FOOTNOTES:
[331] New colour: Both have changed colour, Virgil in anger and Dante in fear.
[332] Unless: To conceal his misgiving from Dante, Virgil refrains from expressing all his thought. The ‘unless’ may refer to what the lying demons had told him or threatened him with; the ‘proffered aid,’ to that involved in Beatrice’s request.
[333] This bottom: The lower depths of Inferno. How much still lies below him is unknown to Dante.
[334] First Degree: The limbo where Virgil resides. Dante by an indirect question, seeks to learn how much experience of Inferno is possessed by his guide.
[335] Erichtho: A Thessalian sorceress, of whom Lucan (Pharsalia vi.) tells that she evoked a shade to predict to Sextus Pompey the result of the war between his father and Cæsar. This happened thirty years before the death of Virgil.
[336] Judas’ circle: The Judecca, or very lowest point of the Inferno. Virgil’s death preceded that of Judas by fifty years. He gives no hint of whose the shade was that he went down to fetch; but Lucan’s tale was probably in Dante’s mind. In the Middle Ages the memory of Virgil was revered as that of a great sorcerer, especially in the neighbourhood of Naples.
[337] The heaven, etc.: The Primum Mobile; but used here for the highest heaven. See Inf. ii. 83, note.
[338] These fens, etc.: Virgil knows the locality. They have no choice, but must remain where they are, for the same moat and wall gird the city all around.
[339] Erynnyes: The Furies. The Queen of whom they are handmaids is Proserpine, carried off by Dis, or Pluto, to the under world.