Was the first man that leap'd; cried, "Hell is empty,

And all the devils are here."

On their sustaining garments not a blemish,
But fresher than before: and, as thou bad'st me,
In troops I have dispers'd them 'bout the isle.
The king's son have I landed by himself,
Whom I left cooling of the air with sighs
In an odd angle of the isle, and sitting,
His arms in this sad knot.

Pro.

Of the king's ship

The mariners, say, how thou hast dispos'd,
And all the rest o' the fleet ?

Ari.
Safely in harbour
Is the king's ship; in the deep nook, where once
Thou call'dst me up at midnight to fetch dew
From the still-vex'd Bermoothes 10, there she's hid:
The mariners all under hatches stow'd;

Whom, with a charm join'd to their suffer'd labour,
I have left asleep and for the rest o' the fleet
Which I dispers'd, they all have met again,
And all upon the Mediterranean float',

Bound sadly home for Naples,

Supposing that they saw the king's ship wreck'd,
And his great person perish.

Pro.

Exactly is perform'd; but there's more work.

What is the time o' the day?

Ari.

Ariel, thy charge

Past the mid season.

10 From the still-vex'd BERMOOTHES,] i. e. Bermudas, commonly known, in Shakespeare's time and afterwards, as “the Isle of Devils," from the evil spirits by which it was supposed to be inhabited. See the "Introduction," p. 6.

1 And ALL upon the Mediterranean FLOAT,] It is "And are upon the Mediterranean float" in the folios; but according to the old corrector of the folio, 1632, are is a misprint for "all." The same blunder is committed in "The Comedy of Errors," A. v. sc. 1:

"And thereupon these errors are arose,"

44

instead of "all arose." The objection, that float," or flole, was not used in English as a substantive, ought not to prevail, because it is so employed several times by T. Lodge in his “Glaucus and Silla,” 1589. If we take flote as a substantive, we must derive it from the Fr. flot.

Pro. At least two glasses. The time 'twixt six and now Must by us both be spent most preciously.

Ari. Is there more toil? Since thou dost give me pains, Let me remember thee what thou hast promis'd,

Which is not yet perform'd me.

Pro.

What is't thou canst demand?

Ari.

How now! moody?

My liberty.

I prithee

Pro. Before the time be out? no more.
Ari.

Remember, I have done thee worthy service;

Told thee no lies, made thee no mistakings, serv'd

Without or grudge, or grumblings'. Thou didst promise To bate me a full year.

Pro.

Dost thou forget

No.

From what a torment I did free thee?

Ari.

Pro. Thou dost; and think'st it much, to tread the ooze

Of the salt deep,

To run upon the sharp wind of the north,

To do me business in the veins o' th' earth,
When it is bak'd with frost.

Ari.

I do not, sir.

Pro. Thou liest, malignant thing! Hast thou forgot The foul witch Sycorax, who, with age and envy,

Was grown into a hoop? hast thou forgot her?

Ari. No, sir.

Pro.

tell me.

Thou hast. Where was she born? speak;

Ari. Sir, in Argier'.

Pro.

Oh! was she so? I must,

Once in a month, recount what thou hast been,

Which thou forget'st. This damn'd witch, Sycorax,

For mischiefs manifold, and sorceries terrible

To enter human hearing, from Argier,

Thou know'st, was banish'd: for one thing she did,
They would not take her life.

Ari. Ay, sir.

Is not this true?

* Without or grudge, or GRUMBLINGS.] The corr. fo. 1632 puts "grumblings," like "grudge," in the singular, but the change is not necessary. Perhaps for the sake of the measure it strikes out "thee" in the preceding line, but we hesitate to follow the example, merely because the line may be a syllable too long, when counted on the fingers.

Sir, in Argier.] The name for Algiers till about the Restoration.

Pro. This blue-ey'd hag was hither brought with child,
And here was left by the sailors: thou, my slave
As thou report'st thyself, wast then her servant:
And, for thou wast a spirit too delicate
To act her earthy and abhorr'd commands,
Refusing her grand hests', she did confine thee,
By help of her more potent ministers,
And in her most unmitigable rage,
Into a cloven pine; within which rift
Imprison'd, thou didst painfully remain

A dozen years; within which space she died,

And left thee there, where thou didst vent thy groans
As fast as mill-wheels strike. Then was this island

(Save for the son that she did litter here,

A freckled whelp, hag-born) not honour'd with
A human shape.

Pro. Dull thing, I say so; he, that Caliban,
Whom now I keep in service. Thou best know'st
What torment I did find thee in: thy groans
Did make wolves howl, and penetrate the breasts
Of ever-angry bears. It was a torment
To lay upon the damn'd, which Sycorax
Could not again undo: it was mine art,
When I arriv'd and heard thee, that made gape
The pine, and let thee out.

Ari.

I thank thee, master.

Pro. If thou more murmur'st, I will rend an oak,

And peg thee in his knotty entrails, till

Thou hast howl'd away twelve winters.

What shall I do? say what? what shall I do?

Pro. Go, make thyself like a nymph o' the sea: be subject

To no sight but thine and mine; invisible

To every eyeball else. Go, take this shape,

• Refusing her grand HESTS,] i. e. Behests: see Vol. ii. p. 153, and Vol. iii. p. 351: the word "commands " in the preceding line explains "hests," and instances must here be needless.

And hither come in't: go; hence, with diligence.

Awake, dear heart, awake! thou hast slept well;
Awake!

Mira. The strangeness of your story put
Heaviness in me.

Pro.

Shake it off. Come on:

We'll visit Caliban, my slave, who never

Yields us kind answer.

Mira.

I do not love to look on.

Pro.

"Tis a villain, sir,

But, as 'tis,

We cannot miss him': he does make our fire,
Fetch in our wood, and serves in offices
That profit us.-What ho! slave! Caliban!
Thou earth, thou! speak.

Cal. [Within.] There's wood enough within.

[Exit ARIEL.

[Waking'.

Pro. Come forth, I say: there's other business for thee. Come, thou tortoise! when'?

Re-enter ARIEL, like a water-nymph.

Fine apparition! My quaint Ariel,

Hark in thine ear.

Ari.

My lord, it shall be done.

Pro. Thou poisonous slave, 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,

[Exit.

' Waking.] Editors, from all time, have sent Miranda to sleep, in their marfo. ginal notes, but never waked her: this stage-direction is also new in the corr. 1632, and shows (if it could be doubted) the precise moment when the slumber of the heroine was to end. Mr. Singer, as if only to avoid the very word of the old obnoxious annotator, prints it "awaking."

• We cannot miss him :] i. e. We cannot do without him, we must not miss him; a provincialism (says Malone) of the midland counties. No similar use of it has been pointed out in other writers.

7 Come, thou tortoise! when?] A very common form of expression in our old dramatists, indicative of impatience. See also Vol. iii. p. 224.

With raven's feather] A most appropriate instrument in the hands of a witch, and we need not look for examples of similar applications of the plumage of that bird of ill omen. In the Rev. Mr. Dyce's edition of Middleton (Vol. v. p. 55) there is as remarkable an error, in reference to the word " raven, as, perhaps,

"

Drop on you both! a south-west blow on ye,
And blister you all o'er!

Pro. For this, be sure, to-night thou shalt have cramps,
Side-stitches that shall pen thy breath up; urchins
Shall, for that vast of night that they may work',
All exercise on thee: thou shalt be pinch'd

As thick as honey-comb, each pinch more stinging
Than bees that made 'em.

Cal.

I must eat my dinner.

This island's mine, by Sycorax my mother,

Which thou tak'st from me. When thou camest first,

Thou strok❜dst me, and mad'st much of me; wouldst give me Water with berries in't; and teach me how

To name the bigger light, and how the less,

That burn by day and night: and then I lov'd thee,

And show'd thee all the qualities o' th' isle,

The fresh springs, brine pits, barren place, and fertile.
Cursed be I that did so!-All the charms

Of Sycorax, toads, beetles, bats, light on you!

For I am all the subjects that you have,

Which first was mine own king; and here you sty me,
In this hard rock, whiles you do keep from me

The rest o' th' island.

Pro.

Thou most lying slave,

Whom stripes may move, not kindness, I have us'd thee,

Filth as thou art, with human care; and lodg'd thee

In mine own cell, till thou didst seek to violate

The honour of my child.

Cal. Oh ho! oh ho!-would it had been done!

was ever pointed out, and it remains uncorrected, the learned, but somewhat hasty editor having allowed ram to stand in his text instead of “raven." The passage is met with in "No Wit, no Help like a Woman's," A. ii. sc. 2:

"Would that Flemish ram

Had neer come near our house!"

It is marvellous that the occurrence of the words "nest" and "egg," in the very next line, did not prove to Mr. Dyce that ram could not be right, and that "raven "" (written of old with u instead of v) had been mistaken for it: he is certainly the first English author who has supposed that Flemish rams laid eggs and made nests. The oversight is, as Mr. Dyce elsewhere expresses it, "a degree beyond the ridiculous," ("Remarks," p. 248,) because the whole context shows that the "Flemish raven had been a bird of ill omen to Sir Oliver Twilight, and had just conveyed most dismal news to him. This ram's nest (he must pardon us for saying) may rival any "mare's nest" yet discovered.

9

"

for that VAST OF NIGHT that they may work,] So in "Hamlet," Vol. vii. p. 209, "In the dead vast and middle of the night." The "vast of night" is the empty space of night. Urchins" here means fairies, not hedge-hogs.