Farinata tells him also of the burning hardships and similarity in the temperature which he has endured for several hundred years. He remembers but one holiday in all that time, the occasion being a ball game gotten up by a picked nine of American sinners against the world. [Illustration] [Illustration: A GREAT EVENT.] _CANTO XXXIV._ Close by Mr. Hunt learns the fate of deceptive land agents. These men who urged poor people to migrate to a barren country under the impression that it was a paradise, and advertised beautiful homes in ideal locations which turned out to be the reverse of the printed descriptions, are lifted high in the car of an observation elevator with promises of a fine view of the surrounding country and choice of cool corner lots. When at a great height a Demon pulls a lever, a trap-door opens and the agent falls into a furnace of brimstone fire. [Illustration] [Illustration: THE FALL OF A DECEIVING LAND-AGENT.] _CANTO XXXV._ In the twelfth district most of the brimstone mines of the region are located. Here confined to hard labor are many kinds of culprits. Among them Mr. Hunt thinks he recognizes an old neighbor who was too lazy to shovel the snow from his sidewalk. * * * * * While watching these laborers a Demon overseer calls his attention to a brood of spirits leaping and tumbling amongst the distant crags. They are embezzlers, carrying heavy bags of stones and being pursued by swift-winged devils. [Illustration] [Illustration: A TASK OF PERPETUAL SHOVELLING.] _CANTO XXXVI._ Still in the same gulf the explorer sees a sign which points to the “trash dumping ground.” Curious to see what is called trash in Satan’s domain, he follows the road that leads down through the red rock and comes to a pit “which all the words of Italy’s bard would fail in power to describe.” In the bottom of this vast hole heaps of gnarled and shrivelled-up souls have fallen and are still falling. He learns that these are the souls of people who continually tried to underrate, or detract from, the success of others. [Illustration] [Illustration: EXEMPT. Guard: “Two new arrivals from the Metropolis.” District Superintendent: “Who are they?” Guard: “Woman says she’s been running a boarding house for twenty years, and man says he’s been living in boarding houses for twenty years.” District Supt.: “Make them comfortable; both have had Hell enough.”] _CANTO XXXVII._ “Standing like patient oxen in their stalls,” Mr. Hunt discovers a row of hapless souls, each held tightly by the nose in the grip of a vice. This is the just penalty ordained for those who habitually intruded their noses into the affairs of others. * * * * * In an enclosure of the same district notorious prize-fighters, wearing eiderdown mittens, are compelled to fight big brawny Demons wearing spiked gloves. [Illustration] [Illustration: HE POKED ABOUT IN OTHER PEOPLE’S AFFAIRS.]