Had issued." He replied: "Eternal fire,

That inward burns, shows them with ruddy flame
Illumed; as in this nether hell thou seest."

We came within the fosses deep, that moat
This region comfortless. The walls appeared
As they were framed of iron. We had made

Wide circuit, ere a place we reached, where loud
The mariner cried vehement: "Go forth:
The entrance is here." Upon the gates I spied
More than a thousand, who of old from heaven

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Were showered. With ireful gestures, "Who is this,"

They cried, "that, without death first felt, goes through
The regions of the dead?" My sapient guide
Made sign that he for secret parley wished;
Whereat their angry scorn abating, thus

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They spake: "Come thou alone; and let him go,
Who hath so hardily entered this realm.
Alone return he by his witless way;

If well he know it, let him prove. For thee,

Here shalt thou tarry, who through clime so dark
Hast been his escort." Now bethink thee, reader!
What cheer was mine at sound of those curst words.
I did believe I never should return.

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"O my loved guide! who more than seven times
Security hast rendered me, and drawn
From peril deep, whereto I stood exposed,
Desert me not," I cried, "in this extreme.
And, if our onward going be denied,
Together trace we back our steps with speed."

My liege, who thither had conducted me,
Replied: "Fear not: for of our passage none
Hath power to disappoint us, by such high
Authority permitted. But do thou

Expect me here; meanwhile, thy wearied spirit
Comfort, and feed with kindly hope, assured
I will not leave thee in this lower world."
This said, departs the sire benevolent,

And quits me. Hesitating I remain

At war, 'twixt will and will not, in my thoughts.
I could not hear what terms he offered them,
But they conferred not long, for all at once
Pellmell rushed back within.

Closed were the gates,

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100

105

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of them, and adding Charon, Minos, Cerberus, Plutus, Phlegyas, and Filippo Argenti, as so many others, we shall have the number; and if this is not satisfactory, we may suppose a determinate to have been put for an indeterminate number.

By those our adversaries, on the breast
Of my liege lord: excluded, he returned
To me with tardy steps. Upon the ground
His eyes were bent, and from his brow erased
All confidence, while thus in sighs he spake :
"Who hath denied me these abodes of woe?"
Then thus to me: "That I am angered, think
No ground of terror: in this trial I
Shall vanquish, use what arts they may within
For hindrance. This their insolence, not new,
Erewhile at gate less secret they displayed,
Which still is without bolt; upon its arch
Thou saw'st the deadly scroll; and even now,
On this side of its entrance, down the steep,
Passing the circles, unescorted, comes

One whose strong might can open us this land."

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120

125

CANTO IX.

ARGUMENT.

After some hindrances, and having seen the hellish furies and other monsters, the Poet, by the help of an angel, enters the city of Dis, wherein he discovers that the heretics are punished in tombs burning with intense fire: and he, together with Virgil, passes onwards between the sepulchres and the walls of the city.

THE hue, which coward dread on my pale cheeks
Imprinted when I saw my guide turn back,
Chased that from his which newly they had worn,
And inwardly restrained it. He, as one
Who listens, stood attentive: for his eye
Not far could lead him through the sable air,
And the thick-gathering cloud. "It yet behoves
We win this fight; " thus he began: "if not,
Such aid to us is offered. -Oh! how long

122. Virgil assures our Poet that these evil spirits had formerly shown the same insolence when our Saviour descended into Hell. They attempted to prevent him from entering at the gate, over which Dante had read the fatal inscription. "That gate which," says the Roman poet, "an angel had just passed, by whose aid we shall overcome this opposition, and gain admittance into the city."

1. Virgil, perceiving that Dante was pale with fear, restrained those outward tokens of displeasure which his own countenance had betrayed,

5

7. The heavenly messenger delays to come, and Virgil, soliloquizing, says, "We must win this fight." Then as doubt assails him, he adds, "if not," meaning, "perhaps I misunderstood Beatrice, and further advance is impossible." But suddenly he rejects this unworthy doubt, and says [We shall conquer, since] such aid is offered," and finally gives vent to his impatience for the arrival of the promised aid, "Oh! how long," etc.

Meseems it, ere the promised help arrive.”
I noted, how the sequel of his words
Cloaked their beginning; for the last he spake
Agreed not with the first. But not the less
My fear was at his saying; sith I drew

To import worse, perchance, than that he held,
His mutilated speech. "Doth ever any
Into this rueful concave's extreme depth
Descend, out of the first degree, whose pain
Is deprivation merely of sweet hope?"
Thus I inquiring. "Rarely," he replied,
"It chances, that among us any makes
This journey, which I wend. Erewhile, 't is true,
Once came I here beneath, conjured by fell
Erictho, sorceress, who compelled the shades
Back to their bodies. No long space my flesh
Was naked of me, when within these walls
She made me enter, to draw forth a spirit
From out of Judas' circle. Lowest place
Is that of all, obscurest, and removed
Furthest from heaven's all-circling orb.
Full well I know: thou therefore rest secure.
That lake, the noisome stench exhaling, round
The city of grief encompasses, which now
We may not enter without rage." Yet more
He added: but I hold it not in mind,
For that mine eye toward the lofty tower
Had drawn me wholly, to its burning top;
Where, in an instant, I beheld uprisen

ΙΟ

15

20

25

The road

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At once three hellish furies stained with blood.

In limb and motion feminine they seemed;
Around them greenest hydras twisting rolled
Their volumes; adders and cerastes crept
Instead of hair, and their fierce temples bound.
He, knowing well the miserable hags

15. Dante had given a more serious ending to the words, "if not," than Virgil had in mind. 18. First degree = Limbo. Dante asks this general question in order to be reassured. His real question is whether Virgil had been there before, and if he knew the way.

24. A Thessalonian sorceress who was employed by Sextus, son of Pompey the Great, to conjure up a spirit who should inform him of the issue of the civil wars between his father and Cæsar. Cf. Lucan, Pharsalia, vi. This was thirty years before the death of Virgil, however, and some other incident of a similar nature is referred to, or else Dante has fallen into an anachronism.

=

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26. Walls = city of Dis. 28. Judas' circle Judecca, in the lowest circle of Hell, where the arch-traitors are punished. Cf. Hell, xxxiv.

30. All-circling orb = Primum Mobile, the outermost of the Nine Spheres, and surrounded itself by the Empyrean.

42. Imitated from Virgil, Æn. vi. 281, and Lucan, Pharsalia, ix. 719. Cf., also, Milton, "Scorpion, and Asp, and Amphisbæna dire, Cerastes horned, Hydrus, and Ellops drear, And Dipsas."

P. L. x. 524.

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Who tend the queen of endless woe, thus spake :
"Mark thou each dire Erinnyes. To the left,
This is Megæra; on the right hand, she
Who wails, Alecto; and Tisiphone

I' th' midst." This said, in silence he remained.
Their breast they each one clawing tore; themselves
Smote with their palms, and such thrill clamor raised,
That to the bard I clung, suspicion-bound.
"Hasten Medusa: so to adamant

Him shall we change; " all looking down exclaimed:
“E'en when by Theseus' might assailed, we took
No ill revenge.' "Turn thyself round, and keep
Thy countenance hid; for if the Gorgon dire
Be shown, and thou shouldst view it, thy return
Upwards would be forever lost." This said,
Himself, my gentle master, turned me round;
Nor trusted he my hands, but with his own
He also hid me. Ye of intellect

Sound and entire, mark well the lore concealed
Under close texture of the mystic strain.

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And now there came o'er the perturbed waves
Loud-crashing, terrible, a sound that made

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Either shore tremble, as if of a wind

Impetuous, from conflicting vapors sprung,
That 'gainst some forest driving all his might,

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Plucks off the branches, beats them down, and hurls
Afar; then, onward passing, proudly sweeps
His whirlwind rage, while beasts and shepherds fly.
Mine eyes he loosed, and spake: "And now direct
Thy visual nerve along that ancient foam,
There, thickest where the smoke ascends."
Before their foe the serpent, through the wave
Ply swiftly all, till at the ground each one
Lies on a heap; more than a thousand spirits

46. Erinnyes: in Greek mythology, female divinities, avengers of iniquity. In later times their number was limited to three, Alecto ("the unresting"), Megæra (" the jealous"), and Tisiphone ("the avenger").

53. One of the Gorgons, whose hair was transformed into serpents by Athene. Her head was so fearful to look upon, that whoever saw it was changed to stone. Accordingly when Perseus sought to cut off her head, he attacked her with averted face, seeing only her reflection in the shield of Athene, who also guided his hand. 55. "Mal non vengiammo in Teseo l'assalto." Cary has missed the point here. Mal Old French Mar (Malâ horâ). The meaning is, "It was bad for us that we did not avenge the

As frogs

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assault of Theseus, for had we done so, no other mortal would have dared to come here after him." Theseus went to Hell to carry off Proserpina, but remained a prisoner there until released by Hercules.

57. The Gorgons were daughters of Phorcys, and lived in the Western Ocean. Their names were Stheno, Euryale, and Medusa. According to Homer, there is but one.

62. Dante warns us here that these lines contain an allegory, meaning probably something as follows. The furies = remorse; the face of Medusa = sensual pleasure, which hardens the heart of man to virtue and holiness.

Destroyed, so saw I fleeing before one

Who passed with unwet feet the Stygian sound.
He, from his face removing the gross air,

Oft his left hand forth stretched, and seemed alone

By that annoyance wearied. I perceived
That he was sent from heaven; and to my guide
Turned me, who signal made, that I should stand
Quiet, and bend to him. Ah me! how full
Of noble anger seemed he. To the gate

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He came, and with his wand touched it, whereat
Open without impediment it flew.

"Outcasts of heaven! O abject race, and scorned!"
Began he, on the horrid grunsel standing,
"Whence doth this wild excess of insolence

Lodge in you? wherefore kick you 'gainst that will
Ne'er frustrate of its end, and which so oft

Hath laid on you enforcement of your pangs?
What profits, at the fates to butt the horn?
Your Cerberus, if ye remember, hence

Bears still, peeled of their hair, his throat and maw."
This said, he turned back o'er the filthy way,
And syllable to us spake none; but wore
The semblance of a man by other care

Then we our steps

Beset, and keenly prest, than thought of him
Who in his presence stands.
Toward that territory moved, secure
After the hallowed words. We, unopposed,
There entered; and, my mind eager to learn
What state a fortress like to that might hold,
I, soon as entered, throw mine eye around,
And see, on every part, wide-stretching space,
Replete with bitter pain and torment ill.

As where Rhone stagnates on the plains of Arles,
Or as at Pola, near Quarnaro's gulf,

That closes Italy and laves her bounds,

The place is all thick spread with sepulchres;
So was it here, save what in horror here

Excelled for 'midst the graves were scattered flames,
Wherewith intensely all throughout they burned,

79. One the heavenly messenger. 91. Grunsel is obsolete for ground-plate, an architectural term for the piece of timber laid horizontally on the ground to support the upright. Cary uses it here for "sill," and takes it from Milton.

out of the gate by the latter.
391 ff.

Cf. Æn. vi.

III. Arles is in Provence, now the department of Bouches-du-Rhône. It is especially noted for its antiquities, which include a Roman theatre, a forum, and a cemetery. Here in the 93. Cf. Acts ix. 5. "It is hard for thee to seventh century a great battle took place between kick against the pricks." Saracens and Christians.

97. Cerberus, wishing to oppose the entrance of Hercules into Hell, was chained and dragged

112. Pola, a seaport in Istria, containing many Roman antiquities.