Inferno: Canto XXV
Project Gutenberg EPUB3 edition
Dante Alighieri and Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth
The one uprose and down the other fell, Though turning not away their impious lamps, Underneath which each one his muzzle changed.
He who was standing drew it tow’rds the temples, And from excess of matter, which came thither, Issued the ears from out the hollow cheeks;
What did not backward run and was retained Of that excess made to the face a nose, And the lips thickened far as was befitting.
He who lay prostrate thrusts his muzzle forward, And backward draws the ears into his head, In the same manner as the snail its horns;
And so the tongue, which was entire and apt For speech before, is cleft, and the bi-forked In the other closes up, and the smoke ceases.
The soul, which to a reptile had been changed, Along the valley hissing takes to flight, And after him the other speaking sputters.
Then did he turn upon him his new shoulders, And said to the other: “I’ll have Buoso run, Crawling as I have done, along this road.”
In this way I beheld the seventh ballast Shift and reshift, and here be my excuse The novelty, if aught my pen transgress.
And notwithstanding that mine eyes might be Somewhat bewildered, and my mind dismayed, They could not flee away so secretly
But that I plainly saw Puccio Sciancato; And he it was who sole of three companions, Which came in the beginning, was not changed;
The other was he whom thou, Gaville, weepest.