Orlando Furioso

To Sir Walter Scott, of Abbotsford, Bart.

Who persuaded me to resume the present work, which had been thrown aside, on the ground that such labour was its own reward.

Scott, for whom Fame a gorgeous garland weaves,
Who what was scattered to the wasting wind,
As grain too coarse to gather or to bind,
Bad’st me collect and gird in goodly sheaves;

If this poor seed hath formed its stalk and leaves,
Transplanted from a softer clime, and pined,
For lack of southern suns, in soils unkind,
Where Ceres or Italian Flora grieves;

And if some fruit, however dwindled, fill
The doubtful ear, though scant the crop and bare,
(Ah! how unlike the growth of Tuscan hill,
Where the glad harvest springs behind the share1)
Praise be to thee! who taught me that to till
Was sweet, however paid the peasant’s care.

Introduction

It will, probably, be expected that a new translation of the Furioso should be prefaced by some account of the versions which have preceded it; and I the more readily undertake this little task, as in the execution of it my reasons will be found for the enterprise upon which I have myself adventured.

The first version of Ariosto’s great poem was made by Sir John Harrington, the godson of Queen Elizabeth, who translated it into the same stanza as that of the original. The main defect of this work is its infidelity; and I cannot better illustrate this than by observing, that he has compressed a canto of nearly two hundred stanzas into ninety. A more unpardonable defect is, that he always omits what is best worth preserving; and, as an Italian friend once observed to me, it is the poetry of Ariosto which he sacrifices. Another defect of this translator is that of exaggerating the extravagances of his author, and often spreading a ray of humour into a broad glare of buffoonery.

The history of his work may explain these faults, and more especially the last; as we are told he began his labours with the story of Giocondo, without the intention of pursuing them further; when his royal mistress imposed upon him the entire version of the Furioso as a sort of covering for the indecent episode which he had chosen to give as a specimen of the Italian.

If, however, Harrington cannot pretend to much merit as a translator, he has some claims to consideration as a writer, and his work has fallen into more obscurity than the antiquated language in which he writes, will serve to explain. His idioms, his grammar, and his construction (though things with difficulty kept free from foreign modes of speech in a translation) are exclusively English. His narrative is light and lively, and, in perusing it, the reader always feels as if he is swimming with the stream.

The gleam of Italian sunshine, during which he wrote, though it produced beneficial effects upon our literature, was of short duration.

“At one stride came the dark.”2

The study of Italian letters was dropped at once, and I believe that no traces of literary intercourse between Italy and England are to be found during the succeeding age.

In the reign of George II, however, we have a proof of renewed intercourse in the publication of a new translation of the Furioso, dedicated to that monarch, as Harrington’s version had been to Queen Elizabeth. This work was produced by William Huggins, Esq., of Headly Park, near Farnham, in Surrey. He was, I am told, reckoned in his day a very learned man, was passionately devoted to music, said to be a great proficient in it, and to have been the person who figures in Hogarth’s picture, as the Enraged Musician.

But, whatever other accomplishments he may have possessed, he had certainly no feeling of poetry, and seems to have taken it up as Vernon did rebellion; “because it lay in his way.” At least I know no better reason for his translation of Ariosto than his having made a journey to Italy.

The title-page of his book (in two vols. quarto), bears the date of 1757, and was printed for Rivington in Paternoster Row, and John Cook, a bookseller of Farnham, whose shop I remember frequenting in the days of my boyhood. It is printed with the English and Italian confronted, executed in the same stanza as Harrington’s version, and translated line for line. Though there are to be found in it some very strange mistakes of Ariosto’s meaning, it is, generally speaking, faithful, and as such, has prima facie, strong claims upon attention. But a species of fidelity is hardly to be coveted, which, at the best, does not accomplish the only end which should be proposed by it. For the translator often departs from the sense of the author, while he echoes his very words. Take an instance. Ariosto has this line

“Dove presso à Bordea mette Caronna;”

“where the Garonne disembogues itself near Bordeaux:” which Huggins has rendered,

Where to Bordea runs Caronna near.

The thing, perhaps, most worthy of remark in his book, is a passage of the Preface, which throws a curious light upon the state of Italian literature in England at the period of its publication. “It may not be improper (says the author) to observe, that after this work was pretty far advanced, I was informed there had been a translation published in the reign of Elizabeth, and dedicated to that queen. Whereupon I requested a friend to obtain a sight of that book; for it is (it seems) very scarce, and the glorious original much more so in this country.”

A few years produced a singular revolution in this respect. Several editions of Ariosto have since that period been published in England; and Hoole’s version, the next which succeeded that of Huggins, has, I believe, gone through nearly twenty editions.

This last circumstance may, however, be cited, rather as a proof of the new passion entertained for Italian literature, than as an illustration of the progress which had been made in it: for never was a worse or more faithless translation executed than that of Hoole. Every grace, every shade, every gradation of colouring which distinguishes Ariosto, is lost in it. Thus, where the Italian poet, in imitation of Homer, wishing to diversify a scene of slaughter, by giving something of character or of locality to his victims, tells us that Rodomont wounded Lewis the Provençal, Luigi il provenzal, Hoole has absurdly translated the passage “Provincial Lewis!” thus awakening a most ridiculous train of ideas, and suggesting the notion of some unfortunate provincial who had the misfortune to have his brains knocked out on his visit to the metropolis. Nor are they only tints and shades which are sacrificed in this miserable copy; for the sense of the author, where most obvious, is frequently misinterpreted; and in one couplet the translator has actually mistaken north for south, and sun for wind; the one specified, and the other obviously implied. The words of the original are,

“Wer ponente io andava lungo la sabbia,
Che del settentrion sente la rabbia.”

Canto VI, stanza XXXIV

Which passage is thus rendered by him:

Against the west along those sands we came,
Which feel the southern heat of Phoebus’ flame.3

In addition, however, to the mistakes of Hoole, and what I must call the meanness and monotony of his poetry, I am inclined to consider the metre which he has chosen, as one among the many causes of his failure: this is our heroic couplet, which appears to me to be the measure most opposite to that of Ariosto which could possibly have been selected. Nothing but a stanza can reflect the original; for it is to be observed, that the poet usually closes the idea with it, and that the end of most of them is marked by something epigrammatic either in sense or sound, which would be out of its place except in the concluding couplet. Each canto, or collection of stanzas, then, may be compared to a gallery of cabinet pictures, all perhaps striking or beautiful, but frequently executed on different principles, each of which is often only in harmony with itself. Whoever, therefore, unites any of these little paintings, yet more, he who runs them into one piece, will necessarily either present a picture full of cross lights, and every species of inconsistency, or will only avoid this by leaving out whatever is most characteristic in the original, and by making a smear without light, shade, or distinction of outline.

Entertaining this opinion, I have chosen the stanza in preference to the couplet; and because I would imitate Ariosto as closely as the nature of our language will allow, have, like Harrington and Huggins, chosen his own ottava rima as the most preferable form of it. Like Mr. Huggins, I have also translated stanza for stanza, but have not, however, imitated that gentleman and some German translators by imposing on myself severer restrictions than appeared to me, to be necessary; as in rendering him uniformly line for line; the less so because there is little analogy between the construction of the two languages, and what is easy in the Italian (I need not say that ease is one characteristic of Ariosto) might often appear harsh and inverted in English. It is for this reason that I have not fettered myself by the rule I have mentioned, wherever I conceived any bad effect would result from the adherence to it; but I have, on the other hand, observed it where I thought such a compliance was not objectionable; because I would, wherever it was practicable, tread in the very footsteps of the Italian poet.

My reasons for so religious, some may think so superstitious, an observance of my author’s text, have, at least, not been hastily adopted. A long consideration of the means through which he wrought, has convinced me that many strong or beautiful effects produced by him, result out of an accumulation of circumstances, which, though they may appear of little value taken separately, are to be esteemed important as conducing, each in its place, to the main object of the poet. In this particularity he bears a striking resemblance to Defoe. The Furioso moreover, often pleases as a whole, where it offends in parts, and, notwithstanding many defects, is perhaps the poetical work which is oftenest re-perused with pleasure. Among the many things which have probably contributed to this, may be remarked Ariosto’s frequent sacrifice of force to truth; which (to take a short instance) I should say was illustrated by Pinabel’s narration of the loss of his lady, in the second canto, where some may be inclined to think that the poet overtalks himself, and many might wish to see the infusion of a spirit, which would perhaps be out of harmony with the circumstances. He is often also studious of what the artists call a repose, and upon which a translator should be most cautious never to intrude. These are some of the reasons why I have followed my leader so warily, and have never intentionally deviated from the print of his steps.

I am, however, well aware that a very weighty objection may be made to a translation so close as that which I present to the reader. It may be said that a simplicity of diction, which is leasing in the Italian, is only to be endured in a less perfect perfect, when seasoned by the addition of some grace, congenial with the spirit of that into which it is transfused: and hence that to translate the Furioso faithfully into English, would be, to borrow a metaphor used somewhere by Alfieri, to transfer an air from the harp to the hurdy-gurdy.

There is, undoubtedly, great force in this reasoning and illustration. To this, however, I will oppose, in the way of question, another illustration which is drawn from a sister art. Would a real lover of Raphael prefer a copy of one of his pictures, which, though well painted, did not convey a true idea of his colouring, or a print of it carefully executed, which gave, at least, a faithful idea of the design? To those who would choose the engraving I offer the following translation.

That it is diligently executed, I may venture to assert; for, mistrusting a hasty mode of reading and a facility of composition, I have sought to guard against the faults incidental to these habits, by frequent and attentive correction. I have with this view, submitted every sheet of my present translation to judicious English and Italian friends; have carefully, if not impartially, weighed their objections, and revised my translation more than once by a close comparison with the original.

Of loves and ladies, knights and arms, I sing,
Of courtesies, and many a daring feat;
And from those ancient days my story bring,
When Moors from Afric passed in hostile fleet,
And ravaged France, with Agramant their king,
Flushed with his youthful rage and furious heat;
Who on king Charles’, the Roman emperor’s, head
Had vowed due vengeance for Troyano dead.

In the same strain of Roland4 will I tell
Things unattempted yet in prose or rhyme,
On whom strange madness and rank fury fell,
A man esteemed so wise in former time;
If she, who to like cruel pass has well
Nigh brought my feeble wit which fain would climb
And hourly wastes my sense, concede me skill
And strength my daring promise to fulfil.

Good seed of Hercules,5 give ear and deign,
Thou that this age’s grace and splendour art,
Hippolitus, to smile upon his pain
Who tenders what he has with humble heart.
For though all hope to quit the score were vain,
My pen and pages may pay the debt in part;
Then, with no jealous eye my offering scan,
Nor scorn my gifts who give thee all I can.

And me, amid the worthiest shalt thou hear,
Whom I with fitting praise prepare to grace,
Record the good Rogero,6 valiant peer,
The ancient root of thine illustrious race.
Of him, if thou wilt lend a willing ear,
The worth and warlike feats I shall retrace;
So thou thy graver cares some little time
Postponing, lend thy leisure to my rhyme.

Roland, who long the lady of Catày,7
Angelica, had loved, and with his brand
Raised countless trophies to that damsel gay,
In India, Median, and Tartarian land,
Westward with her had measured back his way;
Where, nigh the Pyrenees, with many a band
Of Germany and France, King Charlemagne
Had camped his faithful host upon the plain.

To make King Agramant, for penance, smite
His cheek, and rash Marsilius rue the hour;
This, when all trained with lance and sword to fight,
He led from Africa to swell his power;
That other when he pushed, in fell despite,
Against the realm of France Spain’s martial flower.
’Twas thus Orlando came where Charles was tented
In evil hour, and soon the deed repented.

For here was seized his dame of peerless charms,
(How often human judgment wanders wide)!
Whom in long warfare he had kept from harms,
From western climes to eastern shores her guide
In his own land, ’mid friends and kindred arms,
Now without contest severed from his side.
Fearing the mischief kindled by her eyes,
From him the prudent emperor reft the prize.

For bold Orlando and his cousin,8 free
Rinaldo late contended for the maid,
Enamoured of that beauty rare; since she
Alike the glowing breast of either swayed.
But Charles, who little liked such rivalry,
And drew an omen thence of feebler aid,
To abate the cause of quarrel, seized the fair,
And placed her in Bavarian Namus’ care.

Vowing with her the warrior to content,
Who in that conflict, on that fatal day,
With his good hand most gainful succour lent,
And slew most paynims in the martial fray.
But counter to his hopes the battle went,
And his thinned squadrons fled in disarray;
Namus, with other Christian captains taken,
And his pavilion in the rout forsaken.

There, lodged by Charles, that gentle bonnibel,
Ordained to be the valiant victor’s meed,
Before the event had sprung into her sell,
And from the combat turned in time of need;
Presaging wisely Fortune would rebel
That fatal day against the Christian creed:
And, entering a thick wood, discovered near,
In a close path, a horseless cavalier.

With shield upon his arm, in knightly wise,
Belted and mailed, his helmet on his head;
The knight more lightly through the forest hies
Than half-clothed churl to win the cloth of red.9
But not from cruel snake more swiftly flies10
The timid shepherdess, with startled tread,
Than poor Angelica the bridle turns
When she the approaching knight on foot discerns.

This was that Paladin, good Aymon’s seed,
Who Mount Albano had in his command;
And late Bayardo lost, his gallant steed,
Escaped by strange adventure from his hand.
As soon as seen, the maid who rode at speed
The warrior knew, and, while yet distant, scanned
The angelic features and the gentle air
Which long had held him fast in Cupid’s snare.

The affrighted damsel turns her palfrey round,
And shakes the floating bridle in the wind;
Nor in her panic seeks to choose her ground,
Nor open grove prefers to thicket blind.
But reckless, pale and trembling, and astound,
Leaves to her horse the devious way to find.
He up and down the forest bore the dame,
Till to a sylvan river’s bank he came.

Here stood the fierce Ferraù11 in grisly plight,
Begrimed with dust, and bathed with sweat and blood;
Who lately had withdrawn him from the fight,
To rest and drink at that refreshing flood:
But there had tarried in his own despite,
Since bending from the bank, in hasty mood,
He dropped his helmet in the crystal tide,
And vainly to regain the treasure tried.

Thither at speed she drives, and evermore
In her wild panic utters fearful cries;
And at the voice, upleaping on the shore,
The Saracen her lovely visage spies.
And, pale as is her cheek, and troubled sore,
Arriving, quickly to the warrior’s eyes
(Though many days no news of her had shown)
The beautiful Angelica is known.

Courteous, and haply gifted with a breast,
As warm as either of the cousins two;12
As bold, as if his brows in steel were dressed,
The succour which she sought he lent, and drew
His faulchion, and against Rinaldo pressed,
Who saw with little fear the champion true.
Not only each to each was known by sight,
But each had proved in arms his foeman’s might.

Thus, as they are, on foot the warriors vie
In cruel strife, and blade to blade oppose;
No marvel plate or brittle mail should fly,
When anvils had not stood the deafening blows.
It now behoves the palfrey swift to ply
His feet; for while the knights in combat close,
Him vexed to utmost speed, with goading spurs,
By waste or wood the frighted damsel stirs.

After the two had struggled long to throw
Each other in the strife, and vainly still;
Since neither valiant warrior was below
His opposite in force and knightly skill:
The first to parley with his Spanish foe
Was the good master of Albano’s hill
(As one within whose raging breast was pent
A reckless fire which struggled for a vent).

“Thou think’st,” he said, “to injure me alone,
But know thou wilt thyself as much molest:
For if we fight because yon rising sun
This raging heat has kindled in thy breast,
What were thy gain, and what the guerdon won,
Though I should yield my life, or stoop my crest;
If she shall never be thy glorious meed,
Who flies, while vainly we in battle bleed?

“Then how much better, since our stake’s the same,
Thou, loving like myself, should’st mount and stay
To wait this battle’s end, the lovely dame,
Before she fly yet further on her way.
The lady taken, we repeat our claim
With naked faulchion to that peerless prey:
Else by long toil I see not what we gain
But simple loss and unrequited pain.”

The peer’s proposal pleased the paynim well.
And so their hot contention was foregone;
And such fair truce replaced that discord fell,
So mutual wrongs forgot and mischief done;
That for departure seated in his sell,
On foot the Spaniard left not Aymon’s son;
But him to mount his courser’s crupper prayed;
And both united chased the royal maid.

Oh! goodly truth in cavaliers of old!
Rivals they were, to different faith were bred.
Not yet the weary warriors’ wounds were cold—
Still smarting from those strokes so fell and dread.
Yet they together ride by waste and wold,
And, unsuspecting, devious dingle thread.
Them, while four spurs infest his foaming sides,
Their courser brings to where the way divides.

And now the warlike pair at fault, for they
Knew not by which she might her palfrey goad,
(Since both, without distinction, there survey
The recent print of hoofs on either road),
Commit the chase to fortune. By this way
The paynim pricked, by that Rinaldo strode.
But fierce Ferraù, bewildered in the wood,
Found himself once again where late he stood.

Beside the water, where he stoop’d to drink,
And dropt the knightly helmet—to his cost,
Sunk in the stream; and since he could not think
Her to retrieve, who late his hopes had crossed,
He, where the treasure fell, descends the brink
Of that swift stream, and seeks the morion lost.
But the casque lies so bedded in the sands,
’Twill ask no light endeavour at his hands.

A bough he severs from a neighbouring tree,
And shreds and shapes the branch into a pole:
With this he sounds the stream, and anxiously
Fathoms, and rakes, and ransacks shelf and hole.
While angered sore at heart, and restless, he
So lingered, where the troubled waters roll,
Breast-high, from the mid river rose upright,
The apparition of an angry knight.

Armed at all points he was, except his head,
And in his better hand a helmet bore;
The very casque, which in the river’s bed
Ferraù sought vainly, toiling long and sore.
Upon the Spanish knight he frowned, and said:
“Thou traitor to thy word, thou perjured Moor,
Why grieve the goodly helmet to resign,
Which, due to me long since, is justly mine?

“Remember, pagan, when thine arm laid low
The brother of Angelica.13 That knight
Am I;—thy word was plighted then to throw
After my other arms his helmet bright.
If Fortune now compel thee to forego
The prize, and do my will in thy despite,
Grieve not at this, but rather grieve that thou
Art found a perjured traitor to thy vow.

“But if thou seek’st a helmet, be thy task
To win and wear it more to thy renown.
A noble prize were good Orlando’s casque;
Rinaldo’s such, or yet a fairer crown;
Almontes’, or Mambrino’s iron masque:
Make one of these, by force of arms, thine own.
And this good helm will fitly be bestowed
Where (such thy promise) it has long been owed.”

Bristled the paynim’s every hair at view
Of that grim shade, uprising from the tide,
And vanished was his fresh and healthful hue,
While on his lips the half-formed accents died.
Next hearing Argalìa, whom he slew,
(So was the warrior hight) that stream beside,
Thus his unknightly breach of promise blame,
He burned all over, flushed with rage and shame.

Nor having time his falsehood to excuse,
And knowing well how true the phantom’s lore,
Stood speechless; such remorse the words infuse.
Then by Lanfusa’s life the warrior swore,
Never in fight, or foray would he use
Helmet but that which good Orlando bore
From Aspramont, where bold Almontes14 paid
His life a forfeit to the Christian blade.

And this new vow discharged more faithfully
Than the vain promise which was whilom plight;
And from the stream departing heavily,
Was many days sore vexed and grieved in sprite;
And still intent to seek Orlando, he
Roved wheresoe’er he hoped to find the knight.
A different lot befell Rinaldo; who
Had chanced another pathway to pursue.

For far the warrior fared not, ere he spied,
Bounding across the path, his gallant steed,
And, “Stay, Bayardo mine,” Rinaldo cried,
“Too cruel care the loss of thee does breed.”
The horse for this returned not to his side,
Deaf to his prayer, but flew with better speed.
Furious, in chase of him, Rinaldo hies.
But follow we Angelica, who flies.

Through dreary woods and dark the damsel fled,
By rude unharboured heath and savage height,
While every leaf or spray that rustled, bred
(Of oak, or elm, or beech), such new affright,
She here and there her foaming palfrey sped
By strange and crooked paths with furious flight;
And at each shadow, seen in valley blind,
Or mountain, feared Rinaldo was behind.

As a young roe or fawn of fallow deer,
Who, mid the shelter of its native glade,
Has seen a hungry pard or tiger tear
The bosom of its bleeding dam, dismayed,
Bounds, through the forest green in ceaseless fear
Of the destroying beast, from shade to shade,
And at each sapling touched, amid its pangs,
Believes itself between the monster’s fangs,

One day and night, and half the following day,
The damsel wanders wide, nor whither knows;
Then enters a deep wood, whose branches play,
Moved lightly by the freshening breeze which blows.
Through this two clear and murmuring rivers stray:
Upon their banks a fresher herbage grows;
While the twin streams their passage slowly clear,
Make music with the stones, and please the ear.

Weening removed the way by which she wends,
A thousand miles from loathed Rinaldo’s beat,
To rest herself a while the maid intends,
Wearied with that long flight and summer’s heat.
She from her saddle ’mid spring flowers descends
And takes the bridle from her courser fleet;
And loose along the river lets him pass,
Roving the banks in search of lusty grass.

Behold! at hand a thicket she surveys
Gay with the flowering thorn and vermeil rose:
The tuft reflected in the stream which strays
Beside it, overshadowing oaks enclose.
Hollow within, and safe from vulgar gaze,
It seemed a place constructed for repose;
With bows so interwoven, that the light
Pierced not the tangled screen, far less the sight.

Within soft moss and herbage form a bed;
And to delay and rest the traveller woo.
’Twas there her limbs the weary damsel spread,
Her eyeballs bathed in slumber’s balmy dew
But little time had eased her drooping head,
Ere, as she weened, a courser’s tramp she knew.
Softly she rises, and the river near,
Armed cap-à-piè, beholds a cavalier.

If friend or foe, she nothing comprehends,
(So hope and fear her doubting bosom tear)
And that adventure’s issue mute attends,
Nor even with a sigh disturbs the air.
The cavalier upon the bank descends;
And sits so motionless, so lost in care,
(His visage propt upon his arm) to sight
Changed into senseless stone appeared the knight.

Pensive, above an hour, with drooping head,
He rested mute, ere he began his moan;
And then his piteous tale of sorrow said,
Lamenting in so soft and sweet a tone,
He in a tiger’s breast had pity bred,
Or with his mournful wailings rent a stone.
And so he sighed and wept; like rivers flowed
His tears, his bosom like an Aetna glowed.

“Thought which now makes me burn, now freeze with hate,
Which gnaws my heart and rankles at its root!
What’s left to me,” he said, “arrived too late,
While one more favoured bears away the fruit?
Bare words and looks scarce cheered my hopeless state,
And the prime spoils reward another’s suit.
Then since for me nor fruit nor blossom hangs,
Why should I longer pine in hopeless pangs?

“The virgin has her image in the rose15
Sheltered in garden on its native stock,
Which there in solitude and safe repose,
Blooms unapproached by sheperd or by flock.
For this earth teems, and freshening water flows,
And breeze and dewy dawn their sweets unlock:
With such the wistful youth his bosom dresses.
With such the enamoured damsel braids her tresses.

“But wanton hands no sooner this displace
From the maternal stem, where it was grown,
Than all is withered; whatsoever grace
It found with man or heaven; bloom, beauty, gone.
The damsel who should hold in higher place
Than light or life the flower which is her own,
Suffering the spoiler’s hand to crop the prize,
Forfeits her worth in every other’s eyes.

“And be she cheap with all except the wight
On whom she did so large a boon bestow.
Ah! false and cruel Fortune! foul despite!
While others triumph, I am drown’d in woe.
And can it be that I such treasure slight?
And can I then my very life forego?
No! let me die; ’twere happiness above
A longer life, if I must cease to love.”

If any ask who made this sorrowing,
And pour’d into the stream so many tears,
I answer, it was fair Circassia’s king,16
That Sacripant, oppressed with amorous cares.
Love is the source from which his troubles spring,
The sole occasion of his pains and fears;
And he to her a lover’s service paid,
Now well remembered by the royal maid.

He for her sake from Orient’s farthest reign
Roved thither, where the sun descends to rest;
For he was told in India, to his pain,
That she Orlando followed to the west.
He after learned in France that Charlemagne
Secluded from that champion and the rest,
As a fit guerdon, mewed her for the knight
Who should protect the lilies best in fight.

The warrior in the field had been, and viewed,
Short time before, king Charlemagne’s disgrace;
And vainly had Angelica pursued,
Nor of the damsel’s footsteps found a trace.
And this is what the weeping monarch rued,
And this he so bewailed in doleful case:
Hence, into words his lamentations run,
Which might for pity stop the passing sun.

While Sacripant laments him in this plight,
And makes a tepid fountain of his eyes;
And, what I deem not needful to recite,
Pours forth yet other plaints and piteous cries;
Propitious Fortune will his lady bright
Should hear the youth lament him in such wise:
And thus a moment compassed what, without
Such chance, long ages had not brought about.

With deep attention, while the warrior weeps,
She marks the fashion of the grief and tears
And words of him, whose passion never sleeps;
Nor this the first confession which she hears.
But with his plaint her heart no measure keeps,
Cold as the column which the builder rears.
Like haughty maid, who holds herself above
The world, and deems none worthy of her love.

But her from harm amid those woods to keep,
The damsel weened she might his guidance need;
For the poor drowning caitiff, who, chin-deep,
Implores not help, is obstinate indeed.
Nor will she, if she let the occasion sleep,
Find escort that will stand her in such stead:
For she that king by long experience knew
Above all other lovers, kind and true.

But not the more for this the maid intends
To heal the mischief which her charms had wrought.
And for past ills to furnish glad amends
In that full bliss by pining lover sought.
To keep the king in play are all her ends,
His help by some device or fiction bought,
And having to her purpose taxed his daring,
To reassume as wont her haughty bearing.

An apparition bright and unforeseen,
She stood like Venus or Diana fair,
In solemn pageant, issuing on the scene
From out of shadowy wood or murky lair.
And “Peace be with you,” cried the youthful queen,
“And God preserve my honour in his care,
Nor suffer that you blindly entertain
Opinion of my fame so false and vain!”

Not with such wonderment a mother eyes,
With such excessive bliss the son she mourned
As dead, lamented still with tears and sighs,
Since the thinned files without her boy returned.
—Not such her rapture as the king’s surprise
And ecstasy of joy when he discerned
The lofty presence, cheeks of heavenly hue,
And lovely form which broke upon his view.

He, full of fond and eager passion, pressed
Towards his Lady, his Divinity;
And she now clasped the warrior to her breast,
Who in Catày had haply been less free.
And now again the maid her thoughts addressed
Towards her native land and empery:
And feels, with hope revived, her bosom beat
Shortly to repossess her sumptuous seat.

Her chances all to him the damsel said,
Since he was eastward sent to Sericane
By her to seek the martial monarch’s aid,
Who swayed the sceptre of that fair domain;
And told how oft Orlando’s friendly blade
Had saved her from dishonour, death, and pain;
And how she so preserved her virgin flower
Pure as it blossomed in her natal hour.

Haply the tale was true; yet will not seem
Likely to one of sober sense possessed:
But Sacripant, who waked from worser dream,
In all without a cavil acquiesced:
Since Love, who sees without one guiding gleam,
Spies in broad day but that which likes him best:
For one sign of the afflicted man’s disease
Is to give ready faith to things which please.

“If good Anglante’s lord the prize forbore,
Nor seized the fair occasion when he might,
The loss be his, if Fortune never more
Him to enjoy so fair a prize invite.
To imitate that lord of little lore
I think not,” said, apart, Circassia’s knight.
“To quit such proffered good, and, to my shame,
Have but myself on after-thought to blame.

“No! I will pluck the fresh and morning rose,
Which, should I tarry, may be overblown.
To woman, (this my own experience shows,)
No deed more sweet or welcome can be done.
Then, whatsoever scorn the damsel shows,
Though she awhile may weep and make her moan,
I will, unchecked by anger, false or true,
Or sharp repulse, my bold design pursue.”

This said, he for the soft assault prepares,
When a loud noise within the greenwood shade
Beside him, rang in his astounded ears,
And sore against his will the monarch stayed.
He donned his helm (his other arms he wears),
Aye wont to rove in steel, with belted blade,
Replaced the bridle on his courser fleet,
Grappled his lance, and sprang into his seat.

With the bold semblance of a valiant knight,
Behold a warrior threads the forest hoar.
The stranger’s mantle was of snowy white,
And white alike the waving plume he wore.
Balked of his bliss, and full of fell despite,
The monarch ill the interruption bore,
And spurred his horse to meet him in mid space,
With hate and fury glowing in his face.

Him he defies to fight, approaching nigh,
And weens to make him stoop his haughty crest:
The other knight, whose worth I rate as high,
His warlike prowess puts to present test;
Cuts short his haughty threats and angry cry,
And spurs, and lays his levelled lance in rest.
In tempest wheels Circassia’s valiant peer,
And at his foeman’s head each aims his spear.

Not brindled bulls or tawny lions spring
To forest warfare with such deadly will
As those two knights, the stranger and the king.
Their spears alike the opposing bucklers thrill:
The solid ground, at their encountering,
Trembles from fruitful vale to naked hill:
And well it was the mail in which they dressed
Their bodies was of proof, and saved the breast.

Nor swerved the chargers from their destined course;
Who met like rams, and butted head to head.
The warlike Saracen’s ill-fated horse,
Well valued while alive, dropt short and dead:
The stranger’s, too, fell senseless; but perforce
Was roused by rowel from his grassy bed.
That of the paynim king, extended straight,
Lay on his battered lord with all his weight.

Upright upon his steed, the knight unknown,
Who at the encounter horse and rider threw,
Deeming enough was in the conflict done,
Cares not the worthless warfare to renew;
But endlong by the readiest path is gone,
And measures, pricking frith and forest through,
A mile, or little less, in furious heat,
Ere the foiled Saracen regains his feet.

As the bewildered and astonished clown
Who held the plough (the thunder storm o’erpast)
There, where the deafening bolt had beat him down,
Nigh his death-stricken cattle, wakes aghast,
And sees the distant pine without its crown,17
Which he saw clad in leafy honours last;
So rose the paynim knight with troubled face,
The maid spectatress of the cruel case.

He sighs and groans, yet not for mischief sore
Endured in wounded arm or foot which bled;
But for mere shame, and never such before
Or after, dyed his cheek so deep a red,
And if he rued his fall, it grieved him more
His dame should lift him from his courser dead.
He speechless had remained, I ween, if she
Had not his prisoned tongue and voice set free.

“Grieve not,” she said, “sir monarch, for thy fall;
But let the blame upon thy courser be!
To whom more welcome had been forage, stall,
And rest, than further joust and jeopardy;
And well thy foe the loser may I call,
(Who shall no glory gain) for such is he
Who is the first to quit his ground, if aught
Angelica of fighting fields be taught.”

While she so seeks the Saracen to cheer,
Behold a messenger with pouch and horn,
On panting hackney!—man and horse appear
With the long journey, weary and forlorn.
He questions Sacripant, approaching near,
Had he seen warrior pass, by whom were borne
A shield and crest of white; in search of whom
Through the wide forest pricked the weary groom.

King Sacripant made answer, “As you see,
He threw me here, and went but now his way:
Then tell the warrior’s name, that I may be
Informed whose valour foiled me in the fray.”
To him the groom—“That which you ask of me
I shall relate to you without delay:
Know that you were in combat prostrate laid
By the tried valour of a gentle maid.

“Bold is the maid; but fairer yet than bold,
Nor the redoubted virgin’s name I veil:
’Twas Bradamant18 who marred what praise of old
Your prowess ever won with sword and mail.”
This said, he spurred again, his story told,
And left him little gladdened by the tale.
He recks not what he says or does, for shame,
And his flushed visage kindles into flame.

After the woeful warrior long had thought
Upon his cruel case, and still in vain,
And found a woman his defeat had wrought,
For thinking but increased the monarch’s pain,
He climbed the other horse, nor spake he aught;
But silently uplifted from the plain,
Upon the croup bestowed that damsel sweet,
Reserved to gladder use in safer seat.

Two miles they had not rode before they hear
The sweeping woods which spread about them, sound
With such loud crash and trample, far and near,
The forest seemed to tremble all around;
And shortly after see a steed appear,
With housings wrought in gold and richly bound:
Who clears the bush and stream, with furious force
And whatsoever else impedes his course.

“Unless the misty air,” the damsel cries,
“And boughs deceive my sight, yon noble steed
Is, sure, Bayardo,19 who before us flies,
And parts the wood with such impetuous speed.
—Yes, ’tis Bayardo’s self I recognize.
How well the courser understands our need!
Two riders ill a foundered jade would bear,
But hither speeds the horse to end that care.”

The bold Circassian lighted, and applied
His hand to seize him by the flowing rein,
Who, swiftly turning, with his heels replied,
For he like lightning wheeled upon the plain.
Woe to the king! but that he leaps aside,
For should he smite, he would not lash in vain.
Such are his bone and sinew, that the shock
Of his good heels had split a metal rock.

Then to the maid he goes submissively,
With gentle blandishment and humble mood;
As the dog greets his lord with frolic glee,
Whom, some short season past, he had not viewed.
For good Bayardo had in memory
Albracca, where her hands prepared his food,20
What time the damsel loved Rinaldo bold;
Rinaldo, then ungrateful, stern, and cold.

With her left hand she takes him by the bit,
And with the other pats his sides and chest:
While the good steed (so marvellous his wit),
Lamb-like, obeyed the damsel and caressed.
Meantime the king, who sees the moment fit,
Leapt up, and with his knees the courser pressed.
While on the palfrey, eased of half his weight,
The lady left the croup, and gained the seat.

Then, as at hazard, she directs her sight,
Sounding in arms a man on foot espies,
And glows with sudden anger and despite;
For she in him the son of Aymon eyes.
Her more than life esteems the youthful knight,
While she from him, like crane from falcon, flies.
Time was the lady sighed, her passion slighted;
’Tis now Rinaldo loves, as ill requited.

And this effect two different fountains wrought,
Whose wonderous waters different moods inspire.
Both spring in Arden, with rare virtue fraught:
This fills the heart with amorous desire:
Who taste that other fountain are untaught
Their love, and change for ice their former fire.
Rinaldo drank the first, and vainly sighs;
Angelica the last, and hates and flies.

Mixed with such secret bane the waters glide,
Which amorous care convert to sudden hate;
The maid no sooner had Rinaldo spied,
Than on her laughing eyes deep darkness sate:
And with sad mien and trembling voice she cried
To Sacripant, and prayed him not to wait
The near approach of the detested knight,
But through the wood with her pursue his flight.

To her the Saracen, with anger hot:
“Is knightly worship sunk so low in me,
That thou should’st hold my valour cheap, and not
Sufficient to make yonder champion flee?
Already are Albracca’s fights forgot,
And that dread night I singly stood for thee?
That night when I, though naked, was thy shield
Against King Agrican and all his field?”

She answers not, and knows not in her fear
What ’tis she does; Rinaldo is too nigh:
And from afar that furious cavalier
Threats the bold Saracen with angry cry,
As soon as the known steed and damsel dear,
Whose charms such flame had kindled, meet his eye.
But what ensued between the haughty pair
I in another canto shall declare.