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body. Therefore I made a feint of leaning against a painting which covered the wall of the house, and fearing that my emotion might be observed, I raised my eyes, and looking towards the ladies, beheld among them the most gentle Beatrice. Straightway my spirits were so distraught by the vehemence of Love, on finding myself so near that most gentle lady, that nothing remained to me of life but the spirits of vision, and even these were driven forth from their own organs, forasmuch as Love determined to occupy their most honoured place that he might behold that admirable lady. Then many of these ladies, observing my confusion, began to marvel; and they fell to whispering with that sweet lady and making mock of me: whereupon my friend, taken quite aback, and at a loss what to understand, took me by the hand, and leading me aside, asked me what was amiss. Then having rested awhile, and the spirits which had died within me having risen to life again, and those which had been chased away having returned to their abodes, I made answer to my friend,—'I have set my foot in that path of life, to pass beyond which with purpose to return is impossible.' And bidding him farewell, I returned home into the chamber of tears, and there weeping, and blushing as I wept, I said to myself—'If this lady did but know my condition, she would not thus, methinks, make sport of my appearance; rather would she, I believe, be moved to pity.'

This is supposed by many commentators to refer to the marriage-feast of Beatrice herself; but this seems very improbable, since no friend of Dante's is likely to have led him unawares into the heart of such a merrymaking. Much more likely it would seem that the young poet, suddenly brought into immediate contact with the lady whom he had worshipped afar off, should be rendered speechless by the unsuspected shock of a privilege too much for him, and of which he could take