Stories from the Italian Poets: with Lives of the Writers Volume I Part 25

In spite of all the noise of the battle, the sound of the horn broke over it like a voice out of the other world. They say that birds fell dead at it, and that the whole Saracen army drew back in terror. But fearfuller still was its effect at St. John Pied de Port. Charlemagne was sitting in the midst of his court when the sound reached him; and Gan was there. The emperor was the first to hear it.

"Do you hear that?" said he to his n.o.bles. "Did you hear the horn, as I heard it?"

Upon this they all listened; and Gan felt his heart misgive him.

The horn sounded the second time.

"What is the meaning of this?" said Charles.

"Orlando is hunting," observed Gan, "and the stag is killed. He is at the old pastime that he was so fond of in Aspramonte."

But when the horn sounded yet a third time, and the blast was one of so dreadful a vehemence, every body looked at the other, and then they all looked at Gan in fury. Charles rose from his seat. "This is no hunting of the stag," said he. "The sound goes to my very heart, and, I confess, makes me tremble. I am awakened out of a great dream. O Gan! O Gan! Not for thee do I blush, but for myself, and for n.o.body else. O my G.o.d, what is to be done! But whatever is to be done, must be done quickly. Take this villain, gentlemen, and keep him in hard prison. O foul and monstrous villain! Would to G.o.d I had not lived to see this day! O obstinate and enormous folly! O Malagigi, had I but believed thy foresight! 'Tis thou went the wise man, and I the grey-headed fool."

Ogier the Dane, and Namo and others, in the bitterness of their grief and anger, could not help reminding the emperor of all which they had foretold. But it was no time for words. They put the traitor into prison; and then Charles, with all his court, took his way to Roncesvalles, grieving and praying.

It was afternoon when the horn sounded, and half an hour after it when the emperor set out; and meantime Orlando had returned to the fight that he might do his duty, however hopeless, as long as he could sit his horse, and the Paladins were now reduced to four; and though the Saracens suffered themselves to be mowed down like gra.s.s by them and their little band, he found his end approaching for toil and fever, and so at length he withdrew out of the fight, and rode all alone to a fountain which he knew of, where he had before quenched his thirst.

His horse was wearier still than he, and no sooner had its master alighted, than the beast, kneeling down as if to take leave, and to say, "I have brought you to your place of rest," fell dead at his feet.

Orlando cast water on him from the fountain, not wis.h.i.+ng to believe him dead; but when he found it to no purpose, he grieved for him as if he had been a human being, and addressed him by name in tears, and asked forgiveness if ever he had done him wrong. They say, that the horse at these words once more opened his eyes a little, and looked kindly at his master, and so stirred never more.

They say also that Orlando then, summoning all his strength, smote a rock near him with his beautiful sword Durlindana, thinking to s.h.i.+ver the steel in pieces, and so prevent its falling into the hands of the enemy; but though the rock split like a slate, and a deep fissure remained ever after to astonish the eyes of pilgrims, the sword remained unhurt.

"O strong Durlindana," cried he, "O n.o.ble and worthy sword, had I known thee from the first, as I know thee now, never would I have been brought to this pa.s.s."

And now Rinaldo and Ricciardetto and Turpin came up, having given chase to the Saracens till they were weary, and Orlando gave joyful welcome to his cousin, and they told him how the battle was won, and then Orlando knelt before Turpin, his face all in tears, and begged remission of his sins and confessed them, and Turpin gave him absolution; and suddenly a light came down upon him from heaven like a rainbow, accompanied with a sound of music, and an angel stood in the air blessing him, and then disappeared; upon which Orlando fixed his eyes on the hilt of his sword as on a crucifix, and embraced it, and said, "Lord, vouchsafe that I may look on this poor instrument as on the symbol of the tree upon which Thou sufferedst thy unspeakable martyrdom!" and so adjusting the sword to his bosom, and embracing it closer, he raised his eyes, and appeared like a creature seraphical and transfigured; and in bowing his head he breathed out his pure soul. A thunder was then heard in the heavens, and the heavens opened and seemed to stoop to the earth, and a flock of angels was seen like a white cloud ascending with his spirit, who were known to be what they were by the trembling of their wings. The white cloud shot out golden fires, so that the whole air was full of them; and the voices of the angels mingled in song with the instruments of their brethren above, which made an inexpressible harmony, at once deep and dulcet. The priestly warrior Turpin, and the two Paladins, and the hero's squire Terigi, who were all on their knees, forgot their own beings, in following the miracle with their eyes.

It was now the office of that squire to take horse and ride off to the emperor at Saint John Pied de Port, and tell him of all that had occurred; but in spite of what he had just seen, he lay for a time overwhelmed with grief. He then rose, and mounted his steed, and left the Paladins and the archbishop with the dead body, who knelt about it, guarding it with weeping love.

The good squire Terigi met the emperor and his cavalcade coming towards Roncesvalles, and alighted and fell on his knees, telling him the miserable news, and how all his people were slain but two of his Paladins, and himself, and the good archbishop. Charles for anguish began tearing his white locks; but Terigi comforted him against so doing, by giving an account of the manner of Orlando's death, and how he had surely gone to heaven. Nevertheless, the squire himself was broken-hearted with grief and toil; and he had scarcely added a denouncement of the traitor Gan, and a hope that the emperor would appease Heaven finally by giving his body to the winds, than he said, "The cold of death is upon me;" and so he fell dead at the emperor's feet.

Charles was ready to drop from his saddle for wretchedness. He cried out, "Let n.o.body comfort me more. I will have no comfort. Cursed be Gan, and cursed this horrible day, and this place, and every thing. Let us go on, like blind miserable men that we are, into Roncesvalles; and have patience if we can, out of pure misery, like Job, till we do all that can be done."

So Charles rode on with his n.o.bles; and they say, that for the sake of the champion of Christendom and the martyrs that died with him, the sun stood still in the sky till the emperor had seen Orlando, and till the dead were buried.

Horrible to his eyes was the sight of the field of Roncesvalles. The Saracens, indeed, had forsaken it, conquered; but all his Paladins but two were left on it dead, and the slaughtered heaps among which they lay made the whole valley like a great dumb slaughter-house, trampled up into blood and dirt, and reeking to the heat. The very trees were dropping with blood; and every thing, so to speak, seemed tired out, and gone to a horrible sleep.

Charles trembled to his heart's core for wonder and agony. After dumbly gazing on the place, he again cursed it with a solemn curse, and wished that never gra.s.s might grow within it again, nor seed of any kind, neither within it, nor on any of its mountains around with their proud shoulders; but the anger of Heaven abide over it for ever, as on a pit made by h.e.l.l upon earth.

Then he rode on, and came up to where the body of Orlando awaited him with the Paladins, and the old man, weeping, threw himself as if he had been a reckless youth from his horse, and embraced and kissed the dead body, and said, "I bless thee, Orlando. I bless thy whole life, and all that thou wast, and all that thou ever didst, and thy mighty and holy valour, and the father that begot thee; and I ask pardon of thee for believing those who brought thee to thine end. They shall have their reward, O thou beloved one! But, indeed, it is thou that livest, and I that am worse than dead."

And now, behold a wonder. For the emperor, in the fervour of his heart and of the memory of what had pa.s.sed between them, called to mind that Orlando had promised to give him his sword, should he die before him; and he lifted up his voice more bravely, and adjured him even now to return it to him gladly; and it pleased G.o.d that the dead body of Orlando should rise on its feet, and kneel as he was wont to do at the feet of his liege lord, and gladly, and with a smile on its face, return the sword to the Emperor Charles. As Orlando rose, the Paladins and Turpin knelt down out of fear and horror, especially seeing him look with a stern countenance; but when they saw that he knelt also, and smiled, and returned the sword, their hearts became re-a.s.sured, and Charles took the sword like his liege lord, though trembling with wonder and affection: and in truth he could hardly clench his fingers around it.

Orlando was buried in a great sepulchre in Aquisgrana, and the dead Paladins were all embalmed and sent with majestic cavalcades to their respective counties and princ.i.p.alities, and every Christian was honourably and reverently put in the earth, and recorded among the martyrs of the Church.

But meantime the flying Saracens, thinking to bury their own dead, and ignorant of what still awaited them, came back into the valley, and Rinaldo beheld them with a dreadful joy, and shewed them to Charles. Now the emperor's cavalcade had increased every moment; and they fell upon the Saracens with a new and unexpected battle, and the old emperor, addressing the sword of Orlando, exclaimed, "My strength is little, but do thou do thy duty to thy master, thou famous sword, seeing that he returned it to me smiling, and that his revenge is in my hands." And so saying, he met Balugante, the leader of the infidels, as he came borne along by his frightened horse; and the old man, raising the sword with both hands, cleaved him, with a delighted mind, to the chin.

O sacred Emperor Charles! O well-lived old man! Defender of the Faith!

light and glory of the old time! thou hast cut off the other ear of Malchus, and shown how rightly thou wert born into the world, to save it a second time from the abyss.

Again fled the Saracens, never to come to Christendom more: but Charles went after them into Spain, he and Rinaldo and Ricciardetto and the good Turpin; and they took and fired Saragossa; and Marsilius was hung to the carob-tree under which he had planned his villany with Gan; and Gan was hung, and drawn and quartered, in Roncesvalles, amidst the execrations of the country.

And if you ask, how it happened that Charles ever put faith in such a wretch, I shall tell you that it was because the good old emperor, with all his faults, was a divine man, and believed in others out of the excellence of his own heart and truth. And such was the case with Orlando himself.

APPENDIX.

No. I.

STORY OF PAULO AND FRANCESCA.

Poscia ch' i' ebbi il mio dottore udito Nomar le donne antiche e i cavalieri, Pieta mi vinse, e fui quasi smarrito.

I' cominciai: Poeta, volentieri Parlerei a que' duo the 'nsieme vanno, E pajon s al vento esser leggieri.

Ed egli a me: Vedrai, quando saranno Piu presso a noi: e tu allor gli piega, Per quell' amor ch' ei mena; e quei verranno.

Si tosto come 'l vento a noi gli piega, Mossi la voce: O anime affannate, Venite a not parlar, s' altri nol niega.

Quali colombe dal disio chiamate, Con l' ali aperte e ferme, al dolce nido Volan per l' aer dal voter portate:

Cotali uscir de la schiera ov' e Dido, A noi venendo per l' aer maligno, Si forte fu l' affettuoso grido.

O animal grazioso e benigno, Che visitando vai per l' aer perso Noi che tignemmo it mondo di sanguigno; Se fosse amico il Re de l'Universo, Noi pregheremmo lui per la tua pace, Poich' hai pieta del nostro mal perverso.

Di quel ch'udire e che parlar ti piace, Noi udiremo, e parleremo a vui, Mentre che 'l vento, come fa, si tace.

Siede la terra, dove nata fui, Su la marina, dove 'l P discende, Per aver pace co' seguaci sui.

Amor ch'al cor gentil ratto s'apprende, Prese costui de la bella persona Che mi fu tolta, e 'l modo ancor m'offende

Amer ch'a null'amato amar perdona, Mi prese del costui piacer si forte, Che come vedi ancor non m'abbandona

Amor condusse noi ad una morte Caina attende chi 'n vita ci spense.

Queste parole da lor ci fur porte.

Da ch'io 'ntesi quell'anime offense, Chinai 'l viso, e tanto 'l tenni ba.s.so, Finche 'l poeta mi disse: Che pense?

Quando risposi, cominciai: O la.s.so, Quanti dolci pensier, quanto disio Men costoro al doloroso pa.s.so!

Po' mi rivolsi a loro, e parla' io, E cominciai: Francesca, i tuoi martiri A lagrimar mi fanno tristo e pie.

Ma dimmi: al tempo de' dolci sospiri, A che, e come concedette amore Che conosceste i dubbiosi desiri?

Ed ella a me: Nessun maggior dolore, Che ricordarsi del tempo felice Ne la miseria; e ci sa 'l tuo dottore.

Ma s'a conoscer la prima radice Del nostro amor to hai cotanto affetto, Far come colui the piange e dice.

Noi leggiavamo tin giorno per diletto Di Lancilotto, come amor to strinse Soli eravamo, e senza alcun sospetto.