Canto XXXIV
CANTO XXXIV
Virgil now directs his Pupil’s vision forwards to the King of Hell, who from a distance looks like a windmill viewed through darkness or dense fog. Feeling the strength of the winds, the Poet draws in fear behind his Mentor. They now stand in Judecca, the ninth circle’s fourth ring, reserved for traitors to benefactors, who are fully immersed in the ice pell-mell, like straws shot through glass (1–15). When the Pilgrim advances enough to see Satan, he turns so faint and frozen as to feel neither alive nor dead (16–28). The emperor of the woeful realm towers so high from mid-breast above the ice that Dante compares better in size with a giant than a giant does with the Devil’s arms. As grotesque now as he once was fair, Lucifer’s three faces present a perverted image of the Trinity in its threefold attributes of power, wisdom, and love. His yellow face symbolizes impotence, his black one ignorance, and his red one hate. Beneath each face a pair of bathke wings flaps in the proud though vain attempt to raise him up but succeeds only in freezing him more firmly in place. His six eyes weep, and a bloody lather drools down his chins (29–54) as he chomps a sinner in each mouth: in the center, Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Jesus Christ, the founder of the Church; and, on either side, Brutus and Cassius, who conspired against Julius Caesar, the founder of the Roman Empire (55–69). Having now witnessed the depths of Hell, the Poet holds on by the neck to Virgil, who, just when the Devil’s wings are raised, grapples onto his shaggy flank and climbs down to his hip (which marks the center of his body, the earth, and the universe), where he struggles to turn around in order to climb up the Evil One’s shanks towards his feet (70–87). The Pilgrim becomes perplexed as they pass the center of gravity, and Virgil explains that whereas before they had descended from the surface of the northern hemisphere to the center of the earth, they are now ascending from that point to the surface of the southern hemisphere. When Satan fell from the skies, he crashed into the latter, from which all land retreated to the north, while the bowels of the earth rushed up to form a mountain in the south, leaving a dungeon for him at the earth’s center. From Beelzebub’s tomb a passage to the earth’s surface has been dug out by the erosive course of a downward-flowing stream (88–132), which the Wanderers now follow, exiting at last through a round opening to see the stars (133–139).
1 “The banners of the king,” my Master said,
“Of lowest Hell come marching towards us here;[546]
To see if you discern him, look ahead.”
4 When night has fallen on our hemisphere,[547]
Or when thick fog arises in the air,
A distant windmill, turning, will appear
7 As did the spire on which I seemed to stare.
Since winds were strong, I drew behind my Guide,
Because there was no other shelter there.
10 I stood (and this with fear is versified)
Where shades are fully covered up, but show
Through ice like straws in glass. And there inside[548]
13 Some stood erect, and some lay prone below,
Some on their soles, some on their heads of hair;
And some bent face to feet just like a bow.
16 When we had gone so far ahead to where
My Master thought that he should let me see
The creature whose appearance once was fair,[549]
19 He stepped aside before me, halting me,
And said: “Look, here is Dis! and here’s the site[550]
Where you must arm yourself with constancy.”
22 O Reader, do not ask me now to write
How faintness then and freezing gripped my frame—
I can’t: all words fall short of such a plight.
25 I neither died nor stayed alive, I claim;
So think yourself, if but your wits should dare,
How I, deprived of life and death, became.
28 The monarch of the woeful realm stood bare
And from the ice rose upwards from mid-breast;
And better with a giant I compare
31 Than giants do with just his arms at best.
So you can see how huge the whole must be,
If to such parts there correspond the rest.
34 If once as fair as now grotesque was he,
Who still against his Maker raised his brow,
From him may well proceed all misery.
37 It seemed to me so great a marvel now,
As here that head’s three faces came in view:
The red one jutted forwards to allow
40 Attachment to it of the other two
Above the middle of each shoulder, while
Up at the crown all three together grew.
43 The right one seemed like white or yellow bile,
The left one in appearance had been dyed
Like those from where there first descends the Nile.[551]
46 Each had a wing beneath on either side
As would befit a bird so huge of limb;
I never saw a ship with sails so wide.
49 But like a bat’s, they had no feathered trim;
And he was flapping them, so there arose
Three mighty windstorms that came forth from him.
52 Before those currents all Cocytus froze.
With all six eyes he weeps, and down each chin
A stream of tears and bloody lather flows.
55 In every mouth he chewed a man of sin
With jaws that like a heckle are equipped,
And thus he kept in pain the three within.
58 The front one found as naught the teeth that ripped
When they were matched against the claws that shred:
At times the skin upon his back was stripped.
61 “The soul in greatest pain,” my Master said,
“Is Judas, the Iscariot; and so[552]
He has his legs without; within, his head.
64 Of those two others with their heads below,
One’s Brutus, hanging from the blackened snout;[553]
See how he writhes, while saying nothing, though!
67 The other’s Cassius, who appears so stout.[554]
But night comes up; it’s time to go at last,[555]
For we have witnessed all that’s round about.”
70 As he had wished, I kept his neck held fast;
And waiting for the chance of place and time,
Just when there spread enough those wings so vast,
73 From tuft to tuft he made the downward climb
(While taking hold upon that shaggy flank)
Between the matted hair and crusted rime.
76 As now to where the thigh revolves we sank,
Just at the point at which the hip will swell,
To bring his head to where he’d had his shank
79 My Leader had to work and strain a spell.
Like one who climbs, he grappled on the hair,
So that I thought we would return to Hell.
82 “Cling fast to me, for by so steep a stair,”
My panting Master said like one quite spent,
“We must depart from such an evil lair.”
85 Then through a boulder’s opening he went,
And, once he’d placed me on its edge to sit,
His steps towards me were cautious in ascent.
88 I raised my eyes and thought that through the slit
I should see Lucifer as left behind,
But saw him holding up his legs through it.
91 And if I then became perplexed in mind,
Let slower people ponder, I entreat,
By whom what point I’d passed is not divined.[556]
94 “Get up,” my Master said, “be on your feet:
The way is long, the road is hard as well;[557]
The sun’s return to middle-tierce is fleet.”[558]
97 No palace hall, this was a dungeon cell
In which we stood, and one of Nature’s make;
Its floor was bad and scant the light that fell.
100 “O Master, speak before I must forsake
This dark abyss,” I said and stood upright,
“So as to draw me out from my mistake:
103 Where is the ice? And how is he held tight
While upside down? How did the sun pursue
In such short time the course to morn from night?”
106 “You still believe you stand,” he spoke anew,
“Beyond the center where I caught the hair
Of that damn worm that pierces Earth straight through.
109 As long as I descended, you were there;
When I turned round, you left the point aside
Towards which, from every part, all weights must bear.
112 Beneath the hemisphere you now abide[559]
Opposing that whose canopies embrace
The great dry land beneath whose zenith died
115 That Man whose birth and life no sins debase;[560]
You have your feet upon a little sphere[561]
That fashions the Judecca’s other face.
118 When it is evening there, it’s morning here;
And he upon whose hair we had to scale
Is fastened now as ever to our rear.
121 From Heaven to this side there fell that bale;[562]
And since, because of him, it had such fear,
The earth that stood here made the sea its veil,
124 And so it journeyed to our hemisphere.[563]
The land on this side left this empty place,
Perhaps to flee from him, and rose up sheer.[564]
127 And from Beelzebub there is a space[565]
As far removed as all his tomb extends,
Known not by sight, but only by the trace
130 Of sound from some small rill that there descends
Through rocky hollows which its streams erode,
Whose winding course so gently downward tends.”[566]
133 My Guide and I took up the hidden road
For our return back to the world that’s bright;
And with no care at all for rest we strode,
136 He first and I behind, to scale the height;
Thus, through a rounded hole I spied afar
The comely things the heavens bear at night,
139 And we came out again to see each star.