of the human nature and
form.

"The other two
Look'd on, exclaiming, 'Ah! How dost thou change,
Agnello! See! thou art nor double now
Nor only one.' The two heads now became
One, and two figures blended in one form
Appear'd, where both were lost. Of the four lengths
Two arms were made: the belly and the chest,
The thighs and legs, into such members changed
As never eye hath seen."

_Canto XXVI._ From another bridge Dante gazes down into the eighth
gulf, where, in the midst of the flames, are those who gave evil
advice to their fellow-creatures. Here Dante recognizes Diomedes,
Ulysses, and sundry other heroes of the Iliad,--with whom his guide
speaks,--and learns that Ulysses, after his return to Ithaca, resumed
his explorations, ventured beyond the pillars of Hercules, and, while
sailing in the track of the sun, was drowned in sight of a high
mountain.

_Canto XXVII._ In the midst of another bed of flames, Dante next
discovers another culprit, to whom he gives the history of the
Romagna, and whose life-story he hears before following his leader
down to the ninth gulf of Malebolge.

_Canto XXVIII._ In this place Dante discovers the sowers of scandal,
schism, and heresy, who exhibit more wounds than all the Italian wars
occasioned. Watching them, Dante perceives that each victim is ripped
open by a demon's sword, but that his wounds heal so rapidly that
every time the spirit passes a demon again his torture is renewed.
Among these victims Dante recognizes Mahomet, who, wondering that a
living man should visit hell, points out Dante to his fellow-shades.
Passing by the travellers, sundry victims mention their names, and
Dante thus discovers among them the leaders of strife between sundry
Italian states, and shudders when Bertrand de Born, a fellow minstrel,
appears bearing his own head instead of a lantern, in punishment for
persuading the son of Henry II, of England, to rebel.

_Canto XXIX._ Gazing in a dazed way at the awful sights of this
circle, Dante learns it is twenty-one miles in circumference, ere he
passes on to the next bridge, where lamentations such as assail one's
ears in a hospital constantly arise. In the depths of the tenth pit,
into which he now peers, Dante distinguishes victims of all manners of
diseases, and learns these are the alchemists and forgers undergoing
the penalty of their sins. Among them Dante perceives a man who was
buried alive on earth f