Though thou didst learn, had that in't which good natures Could not abide to be with; therefore waft thou Defervedly confin'd into this rock, Who hadft deferv'd more than a prifon. CAL. You taught me language; and my profit on't Is, I know how to curfe: The red plague rid you,* PRO. Hag-feed, hence! Fetch us in fuel; and be quick, thou wert best, To anfwer other bufinefs. Shrug'ft thou, malice? If thou neglectft, or doft unwillingly What I command, I'll rack thee with old cramps; Fill all thy bones with aches; make thee roar, That beafts fhall tremble at thy din. CAL No, 'pray thee!I muti obey his art is of fuch power, [Afide. fay-The race of wine: Thus, in Maflinger's New Way to pay id Debts: "There came, not fix days fince, from Hull, a pipe "Of rich canary. "Is it of the right race?" and Sir W. Temple has fomewhere applied it to works of literature. STEEVENS. Race and racinefs in wine, fignifies a kind of tartnefs. 2 BLACKSTONE. the red plague rid you,] Ifuppofe from the redness of the body, univerfally inflamed. JoHNSON. The eryfipelas was anciently called the red plague. STEEVENS. So again, in Coriolanus: "Now the red peftilence ftrike all trades in Rome !" The word rid, which has not been explained, means to defiroy. So, in K. Henry VI. P. II : "If you ever chance to have a child, "Look, in his youth, to have him fo cut off, "As, deathfien! you have rid this fweet young prince." MALONE. It would control my dam's god, Setebos,3 PRO So, flave; hence! [Exit CALIBAN. Re-enter ARIEL invifible, playing and finging; FERDINAND following him. 3 ARIEL'S Song. Come unto thefe yellow fands, my dam's god, Setebos,] A gentleman of great merit, Mr. Warner, has obferved on the authority of John Barbot, that "the Patagons are reported to dread a great horned devil, called Setebus.It may be asked, however, how Shakspeare knew any thing of this, as Barbot was a voyager of the present century?——— Perhaps he had read Eden's Hifiory of Travayle, 1577, who tells us, p. 434, that "the giantes, when they found themselves fettered, roared ike buis, and cried upon Setebos to help them."The metathefis in Caliban from Canibal is evident. FARMER. We learn from Magellan's voyage, that Setebos was the supreme god of the Patagons, and Cheleule was an inferior one. TOLLET. Setebos is alfo mentioned in Hackluyt's Voyages, 1598. MALONE. Re-enter Ariel invifible,] In the wardrobe of the Lord Admiral's men, (i. e. company of comedians,) 1598, was-" a robe for to goo invifebell." See the MS. from Dulwich college, quoted by Mr. Malone, Vol. III. STEEVENS. 5 Court fied when you have, and kifs'd,] As was anciently done at the beginning of fome dances. So, in K. Henry VIII. that prince fays to Anna Bullen "I were unmannerly to take you out, "And not to kiss you." The wild waves whift;] i. e. the wild waves being filent. So, in Spenfer's Fairy Queen, B. VII. c. 7. f. 59: "So was the Titaneis put down, and whist." Foot it featly here and there; And, Jweet jprites, the burden bear." BUR. Bowgh, wowgh. The watch-dogs bark: BUR. Bowgh, wowgh. Hark, hark! I hear [difperfedly. [difperfedly. The firain of firutting chanticlere Cry, Cock-a-doodle-doo. FER. Where should this musick be? i' the air, or the earth? It founds no more:-and fure, it waits upon And Milton feems to have had our author in his eye. See ftanza 5, of his Hymn on the Nativity: "The winds with wonder whift, cc Smoothly the waters kiss'd." So again, both Lord Surrey and Phaer, in their translations of the fecond book of Virgil: " Conticuere omnes. They whifted all." and Lyly, in his Maid's Metamorphofis, 1600: 6 66 But every thing is quiet, whift, and ftill." STEEVENS. the burden bear.] Old copy-bear the burden. Corrected by Mr. Theobald. MALONE. Weeping again the king my father's wreck,] Thus the old copy; but in the books of Shakspeare's age again is fometimes printed instead of against, [i. e. oppofite to,] which I am perfuaded was our author's word. The placing Ferdinand in fuch a fituation that he could still gaze upon the wrecked veffel, is one of Shakspeare's touches of nature. Again is inadmiffible; for this would import that Ferdinand's tears had ceased for a time; whereas he himself tells us, afterwards, that from the hour of his father's wreck they had never ceafed to flow : Myfelf am Naples, "Who with mine eyes, ne'er fince at ebb, beheld This mufick crept by me upon the waters;8 ARIEL fings. Full fathom five thy father lies ;9 However, as our author fometimes forgot to compare the different parts of his play, I have made no change. MALOne. By the word-again, I fuppofe the Prince means only to defcribe the repetition of his forrows. Befides, it appears from Miranda's defcription of the ftorm, that the ship had been swallowed by the waves, and, confequently, could no longer be an object of fight. STEEVENS. This mufick crept by me upon the waters ;] So, in Milton's Mafque: a foft and folemn breathing found "Rofe like a steam of rich diftill'd perfumes, "And stole upon the air." STEEVENS. 9 Full fathom five thy father lies; &c.] Ariel's lays, [which have been condemned by Gildon as trifling, and defended not very fuccessfully by Dr. Warburton,] however seasonable and efficacious, must be allowed to be of no fupernatural dignity or elegance; they express nothing great, nor reveal any thing above mortal discovery. The reason for which Ariel is introduced thus trifling is, that he and his companions are evidently of the fairy kind, an order of beings to which tradition has always afcribed a fort of diminutive agency, powerful but ludicrous, a humorous and frolick controlment of nature, well expreffed by the fongs of Ariel. JOHNSON. The fongs in this play, Dr. Wilfon, who refet and published two of them, tells us, in his Court Ayres, or Ballads, published at Oxford, 1660, that " Full fathom five," and "Where the bee fucks," had been first set by Robert Johnson, a composer contemporary with Shakspeare. BURNEY. I Nothing of him that doth fade, But doth fuffer a fea-change-] The meaning is Every thing about him, that is liable to alteration, is changed. STEEVENS. But doth fuffer a fea-change2 Hark! now I hear them,-ding-dong, bell.s [Burden, ding-dong.4 FER. The ditty does remember my drown'd father : This is no mortal bufinefs, nor no found That the earth owes :5-I hear it now above me. PRO. The fringed curtains of thine eye advance 2 But doth fuffer a fea-change-] So, in Milton's Masque: "And underwent a quick immortal change." 3 Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell : STEEVENS. Burden, ding-dong.] So, in The Golden Garland of Princely Delight, &c. 13th edition, 1690: "Corydon's doleful knell to the tune of Ding, dong." "Yet will I ring her knell, Ding, dong." The fame burthen to a fong occurs in The Merchant of Venice, A& III. fc. ii. STEEVENS. Burden, ding-dong.] It fhould be— Ding-dong, ding-dong, ding-dong bell. FARMER. 5 That the earth owes:] To owe, in this place, as well as many others, fignifies to own. So, in Othello: that sweet sleep "Which thou ow'dfi yesterday." Again, in the Tempefi: thou doft here ufurp "The name thou ow'ft not.' " To use the word in this fenfe, is not peculiar to Shakspeare. I meet with it in Beaumont and Fletcher's Beggar's Bufh: "If now the beard be fuch, what is the prince "That owes the beard?" STEEVENS. The fringed curtains, &c.] The fame expreffion occurs in Pericles Prince of Tyre, 1609: 66 her eyelids "Begin to part their fringes of bright gold." |