VIII. THE DUCAL PALACE 409

special reference to the Papal deceits. In her true form she is a loathsome hag, but in her outward aspect,

“A goodly lady, clad in scarlot red,

Purfled with gold and pearle;...

Her wanton palfrey all was overspred

With tinsell trappings, woven like a wave,

Whose bridle rung with golden bels and bosses brave.”¹

Dante’s Fraud, Geryon, is the finest personification of all, but the description (Inferno, Canto XVII.) is too long to be quoted.²

§ 101. Seventh side. Injustice.³ An armed figure holding a halbert; so also in the copy. The figure used by Giotto,⁴ with the particular intention of representing unjust government, is represented at the gate of an embattled castle in a forest, between rocks, while various deeds of violence are committed at his feet. Spenser’s “Adicia” is a furious hag, at last transformed into a tiger.⁵

§ Eighth side. A man with a dagger looking scornfully at a child, who turns its back to him. I cannot understand this figure. It is inscribed in the copy, “ASTINECIA (Abstinentia?) OPITIMA?”

§ 102. THIRTEENTH CAPITAL. It has lions’ heads all round, coarsely cut.

FOURTEENTH CAPITAL. It has various animals, each sitting on its haunches. Three dogs, one a greyhound, one long-haired, one short-haired with bells about its neck; two monkeys, one with fan-shaped hair projecting on each side of its face; a noble boar, with its tusks, hoofs, and bristles sharply cut; and a lion and lioness.

§ 103. FIFTEENTH CAPITAL. The pillar to which it belongs is thicker than the rest, as well as the one over it in the upper arcade.

¹ [Book i. canto ii. 13.]

² [See, however, Modern Painters, vol. v. pt. ix. ch. x. § 13, where the passage is quoted, and Dante’s conception analyzed; and compare Unto This Last, § 74, § 148 n., and Munera Pulveris, § 88.]

³ [Inscribed “Injusticia seva (sæva) su(m),” but on Capital 33 “su(m)” is “est.”]

⁴ [In the Arena Chapel. The fresco is engraved as frontispiece to Fors Clavigera, Letter 10 (“The Baron’s Gate”), where it is further described; there is another allusion to it in Val d’Arno, § 32.]

⁵ [Book v. canto viii. 49.]

[Version 0.04: March 2008]