he, e come concedette Amore
Che conosceste i dubbiosi desiri?
Ed ella a me: nessun maggior dolore,
Che ricordarsi del tempo felice
Nella miseria, e cio sa 'l tuo dottore.
Ma se a conoscer la prima radice
Del nostro amor tu hai cotanto affetto,
Faro come colui che piange, e dice.
Noi leggevamo un giorno per diletto
Di Lancilotto, come Amor lo strinse.
Soli eravamo, e senza alcun sospetto.
Per piu fiate gli occhi ci sospinse
Quella lettura, e scolorocci 'l viso:
Ma solo un punto fu quel, che ci vinse.
Qando leggemmo il disiato riso
Esser baciato da cotanto amante,
Questi, che mai da me non sia diviso,
La bocca mi bacio tutto tremante.
Galeotto fu il libro, e chi lo scrisse:
Quel giorno piu non vi leggemmo avante.
Mentre che l'uno spirito queste disse,
L'altro piangeva si, che di pietade
Io venni meno come s'io morisse,
E caddi, come corpo morto cade."

Mr. Dayman:--

"Then toward them turned again: 'Thy racking woe,'
I said, 'Francesca, wrings from out mine eyes
The pious drops that sadden as they flow.
But tell me, in your hour of honeyed sighs,
By whom and how love pitying broke the spell,
And in your doubtful longings made too wise.'
And she to me: 'No keener pang hath hell,
Than to recall, amid some deep distress,
Our happier time: thy teacher knows it well.
Yet if desire so strong thy soul possess
To trace the root from whence our love was bred,
His part be mine, who tells and weeps no less.
'T was on a day when we for pastime read
Of Lancillot, how love snared him to ruin:
We were alone, nor knew suspicious dread.
Oft on that reading paused our eyes, renewing
Their glance; and from our cheeks the color started;
But one sole moment wrought for our undoing:
When that we read of lover so kind-hearted
Kissing the smile so coveted before,
He that from me shall never more be parted
Kissed me with lip to lip, trembling all o'er.
The broker of our vows, it was the lay,
And he who wrote--that day we read no more.'
The other spirit, while the first did say
These words, so moaned, that with soft remorse
As death had stricken me, I swooned away,
And down I fell, heavily as falls a corse."

Mr. Longfellow:--

"Then unto them I turned me, and I spake,
And I began: 'Thine agonies, Francesca,
Sad and compassionate to weeping make me.
But tell me