Orlando Furioso | Page 4

his promised pleasure.
I
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.
II
In the same strain of Roland 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.
III
Good seed of Hercules, 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.
IV
And me, amid the worthiest shalt thou hear,
Whom I with fitting
praise prepare to grace,
Record the good Rogero, 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.
V
Roland, who long the lady of Catay,
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.
VI
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.
VII

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.
VIII
For bold Orlando and his cousin, free
Rinaldo, late contended
for the maid,
Enamored 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.
IX
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.
X
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.
XI
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.
But not from
cruel snake more swiftly flies
The timid shepherdess, with startled
tread,
Than poor Angelica the bridle turns
When she the
approaching knight on foot discerns.
XII
This was that Paladin, good Aymon's seed,
Who Mount Albano

had in his command;
And late Baiardo 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.
XIII
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.
XIV
Here stood the fierce Ferrau 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.
XV
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