Inferno: Canto XVII
Project Gutenberg EPUB3 edition
Dante Alighieri and Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth
Then was I still more fearful of the abyss; Because I fires beheld, and heard laments, Whereat I, trembling, all the closer cling.
I saw then, for before I had not seen it, The turning and descending, by great horrors That were approaching upon divers sides.
As falcon who has long been on the wing, Who, without seeing either lure or bird, Maketh the falconer say, “Ah me, thou stoopest,”
Descendeth weary, whence he started swiftly, Thorough a hundred circles, and alights Far from his master, sullen and disdainful;
Even thus did Geryon place us on the bottom, Close to the bases of the rough-hewn rock, And being disencumbered of our persons,
He sped away as arrow from the string.