My leader stopped; and I the shade addressed
Who kept full bitterly blaspheming still,
'Say, who art thou whose tongue so foully speaks?'
'Nay, who art thou that walk'st the withering air
Of Antemora, smiting others' cheeks
That, wert thou living, 't were too much to bear?'
'Living I am; and thou, if craving fame,
Mayst count it precious,'--this was my reply,--
'That I with other notes record thy name.'
He answered thus: 'Far other wish have I.
Trouble me now no longer,--get thee gone:
Thine is cold flattery in this waste of Hell.'
At this his hindmost hairs I fastened on,
And cried, 'Thy name! I'll force thee now to tell.
Or not one hair upon thy head shall grow.'
He answered thus: 'Although thou pluck me bare,
I'll neithertell my name, nor visage show;
Nay, though a thousand times thou rend my hair,'

"I held his tresses in my fingers wound,
And more than one tuft had I twitched away
As he, with eyes bent down, howled like a hound;
When one cried out, 'What ails thee, Bocca? say,--
Canst thou not make enough clack with thy jaws,
But thou must bark too! What fiend pricks thee now?'
'Aha!' said I, 'henceforth I have no cause
To bid thee speak, thou cursed traitor thou!
I'll shame thee, bearing truth of thee to men.'
'Away!' he answered: 'what thou wilt, relate:
But, shouldst thou get from hence with breath again,
Mention him too so ready with his prate."

The encounter of Dante with Farinata and Cavalcante in their fiery tombs
is also painted with such animated and fortunate strokes that we must
reproduce some of them here:--

"'O Tuscan! thou who com'st with gentle speech.
Through Hell's hot city, breathing from the earth,
Stop in this place one moment, I beseech:
Thy tongue betrays the country of thy birth.
Of that illustrious land I know thee sprung,
Which in my day perchance I somewhat vexed.'
Forth from one vault these sudden accents rung,
So that I trembling stood with fear perplexed.
Then as I closer to my master drew.
'Turn back! what dost thou?' he exclaimed in haste;
'See! Farinata rises to thy view;
Now mayst behold him upward from his waist.'

"Full in his face already I was gazing,
While his front lowered, and his proud bosom swelled,
As though even