brown furze, any thing: The wills above be done! [Exit. but I would fain die a dry death. SCENE II. The Island: before the Cell of Prospero. Enter PROSPERO and MIRANDA. Mira. If by your art, my dearest father, you have Put the wild waters in this roar, allay them: The sky, it seems, would pour down stinking pitch, But that the sea, mounting to the welkin's cheek, Dashes the fire out. O, I have suffer'd With those that I saw suffer! a brave vessel, Who had no doubt some noble creature in her, Dash'd all to pieces. O, the cry did knock Against my very heart! Poor souls! they perish'd. Had I been any god of power, I would

Have sunk the sea within the earth, or e'er1

It should the good ship so have swallowed, and
The freighting souls within her.

Pro.

Be collected:

No more amazement: tell your piteous heart, There's no harm done.

Mira.

Pro.

O, woe the day!

I have done nothing but in care of thee,

No harm.

Mira.

More to know

Did never meddie with my thoughts. Pro.

'Tis time

comfort.

1

That my remembrance warrants: Had I not Four or five women once, that tended me? how is it,

Pro. Thou had'st, and more, Miranda: But

That this lives in thy mind? What seest thou else
In the dark backward and abysm' of time?
If thou remember'st aught, ere thou cam'st here,
How cam'st thou here, thou may'st.

Mira.

But that I do not.

Pro. Twelve years since, Miranda, twelve years since,

Thy father was the duke of Milan, and
A prince of power.
Mira.

Sir, are not you my father?

Pro. Thy mother was a piece of virtue, and She said thou wast my daughter; and thy father Was duke of Milan; and his only heir

A princess;-no worse issued.

Mira.

O, the heavens!

What foul play had we, that we came from thence ?
Or blessed was't we did?
Pro.

By foul play, as thou say'st,
But blessedly holp hither.

Mira.

Both, both, my girl: where we heav'd thence;

O, my heart bleeds To think o' the teen that I have turned you to, Which is from my remembrance! Please you further.

Pro. My brother, and thy uncle, call'd Antonio-
I pray thee, mark me, that a brother should
Be so perfidious!-he whom, next thyself,
Of all the world I lov'd, and to him put
The manage of my state; as, at that time,
Through all the signiories it was the first,
And Prospero the prime duke; being so reputed
In dignity, and, for the liberal arts,

Without a parallel; those being all my study,
The government I cast upon my brother,

And to my state grew stranger, being transported,
And wrapped in secret studies. Thy false uncle-
Dost thou attend me?

Or else new form'd them: having both the key Of officer and office, set all hearts i' th' state To what tune pleas'd his ear; that now he was The ivy, which had hid my princely trunk,

And suck'd my verdure out on't.-Thou attend'st not

Mira. O good sir, I do. Pro.

I pray thee mark me.

I thus neglecting worldly ends, all dedicate
To closeness, and the bettering of my mind
With that, which, but by being so retir'd,
O'er-priz'd all popular rate, in my false brother
Awak'd an evil nature and my trust,
Like a good parent, 1o did beget of him
A falsehood, in its contrary as great

cumber and trash"-" to trash or overslow" and "foreslowed and trashed."

There was another word of the same kind used in Falconry (from whence Shakspeare very frequently draws his similies ;) "Trassing is when a hawk raises aloft any fowl, and soaring with it, at length. descends therewith to the ground." Dictionarium Rusticum, 1704.

Probably this term is used by Chapman in his ad dress to the reader prefixed to his translation of Homer "That whosesoever muse dares use her wing, When his muse flies she will be trass't by his, And show as if a Bernacle should spring

As my trust was; which had, indeed, no limit,
A confidence sans bound. He being thus lorded,
Not only with what my revenue yielded,

But what my power might else exact, -lite one,
Who having, unto truth, by telling of it,

Made such a sinner of his memory,

To credit his own he, he did believe

He was indeed the duke; out of the substitution, And executing the outward face of royalty,

With all prerogative: -Hence his ambition

Growing, Dost hear?

Mira. Your tale, sir, would cure deafness. Pro. To have no screen between this part he

play'd

And him he play'd it for, he needs will be
Absolute Milan: Me, poor man!-my library
Was dukedom large enough; of temporal royalties
He thinks me now incapable: confederates
(So dry he was for sway) with the king of Naples,
To give him annual tribute, do him homage;
Subject his coronet to his crown, and bend

The dukedom, yet unbow'd, (alas, poor Milan!)
To most ignoble stooping.

Mira.

O the heavens.

Knowing I lov'd my books, he furnish'd me,

tell me,

I prize above my dukedom. Mira.

But ever see that man! Рто.

If this might be a brother.
Mira.
I should sin
To think but nobly of my grandmother:
Good wombs have borne bad sons.
Pro.

Now the condition.

This king of Naples, being an enemy

To me inveterate, hearkens my brother's suit; Which was, that he in lieu o' the premises, Of homage, and I know not how much tribute,Should presently extirpate me and mine

Out of the dukedom; and confer fair Milan,

With all the honours, on my brother: Whereon, A treacherous army levied, one midnight

Fated to the purpose, did Antonio open

The gates of Milan; and, i' the dead of darkness, The ministers for the purpose hurried thence

Me, and thy crying self.

Mira.

Alack, for pity!

I, not rememb'ring how I cried out then,
Will cry it o'er again; it is a hint,

That wrings mine eyes to't.
Pro.

Hear a little further,
And then I'll bring thee to the present business
Which now's upon us; without the which, this story
Were most impertinent.
Mira.

That hour destroy us? Pro.

Wherefore did they not

Well demanded, wench;

My tale provokes that question. Dear, they durst

not;

(So dear the love my people bore me) nor set
A mark so bloody on the business; but
With colours fairer painted their foul ends.
In few, they hurried us aboard a bark;

Bore us some leagues to sea; where they prepar'd
A rotten carcass of a boat, not rigg'd,

common rate of men has generally a son below it. Heroum filii noza.

1 "Who having made his memory such a sinner to truth as to credit his own lie by telling of it."

2 Tooke, in his Diversions of Purley, has clearly wn that we use one word, But, in modern English, or two words Bot and But, originally (in the Anglo Saxon) very different in signification, though (by repeated abbreviation and corruption) approaching in sound. Bot is the imperative of the A. S. Botan, to boot. But is the imperative of the A. S. Be-utan, to be out. By this means all the seemingly anomalous uses of But may be explained; I must however content myself with referring the reader to the Diversions of Purley, vol. i. p. 190. Merely remarking that but (as distinguished from Bot) and be-out have exactly the same meaning, viz. in modern English, without.

3 In lieu of the premises; that is, "in consideration of the premises, &c." This seems to us a strange use of this French word, yet it was not then unusual.

"But takes their oaths in lieu of her assistance." Beaumont and Fletcher's Prophetess.

'Would I mig at

Now I arise :Sit still, and hear the last of our sea-sorrow. Here in this island we arriv'd; and here Have I, thy school-master, made thee more prאלכ Than other princes can, that have more time For vainer hours, and tutors not so careful,

Mira. Heavens thank you for't! And now I

pray you, sir,

(For still 'tis beating in my mind,) your reason

For raising this sea-storm?
Pro.

Know thus far forth.

By accident most strange, bountiful fortune,
Now my dear lady, hath mine enemies
Brought to this shore: and by my prescience
I find my zonith doth depend upon

A most auspicious star; whose influence
If now I court not, but omit, my fortunes,

Will ever after droop. - Here cease more questions;
Thou art inclin'd to sleep; 'tis a good dulness,
And give it way; -I know thou can'st not choose.-
[MIRANDA sleeps.

Come away, servant, come: I am ready now;
Approach, my Ariel; come.

- tell me, sweetest,
What new service now is meetest
For the satyre; shall I stray
In the middle air, and stay

The sailing racke, or nimbly take
Hold by the moon, and gently make
Suit to the pale queen of night,
For a beame to give thee light?
Shall I dive into the sea,

And bring thee coral, making way
Through the rising waves, &c."

9 Ariel's quality is not his confederates, but the powers of his nature as a spirit, his qualification in sprighting 10 i. e, to the minutest article, literally from the French a point; so in the Chances,

Safely in harbour

Is the king's ship; in the deep nook, where once Thou ca!!'st me up at midnight to fetch dew

From the still-vex'd Bermoothes, there she's hid:
The mariners all under hatches stow'd;

Whom, with a charm join'd to their suffer'd labour,
I have left asleep and for the rest o' the fleet,
Which I dispers 1, they all have met again;
And are upon the Mediterranean flute,

Bound sadly home for Naples;

Supposing that they saw the king's ship wreck'd, And his great person perish.

Pro.

Ariel, thy charge Exactly is performed; but there's more work: What is the time o' the day?

Ari.

Past the mid season.

Pro. Thou liest, malignant thing! Hast thou forgot The foul witch, Sycorax, who, with age and envy, Was grown into a hoop? hast thou forgot her?

Ari. No, sir. Pro.

Thou hast where was she born? speak; tell me.

Ari. Sir, in Argier."

Pro.

O, was she so? I must, Once in a month, recount what thou hast been, Which thou forget'st. This damn'd witch, Sycorax, For mischiefs manifold, and sorceries terrible To enter human hearing, from Argier, Thou know'st, was banish'd; for one thing she did, They would not take her life: Is not this true?

Ari. Ay, sir.

Pro. This blue-ey'd hag was hither brought with

child,

And here was left by the sailors: Thou, my slave,
As thou report'st thyself, was then her servant:
And, for thou wast a spirit too delicate
To act her earthly and abhorr'd commands,
Refusing her grand hests," she did confine thee,
By help of her more potent ministers,
And in her most unmitigable rage,
Into a cloven pine; within which rift
Imprison'd, thou didst painfully remain

A dozen years; within which space she died,

And left thee there; where thou didst vent tay

groans,

As fast as mill-wheels strike: Then was this island, (Save for the son that she did litter here,

A freckled whelp, hag-born) not honoured with
A human shape.

Ari.

Yes; Caliban her son.

Pro. Dull thing, I say so; he, that Caliban,
Whom now I keep in service. Thou best know'st
What torment I did find thee in: thy groans
Did make wolves howl, and penetrate the breasts
Of ever-angry bears: it was a torment
To lay upon the damn'd, which Sycorax
Could not again undo; it was mine art,

When I arriv'd, and heard thee, that made gape
The pine, and let thee out.
Ari.

I thank thee, master.

Pro. If thou more murmur'st, I will rend an oak, And peg thee in his knotty entrails, till Thou hast howl'd away twelve winters. Ari.

Pardon, master:

I will be correspondent to command,

And do my sprighting gently.

Pro.

I will discharge thee. Ari.

Do so; and after two days

That's my noble master! What shall I do? say what? what shall I do?

Pro. Go, make thyself like a nymph o' the sea;

be subject

Remember, I have done thee worthy service; Told thee no lies, made no mistakings, serv'd Without or grudge or grumblings: thou didst proTo bate me a full year.

To every eyeball else. Go, take this shape,
And hither come in't: go hence, with diligence.
[Exit ARIEL.
Awake, dear heart, awake! thou hast slept well;
Awake!

Cal. As wicked dew as e'er my mother brush'd With raven's feather from unwholesome fen, Drop on you both! a south-west blow on ye, And blister you all o'er!

Pro. For this, be sure, to-night thou shalt have cramps, Side-stitches that shall pen thy breath up; urchins Shall, for that vast of night that they may work All exercise on thee: thou shalt be pinch'd

As tnick as honey-combs, each pinch more stinging Than bees that made them.

1 i. e. we cannot do without him. The phrase is still common in the midland counties.

2 This is a common expression of impatience. Vide note on King Richard II. Act i. Scene 1.

3 Quaint here means brisk, spruce, dexterous, from the French cointe.

4 Urchins were fairies of a particular class. Hedgehogs were also called urchins; and it is probable that the sprites were so named, because they were of a mischievous kind, the urchin being anciently deemed a very noxious animal. Shakspeare again mentions these fairy beings in the Merry Wives of Windsor.

"Like urchins, ouphes, and fairies green and white." In the phrase still current, "a little urchin," the idea of the fairy still remains.

5 That vast of night is that space of night. So, in Hamlet:

"In the dead waste and middle of the night," nor rasta, midnight, when all things are quiet and still, making the world appear one great uninhabited waste. In the pneumatology of ancient times visionary beings

Re-enter ARIFL invisible, playing and singing;

FERDINAND following him.
ARIEL'S SONG.

Come unto these yellow sands,
And then take hands:

Court'sied when you have, and kiss'd,

(The wild waves whist3)

Foot it featly here and there;

And, sweet sprites, the burden bear.

Hark, hark!

Bur. Bowgh, wowgh.

The watch-dogs bark:

Bur. Bowgh, wowgh.

Hark, hark! I hear

The strain of strutting chanticlere

Cry, Cock-a-doodle-doo.

[dispersedly.

[dispersedly.

Fer. Where should this musick be? i' the air, the earth?

It sounds no more; --and sure, it waits upon
Some god of the island. Sitting on a bank,
Weeping again the king my father's wreck,
This music crept by me upon the waters;
Allaying both their fury, and my passion,
With its sweet air: thence I have follow'd it,
Or it hath drawn me rather:-But 'tis gone.
No, it begins again.