Four cedar beams, exactly wrought to shape,
Lie, near each brink, across the dreadful gap;
Four other beams of equal size extend
Towards the heav’ns, and centre in one end;
To which a chain, wrought out of Ætna’s fire,
Pass’d through an aperture a cubit higher
(Its length ten leagues, and polish’d every link);
One end in hell, and one upon the brink,
Upon the side whereat the funeral train
Would yield the corpse; there, on the sacred plain,