Page:Divine Comedy (Longfellow 1867) v1.djvu/192

172 And one his limb transpierced, and one lopped off,

Should show, it would be nothing to compare

With the disgusting mode of the ninth Bolgia.

A cask by losing centre-piece or cant

Was never shattered so, as I saw one

Rent from the chin to where one breaketh wind.

Between his legs were hanging down his entrails;

His heart was visible, and the dismal sack

That maketh excrement of what is eaten.

While I was all absorbed in seeing him,

He looked at me, and opened with his hands

His bosom, saying: "See now how I rend me;

How mutilated, see, is Mahomet;

In front of me doth Ali weeping go,

Cleft in the face from forelock unto chin;

And all the others whom thou here beholdest,

Disseminators of scandal and of schism

While living were, and therefore are cleft thus.

A devil is behind here, who doth cleave us

Thus cruelly, unto the falchion's edge

Putting again each one of all this ream,

When we have gone around the doleful road;

By reason that our wounds are closed again

Ere any one in front of him repass.