Indico legno, lucido e sereno,
which line I would then have read,
Indico legno, lucido sereno,
without the conjunction. I had not found this reading in any edition which fell to my hands, and it was merely a suggestion of my own to make intelligible what seemed to be unsatisfactory to the sense.
In a late No. (June 14) of the London Athenæum, Dr. H. C. Barlow, a very learned Dantean, confirms my reading by one of the older texts in his library, and also adds that, "in the edition of the Divina Commedia by Paola Costa, we find the reading recently adopted by Mr. Parsons ... which the editor says is an emendation of Biondi, who has defended it with much learned reasoning."
Nevertheless, Dr. Barlow does not accept this amendment; but believes, with Monti, that Dante meant to compare the rich and varied hues of a flower-bed to something like charcoal; to wood, clear and dry; for instance, ebony; and he quotes from Monti this word: "What can be darker than the night? yet when free from clouds we call it serene." The answer whereto is that when the night is free from clouds, and starry, or serene, it is not dark, and many objects in nature are blacker than such a night.
I cannot feel quite so sure of my reading as Dr. Barlow appears to be of his own interpretation, but I have some confidence that Dante did not mean ebony, for the obvious reason that ebony is not a brilliant color such as Dante was describing; and the statement which Dr. Barlow takes such pains to prove, namely, that painters often introduce black for the sake of contrast, does not apply at all to a verbal description—"segnius per aurem," etc.
I am after all inclined to think that the true reading of this much-disputed verse may be
Indico legno, e lucido sereno,
but my mind is not made up entirely, and one object of publishing these Cantos in a periodical is that my version, before it is completed, may have the advantage of critical suggestions, and perhaps elucidation, in doubtful passages, from the learning and ingenuity of such Italian scholars in England as Mr. Haselfoot, Dr. Barlow, and Sir Frederic Pollock.