Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 15, No. 86, February, 1875Various
History
Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 15, No. 86, February, 1875
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Literature, Modern -- 19th century -- Periodicals; Science -- Periodicals
with any imitation of these typographical magnificences, but will simply
copy the language of the bill. It must have been my mother's
composition, and Powers had to work up to it, which he did to the
letter:
"The World to come, as described by Dante, and comprising, Hell,
Purgatory, and Paradise, will be exhibited in a room adjoining the
Western Museum on the 4th of July, and days following. Admittance,
twenty-five cents. In the centre is seen a grand colossal figure of
Minos, the Judge of Hell. He is seated at the entrance of the
INFERNAL REGIONS [enormous capitals]. His right hand is raised as
in the act to pronounce sentence, his left holding a two-pronged
sceptre. Above his head is a scroll on which are written the
concluding words of Dante's celebrated inscription, 'Abandon hope,
all ye who enter here!' To the right of this figure the foreground
presents a frozen lake, on the surface of which are seen the heads
of those who have been doomed to this species of punishment. Among
these is the head of Ugolino, whom Dante describes as eternally
gnawing the head of his enemy, who, after placing him and his three
sons in the upper chamber of a strong tower near Florence, threw
the key of it into the moat and left them to perish with hunger.
Grinning in mockery of these ice-bound sufferers, A BLACK IMP
[biggest extra black capitals] is seated on a rock, dandling a
young monster. On the edge of the opposite side of the frozen lake
stands a spirit, who is just about to endure the frozen torment;
and his attitude and countenance express the agony of extreme cold.
Behind him opens the fiery gulf, the reflection of whose lurid
glare is seen on his half-frozen body. At his feet a female head,
fixed in the ice, looks up to the flames, as longing for their
warmth; while a little way within the lake of fire another head is
seen gazing with longing eyes upon the ice. A brilliant fountain of
flame is in the midst of the lake, and around it crowds of
condemned spirits in all varieties of suffering. In one corner a
fiend is proclaiming their infamy by the aid of a trumpet through
all the depths of Hell. Birds and animals of hideous form and evil
omen are fluttering over the heads and tormenting the sufferers.
Large icicles hang from the rocks that form the Gate of Hell, and
reflect on their bright surface the red glare of the fires within.
On the left of Minos is seen a Skeleton ascending a column of
Icicles and holding a standard bearing these lines:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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