“They’ve sunk me down to this, the flatteries of which my tongue could never have enow.”
. . . . .
In Canto XXII, Dante marvels that he is in such terrible company, but he realizes that this part of his trek with the demons is necessary. Every now and then a sinner shows his back at the surface of the pitch to ease his pain, and Dante compares them to frogs squatting about in water with only their muzzles sticking out. Like the rest of the sinners in Hell, the Grafters also experience Dante's concept of Divine Retribution. Because they had "sticky" hands in life, stealing and embezzling money, they are damned to spend eternity in sticky pitch, and just as their dealings were hidden from the world in life, their souls are hidden beneath the pitch in death. On Earth, Grafters took every opportunity to take advantage of others, and they are now overseen by terrible demons that use every opportunity to take advantage of them.