Classic Poem

Ante-Purgatory.--Spirits who had delayed repentance, and
met with death by violence, but died repentant.--Jacopo del
Cassero.--Buonconte da Montefeltro--Via de' Tolomei.


I had now parted from those shades, and was following the
footsteps of my Leader, when behind me, pointing his finger, one
cried out, "Look, the ray seems not to shine on the left hand of
that lower one, and as if alive he seems to hear himself." I
turned my eyes at the sound of these words, and I saw them
watching, for marvel, only me, only me, and the light which was
broken.

"Why is thy mind so hampered," said the Master, "that thou
slackenest thy going? What matters to thee that which here is
whispered? Come after me, and let the people talk. Stand as a
tower firm, that never wags its top for blowing of the winds; for
always the man in whom thought on thought wells up removes from
himself his aim, for the force of one weakens the other." What
could I answer, save "I come"? I said it, overspread somewhat
with the color, which, at times, makes a man worthy of pardon.

And meanwhile across upon the mountain side, a little in front of
us, were coming people, singing "Miserere," verse by verse. When
they observed that I gave not place for passage of the rays
through my body, they changed their song into a long and hoarse
"Oh!" and two of them, in form of messengers, ran to meet us, and
asked of us, "Of your condition make us cognizant." And my
Master, "Ye can go back, and report to them who sent you, that
the body of this one is true flesh. If, as I suppose, they
stopped because of seeing his shadow, enough is answered them;
let them do him honor and he may he dear to them."

Never did I see enkindled vapors at early night so swiftly cleave
the clear sky, nor at set of sun the clouds of August, that these
did not return up in less time; and, arrived there, they, with
the others, gave a turn toward us, like a troop that runs without
curb. "These folk that press to us are many, and they come to
pray thee," said the Poet; "wherefore still go on, and in going
listen." "O soul," they came crying, "that goest to be happy with
those limbs with which thou wast born, a little stay thy step;
look if thou hast ever seen any one of us, so that thou mayest
carry news of him to earth. Ah, why dost thou go on? Ah, why dost
thou not stop? We were of old all done to death by violence, and
sinners up to the last hour; then light from Heaven made us
mindful, so that both penitent and pardoning we issued forth from
life, at peace with God, who fills our hearts with the desire to
see him." And I, "Although I gaze upon your faces, not one I
recognize; but if aught that I can do be pleasing to you, spirits
wellborn,[1] speak ye, and I will do it by that peace which makes
me, following the feet of such a guide, seek for itself from
world to world." And one began, "Each of us trusts in thy good
turn without thy swearing it, provided want of power cut not off
the will; wherefore I, who alone before the others speak, pray
thee, if ever thou see that land that sits between Romagna and
the land of Charles,[2] that thou be courteous to me with thy
prayers in Fano, so that for me good orisons be made, whereby I
may purge away my grave offences. Thence was I; but the deep
wounds, wherefrom issued the blood in which I had my seat,[3]
were given me in the bosom of the Endoneuria,[4] there where I
thought to be most secure; he of Este had it done, who held me in
wrath far beyond what justice willed. But if I had fled toward
Mira,[5] when I was overtaken at Oriaco, I should still be yonder
where men breathe. I ran to the marsh, and the reeds and the mire
hampered me so that I fell, and there I saw a lake made by my
veins upon the ground."

[1] Elect from birth to the joys of Paradise, in contrast with
the ill-born, the miscreants of Hell.

[2] The March of Ancona, between the Romagna and the kingdom of
Naples, then held by Charles II. of Anjou. It is Jacopo del
Cassero who speaks. He was a noted and valiant member of the
leading Guelph family in Fano. On his way to take the place of
Podesta of Milan, in 1298, he was assassinated by the minions of
Azzo VIII. of Este, whom he had offended.

[3] The life of all flesh is the blood thereof." Levit., xvii.
14. Or, according to the Vulgate, "Anima carnis in sanguine est."

[4] That is to say, in the territory of the Paduans, whose city
was reputed to have been founded by Antenor.

[5] Mira is a little settlement on the bank of one of the canals
of the Brenta. Why flight thither would have been safe is mere
matter of conjecture.


Then said another, "Ah! so may that desire be fulfilled which
draws thee to the high mountain, with good piety help thou mine.
I was of Montefeltro, and am Buonconte.[1] Joan or any other has
no care for me, wherefore I go among these with downcast front."
And I to him, "What violence, or what chance so carried thee
astray from Campaldino,[2] that thy burial place was never
known?" "Oh!" replied he, "at foot of the Casentino crosses a
stream, named the Archiano, which rises in the Apennine above the
Hermitage.[3] Where its proper name becomes vain[4] I arrived,
pierced in the throat, flying on foot, and bloodying the plain.
Here I lost my sight, and I ended my speech with the name of
Mary, and here I fell, and my flesh remained alone. I will tell
the truth, and do thou repeat it among the living. The Angel of
God took me, and he of Hell cried out, "O thou from Heaven, why
dost thou rob me?[5] Thou bearest away for thyself the eternal
part of him for one little tear which takes him from me; but of
the rest I will make other disposal." Thou knowest well how in
the air is condensed that moist vapor which turns to water soon
as it rises where the cold seizes it. He joined that evil will,
which seeketh only evil, with intelligence, and moved the mist
and the wind by the power that his own nature gave. Then when the
day was spent he covered the valley with cloud, from Pratomagno
to the great chain, and made the frost above so intense that the
pregnant air was turned to water. The rain fell, and to the
gullies came of it what the earth did not endure, and as it
gathered in great streams it rushed so swiftly towards the royal
river that nothing held it back. The robust Archiano found my
frozen body near its outlet, and pushed it into the Arno, and
loosed on my breast the cross which I made of myself when the
pain overcame me. It rolled me along its banks, and along its
bottom, then with its spoil it covered and girt me."

[1] Son of Count Guido da Montefeltro, the treacherous counsellor
who had told his story to Dante in Hell, Canto XXVII. Joan was
his wife.

[2] The battle of Campaldino, in which Dante himself, perhaps,
took part, was fought on the 11th of June, 1289, between the
Florentine Guelphs and the Ghibellines of Arezzo. Buonconte was
the captain of the Aretines. Campaldino is a little plain in the
upper valley of the Arno.

[3] The convent of the Calmaldoli, founded by St. Romualdo of
Ravenna, in 1012.

[4] Being lost at its junction with the Arno.

[5] St. Francis and one of the black Cherubim had had a similar
contention, as will be remembered, over the soul of Buonconte's
father.


"Ah! when thou shalt have returned unto the world, and rested
from the long journey," the third spirit followed on the second,
"be mindful of me, who am Pia.[1] Siena made me, Maremma unmade
me; he knows it who with his gem ringed me, betrothed before."

[1] This sad Pia is supposed to have belonged to the Sienese
family of the Tolomei, and to have been the wife of Nello or
Paganello de' Pannocchieschi, who was reported to have had her
put to death in his stronghold of Pietra in the Tuscan Maremma.
Her fate seems the more pitiable that she does not pray Dante to
seek for her the prayers of any living person. The last words of
Pia are obscure, and are interpreted variously. Possibly the
"betrothed before" hints at a source of jealousy as the motive of
her murder.