Canto XLII

Orlando, having regained consciousness, discovers that his dear friend Brandimarte is dead. In fury, he slays Agramante and Gradasso. Sobrino is near death as well, while Oliver is still trapped beneath his horse.

               1
What bit, what iron curb is to be found,
Or (could it be) what adamantine rein,
That can make wrath keep order and due bound,
And within lawful limits him contain?
When one, to whom the constant heart is bound
And linked by Love with solid bolt and chain,
We see, through violence or through foul deceit,
With mortal damage or dishonour meet.

               2
And is the mind sometimes, if so possest,
To ill and savage action led astray,
It may deserve excuse; in that the breast
No more is under Reason's sovereign sway.
Achilles, when, beneath his borrowed crest,
He saw Patroclus crimsoning the way,
Was with his murderer's slaughter ill content,
Till he his mangled corse had dragged and shent.

               3
Unconquered Duke Alphonso, anger so
Inflamed thy host the day that weighty stone
Wounded thy forehead with such grievous blow,
That all believed it to its rest was gone;
-- Inflamed them with such fury, for the foe
In rampart, fosse, or wall, defence was none,
Who, one and all, within their works lay dead,
Nor wight was left the woeful news to spread.

               4
Seeing thy fall caused thine such mighty pain,
They were to fury moved; hadst thou, my lord,
Maintained thy footing, haply might thy train
Have with less licence plied the murderous sword.
Enough for thee thy Bastia to regain!
In fewer hours replaced beneath thy ward,
Then Cordova's and fierce Granada's band
Took days erewhile, to wrest it from thy hand.

               5
Haply Heaven's vengeance ordered what befel,
And in that case thy wound so hindered thee
To the end, the cruel outrage, foul and fell,
Done by that band before, should punished be.
For after the unhappy Vestidel,
Wearied and hurt, had sought their clemency,
Among them (mostly an unchristened train)
He, mid a hundred swords, unarmed, was slain.

               6
To end; I say that other rage is none
Which can be weighed with that in equal wise,
Which kindles, when an injury is done
To kinsman, friend or lord before our eyes.
Then justly in Orlando's heart, for one
So dear to him, might sudden fury rise;
When him he saw, extended on the sand,
Slain by the stroke of fierce Gradasso's brand.

               7
As nomade swain, who darting on its way
In slippery line the horrid snake has seen,
That his young son, amid the sands at play,
Has killed with venomed tooth, enflamed with spleen,
Grasps his batoon, the poisonous worm to slay;
His sword, than every other sword more keen,
So, in his fury grasped Anglantes' knight,
And wreaked on Agramant his first despite,

               8
Scaped, bleeding, with helm loosened form his head,
With half a shield and swordless, through his mail,
Sore wounded in more places than is said;
As from the dull or envious falcon's nail,
Escapes the unhappy sparrowhawk, half dead,
With ruffled plumage and with loss of tail.
On him Orlando came and smote him just
Where with the helmed head confined the bust.

               9
Loosed was the helm, the neck without its band:
So, like a rush, was severed by the sword.
Down-fell, and shook its last upon the sand
The heavy trunk of Libya's mighty lord.
His spirit, which flitted to the Stygian strand,
Charon with crooked boat-hook dragged aboard.
On him Orlando wastes no further pain,
But, sword in hand, seeks him of Sericane.

               10
As the headless trunk of Africk's cavalier
Extended on the shore Gradasso's viewed,
(What never had befallen him whilere)
He shook at heart, a troubled visage shewed,
And, at the coming of Anglantes' peer,
Presageful of his fate, appears subdued:
Nor seeks he means of fence against his foe,
When fierce Orlando deals the fatal blow.

               11
Orlando levels at his better side,
Beneath the lowest rib, his faulchion bright;
And crimsoned to the hilt, a hand's breadth wide
Of the other flank, the sword appears in sight;
And well his mighty puissance testified,
And spoke him as the strongest living knight
That stroke, by which a warrior was undone,
Better than whom in Paynimry was none.

               12
Little his victory good Orlando cheers:
Himself he quickly from his saddle throws;
And, with a face disturbed, and wet with tears,
To his Brandimart in haste the warrior goes;
The field about him red with blood appears,
His helmet cleft as by a hatchet's blows;
And, had it been than spungy rind more frail,
Would have defended him no worse than mail.

               13
Orlando lifts the helmet, and descries
Brandimart's head by that destructive brand
Cleft even to his nose, between the eyes;
Yet so the wounded knight his spirits manned,
That pardon of the king of Paradise
He, before death, was able to demand,
And to exhort to patience Brava's peer,
Whose manly cheeks were wet with many a tear;

               14
And -- "Roland, in thy helping orisons, I
Beseech thee to remember me," he cried,
"Nor recommend to thee less warmly my --"
-- Flordelice would, but could not, say -- and died;
And sounds and songs of angels in the sky,
As the soul parts, are heard on every side;
Which from its prison freed, mid hymns of love,
Ascends into the blissful realms above.

               15
Orlando, albeit he should joy in heart
At death so holy, and is certified
That called to bliss above is Brandimart;
For he heaven opened to the knight described;
Through human wilfulness -- which aye takes part
With our weak senses -- hardly can abide
The loss of one, above a brother dear,
Nor can refrain from many a scalding tear.



               16
Warlike Sobrino, of much blood bereaved,
Which from his flank and wounded visage rained,
Long since had fallen, reversed and sore aggrieved,
And had by now his vessels well nigh drained.
Olivier too lies stretched; nor has retrieved,
Nor can retrieve, his crippled foot, save sprained,
And almost crushed; so long between the plain,
And his stout courser jammed, the limb has lain;

               17
And but Orlando helped (so woe begone
Was weeping Olivier, and brought so low)
He could not have released his limb alone;
And, when released, endures such pain, such woe,
The helpless warrior cannot stand upon,
Or shift withal his wounded foot, and so
Benumbed and crippled is the leg above,
That he without assistance cannot move.

               18
The victory brought Orlando small delight;
On whom too heavily and hardly weighed
Of slaughtered Brandimart the piteous sight;
Nor sure of Oliviero's life he made.
Sobrino yet survived; but little light
The wounded monarch had, amid much shade:
For almost spend his ebbing life remained
So fast from him the crimson blood had drained.

               19
The County has him taken, bleeding sore;
Thither, where he is saved with sovereign care;
And he as if a kinsman of the Moor,
Benignly comforts him and speaks him fair:
For in Orlando, when the strife was o'er,
Was nothing evil; ever prompt to spare.
He from the dead their arms and coursers reft,
The rest he to their knives' disposal left.