Page:Undivine Comedy - Zygmunt Krasiński, tr. Martha Walker Cook.djvu/160

154 veiled with long hair, she had two angel wings softly bent in the form of a cross and folded above her shoulders. And these wings were furrowed with deep wounds, and in each wound a nail was deeply sunk, which kept the wings from unfolding. A moment after, these two forms melted into each other,—and once more there was only the kneeling figure in mourning.

Then the Shade said: "Lo! she has finished her prayer, for her soul of snow has disappeared." And he added, as if in spite of himself: "Beatrice!"

The woman in black turned round, and said: "She who bore this name years and years ago knew nothing but Paradise upon this earth, for she perished in the first spring of life;—and she knew nothing but Paradise beyond this earth, for Heaven immediately received her into its bosom! But, miserable me! none ever compensated me for the loss of my first spring by a second! That is not my name!"

And wringing her hands, she stood erect and white as alabaster.

And when the Seer conjured her to speak, she began in these words: "I was born in a land of milk and honey, which is to-day called the land of sepulchres and of crosses,—and which is also called the ! You have heard me spoken of there! But a thousand tongues had poisoned and torn my name before it reached your ears. At first my parents called me: Innocent, Lovely, Blessed,—afterwards they gave me another name:

"For in accordance with the customs of the world, while still a child and knowing nothing of love, I was given, or rather sold, to a husband. Oh! weep for me and for my sisters, who, as yet young, knowing nothing and feeling nothing, go without volition to deliver themselves up, body and soul, to those who know all and have already felt all,—to whom nevertheless knowledge has not given the light of the angel, but rather the astute decrepitude of the demon!

"I bore all,—for all may be endured in this sad world save one feeling: contempt! When like a dagger it penetrates between two beings,—the handle in the heart of