Hearing the air cut by their verdant plumes,
The serpent fled; and, to their stations, back
The angels up return'd with equal flight."
(Purg., VIII.)
A third picture of temptation is furnished by the episode of one of the
Sirens who appears first repulsive and then seems to the poet sweet and
alluring. Only when Virgil discloses her hideous nature does Dante see
how easily he might have fallen a victim to her wiles. He tells us that
in his sleep there appeared to him a woman with stammering utterance,
squinting eyes, deformed hands. "I gazed at her, and as the sun restores
the cold limbs made heavy by night, thus my look loosened her tongue,
then straightened her all out in a little while and colored her wan face
as love demands. When her speech was thus unbound she began to sing so
that I could hardly have turned my attention from her. 'I am,' she sang,
'I am sweet Siren who bewitch sailors by mid-sea, so full am I of charm
to hear. By my song I turned Ulysses from his wandering way. And
whosoever abides with me seldom departs, so wholly do I satisfy him.'
Her lips were not yet closed when a lady, swift and holy, appeared at my
side to confound the other. 'O Virgil, Virgil, who is this?' she said
proudly; and he advanced with his eyes fixed only on this modest woman.
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