And if I then became disquieted,
Let stolid people think who do not see
What the point is beyond which I had passed.
"Rise up," the Master said, "upon thy feet;
The way is long, and difficult the road, 95
And now the sun to middle-tierce returns."
It was not any palace corridor
There where we were, but dungeon natural,
With floor uneven and unease of light.
"Ere from the abyss I tear myself away, 100
My Master," said I when I had arisen,
"To draw me from an error speak a little;
Where is the ice? and how is this one fixed
Thus upside down? and how in such short time
From eve to morn has the sun made his transit?" 105
And he to me: "Thou still imaginest
Thou art beyond the centre, where I grasped
The hair of the fell worm, who mines the world.
That side thou wast, so long as I descended;
When round I turned me, thou didst pass the point 110
To which things heavy draw from every side.
And now beneath the hemisphere art come
Opposite that which overhangs the vast
Dry-land, and 'neath whose cope was put to death
Page:Divine Comedy (Longfellow 1867) v1.djvu/235
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Inferno XXXIV.
215
