This song uses staccato throughout to represent a choppy, ice like feeling from all the ice the sinners are in. “A wild and bitter wind, I cowered,” then there is a sudden chord, representing the fear Dante feels from when he suddenly feels the wind, then a change where the tempo slows down and the notes are lower and more dragged out. (Alighieri 34. 7-8) This represents the wind that Dante feels. The music then returns to staccato once Dante sees Satan and the sinners he chews. The tempo speeds up to create a more suspenseful feeling when Dante watches the sinners, but then begins to slow down once him and Virgil are leaving. At the end, the notes begin to ascend in octave symbolizing the ascent of Virgil and Dante climbing out of Hell.