He thinks that if by fraud he takes the knight
He'll get the lady in his hands as well
(If he has heard the messenger alright).
And so he issues orders to detail
A party, thirty strong, to creep from sight
And made a detour from the citadel.
By a circuitous and hidden track,
They issue forth behind Orlando's back.

And when Cimosco hears, as he has willed,
The company has reached the place decreed
And all his orders duly are fulfilled,
He issues from the gate, accompanied
By thirty other men; and as a skilled
And cunning huntsman often may proceed,
Or fishermen who near Volano fling
Their nets in a wide circle, so the king,

To circumvent his challenger's escape,
Blocks every avenue upon all sides.
Alive he wants him - in no other shape.
This seems a simple task, so he decides
The weapon with the deadly thunder-clap
He'll not employ, but in a plan confides
Where strategy and treachery combine,
To capture, not to kill, being his design.

And, as a fowler prudently will spare
The life of birds among the first he nets,
Since greater booty still he hopes to snare,
And, using those as lure and decoy, sets
His traps anew, so did Cimosco dare
To set his own against Orlando's wits.
But he's no man to take at the first stroke,
And soon the ring encircling him he broke.

The Cavalier Anglante, where the row
Of soldiery is thickest, drives his lance.
As if they one and all are made of dough,
In one and then another he implants
His weapon, till he's skewered at one go
No less than six; a seventh, too, he wants
To add, but, as no space for him is found,
He has to leave him, dying, on the ground.

Just so the skil[l]ful archer strings a line
Of frogs which hide in ditches and canals,
Shooting them through the haunches and the spine,
Until from notch to tip with animals
His arrow is replete; the paladin,
Whose expertise such archery recalls,
His fully-burdened lance now flings away
And plunges, sword in hand, into the fray.

With his good sword, which never once in vain
He'd wielded, he struck out with all his might.
With blade or point, he felled in mortal pain
First here a man on foot, and there a knight,
On all sides marking with acrimson stain
Surcoats of blue, green, yellow, black and white.
Cimosco grieved that he had not employed
His deadly fire-device to fill the void.

In a loud voice he bellows the command,
And threatens all who dare to disobey,
To bring the weapon forth; but none to hand
He finds: those in the city mean to stay
There, those outside take to their heels, unmanned.
He, too, decides the coward's part to play.
Reaching the inner gate, he tries to wind
The drawbridge up; the Count is close behind.

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