CANTO V.

instant Francesca appeared, and, seeing one brother unarmed and hanging, and the other rushing towards him with a naked weapon, she flung herself between; and struggling with her infuriated lord, who, perfectly out of his senses, struck about him with his blade, one of those random lounges ran both her and Paul through the body. Their death was then direful, but not premeditated; and their slayer was the brutalized personification of jealousy and rage, but no murderer (1). This bloody catas. trophe was acted in 1289 about two years before Polenta went as Podestà to Florence. Scanatus lost no time in consoling himself with a new wife; and, on her death, married a third within two years after Francesca's tragical end. A son, whom he had by her, died in child-hood: but he left a numerous progeny by his other wives. Paul, the

even if it were otherwise, Paul hanging within it would not have been exposed to Scanatus's sword, much less could that sword have passed through him and Francesca at the same time; for to do so, it must also have passed through the wall. The M. S. account then is the more credible. But this slight variance (as well as whether it was by the hem of the coretto, or one of the links of the tosetto be was caught) is only a proof of the veracity of both writers. For it shows they did not copy each other, although they are perfectly agreed in substance.

*(1) Veduto Polo entrare nella camera di Madonna Francesca, fu Gianciotto in quel punto menato all'uscio, e chiamò fuori la donna (Boccaccio ut supra): Polo fu sopraggiunto da lui nella camera che rispondea di sotto; e si sarebbe partito senonchè una maglia del tosetto (la falda del coretto, according to Boccaccio) ch' egli aveva indosso s'appiccò ad una punta d'aguto della cateratta, e rimase così appiccato. Lanciotto gli corse addosso con uno spuntone. La donna entrò nel mezzo, di che menando e credendo dare a lui (avvenne quello ch'egli non avrebbe voluto, says Boccaccio) diede alla moglie ed uccisela, ed amazzò ivi medesimamente Polo dove era impiccato. M. S. ut supra.

CANTO V.

beautiful' (who was a widower, though a very ju venile one, when he first saw Francesca) had a son whom his uncle, Scanatus, was suspected of an intention to murder, in order to prevent his avenging his father's death. But the boy escaped, and, in turn, conspired against his uncle. Plots and counter-plots succeeded between the son and the slayer of 'Paul the beautiful;' nor did the nephew ever cease from roving, until the demise of Scanatus, in 1304, permitted him to return home. The palace in Rimini is still pointed out, where the unfortunate lovers are said to have been sacrificed; and they were certainly buried in the Augustine. Church in that town; for their bodies were found there three hundred years afterwards, when the silk mantles in which they were wrapt up appeared still quite fresh and brilliant: but some pretend that their slaughter took place at Pesaro, where Scanatus had a castle, from the tower of which their bodies were flung into the sea; although they were soon piously picked up and conveyed to Rimini for interment (1).

If this account be correct (and, I believe, no ques

(1) Clementini, Bacc. Ist. di Rimini. This difference as to whether they were killed at Pesaro, or Rimini, as well as another with regard to the date (for some postpone it as late as 1296, but evidently erroneously), proves there was much mystery endeavoured to be thrown over the whole catastrophe: and as it was clearly the interest of the Malate. sti to blacken Francesca's fame, and scarcely of her own family, who had so sacrificed her, to defend it, it is no wonder she was mal-treated by the chroniclers of both Rimini and Ravenna.

GANTO V.

tion but it is) the imputation against all the three is much diminished; and not only the luckless lady and her paramour, but even their slayer is to be held still more unfortunate than guilty: so that he, on whom the heaviest load of culpability presses, is the miserable father, Polenta. He however was Dante's intimate friend, and his repentance was so severe, that, it is likely, his state of mind rather challenged commiseration, than reproach: besides, it is Francesca herself that is about to speak, and what daughter shall ever be made reproach her parents? On recapitulating all the cir cumstances I dare say it will be thought, that, as a display of poetic judgment (in awaking the fullest sympathy for sufferers, without a single reference to the most hateful truths of the tale) nothing can be more perfect than this episode: but as to its pretensions to the grand qualities of composition, I am completely of the opinion of those, who ridicule the vulgar notion of its meriting any thing like the first rank in the Divine Comedy; and who aver that, if Oltremontani are more profuse than any Italian in extolling its beauties, it is not because they appreciate them better than a well educated Italian, but because they are ignorant of the numerous beauties of a vastly superior order, with which Italians are familiar in the Purgatory and Paradise two canticles, that contain a quantity of poetry incomparably finer, than any thing to be found in this one of Hell (1).

(1) I have said nothing of Peter, or Jacob Alighieri in this Article;

To those readers of the Histoire Littéraire d'Italie who have also perused the late Parisian edition of the Divine Comedy, it will not be necessary to justify a variation from the French version, since a far better authority than mine has already assured them, that it is impossible for words to express the vast portion of elegance and suavity' of which M. Ginguené has stripped his original (4): but by such of the above readers as do not possess a thorough knowledge of Dante in his native tongue, I may be accused of great inaccuracy, unless I make it appear that the Critic has been guilty of various mis-interpretations; in noticing which I am guided not certainly by a desire to blame him, but to vin. dicate myself. In the present passage he translates per quell'amor ch'ei mena, au nom de cet amour qui les conduit; as if mena was here simply synonimous with conduce, which it is not. The verb menare is given in the Vocabulary nearly 40 significations, many of which convey sense of infliction; it often means percuotere, for which several authorities are cited, as they struck each other with such fury that they both died'. The context (but parti

because neither of them seem to have known much about either Francesca, or Paul the beautiful. So, in this instance, their comments are meagre and most unsatisfactory.

· (1) Il Sig. Ginguené ha tradotto questo luogo per intero; ma di quanta grazia e soavità l'abbia scemato non si può dire. Biagioli. Comento, Vol. 1. p. 108.

CANTO V.

culary what follows) proves sufficiently, that it is in this latter sense that mena is here employed; and its union with the word amor, and the manner of its introduction produce a very complex'imagery, which no two or three words in either English or French can render(1). It is indeed the beginning of an exquisite counterpoise of pain and pleasure, which confers the chief charm on the whole of this episode; and makes the agony of severe sufferings, with the despairing reflection that they were produced by one beloved, and that they shall never end, be in continual contest with the consolatory circumstance of suffering in company with that beloved one, of finding him a faithful companion even in such extreme of misery, and the certainty that he will continue to remain so throughout all eternity. If this complexity of feel. ings (which is beyond doubt implied by the text, amor ch' ei mena, and nowise retained by amour qui les conduit) be tolerably well suggested by my undying fondness which drew them to their ruin and of which they shall never be rid,' I believe small apology is requisite for the slight paraphrase. It is the author's thought that is the first object; hence it may sometimes occur, that a translator's mere verbal exactitude is of little moment, since the implied meaning may evaporate in spite of rigo

4

(1) Si inimichivolmente si menarono che amendue rimasero morti. Vocabolario, §. II. Mr. Cary's “love which carries them along "is as deficient as the French version.