The subjection of the women to
the priests is what has always greatly contributed to defeat Italian
efforts for reform; it now helps to unnerve the Roman multitude; and
the poet finally makes it the weakness through which Arnaldo is dealt
his death. With a few strokes in the scene that follows the death of
Guido, he indicates the remorse and dismay of the people when the Pope
repels them from the church door and proclaims the interdict; and then
follow some splendid lyrical passages, in which the Pope commands the
pictures and images to be veiled and the relics to be concealed, and
curses the enemies of the Church. I shall but poorly render this curse
by a rhymeless translation, and yet I am tempted to give it:
_The Pope._ To-day let the perfidious
Learn at thy name to tremble,
Nor triumph o'er the ruinous
Place of thy vanished altars.
Oh, brief be their days and uncertain;
In the desert their wandering footsteps,
Every tremulous leaflet affright them!
_The Cardinals._ Anathema, anathema, anathema!
_Pope._ May their widows sit down 'mid the ashes
On the hearths of their desolate houses,
With their little ones wailing around them.
_Cardinals._ Anathema, anathema, anathema!
_Pope.
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