Produced by David Widger THE VISION OF HELL, PURGATORY, AND PARADISE BY DANTE ALIGHIERI TRANSLATED BY THE REV. H. F. CARY, M.A. HELL OR THE INFERNO Part 8 Cantos 23 - 28 CANTO XXIII IN silence and in solitude we went, One first, the other following his steps, As minor friars journeying on their road. The present fray had turn'd my thoughts to muse Upon old Aesop's fable, where he told What fate unto the mouse and frog befell. For language hath not sounds more like in sense, Than are these chances, if the origin And end of each be heedfully compar'd. And as one thought bursts from another forth, So afterward from that another sprang, Which added doubly to my former fear. For thus I reason'd: "These through us have been So foil'd, with loss and mock'ry so complete, As needs must sting them sore. If anger then Be to their evil will conjoin'd, more fell They shall pursue us, than the savage hound Snatches the leveret, panting 'twixt his jaws." Already I perceiv'd my hair stand all On end with terror, and look'd eager back. "Teacher," I thus began, "if speedily Thyself and me thou hide not, much I dread Those evil talons. Even now behind They urge us: quick imagination works So forcibly, that I already feel them." He answer'd: "Were I form'd of leaded glass, I should not sooner draw unto myself Thy outward image, than I now imprint That from within. This moment came thy thoughts Presented before mine, with similar act And count'nance similar, so that from both I one design have fram'd. If the right coast Incline so much, that we may thence descend Into the other chasm, we shall escape Secure from this imagined pursuit." He had not spoke his purpose to the end, When I from far beheld them with spread wings Approach to take us. Suddenly my guide Caught me, ev'n as a mother that from sleep Is by the noise arous'd, and near her sees The climbing fires, who snatches up her babe And flies ne'er pausing, careful more of him Than of herself, that but a single vest Clings round her limbs. Down from the jutting beach Supine he cast him, to that pendent rock, Which closes on one part the other chasm. Never ran water with such hurrying pace Adown the tube to turn a landmill's wheel, When nearest it approaches to the spokes, As then along that edge my master ran, Carrying me in his bosom, as a child, Not a companion. Scarcely had his feet Reach'd to the lowest of the bed beneath, When over us the steep they reach'd; but fear In him was none; for that high Providence, Which plac'd them ministers of the fifth foss, Power of departing thence took from them all.