Ditchley (Gaffer), one of the miners employed by Sir Geoffrey Peveril.—­Sir W. Scott, Peveril of the Peak (time, Charles II.).

DITHYRAMBIC POETRY (Father of), Arion of Lesbos (fl.  B.C. 625).

DITTON (Thomas) footman of the Rev. Mr. Staunton, of Willingham Rectory.—­Sir W. Scott, Heart of Midlothian (time, George II.).

DIVAN (The), the supreme council and court of justice of the caliphs.  The abbassides always sat in person in this court to aid in the redress of wrongs.  It was called “a divan” from the benches covered with cushions on which the members sat.—­D’Herbelot, Bibliotheque Orientate, 298.

DIVE [deev], a demon in Persian mythology.  In the mogul’s palace at Lahore, there used to be several pictures of these dives (1 syl), with long horns, staring eyes, shaggy hair, great fangs, ugly paws, long tails, and other horrible deformities.

DI’VER (Colonel), editor of the New York Rowdy Journal, in America.  His air was that of a man oppressed by a sense of his own greatness, and his physiognomy was a map of cunning and conceit.—­C.  Dickens, Martin Chuzzlewit (1844.)

DI’VES (2 syl.), the name popularly given to the “rich man” in our Lord’s parable of the rich man and Lazarus; in Latin, Dives et Lazarus.—­Luke xvi.

DIVI’NA COMME’DIA, the first poem of note ever written in the Italian language.  It is an epic by Dante’ Alighie’ri, and is divided into three parts:  Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise.  Dante’ called it a comedy, because the ending is happy; and his countrymen added the word divine from admiration of the poem.  The poet depicts a vision, in which he is conducted, first by Virgil (human reason,) through hell and purgatory; and then by Beatrice (revelation), and finally by St. Bernard, through the several heavens, where he beholds the Triune God.

“Hell,” is represented as a funnel-shaped hollow, formed of gradually contracting circles, the lowest and smallest of which is the earth’s centre. (See INFERNO, 1300).

“Purgatory” is a mountain rising solitarily from the ocean on that side of the earth which is opposite to us.  It is divided into terraces, and its top is the terrestrial paradise. (See PURGATORY, 1308).

From this “top” the poet ascends through the seven planetary heavens, the fixed stars, and the “primum mobile” to the empyre’an or seat of God. (See PARADISE, 1311).

DIVINE (The), St. John the evangelist, called “John the Divine.”

Raphael, the painter, was called Il Divino (1483-1520).

Luis Morales, a Spanish painter, was called El Divino (1509-1586).

Ferdinand de Herre’ra, a Spanish poet (1516-1595).

DIVINE DOCTOR (The), Jean de Ruysbroek, the mystic (1294-1381).

DIVINE SPEAKER (The) Tyr’tamos, usually known as Theophrastos ("divine speaker"), was so called by Aristotle (B.C. 370-287).