The Family Shakspeare

TEMPEST.

Other Spirits attending on Prospero.

GONZALO, an honest old Counsellor of Naples.

ADRIAN,

FRANCISCO,

}

Lords.

CALIBAN, a savage and deformed Slave.

TRINCULO, a Jester.

STEPHANO, a drunken Butler.

Master of a Ship, Boatswain, and Mariners.

SCENE, the Sea, with a Ship; afterwards an uninhabited Island.

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SCENE I.-On a Ship at Sea.

A storm with thunder and lightning.

Enter a Ship-master and a Boatswain. Master. Boatswain,

ACT I.

Boats. Here, master: what cheer? Master. Good: Speak to the mariners fall to't yarely, or we run ourselves aground: bestir, bestir. [Erit.

Gon. Good; yet remember whom thou hast aboard.

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, 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.

Re-enter Boatswain.

Boats. Down with the topmast; yare; lower, ГА сту lower; bring her to try with main course. within.] A plague upon this howling! they are louder than the weather, or our office

Re-enter SEBASTIAN, ANTONIO, and GONZALO. Yet again? what do you here? Shall we give o'er and drown? Have you a mind to sink?

Sed. A plague o' your throat! you bawling, blasphemous, uncharitable dog!

2 Present instant.

Gon.
Though every drop of water swear against it,
And gape at wid'st to glut him.
[A confused noise within.]

split, we split! - Farewell, my wife and children!
Farewell, brother; -We split, we split, we split!
Ant. Let's all sink with the king.
Seb. Let's take leave of him.

[Exit. [Erit. 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.

SCENE II.

[Exit.

Lend thy hand,

I should inform thee further.
And pluck my magic garment from me. - So;
[Lays down his mantle.

Lie there my art.

comfort.

- Wipe thou thine eyes; have

The direful spectacle of the wreck, which touch'd
The very virtue of compassion in thee,
I have with such provision in mine art
So safely order'd, that there is no soul
No, not so much perdition as an hair,
Betid to any creature in the vessel
Which thou heard'st cry, which thou saw'st sink.
Sit down;

For thou must now know further.

Mira.

You have often

Begun to tell me what I am; but stopp'd
And left me to a bootless inquisition;
Concluding, Stay, not yet.

Pro.

The hour's now come;

The very minute bids thee ope thine ear;
Obey, and be attentive. Canst thou remember
A time before we came into this cell?

I do not think thou canst; for then thou wast not
Out three years old.

Mira.

Certainly, sir, I can.
Pro. By what? by any other house, or person?
Of any thing the image tell me, that
Hath kept with thy remembrance.

Mira.

'Tis far off;
And rather like a dream than an assurance
Had I not
That my remembrance warrants:
Four or five women once, that tended me?
Pro. Thou had'st, and more, Miranda: But how
is it,

That this lives in thy mind? What seest thou else
In the dark backward and abysm of time?

The Island: before the Cell of If thou remember'st aught, ere thou cam'st here,
Prospero.
How thou cam'st here, thou may`st.
Mira.
Pro. Twelve years since,

Enter PROSPERO and MIRANDA.

But that I do not.

Mira. If by your art, my dearest father, you Miranda, twelve years since, thy father was

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

Mira.

Both, both, my girl:
we heav'd
say'st, were

O, my heart bleeds
To think o' the teen 5 that I have turn'd you to,
Please you,
Which is from my remembrance!

further.

Pro. My brother, and thy uncle, call'd Antonio, that a brother should I pray thee, mark me,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,

Pro. I thus neglecting wordly ends, all dedi- Bore us some leagues to sea; where they prepar'd

cate

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, did beget of him
A falsehood, in its contrary as great

- like one

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,
Who, having unto truth, by telling of it,
Made such a sinner of his memory,
To credit his own lie, - he did believe
He was 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 skreen 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.

Pro. Mark his condition, and the event; then Sit still, and hear the last of our sea-sorrow.

tell me, If this might be a brother.

I should sin

Mir. To think but nobly of my grandmother. 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.

6 Cut away..

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