The farcical element is not wanting in the Inferno, a fact proving that our poet, in furnishing the episodes, not superior to his age which demanded especially in the religious plays presented in the public square the sight of the discomfiture of the devil in scenes provoking the audience to laughter. The best example of such farcicality occurs in the eighth circle, fifth bolgia, where officials, traffickers in public offices, or unjust stewards are immersed in boiling pitch. From time to time when the fiends are not alert the reprobate here come to the surface for a breathing or cooling spell, like dolphins on the approach of a storm darting in the air and diving back again or like frogs with their muzzles alone exposed and their bodies covered by the water, resting on the banks of a stream into which they drop at the first approach of danger. Getting in this way momentary relief from suffering a grafter named Ciampolo, a former retainer of King Thibaut II of Navarre, lingered too long and was deftly hooked by Graffiacane amid the savage exultations of the other fiends, who proceed to maltreat the unfortunate wretch. The hideous confusion of attacks by the demons is stopped long enough for the poet to learn his history, and also what is more interesting to Dante, the names of two Italians, Friar Gomita and Michel Zanche who are likewise suffering in the boiling pitch. Ciampolo, to save himself from further maltreatment and to escape from his captors, now has recourse to stratagem. He promises that if they consent to withdraw out of sight he will whistle a signal that will be recognized only by his hapless comrades; the two Italians and five others will then come to the surface for cool air. The fiends may then have not one, but seven to rend! The crafty plan succeeds. The demons withdraw behind the crags and then Ciampolo plunges deeply into the boiling pitch. Two devils, endeavoring to swoop down upon him now beyond their reach, fall upon each other in brutal fury, while the rest of the troop hurry to the opposite shore to rescue the belimed pair. Here is Dante's description of the farce: "As dolphins, when with the arch of the back; they make sign to mariners that they may prepare to save their ship: so now and then, to ease the punishment, some sinner showed his back and hid in less time than it lightens. And as at the edge of the water of a ditch, the frogs stand only with their muzzles out, so that they hide their feet and other bulk: thus stood on every hand the sinners; but as Barbariccia approached, they instantly retired beneath the seething. I saw, and my heart still shudders thereat, one linger so, as it will happen that one frog remains while the other spouts away; and Graffiancane, who was nearest to him, hooked his pitchy locks and haled him up, so that to me he seemed an otter.