stripling eyed.
Faustus, who vainly would apply relief,
Ill cheered him, witless what had caused his grief.

XXVI
"He for his sore an evil salve had found,
And, where he should retire, encreased his woes;
Who, with the mention of his wife, that wound
Inflamed and opened, which he sought to close.
He rests not night nor day, in sorrow drowned;
His appetite is gone, with his repose,
Ne'er to return; and (whilom of such fame)
His lovely visage seems no more the same.

XXVII
"His eye-balls seem deep-buried in his head,
His nose seems grown -- his cheeks are pined so sore --
Nor even remains (his beauty so is fled)
Enough to warrant what he was before.
Such fever burns him, of his sorrow bred,
He halts on Arbia's and on Arno's shore;
And, if a charm is left, 'tis faded soon,
And withered like a rose-bud plucked at noon.