Page:Divine Comedy (Longfellow 1867) v2.djvu/26

8 From which when I a little had withdrawn

Mine eyes, that I might question my Conductor,

Again I saw it brighter grown and larger.

Then on each side of it appeared to me

I knew not what of white, and underneath it

Little by little there came forth another.

My master yet had uttered not a word

While the first whiteness into wings unfolded;

But when he clearly recognized the pilot,

He cried: "Make haste, make haste to bow the knee!

Behold the Angel of God! fold thou thy hands!

Henceforward shalt thou see such officers!

See how he scorneth human arguments,

So that nor oar he wants, nor other sail

Than his own wings, between so distant shores.

See how he holds them pointed up to heaven,

Fanning the air with the eternal pinions,

That do not moult themselves like mortal hair!"

Then as still nearer and more near us came

The Bird Divine, more radiant he appeared,

So that near by the eye could not endure him,

But down I cast it; and he came to shore

With a small vessel, very swift and light,

So that the water swallowed naught thereof.