Stories from the Italian Poets: with Lives of the Writers, Volume 1

by Leigh Hunt

Astolfo thrust his antagonist's body out of the saddle, and his soul into the other world; and Angiolin gave and took a terrible blow with Malducco; but his horse bore him onward; and Avino had something of the like encounter with Mazzarigi; but Uliviero, though he received a thrust which hurt him, sent his lance right through the heart of Malprimo.

Falseron was daunted at this blow. "Verily," thought he, "this is a miracle." Uliviero did not press on among the Saracens, his wound was too painful; but Orlando now put himself and his whole band into motion, and you may guess what an uproar ensued. The sound of the rattling of the blows and helmets was as if the forge of Vulcan had been thrown open. Falseron beheld Orlando coming so furiously, that he thought him a Lucifer who had burst his chain, and was quite of another mind than when he proposed to have him all to himself. On the contrary, he recommended himself to his gods; and turning away, begged for a more auspicious season of revenge. But Orlando hailed and arrested him with a terrible voice, saying, "O thou traitor! Was this the end to which old quarrels were made up? Dost thou not blush, thou and thy fellow-traitor Marsilius, to have kissed me on the cheek like a Judas, when last thou wert in France?"

Orlando had never shewn such anger in his countenance as he did that day. He dashed at Falseron with a fury so swift, and at the same time a mastery of his lance so marvellous, that though he plunged it in the man's body so as instantly to kill him, the body did not move in the saddle. The hero himself, as he rushed onwards, was fain to see the end of a stroke so perfect, and, turning his horse back, he touched the carcass with his sword, and it fell on the instant. They say, that it had no sooner fallen than it disappeared. People got off their horses to lift up the body, for it seemed to be there still, the armour being left; but when they came to handle the armour, it was found as empty as the shell that is cast by a lobster. O new, and strange, and portentous event!—proof manifest of the anger with which God regards treachery.

When the first infidel army beheld their leader dead, such fear fell upon them, that they were for leaving the field to the Paladins; but they were unable. Marsilius had drawn the rest of his forces round the valley like a net, so that their shoulders were turned in vain. Orlando rode into the thick of them, with Count Anselm by his side. He rushed like a tempest; and wherever he went, thunderbolts fell upon helmets. The Paladins drove here and there after them, each making a whirlwind round about him, and a bloody circle. Uliviero was again in the mêlée; and Walter of Amulion threw himself into it; and Baldwin roared like a lion; and Avino and Avolio reaped the wretches' heads like a turnip-field; and blows blinded men's eyes; and Archbishop Turpin himself had changed his crozier for a lance, and chased a new flock before him to the mountains.

Yet what could be done against foes without number? Multitudes fill up the spaces left by the dead without stopping. Marsilius, from his anxious and raging post, constantly pours them in. The Paladins are as units to thousands. Why tarry the horses of Rinaldo and Ricciardetto?

The horses did not tarry; but fate had been quicker than enchantment. Ashtaroth, nevertheless, had presented himself to Rinaldo in Egypt, as though he had issued out of a flash of lightning. After telling his mission, and giving orders to hundreds of invisible spirits round about him (for the air was full of them), he and Foul-Mouth, his servant, entered the horses of Rinaldo and Ricciardetto, which began to neigh and snort and leap with the fiends within them, till off they flew through the air over the pyramids, crowds of spirits going like a tempest before them. Ricciardetto shut his eyes at first, on perceiving himself so high in the air; but he speedily became used to it, though he looked down on the sun at last. In this manner they passed the desert, and the sea-coast, and the ocean, and swept the tops of the Pyrenees, Ashtaroth talking to them of wonders by the way; for he was one of the wisest of the devils, and knew a great many things which were then unknown to man. He laughed, for instance, as they went over sea, at the notion, among other vain fancies, that nothing was to be found beyond the pillars of Hercules; "for," said he, "the earth is round, and the sea has an even surface all over it; and there are nations on the other side of the globe, who walk with their feet opposed to yours, and worship other gods than the Christians."

"Hah!" said Rinaldo; "and may I ask whether they can be saved?"

"It is a bold thing to ask," said the devil; "but do you take the Redeemer for a partisan, and fancy he died for you only? Be assured he died for the whole world, Antipodes and all. Perhaps not one soul will be left out the pale of salvation at last, but the whole human race adore the truth, and find mercy. The Christian is the only true religion; but Heaven loves all goodness that believes honestly, whatsoever the belief may be."

Rinaldo was mightily taken with the humanity of the devil's opinions: but they were now approaching the end of their journey, and began to hear the noise of the battle; and he could no longer think of any thing but the delight of being near Orlando, and plunging into the middle of it.

"You shall be in the very heart of it instantly," said his bearer. "I love you, and would fain do all you desire. Do not fancy that all nobleness of spirit is lost among us people below. You know what the proverb says, 'There's never a fruit, however degenerate, but will taste of its stock.' I was of a different order of beings once, and—But it is as well not to talk of happy times. Yonder is Marsilius; and there goes Orlando. Farewell, and give me a place in your memory."