128–30) that tie the ingenium (genius) of the poet, treating his material, to the voyage of a ship over difficult waters. Dante’s ship, for now, is a small one (but cf. Par. II.1–3, where it is implicitly a much larger vessel), raising its sails over better (“smoother”) “water” than it traversed ...
Poi che ciascuno fu tornato ne lo → punto del cerchio in che avanti s’era, 15 15 fermossi, come a candellier candelo. E io senti’ dentro a quella lumera che pria m’avea parlato, sorridendo 18 18 incominciar, faccend...