beings go to their death in a like manner on the East River Bridge.

Elsewhere in his Banquet Dante says that to live means to think, and thinking belongs only to man, because the beasts have no reason, and not only the lesser beasts but those that have a human demeanour and the spirit of a sheep or of some other abominable beast.'1 And again he cries, 'Happy the few who sit at that table where the bread of the Angels is eaten, and wretched they who with the sheep have a common food.' 2

One need hardly cite more to make Dante's attitude clear.

He accepts the symbolism of the Lamb of God, and develops in a dozen ways the figure of speech that makes flocks' out of the congregations of the Church, once even calling the Emperor a Hectorean

1 Conv. II, vii, 30-33, 'E non dico pur delle minori bestie, ma di quelle che hanno apparenza umana, e spirito di pecora o d'altra bestia abbominevole.' Cf. the Biblical 'abomination' the hog.

2 Conv. I, i, 51-54, 'Oh beati que' pochi che seggono a quella mensa ove il pane degli Angeli si mangia, e miseri quelli che colle pecore hanno comune cibo.' Cf. the legend of Nebuchadnezzar.

3

Epist. VIII, iv, 46-49, 'Et quorum sequentem gregem per saltus peregrinationis huius illustrare intererat, ipsum una vobiscum ad præcipitium traduxistis.' Parad. IX, 127–132 (cf. Matthew vii, 15): — 'La tua citta, che di colui è pianta

Parad. X, 94-96 :

Che pria volse le spalle al suo fattore,
E di cui è la invidia tanto pianta,
Produce e spande il maledetto fiore
C'ha disviate le pecore e gli agni,
Perocchè fatto ha lupo del pastore.'

'Io fui degli agni della santa greggia
Che Domenico mena per cammino,
U' ben s' impingua se non si vaneggia.'

De Mon. III, xv, 16–26; ibid. III, iii, 116–118; Parad. XI, 99 (Archimandrita); De Mon. III, ix, 123 (Archimandrita); Epist. VIII, vi

Shepherd; but in his most natural moods Dante is either the artist who paints the sheep with a certain tenderness, or the great thinker, conscious always of his power and intolerant of stupidity in sheep2 as in men.

(nomine solo archimandritis, etc.); Purg. XIX, 107; Epist. VII, 157-162 (neighbouring flocks sickened by contagion); Epist. VII, 144-146, hæc est languida pecus, gregem domini sui sua contagione commaculans.' Parad. XI, 124-132 (St. Francis describes the condition of the Dominicans in 1300 A.D.): –

'Ma il suo peculio di nuova vivanda
E fatto ghiotto sì ch' esser non puote
Che per diversi salti non si spanda;
E quanto le sue pecore remote
E vagabonde più da esso vanno
Più tornan al ovil di latte vote.

Ben son di quelle che temono il danno,
E stringonsi al pastor; ma son sì poche,
Che le cappe fornisce poco panno.'

Cf. Isaiah liii, 6; also Psalm cxix, 176.

Another reference to sheep is found in Epist. VII, v, 98-100, ... in Turnos ubique sicut leo desæviet, et in Latinos velut agnus mitescet.' Cf. Parad. XVI, 117 (com' agnel si placa); Purg. XXXIII, 51. See H. F. Tozer.

1 Epist. V, v, 84-87, 'Parcite, parcite iam ex nunc, o carissimi, qui mecum iniuriam passi estis, ut Hectoreus pastor vos oves de ovili suo cognoscat,' etc.

2 Aristotle has also something to say on the stupidity of sheep. See De Hist. Animal. IX, 3 (De genere ovili amente et stulto), and cf. also ALBERTUS MAGNUS, De Animal. lib. XXII, tract ii, cap. 1. Albertus Magnus is not only friendly to the sheep, but gives a minute and relatively intelligent description, apparently from his own observation. Cf. Parad. V, 80, with Inf. XXVI, 119.

CHAPTER XXIV

THE GOAT

COMEDY,' explains Dante to Can Grande, 'differs materially from tragedy in this, that tragedy is at the beginning wondrous and quiet; at the end or outcome stinking and grisly; and it is named, therefore, from tragus, which means he-goat, and oda; as it were a goatish song, that is to say, stinking, like a he-goat, as is plainly shown by Seneca's tragedies.'1

Being entirely ignorant of Greek, our author no doubt found this etymological lore in some Latin writer and made it bodily his own.2 As Hell, which is the culmination of evil, sends forth a stench, so tragedy, which ends unhappily, smells ill. One thinks of Hamlet's saying as to Denmark.

Not only is the he-goat rank; he is also a quarrelsome 'butter' (to translate his Hebrew name),3 and in

1 Epist. X, x, 195-203, 'Differt ergo a tragœdia in materia per hoc, quod tragœdia in principio est admirabilis et quieta, in fine sive exitu est fœtida et horribilis, et dicitur propter hoc a tragus, quod est hircus, et oda, quasi cantus hircinus, id est foetidus ad modum hirci, ut patet per Senecam in suis Tragœdiis.'

2 HORACE (Ars. P. 220 ff.) is not sufficiently precise to be the authority of Dante. Horace says:

'Carmine qui tragico vilem certavit ob hircum,

Mox etiam agrestes satyros nudavit,' etc.

Dante almost certainly borrowed the explanation about as it stands.

8 Tayish,' Proverbs xxx, 29, 31, and elsewhere.

this capacity is like two brothers whom Dante saw in the ice hell:

'Clamp never girt board to board so strongly; wherefore they like two he-goats butted together, such anger NORTON. overcame them.'

Con legno legno mai spranga non cinse
Forte così, ond' ei, come due becchi,

Cozzaro insieme: tant' ira li vinse.1

The nature of the he-goat is to butt, and butt often; that of all the breed is to climb along narrow ledges without ever falling, and stand on any point wide enough to hold their nimble, sharp-pointed hoofs. Since a mere chink or rift in an almost perpendicular wall is wide enough for goats, one can have but the greater admiration for the shade of Virgil, which set our poet down on a ledge that would have been to very goats no easy road.

Che sarebbe alle capre duro varco.2

This does well for a comparison, but in beauty is surpassed by another scene.

Dante, Master Virgil, and Statius stop to rest on the mountain of Purgatory to await the morning.

1

Quali si fanno ruminando manse
Le capre, state rapide e proterve
Sopra le cime, avanti che sien pranse,
Tacite all' ombra, mentre che il sol ferve,
Guardate dal pastor, che in sulla verga

1 Inf. XXXII, 49–51. This simile seems to have been foreshadowed by vss. 44-45.

2 Inf. XIX, 132. Compare with this the climbing of the mountain in Purg. XXV, 7–9.

Poggiato s'è, e lor poggiato serve;
E quale il mandrian che fuori alberga,
Lungo il peculio suo queto pernotta,
Guardando perchè fiera non lo sperga;
Tali eravamo tutti e tre allotta,
Io come capra, ed ei come pastori,
Fasciati quindi e quinci d' alta grotta.
Poco potea parer lì del di fuori;
Ma per quel poco vedev' io le stelle,
Di lor solere e più chiare e maggiori.
Si ruminando, e sì mirando in quelle,
Mi prese il sonno; il sonno che sovente,
Anzi che il fatto sia, sa le novelle.

Even as in ruminating passive grow

The goats that have been swift and venturesome
Upon the mountain tops ere they were fed
Hushed in the shadow, while the sun is hot,
Watched by the herdsman, who upon his staff
Is leaning, and in leaning tendeth them;
And as the shepherd, lodging out of doors
Passes the night beside his quiet flock,
Watching that no wild beasts may scatter it ;
Such at that hour were we, all three of us,
I like the goat, and like the herdsman they,
Begirt on this side and on that by rocks.
Little could there be seen of things without;
But through that little I beheld the stars
More luminous and larger than their wont.
Thus ruminating, and beholding these,

1 Purg. XXVII, 76-93. Cf. 80-84 with VIRGIL, Georg. IV, 433436 (cited by Scartazzini):