"In the beginning was the Word next God; God was the Word, the Word no less was he: This was in the beginning, to my mode Of thinking, and without him nought could be. Therefore, just Lord! from out thy high abode, Benign and pious, bid an angel flee, One only, to be my companion, who Shall help my famous, worthy, old song through. "And thou, O Virgin! daughter, mother, bride Of the same Lord, who gave to you each key Of heaven and hell, and every thing beside, The day thy Gabriel said, 'All hail!' to thee; Since to thy servants pity's ne'er denied, With flowing rhymes, a pleasant style and free; Be to my verses then benignly kind, And to the end illuminate my mind." LORD BYRON's _Translation of Canto I. of Pulci._ The scope of the poem is then, in true epic fashion, summed up in a few lines[87]:-- "Twelve paladins had Charles in court, of whom The wisest and most famous was Orlando; Him traitor Gan conducted to the tomb In Roncesvalles, as the villain plann'd too, While the horn rang so loud, and knell'd the doom Of their sad rout, though he did all knight can do; And Dante in his comedy has given To him a happy seat with Charles in heaven." --_Id. ibid._ The poet then introduces the immediate object of the poem. On Christmas day Charlemagne held his court, and the emperor was over-glad to see all his noble Paladins around him. His favour shown towards Orlando excited the spleen of Gano, who openly attacked him as too presumptuous and powerful. Orlando overhearing his words, and perceiving Charlemagne's ready credulity, drew his sword in a rage, and would have killed the slanderer, had not Ulivieri interposed. On this Orlando quits Paris, full of grief and rage, and goes forth to wander over the world in search of adventures. His first enterprise is undertaken in behalf of a convent, besieged by three giants, who amused themselves by throwing fragments of rock and trees torn up by the roots, into the courts and garden of the monastery, which kept the poor monks in perpetual alarm. Notwithstanding their dissuasions, Orlando conceives this to be an adventure worthy of him: he goes out against the pagan and monstrous assailants. He kills two in single combat, and then goes to seek the fiercest and mightiest of the three, Morgante. This ferocious giant has retired, meanwhile, to a cavern of his own fashioning, and was dreaming uneasily of a serpent who came to slay him, which was only defeated by his having recourse to the name of the Christian Saviour. This disposed him to submission and conversion, and Orlando, delighted with these good dispositions, embraces and baptizes him. The monks are very grateful for their deliverance, and desirous to keep their preserver; but Orlando, tired of idleness, takes a kind and affectionate leave of the abbot, whom he discovers to be a cousin of his own, and departs with his convert in search of adventures.