Page:Divine Comedy (Longfellow 1867) v1.djvu/134

114 And the good Master yet from off his haunch

Deposed me not, till to the hole he brought me

Of him who so lamented with his shanks.

"Whoe'er thou art, that standest upside down,

O doleful soul, implanted like a stake,"

To say began I, "if thou canst, speak out."

I stood even as the friar who is confessing

The false assassin, who, when he is fixed,

Recalls him, so that death may be delayed.

And he cried out: "Dost thou stand there already,

Dost thou stand there already, Boniface?

By many years the record lied to me.

Art thou so early satiate with that wealth,

For which thou didst not fear to take by fraud

The beautiful Lady, and then work her woe?"

Such I became, as people are who stand,

Not comprehending what is answered them,

As if bemocked, and know not how to answer.

Then said Virgilius: "Say to him straightway,

I am not he, I am not he thou thinkest."

And I replied as was imposed on me.

Whereat the spirit writhed with both his feet,

Then, sighing, with a voice of lamentation

Said to me: "Then what wantest thou of me?