Page:Divine Comedy (Longfellow 1867) v1.djvu/294

274 63. was one of the seven kings who besieged Thebes. Euripides, Phœnissæ, line 1188, thus describes his death:—

Also Gower, Confes. Amant., I.:—

72. Like Hawthorne's scarlet letter, at once an ornament and a punishment.

79. The Bulicame or Hot Springs of. Villani, Cronica, Book I. Ch. 51, gives the following brief account of these springs, and of the origin of the name of Viterbo:—

"The city of Viterbo was built by the Romans, and in old times was called Vigezia, and the citizens Vigentians. And the Romans sent the sick there on account of the baths which flow from the Bulicame, and therefore it was called Vita Erbo, that is, life of the sick, or city of life."

80. "The building thus appropriated," says Mr. Barlow, Contributions to the Study of the Divine Comedy, p. 129, " would appear to have been the large ruined edifice known as the Bagno di Ser Paolo Benigno, situated between the Bulicame and Viterbo. About half a mile beyond the Porta di Faule, which leads to Toscanella, we come to a way called Riello, after which we arrive at the said ruined edifice, which received the water from the Bulicame by conduits, and has popularly been regarded as the Bagno delle Meretrici alluded to by Dante; there is no other building here found, which can dispute with it the claim to this distinction."

102. The shouts and cymbals of the, drowning the cries of the infant Jove, lest Saturn should find him and devour him.

103. The statue of Time, turning its back upon the East and looking towards Rome, Compare Daniel ii. 31.

105. The Ages of Gold, Silver, Brass, and Iron. See Ovid, Metamorph. I.

See also Don Quixote's discourse to the goatherds, inspired by the acorns they gave him. Book II. Chap. 3; and Tasso's Ode to the Golden Age, in the Aminta.

113. The Tears of Time, forming the infernal rivers that flow into Cocytus.

Milton, Parad. Lost, II. 577:—

136. See Purgatorio XXVIII.