“Love,” she said, “which is soon kindled in a gentle heart, seized this my companion for the fair body I once inhabited—­how deprived of it, my spirit is bowed to recollect.  Love, which compels the beloved person upon thoughts of love, seized me in turn with a delight in his passion so strong, that, as thou seest, even here it forsakes me not.  Love brought us both to one end.  The punishment of Cain awaits him that slew us.”

The poet was struck dumb by this story.  He hung down his head, and stood looking on the ground so long, that his guide asked him what was in his mind.  “Alas!” answered he, “such then was this love, so full of sweet thoughts; and such the pass to which it brought them!  Oh, Francesca!” he cried, turning again to the sad couple, “thy sufferings make me weep.  But tell me, I pray thee, what was it that first made thee know, for a certainty, that his love was returned?—­that thou couldst refuse him thine no longer?”

“There is not a greater sorrow,” answered she, “than calling to mind happy moments in the midst of wretchedness.[13] But since thy desire is so great to know our story to the root, hear me tell it as well as I may for tears.  It chanced, one day, that we sat reading the tale of Sir Launcelot, how love took him in thrall.  We were alone, and had no suspicion.  Often, as we read, our eyes became suspended,[14] and we changed colour; but one passage alone it was that overcame us.  When we read how Genevra smiled, and how the lover, out of the depth of his love, could not help kissing that smile, he that is never more to be parted from me kissed me himself on the mouth, all in a tremble.  Never had we go-between but that book.  The writer was the betrayer.  That day we read no more.”

While these words were being uttered by one of the spirits, the other wailed so bitterly, that the poet thought he should have died for pity.  His senses forsook him, and he fell flat on the ground, as a dead body falls.[15]

On regaining his senses, the poet found himself in the third circle of hell, a place of everlasting wet, darkness, and cold, one heavy slush of hail and mud, emitting a squalid smell.  The triple-headed dog Cerberus, with red eyes and greasy black beard, large belly, and hands with claws, barked above the heads of the wretches who floundered in the mud, tearing, skinning, and dismembering them, as they turned their sore and soddened bodies from side to side.  When he saw the two living men, he showed his fangs, and shook in every limb for desire of their flesh.  Virgil threw lumps of dirt into his mouth, and so they passed him.