seech you, Which I so often owe: but your ring first; And here the bracelet of the truest princess That ever swore her faith. Post. Kneel not to me: The power that I have on you is to spare you; The malice towards you to forgive you : live, And deal with others better. Cym. Nobly doom'd! 420 We'll learn our freeness of a son-in-law; Pardon's the word to all. Arv. You holp us, sir, As you did mean indeed to be our brother; Joy'd are we that you are. Post. Your servant, princes. Good my lord of Rome, Call forth your soothsayer: as I slept, methought Great Jupiter, upon his eagle back'd, Luc. Sooth. Here, my good lord. Luc. 431 Philarmonus! Read, and declare the meaning. Sooth. [Reads] When as a lion's whelp shall, to himself unknown, without seeking find, and be embraced by a piece of tender air; and when from a stately cedar shall be lopped branches, which, being dead many years, shall after revive, be jointed to the old stock, and freshly grow; then shail Posthumus end his miseries, Britain be fortunate and flourish in peace and plenty.' Thou, Leonatus, art the lion's whelp; My peace we will begin. And, Caius Lucius, Have laid most heavy hand. Sooth. The fingers of the powers above do THE TEMPEST. (WRITTEN ABOUT 1610.) INTRODUCTION. were The Tempest was probably written late in the year 1610. A few months previously had appeared ar account of the wreck of Sir George Somers' ship in a tempest off the Bermudas, entitled A Discovery of the Bermudas, otherwise called the Ile of Divels, etc., written by Silvester Jourdan. Shakespeare (Act I., Sc. II., L. 229) makes mention of "the still-vexed Bermoothes;" and several points of resemblance render it probable that in writing the play he had Jourdan's tract before him. Beyond the suggestions obtained from this tract no source of the story of the play can be pointed out. Mention was made by the poet Collins of a tale called Aurelis and Isabella containing the same incidents, but in this point he was mistaken, though he may have seen some other Italian story which resembled The Tempest. The name Setébos (Sycorax's god) and perhaps other names of persons Shakespeare found in Eden's History of Travaile, published in 1577. The Tempest, although far from lacking dramatic or human interest, has something in its spirit of the nature of a clear and solemn vision. It expresses Shakespeare's highest and serenest view of life. Prospero, the great enchanter, is altogether the opposite of the vulgar magician. With command over the elemental powers, which study has brought to him, he possesses moral grandeur and a command over himself, in spite of occasional fits of involuntary abstraction and of intellectual impatience; he looks down on life, and sees through it, yet will not refuse to take his part in it. In Shakespeare's early play of supernatural agencies-A Midsummer Night's Dream-the "human mortals made the sport of the frolic-loving elves; here the supernatural powers attend on and obey their ruler, man. It has been suggested that Prospero, the great enchanter, is Shakespeare himself, and that when he breaks his staff, drowns his book, and dismisses his airy spirits, going back to the duties of his dukedom, Shakespeare was thinking of his own resigning of his powers of imaginative enchantment, his parting from the theatre, where his attendant spirits had played their parts, and his return to Stratford. The persons in this play, while remaining real and living, are conceived in a more abstract way, more as types than those in any other work of Shakespeare. Prospero is the highest wisdom and moral attainment; Gonzalo is humorous common-sense incarnated; all that is meanest and most despicable appears in the wretched conspirators; Miranda, whose name seems to suggest wonder, is almost an elemental being, framed in the purest and simplest type of womanhood, yet made substantial by contrast with Ariel, who is an unbodied joy, too much a creature of light and air to know human affection or human sorrow; Caliban (the name formed from cannibal) stands at the other extreme, with all the elements in him-appetites, intellect, even imaginationout of which man emerges into early civilization, but with a moral nature that is still gross and malignant. Over all presides Prospero like a providence; and the spirit of reconciliation, of forgiveness, harmonizing the contentions of men, appears in The Tempest in the same noble manner as In The Winter's Tale, Cymbeline, and Henry VIII. The action of the play is comprised within three hours. ALONSO, King of Naples. SEBASTIAN, his brother. DRAMATIS PERSONE. Boatswain. PROSPERO, the right Duke of Milan. ANTONIO, his brother, the usurping Duke of MIRANDA, daughter to Prospero. Milan. ARIEL, an airy Spirit. Master of a Ship. SCENE-A ship at Sea: an island. Ant. Where is the master, boatswain ? Boats. Do you not hear him? You mar our labor keep your cabins: you do assist the storm. Gon. Nay, good, be patient. Boats. When the sea is. Hence! What cares these roarers for the name of king? To cabin silence! trouble us not. Gon. Good, yet remember whom thou hast aboard. 21 Boats. None that I more love than myself. You are a counsellor; if you can command these elements to silence, and work the peace of the present, we will not hand a rope more; use your authority: if you cannot, give thanks you have lived so long, and make yourself ready in your cabin for the mischance of the hour, if it so hap. Cheerly, good hearts! Out of our way, I say. [Exit. Gon. I have great comfort from this fellow methinks he hath no drowning mark upon him; his complexion is perfect gallows. Stand fast, good Fate, to his hanging: make the rope of his destiny our cable, for our own doth little advantage If he be not born to be hanged, our case is miserable. [Exeunt. Gon. I'll warrant him for drowning; though the ship were no stronger than a nutshell and as leaky as an unstanched wench. Boats. Lay her a-hold, a-hold! set her two courses off to sea again; lay her off. Enter Mariners wet. Mariners. All lost! to prayers, to prayers! all lost! Boats. What, must our mouths be cold? Gon. The king and prince at prayers! let's assist them, For our case is as theirs. Seb. I'm out of patience. Ant. We are merely cheated of our lives by drunkards: This wide-chapp'd rascal-would thou mightst lie drowning 60 The washing of ten tides! [A confused noise within: Mercy on us!— We split, we split!'-' Farewell, my wife and children!' 'Farewell, brother!'-'We split, we split, we split!'] Ant. Let's all sink with the king. [Exeunt Ant. and Seb. Gon. Now would I give a thousand furlongs of sea for an acre of barren ground, long heath, brown furze, any thing. The wills above be done! but I would fain die a dry death. [Exeunt. SCENE II. The island. Before PROSPERO'S cell. Enter PROSPERO and MIRANDA. Mir. 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 suffered Dash'd all to pieces. O, the cry did knock Against my very heart. Poor souls, they perish'd. I have done nothing but in care of thee, who Or blessed was't we did? Pros. Both, both, my girl : 61 By foul play, as thou say'st, were we heaved thence, But blessedly holp hither. Mir. O, my heart bleeds To think o' the teen that I have turn'd you to, Which is from my remembrance ! Please you, farther. [tonio Pros. My brother and thy uncle, call'd An- In dignity, and for the liberal arts And rapt in secret studies. Thy false uncle- Mir. How to deny them, who to advance and who changed 'em, Or else new form'd 'em; having both the key Of officer and office, set all hearts i' the state To what tune pleased 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. Mir. O, good sir, I do. I pray thee, mark me. Awaked an evil nature; and my trust, As my trust was; which had indeed no limit, A confidence sans bound. He being thus lorded, Not only with what my revenue yielded, Mark his condition and the event; Then tell me An undergoing stomach, to bear up Out of his charity, being then appointed Knowing I loved my books, he furnish'd me But ever see that man! Would I might Pros. Now I arise [Resumes his mantle. Sit still, and hear the last of our sea-sorrow. 120 Here in this island we arrived; and here 171 Have I, thy schoolmaster, made the more profit [time Than other princesses can that have more For vainer hours and tutors not so careful. If this might be a brother. ness, 130 The ministers for the purpose hurried thence Me and thy crying self. Mir. Alack, for pity! Mir. Heaven's thank you for't! And now, I pray you, sir, For still 'tis beating in my mind, your reason For raising this sea-storm? Pros. 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 zenith doth depend upon 181 A most auspicious star, whose influence Thou art inclined to sleep: 'tis a good dulness, 140 Ari. Enter ARIEL. All hail, great master! grave sir, hail! I come To answer thy best pleasure; be't to fly, Bore us some leagues to sea; Where they pre- To swim, to dive into the fire, to ride 190 Thou wast that did preserve me. Thou didst And burn in many places; on the topmast, |