Alon. Give me your hands:

Let grief and forrow ftill embrace his heart,
That doth not wish you joy!

Gon. Be't fo, Amen!

Re-enter Ariel, with the Mafter and Boatfwain amazedly following.

O look, fir, look, fir, here are more of us!
I prophefy'd, if a gallows were on land,

This fellow could not drown :-Now, blafphemy,
That fwear'ft grace o'erboard, not an oath on fhore?
Haft thou no mouth by land? What is the news?

Boatf. The best news is, that we have fafely found Our king, and company: the next, our fhip,Which but three glaffes fince, we gave out fplit,Is tight, and yare, and bravely rigg'd, as when We first put out to fea.

Ari. Sir, all this fervice Have I done fince I went.

Pro. My trickfy spirit!

}

[Afide

Alon. These are not natural events; they ftrengthen, From strange to ftranger:-Say, how came you hither?

When is certainly right; i. e. at a time when no one was in his fenfes. Shakespeare could not have written where, (i. e. in the ifland) because the mind of Profpero, who lived in it, had not been difordered. It is ftill faid, in colloquial language, that a madman is not his own man, i. e. is not master of himself.

STEEVENS.

My trickfy Spirit!] is, I believe, my clever, adroit fpirit. Shakespeare ufes the fame word elsewhere:

66

66

-that for a tricky word

Defy the matter."

So in the interlude of the Disobedient Child, bl. 1. no date: "invent and feek out

"To make them go trickfie, gallaunt and cleane.” Again, in the interlude of Jacob and Efau, 1568:

"Mary, fir, now is Maifter Jacob trimme indeede,
"That is all trickfie and gallant, &c."

Again, in Warner's Albion's England, 1602, b. VI. ch. 31:
"There was a trickfic girl, I wot albeit clad in gray."

STEEVENS.

Boatf.

Beatf. If I did think, fir, I were well awake, I'd strive to tell you. We were dead afleep', And (how, we know not) all clapp'd under hatches, Where, but even now, with ftrange and feveral noifes Of roaring, fhrieking, howling, gingling chains, And more diverfity of founds, all horrible, We were awak'd; straightway, at liberty: Where we, in all her trim, freshly beheld Our royal, good, and gallant ship; our mafter Cap'ring to eye her: On a trice, so please you, Even in a dream, were we divided from them, And were brought moping hither.

Ari. Was't well done?

Pro. Bravely, my diligence. Thou shalt [Afide.

be free.

Alon. This is as ftrange a maze as e'er men trod; And there is in this bufinefs more than nature Was ever conduct of: fome oracle

Muft rectify our knowledge.

Pro. Sir, my liege,

Do not infeft your mind with beating on
The strangeness of this bufinefs; at pick'd leifure,
Which fhall be fhortly, fingle I'll refolve you,
(Which to you shall feem probable) of every

3

4

Thefe

dead afleep,] The old copy reads-of fleep. STEEVENS. conduct for conductor. So in Ben Jonfon's Every Man out f bis Humour:

"Come, gentlemen, I will be your conduct." STEEVENS. with beating on

The ftrangeness, &c.] A fimilar expreffion occurs in one of parts of Hen. VI:

-your thoughts

"Beat on a crown."

Beating may mean hammering, working in the mind, dwelling long upon. So in the preface to Stanyhurit's Tranflation of Virgil, 1582: For my part, I purpofe not to beat on everye childish tittle that concerneth profodie." Again, Miranda, in the fecond fcene of this play, tells her father that the ftorm is still beating in her mind. STEEVENS.

(Which to you fall seem probable)] Thefe words feem, at the first view, to have no ufe; fome lines are perhaps loft with which

they

These happen'd accidents: till when, be cheerful, And think of each thing well. Come hither,

fpirit;

Set Caliban and his companions free :

[To Ariel.
Untie the spell. How fares my gracious fir?
There are yet miffing of your company
Some few odd lads, that you remember not.

Re-enter Ariel, driving in Caliban, Stephano, and
Trinculo, in their fiolen apparel.

Ste. Every man fhift for all the reft, and let no man take care for himfelf; for all is but fortune:Coragio, bully-monfter, Coragio?!

Trin. If these be true fpies which I wear in my head, here's a goodly fight.

Cal. O Setebos, these be brave fpirits, indeed! How fine my mafter is! I am afraid

He will chaftise me.

Seb. Ha, ha;

What things are thefe, my lord Anthonio!
Will money buy them?

Ant. Very like; one of them

Is a plain fifh, and, no doubt, marketable.

Pro. Mark but the badges of thefe men, my lords, Then fay, if they be true:-This mif-shapen

knave,

8

they were connected. Or we may explain them thus: I will re folve you, by yourself, which method, when you hear the story [of Anthonio's and Sebaftian's plot] fhall feem probable; that is, Shall deferve your approbation. JOHNSON.

Surely Profpero's meaning is: "I will relate to you the means by which I have been enabled to accomplish these ends; which means, though they now appear ftrange and improbable, will then appear otherwife." ANONYMOUS.

7 Coragio!] This exclamation of encouragement I find in J. Florio's Tranflation of Montaigne, 1603:

66

You often cried Coragio, and called ça, ça.” Again, in the Blind Beggar of Alexandria, 1598. STEEVENS. -true:-] That is, boneft. A true man is, in the language of that time, oppofed to a thief. The fenfe is, Mark what these men wear, and fay if they are honeft. JOHNSON.

His mother was a witch; and one fo strong
That could controul the moon, make flows and ebbs, -
And deal in her command without her power:
These three have robb'd me; and this demi-devil
(For he's a baftard one) had plotted with them,
To take my life: two of these fellows, you
Muft know, and own; this thing of darkness, I
Acknowledge mine.

Cal. I fhall be pinch'd to death.

Alon. Is not this Stephano, my drunken butler?
Seb. He's drunk now: Where had he wine?
Alon. 9 And Trinculo is reeling ripe: Where should
they

9 And Trinculo is reeling ripe; where Should they

Find this grand LIQUOR that hath gilded them?-] Shakespeare, to be fure, wrote-grand 'LIXIR, álluding to the grand Elixir of the alchymifts, which they pretend would restore youth, and confer immortality. This, as they faid, being a preparation of gold they called Aurum potabile; which Shakefpeare alluded to in the word gilded; as he does again in Anthony and Cleopatra:

"How much art thou unlike Mark Anthony?

"Yet coming from him, that great med'cine hath,
"With his tinct gilded thee."

But the joke here is to infinuate that, notwithstanding all the boafts of the chymists, fack was the only reftorer of youth, and bestower of immortality. So Ben Jonfoh, in his Every Man out of his Humour :-" Canarie the very Elixar and spirit of wine." This feems to have been the cant name for fack, of which the English were, at that time, immoderately fond. Randolph, in his Jealous Lovers, fpeaking of it, fays,-"A pottle of Elixar at the Pegafus bravely caroufed." So again in Fletcher's Monfieur Thomas, act III:

"Old reverend fack, which, for ought that I can read

yet,

"Was that philofopher's ftone the wife king Ptolemeus
"Did all his wonders by.".

The phrafe too of being gilded was a trite one on this occafion.
Fletcher, in his Chances:- "Duke. Is he not drunk too? Whore.
A little gilded o'er, fir; old fack, old fack, boys!" WARB.

As the alchymift's Elixir was fuppofed to be a liquor, the old reading may ftand, and the allufion holds good without any alteration. STEEVENS.

Find this grand liquor that hath gilded them
How cam'ft thou in this pickle?

Trin. I have been in fuch a pickle, fince I faw you laft, that, I fear me, will never out of my bones: I shall not fear fly-blowing'.

Seb. Why, how now, Stephano?

Ste. O, touch me not; I am not Stephano, but a cramp 2.

Pro. You'd be king of the ifle, firrah?
Ste. I fhould have been a fore one then.
Alon. This is a strange thing as e'er I look'd on.

[Pointing to Caliban.
Pro. He is as difproportion'd in his manners,
As in his fhape:-Go, firrah, to my cell;
Take with you your companions; as you look
To have my pardon, trim it handsomely.

Cal. Ay, that I will; and I'll be wife hereafter, And feek for grace: What a thrice-double afs Was I, to take this drunkard for a god, And worship this dull fool?

Pro. Go to; away!

Alon. Hence, and bestow your luggage where you found it.

Seb. Or ftole it, rather.

Pro. Sir, I invite your highness, and your train, To my poor cell where you fhall take your reft For this one night; which (part of it) I'll wafte With such discourse, as, I not doubt, fhall make it. Go quick away: the ftory of my life, And the particular accidents, gone by,

Ay-blowing. This pickle alludes to their plunge into the ftinking pool; and pickling preferves meat from fly-blowing

2

STEEVENS.

but a cramp.] i. e. I am all over a cramp. Profpero had ordered Ariel to Jhorten up their finews with aged cramps. Touch me not alludes to the forenes occafioned by them. In the next line the speaker confirms this meaning by a quibble on the word fore.

STEEVENS.