[BNP/E3, 79 – 47]

Old Castle.

     Next after him

The brave Alonso held the towered seat;

Right brave he was, though haughty too of mien,

Bold and unsparing, but he was so brave:

His deeds all knew, and every hidden nook

That held a mouth or tongue, every house

Held close relation of Alfonso’s deeds.

And fame rose high, Alonso to the wars

Rode with far {…}

[47^v]

I thither dragged my wandering steps

{…} and {…} Uprose

Abrupt and sudden a tremendous frame

Of shades that darkened to unvisioned night –

Layer on layer blackening, like the clouds

That stain a summer evening the radiance of a summer’s eve

Vultures of thunder that far-stretching stain

An evening’s radiance.

                       Dim and awful forms

Columns of night, and visionary curves

Cowarded my darkened sight, but then at length

Mine eyes accustomed to this darkness, saw

Things darker yet and even where a chasm

Seemed in the dead † cleft a portal huge

That seemed on mortal’s wasted, and from there

Cave sounds and various, but too oft from-far

As it from nothing, rose the monotone

Of groans and mourning. As I gazed again

The frontage took a shape, and I perceived

Enormous steps, that my degrees appeared

Upward and upward to my wondering sight.

          And now the race

Of great Bellario rose to highest point;