We cannot mifs him :9 he does make our fire, That profit us. What ho! flave! Caliban! CAL. [Within] There's wood enough within. PRO. Come forth, I fay; there's other business for thee: Come forth, thou tortoife! when?' Re-enter ARIEL, like a water-nymph. Fine apparition! My quaint Ariel, Hark in thine ear. ARI. My lord, it shall be done. [Exit. PRO. Thou poifonous flave, got by the devil himself Upon thy wicked dam, come forth! Enter CALIBAN. CAL. As wicked dew as e'er my mother brush'd With raven's feather from unwholesome fen, Drop on you both! a fouth-weft blow on ye, And blifter you all o'er! 9 We cannot mifs him :] That is, we cannot do without him. M. MASON. This provincial expreffion is ftill used in the midland counties. MALONE. Come forth, thou tortoife! when ?] This interrogation, indicative of impatience in the highest degree, occurs also in King Richard II. A& I. fc. i.: "When, Harry?" See note on this paffage, A& I. fc. i. In Profpero's fummons to Caliban, however, as it ftands in the old copy, the word forth (which I have repeated for the fake of metre) is wanting. STEEVENS. 2 Cal. As wicked dew as e'er my mother brush'd With raven's feather from unwholesome fen, Drop on you both!] It was a tradition, it feems, that PRO. For this, be fure, to-night thou shalt have cramps, Side-stitches that shall pen thy breath up; urchins 3 Lord Falkland, Lord C. J. Vaughan, and Mr. Selden concurred in observing, that Shakspeare had not only found out a new character in his Caliban, but had also devised and adapted a new manner of language for that character. What they meant by it, without doubt, was, that Shakspeare gave his language a certain grotefque air of the favage and antique; which it certainly has. But Dr. Bentley took this, of a new language, literally; for, fpeaking of a phrafe in Milton, which he fuppofed altogether abfurd and unmeaning, he fays, Satan had not the privilege, as .Caliban in Shakspeare, to ufe new phrafe and diction unknown to all others- and again-to practife diftances is fill a Caliban fiyle. Note on Milton's Paradife Loft, 1. iv. v. 945. But I know of no fuch Caliban ftyle in Shakspeare, that hath new phrafe and diction unknown to all others. WARBURTON. Whence thefe critics derived the notion of a new language ap propriated to Caliban, I cannot find: they certainly miftook brutality of fentiment for uncouthnefs of words. Caliban had learned to fpeak of Profpero and his daughter; he had no names for the fun and moon before their arrival, and could not have invented a language of his own, without more understanding than Shakspeare has thought it proper to bestow upon him. His diction is indeed fomewhat clouded by the gloominefs of his temper, and the malignity of his purposes; but let any other being entertain the fame thoughts, and he will find them eafily iffue in the fame expreffions, JOHNSON, As wicked dew-] Wicked; having baneful qualities. So Spenfer fays, wicked weed; fo, in oppofition, we fay herbs or medicines have virtues. Bacon mentions virtuous bezoar, and Dryden virtuous herbs. JOHNSON. So, in the Book of Haukyng, &c. bl. 1. no date: " If a wycked fellon be fwollen in fuch a manner that a man may hele it, the hauke fhall not dye." Under King Henry VI. the parliament petitioned againft hops, as a wicked weed. See Fuller's Worthies; Ellex. STEEVENS. 3 urchins-] i. e. hedgehogs. Urchins are enumerated by Reginald Scott among other terrific beings. So, in Chapman's May Day, 1611: to fold thyfelf up like an urchin." Again, in Selimus Emperor of the Turks, 1584: " Shall, for that vaft of night that they may work,+ All exercife on thee: thou fhalt be pinch'd "What, are the urchins crept out of their dens, Urchins are perhaps here put for fairies. Milton in his Mafque fpeaks of " urchin blafts," and we ftill call any little dwarfith child, an urchin. The word occurs again in the next act. The echinus, or fea hedge-hog, is ftill denominated the urchin. STEEVENS. In the Merry Wives of Windfor we have " urchins, ouphes, and fairies;" and the paffage to which Mr. Steevens alludes, proves, I think, that urchins here fignifies beings of the fairy kind: "His fpirits hear me, "And yet I needs muft curfe; but they'll nor pinch, 66 Fright me with urchin-fhews, pitch me i' the mire," &c. MALONE. In fupport of Mr. Steevens's note, which does not appear fatisfactory to Mr. Malone, take the following proofs from Hormanni Fulgaria, 4to. 1515, p. 109:-" Urchyns or Hedgehoggis, full of fharpe pryckillys, whan they know that they be hunted, make them rounde lyke a balle." Again, " Porpyns have longer prykels than urchyns." DOUCE. 4for that vaft of night that they may work;] The vaft of night means the night which is naturally empty and deferted, without action; or when all things lying in fleep and filence, makes the world appear one great uninhabited wafte. So, in Hamlet: "In the dead waste and middle of the night." It has a meaning like that of nox vafia. Perhaps, however, it may be ufed with a fignification fomewhat different, in Pericles Prince of Tyre, 1009: "Thou God of this great raft, rebuke the furges." Vaftum is likewise the ancient law term for waste, uncultivated land; and, with this meaning, vaft is used by Chapman in his Shadow of Night, 1594: 66 When unlightfome, vaft, and indigeft, "The formelefs matter of this world did lye." It should be remembered, that, in the pneumatology of former ages, thefe particulars were fettled with the most minute exactness, and the different kinds of vifionary beings had different allotments of time fuitable to the variety or confequence of their employments. During thefe fpaces, they were at liberty to act, but were always obliged to leave off at a certain hour, that they might not interfere in that portion of night which belonged to others. Among As thick as honey-combs, each pinch more ftinging Than bees that made them. CAL. I must eat my dinner. This ifland's mine, by Sycorax my mother, first,5 Thou strok'dft me, and mad'ft much of me; would'ft give me Water with berries in't; and teach me how The fresh springs, brine pits, barren place, and fertile; Curfed be I that did fo!-All the charms 6 Of Sycorax, toads, beetles, bats, light on you! Which first was mine own king: and here you fty me In this hard rock, whiles you do keep from me PRO. Thou most lying flave, Whom stripes may move, not kindness: I have us'd thee, thefe, we may fuppofe urchins to have had a part fubjected to their dominion. To this limitation of time Shakspeare alludes again in K. Lear: "He begins at curfew, and walks till the fecond cock." STEEVENS. • Which thou tak ft from me. When thou cameft first,] We might read "Which thou tak'ft from me. firft." RITSON. When thou cam'ft here All the charms-] The latter word, like many others of the fame kind, is here used as a diffyllable. Malone. Why should we encourage a fuppofition which no inftance whatever countenances? viz. that charms was used as a diffyllable. The verfe is complete without fuch an effort to prolong it: "Curfed be I that did | fo! All | the charms-." STEEVENS. Filth as thou art, with human care; and lodg'd thee CAL. O ho, O ho !7-'would it had been done! Thou didst prevent me; I had peopled elfe This ifle with Calibans. PRO. Abhorred flave;8 Which any print of goodness will not take, Took pains to make thee speak, taught thee cach hour One thing or other: when thou didft not, favage, Oho, O ho!] This favage exclamation was originally and conftantly appropriated by the writers of our ancient Myfteries and Moralities, to the Devil; and has, in this inftance, been transferred to his descendant Caliban. STEEVENS. 8 Abhorred flave ;] This fpeech, which the old copy gives to Miranda, is very judiciously bestowed by Theobald on Profpero. JOHNSON. Mr. Theobald found, or might have found, this speech transferred to Profpero in the alteration of this play by Dryden and Davenant. MALONE. 9 when thou didst not, favage, Know thine own meaning,] By this expreffion, however defective, the poet feems to have meant-When thou didst utter founds, to which thou hadst no determinate meaning: but the following expreffion of Mr. Addifon, in his 389th Spectator, concerning the Hottentots, may prove the best comment on this paffage: "having no language among them but a confused gabble, which is neither well understood by themselves, or others." STEEVENS. I But thy vile race,] The old copy has vild, but it is only the ancient mode of fpelling vile. Race, in this place, seems to fignify original difpofition, inborn qualities. In this fenfe we ftill, |