Vulgar words in Orlando Furioso (Page 1)
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XIII Wasted he was as much by fasts as age, And on an ass was mounted, slow and sure; His visage warranted that never sage Had conscience more precise or passing pure.
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LXII This gallops on a horse without a bit; This backs the sluggish ass, or bullock slow; These mounted on the croup of centaur sit: Those perched on eagle, crane, or estridge, go.
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And -- "What more could he say, sir cavalier," (Orlando cried to Sacripant) "if we Were known for the two basest whores that pull And reel from spindle-staff the matted wool?"
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LXXII The quivering brook, as warmer breezes blew, Beginning now from ice its waves to free, And the fresh-springing grass and foliage new, To cloathe again the field and greenwood tree, All those King Agramant assembled, who Had followed him in his prosperity; To muster in review the armed swarm, And give to his affairs a better form: LXXIII Hence did the King of Tremisen' repair, With him who had Noritia in command, To be in time at that full muster, where Each squadron, good or bad, was to be scanned Orlando thus by chance encountered there, As I have told you, this united hand; Who, as his usage was, went seeking her, By whom he had been made Love's prisoner.
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XVI Follicon, Kind Marsilius' bastard, hies With valiant Doricont; amid this horde, Bavartes, Analard, and Argalise, And Archidantes, the Saguntine lord.
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LX Chelindo and Mosco (bastards were the twain Of Calabrun, late king of Arragon), And one esteemed among the valiant train, Calamidor, of Barcellona's town, Leaving their standards, in the hope to gain, By young Zerbino's death, a glorious force, And wounded in his flanks the prince's horse.
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LXXII Bastard of Buovo, brother to the pair, Sir Vivian and Sir Malagigi hight: Who him Gerardo's lawful son declare, Are witnesses of little worth and light.
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XIX This cause made him who in his fury shared, Good Buovo's bastard, seems a lion fell; He, without pause, each trusty helmet pared With his good blade, or crushed it like the shell Of brittle egg: and who would not have dared -- Would not have shown a Hector's worth as well, Having two such companions in the stower, Of warlike wights the very choice and flower?
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XXXI Here, to appearance, from the forest prest A cruel Beast and hideous to the eye, With teeth of wolf, an ass's head and crest, A carcass with long famine lean and dry, And lion's claws; a fox in all the rest: Which seemed to ravage France and Italy, And Spain and England's desolated strands, Europe and Asia, and in fine all lands.
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LII Here he by chance encountered in mid road Two youths, that wood men were, and drove before An ass along that pathway, with a load Of logs; they, marking well what scanty store Of brain in poor Orlando's head was stowed, Called to the approaching knight, and threatened sore; Bidding him stand aside, or else go back, Nor to their hindrance block the common track.
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For on my father, bent on gain and gear And avarice, of all vice the fountain-head, Manners and merit for as little pass, As the lute's music on the lumpish ass.
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XX "And even, as here above, the raven, daw, Vulture, and divers other birds of air, All from the turbid water seek to draw The names, which in their sight appear most fair; Even thus below, pimps, flatterers, men of straw, Buffoons, informers, minions, all who there Flourish in courts, and in far better guise And better odour, than the good and wise; XXI "And by the crowd are gentle courtiers hight, Because they imitate the ass and swine: When the just Parcae or (to speak aright) Venus and Bacchus cut their master's twine, -- These base and sluggish dullards, whom I cite -- Born but to blow themselves with bread and wine, In their vile mouths awhile such names convey, Then drop the load, which is Oblivion's prey.