that not only virtue in its strict sense, but all natural refinement whatever, is God's gift to his creatures; and that in a soul finally abandoned by him there remains nothing good or pleasant, morally or physically. So in like manner it was a wise instinct with ancient painters to represent devils as the impersonations of ugliness, that the outward and visible form might fitly indicate the character of which it was the embodiment; and this holds good, however much such representations may now in the decay of faith have been turned to ridicule by doggerel poets and jesters. And therefore we accept the lying and coarseness, the treachery and cruelty, of the devils described in this and the following Canto, as creations of true genius, worthy of our highest admiration, and such as could be ill spared even from the masterpiece of all poetry.

THE INFERNO.-CANTO XXI.

THUS we from bridge to bridge proceeded, talking
Of matters by mine epic here eschewed;
Then, when already on the summit walking,
We stopt to see the next deep fissure hewed
In Malebolge with its useless wailing;
And there its strange obscurity I viewed.
Just as, in Venice' arsenal, unfailing

Through winter time the pitch tenacious boileth
To caulk their unsound timbers, then for sailing
Unfit; and in that interval one toileth

At his new vessel, and another pitches
The ribs whose firmness many a voyage spoileth;
One hammers hard at prow or stern; one hitches
A coil of cordage; one his oars reneweth;
One the rent mizen, one the mainsail stitches;—
Even thus a slimy pitch beneath us breweth,

(No fire but wrath divine its heat providing,)
Which on all sides with scum its margin glueth.

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I looked, but nought beheld I there abiding

More than the bubbles which the boiling raised,
All surging up and then again subsiding.

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And while with fixed countenance I gazed

Below, my guide 'Take heed, take heed,' out-crying,
Drew me towards him whence I stood.

Amazed

At this I turned, as one who lingers trying,
Until that sudden fear his heart dismayeth,
To witness that from which he should be flying,

And then no longer for the sight delayeth
Retreat :-for lo, a fiend behind us running

Across the rock his black-hued form displayeth.

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Ah me, how fierce bis countenance and cunning!

In attitude how bitter he appeared,

With outspread wings and feet all slowness shunning!
Upon his shoulder, sharp and proudly reared,

A sinner's burden hung, the thighs together
And the feet's sinews tightly clutched. He neared
Our bridge and cried, 'Ho there, sharp talons, hither!
Lo, one of Santa Zita's chiefs arriving:

Plunge him beneath; for I must journey thither
Again great numbers of them there are thriving,
All save Bonturo thieves and cheats false-hearted,
Of no for lucre quickly yes contriving.'

He threw him down, and turning then departed
O'er the hard rock; nor mastiff e'er unchained

With so much haste in quest of thief hath darted.
The sinner sank, and then with muscles strained

Rose; but the fiends who 'neath the bridge had station
Cried, 'Here no shrine the sacred Face hath gained:
'Tis different swimming here from Serchio's fashion;
Wherefore, unless thou wish to taste our hooks,
Make us above the pitch no elevation.'

Then bit they him with full a hundred crooks;
And said, ""Tis needful here thou caper hidden;
So if thou canst, in secret filch.' So cooks.
Oft in like mode have their attendants bidden

To plunge the boiling meat with flesh-hooks under
To the mid caldron, thence to float forbidden.
Then the good Master, 'Lest those waiting yonder

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Perceive thee here, beneath some rock's protection

Crouch down, that it may shield thee well; nor ponder

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In fear at aught of hindrance or objection

Against me done; when here before, I heeded
This pass, and stored it in my recollection.'
Then he beyond the bridge's head proceeded;
But on the sixth bank as he was descending,
A brow of dauntless courage there was needed.
As dogs their storm and furiousness expending

Which round the poor man suddenly hath surged,
Who stands and begs in low entreaty bending;

So from beneath the bridge they forth emerged,

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And turned their hooks all towards him. But unshaken, 'Let none of you be so perverse,' he urged;

'Ere that one hook its hold of me hath taken, Come one by whom my story may be tried: So will his plan to grip me be forsaken.'

Then all at once 'Go, Malacoda!' cried;
Whereat one moved, the others still remaining,

Who as he came, 'What profits it?' replied. 'Think'st thou to see me, Malacoda, gaining

Such progress onward,' said my guide indignant, 'Safe hitherto from all your schemed restraining, Without God's will and destiny benignant?

Let me advance: so in Heaven's law 'tis written,
That I should guide one through this realm malignant.'
Then sank his ire, by this reproof so bitten,

That he let fall his hook to ground, and chiding
Said to the rest, 'Now must he not be smitten.'
'O thou that crouched on the bridge art biding
Betwixt the crags,' thus me my guide addressed,
'Come now safe hither from thy place of hiding.'
Then quick I moved, and on towards him pressed,
And all the devils forward round me closed,
So that I feared the pact would be transgressed;
As once I saw the troops in fear supposed
Who from Caprona went by stipulation,
Themselves beholding by such foes enclosed.
To my lord's side in close approximation

I drew myself, nor ever moved my glances
Off from their mien of evil inclination.

Then one to another, as they bent their lances,

'Wilt thou I touch him on the hip?' demanded;
Who answered, 'Ay, make sure as he advances
To notch him.' But that demon who was banded
In converse with my master, quickly turned,
And, Quiet, quiet, Scarmiglion,' commanded.
And then to us, 'Soon will your feet be spurned
From further progress by this rock which lieth
Cleft to the bottom, as will be discerned,
Of the sixth arch. But if your courage trieth
Yet onward, up by that ravine 'tis given
To climb; close there another rock supplieth
Your road. Some five hours later, yestereven,

Twelve hundred years and sixty-six were tending
To their completion, since this path was riven.

Some of my comrades thither am I sending,

To guard, lest any from the wave be landed;

Go with them; for they will not dare offending.'

Straightway, Advance there forward,' he commanded: 'Alichino, Calcabrina, and Cagnazzo:

Lead the patrol thou, Barbariccia. Banded

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With them, tusked Ciriatto, Draghignazzo,
Graffiacane and Libicocco follow;

Then Farfarello, Rubicante Pazzo.

Search round for those that in the slime should wallow;
But these guard safely to the bridge desired,
Which goes unbroken o'er the adjacent hollow.'
Then, Master, ah! what see I?' I inquired;
'Nay, without escort go we, if in earnest
Thou know the road; by me is none required.
If thou as clear as is thy wont discernest,

Seest not how each his teeth in fury grindeth,

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And with his eyebrows threateneth vengeance sternest?'

But he, 'No cause for fear my spirit findeth :
Let them grin on, their evil pleasure sating,

For 'tis at those the wave in torture bindeth.'

Then each 'twixt teeth an outstretched tongue creating,
Ere to the left across the bank they bounded,
Turned to their captain, for the signal waiting,
Which he to them with obscene trumpet sounded.
(To be continued.)

MUSINGS OVER THE CHRISTIAN YEAR
AND LYRA INNOCENTIUM.

FOURTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY.

THE Gospel of this day gives us first the calming of the tempest on the Lake of Tiberias, and then the healing of the demoniac who was possessed by the legion; concluding with the abject folly of the Gadarenes who rejected the presence of the Healing Saviour.

This narrative is the theme of the meditation. First we have the storm in nature; still held and restrained by the Maker's power, who says to the wind as to the wave, 'So far shalt thou come and no farther.' We feel a strange exulting fear in the sight of the lightning flash, and the roar of the tempest; and yet more blessed is the power that tames and orders 'the unruly wills and affections of sinful men,' and calms their passions into the peace which passeth all understanding.

Yet is there not a love of excitement which believes life to consist in the tumult of human impulses? Nay, which, while forced to spend a quiet eventless career, loves to contemplate the furious conflict of passion, whether in the records of actual guilt or in works of imagination. To delight in such scenes is verily to choose to dwell in the grim

sepulchres in the mountain side-amid rottenness, dead men's bones, and the howls of the possessed-rather than to follow the Prince of Peace up the mountain side in the showery freshness of the morning after the storm. So following, so resting on Him, there is perfect repose and security; for 'as the hills stand about Jerusalem, so standeth the Lord round about His people from this time forth for evermore.'

Can there be a recoil from such security-a preference for the deadly contention of opposing evils, the desert, the tomb, the chain? Alas! too often the world gains the victory: the loss of some temporal possession (like that of the swine) alarms the selfish spirit; slavish terror is awakened by the manifestation of power, and the Gadarene temper drives the Saviour from the heart. Yet even then His endless pleading is not over. He draws the soul from dreams of earth-now by nature's lessons, now by those of the Gospel-till often the victory is won, and 'their lawless cries are turned to hymns of perfect love.'

We believe that the temptation to contemplate vice and to love the excitement of the study of passion, to which these verses primarily referred, was that afforded by Byron's poetry; and that the last lines expressed the hope that could not but be felt that such a change in the unhappy poet would come while it was not yet too late. In these days the works that dwell on the foul and dark wiles and violences prompted by miscalled love, ambition, or revenge, have not even the ornament of poetry, nor the poor excuse of being the veritable utterances of a diseased spirit. They are mere idle simulations. May not this poem remind us— ere we beguile our time with them in sheer idleness and curiosity—that they put us in danger, not indeed of 'doing such things,' but of 'taking pleasure in those that do them.'

The Sleep of our Lord on the Lake during the tempest has been the subject in the Lyra of that most musical and descriptive poem entitled 'Sleeping on the Waters,' which works up from the flower in the cottage window, which is not afraid of the snow' all around, to the babe sleeping unconsciously in the midst of a mourning or terrified household; then looks back to Moses slumbering in his bulrush ark.

'What recks he of his mother's tears,

His sister's boding sigh?

The whispering reeds are all he hears,
And Nile soft weltering nigh

Sings him to sleep: but he will wake,
And o'er the haughty flood

Wave his stern rod, and lo! a lake,
A restless sea of blood.'

Soon, however, a still mightier sea obeys him, when

'From left to right the watery wall

From Israel shrinks away.'