I have done nothing but in care of thee, Of thee, my dear one! thee, my daughter!) who Art ignorant of what thou art, nought knowing Of whence I am; nor that I am more better & Than Profpero, mafter of a full poor cell", And thy no greater father. Mira. More to know Did never meddle' with my thoughts. 1 fhould inform thee further. Lend thy hand, fort. The diceful fpectacle of the wreck, which touch'd The very virtue of compaffion in thee, Miranda, when the fpeaks the words, O, woe the day! fuppofes, not that the crew had efcaped, but that her father thought differently from her, and counted their deftruction na barm. JOHNSON more better. This ungrammatical expreffion is very frequent among our oldeft writers. So in the Hiftory of Helyas Knight of the Swan. bl. L. no date: imprinted by William Copland And alfo the more footer to come, without prolixity, to the true Chronicles, &c." Again in the True Tragedies of Marins and Scilla. 1594 "To wait a meffage of more better worth.” Again, ibid 9 That hale more greater than Caffandra now." STEEVENS. -full poor cell, i e. a cell in a great degree of poverty. So in Antony and Cleopatra, act I. fc. i.—I am full forry. STEEVENS. › Did nover meddle swith my thoughts.] To meddle, in this inftance, seems to fignify to mingle. Hence the fubftantive medley. To meddle for to mix is used at least twenty times in the ancient Book of Hawking, &c. commonly called the Book of St. Alban's, and yet more often by Chaucer. STEEVENS. 2 Lye there my art.] Sir W. Cecil, lord Burleigh, lord high treafurer, &c. in the reign of queen Elizabeth, when he put off This gown at night, used to fay, Lie there, lord treasurer. See Peck's Defiderata Curiofa. STEEVENS. 2 virtue of compaion Virtue; the most efficacious part, the energetic quality; in a like fenfe.we fay, The virtue of a plant is in the extract. JOHNSON. I have with fuch provifion in mine art Which thou heard'ft cry, which thou faw'ft fink. Sit down; For thou must now know further. Mira. You have often Begun to tell me what I am; but stopp'd, Pro. The hour's now come; The very minute bids thee ope thine ear; I do not think, thou canft; for then thou waft not 5 Out three years old. Mira, Certainly, fir, I can. Pro. By what? by any other house, or perfon? that there is no foul-] Thus the old editions read, but this is apparently defective. Mr. Rowe, and after him Dr. Warburton, read that there is no foul loft, without any notice of the variation. Mr. Theobald fubftitutes no foil, and Mr. Pope follows him. To come fo near the right, and yet to miss it, is unlucky: the author probably wrote no foil, no ftain, no fpot: for fo Ariel tells, Not a hair perif'd; On their fuftaining garments not a blemish, And Gonzalo, The rarity of it is, that our garments being drench'd in the fea, keep notwithstanding their freshness and gloffes. Of this emendation I find that the author of notes on The Tempest had a glimpfe, but could not keep it. JOHNSON. —~no foul—] Such interruptions are not uncommon to Shakespeare. He fometimes begins a fentence, and before he concludes it, entirely changes the conftruction, because another, more forcible, occurs. As this change frequently happens in conversation, it may be fuffered to pafs uncenfured in the language of the stage. STEEVENS. 5 Out three years old.] i. e. Quite three years old, three years old full-out, complete. Mr. Pope, without occafion, reads, FULL three years old. STEEVENS. Of Of any thing the image tell me, that And rather like a dream, than an affurance Pro. Thou hadft, and more, Miranda: But how is it, That this lives in thy mind? What feeft thou elfe Mira. But that I do not. Pro. Twelve years fince, Miranda, twelve years fince, 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 faid-thou waft my daughter; and thy father Was duke of Milan; 7 thou his only heir And princefs, no worse iffu'd. Mira. O the heavens! What foul play had we, that we came from thence? Or bleffed was't, we did? Pro. Both, both, my girl: By foul play, as thou fay'ft, were we heav'd thence; But bleffedly holp hither. abyfin of time.] This method of fpelling the word, is common to other ancient writers. They took it from the French abysme, now written abime. So in Heywood's Brazen Age, 1613. "And chafe him from the deep abyfms below. STEEVENS. 7 Perhaps and thou his only heir. JOHNSON. The old copy reads - --- and princefs and his only heir Perhaps we should read,-and his only heir A princess:no orfe iffued. Iffued is defcended. So in Greene's Card of Fancy, 1608. For I am by birth a gentleman, and iffued of fuch parents,' &c. STEEVENS. Mira. O, my heart bleeds. 8 To think o' the teen that I have turn'd you to, Without a parallel; thofe being all my ftudy, And to my state grew ftranger, being transported, Mira. Sir, moft heedfully. Pro. Being once perfected how to grant fuits, How to deny them; whom to advance, and whom To trash for over-topping; new created The creatures that were mine; I fay, or chang'd 'em, Or else new form'd 'em having both the key Of -teen.-] Is forrow, grief, trouble. So in Romeo and Juliet: -to my teen be it spoken." STEEVENS. 66 To trash for over-topping;] To trah, as Dr. Warburton obferves, is to cut away the fuperfluities. This word I have met with in books containing directions for gardeners, published in the time of queen Elizabeth. The prefent explanation may be countenanced by the following paffage in Warner's Albions England, 1602. b. x. ch. 57. "Who fuffreth none by might, by wealth or blood to overtopp, "Himfelf gives all preferment, and whom lifteth him, doth lop.' Again in our author's K. Richard II. Go thou, and like an executioner, Cut off the heads of too-fast-growing sprays That look too lofty in our commonwealth. Mr. Warton's note, however, on trash for his quick hunting," in the fecond act of Othello, leaves my interpretation of this paffage exceedingly difputable. STEEVENS. -both the key ] Key in this place feems to fignify the key of a mufical inftrument, by which he fet Hearts to tune. JOHNSON. Of officer and office, fet all hearts i' the state To what tune pleas'd his ear; that now he was Pro. I pray thee, mark me. I thus neglecting worldly ends, all dedicated Like a good parent, did beget of him As my trust was; which had, indeed, no limit, Who This doubtless is meant of a key for tuning the harpsichord, fpinnet, or virginal; we call it now a tuning hammer, as it is ufed as well to strike down the iron pins whereon the ftrings are wound, as to turn them. As a key it acts like that of a watch. Sir J. HAWKINS. 2 Like a good, &c.] Alluding to the observation, that a father above the common rate of men has commonly a fon below it. Heroum filii noxa. JOHNSON. 3 -like one, Who having, INTO truth, by telling of it, To credit his own lie,] The corrupted reading of the fecond line has rendered this beautiful fimilitude quite unintelligible. For what is [having into truth?] or what doth [it] refer to not to [truth,] because if he told truth he could never credit a lie. And yet there is no other correlative to which [it] can belong. I read and point it thus: i.e. by often repeating the fame story, made his memory fuch a finner unto truth, as to give credit to his own lie. A miferable delufion, to which ftory-tellers are frequently fubject. The |