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mafter's whistle :-Blow, till thou burft thy wind, if

room enough + !

Enter ALONSO,

SEBASTIAN, ANTHONIO,

FERDINAND, GONZALO, and others.

Alon. Good boatswain, have care. Where's the mafter?

Play the men 5.

Boat. I pray now, keep below.

Ant. Where is the master, boatswain ?
Boats. Do you not hear him?

You mar our labour;

Keep your cabins: you do affift the form.
Gon. Nay, good, be patient.

Boats. When the fea is. Hence! What care these roarers for the name of king? To cabin: filence: trouble

us not.

Gon. Good; yet remember whom thou haft aboard.

Boats. None that I more love than myself. You are a counfellor; if you can command thefe elements to filence, and work the peace of the prefent, we will not hand a rope more; ufe your authority. If you cannot, give thanks you have liv'd fo long, and make yourfelf ready in your cabin for the mifchance of the hour, if it so hap.Cheerly, good hearts.-Out of our way, I fay. [Exit. Gon. I have great comfort from this fellow; methinks,

he

was difcovered and before 1614, when Jonfon fneers at it in his Bartholomero Fair. In the latter plays of Shakspeare, he has lefs of pun and quibble than in his early ones. In The Merchant of Venice he exprefsly declares against them. This perhaps might be one criterion to difcover the dates of his plays. BLACKSTONE.

See a note on The cloud-capt Towers, &c. act iv. STEEVENS. See alfo An Attempt to afcertain the order of Shakspeare's Plays, ante. MALONE.

-room enough.] We might read-blow till thou burst thee, wind! if room enough. And yet, defiring the winds to blow till they burst their winds, is not unlike many other conceits of Shakspeare. STEEVENS. s Play the men.] i. e. act with fpirit, behave like men. Avers 15:, φίλοι. STEEVENS.

of the prefent,] It may mean of the prefent inflant. STEEVENS. ? Gon.] It may be obferved of Gonzalo, that, being the only good

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he hath no drowning mark upon him; his complexion is perfect gallows. Stand faft, good fate, to his hanging; make the rope of his destiny our cable, for our own doth little advantage: If he be not bora to be hang'd, our cafe is miferable. [Exeunt.

Re-enter Boatswain.

Boat. Down with the topmaft; yare, lower, lower ; bring her to try with main-courie. [A cry within.] A plague upon this howling! they are louder than the weather, or our office.

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

Seb. A pox of your throat! you bawling, blafphemous, incharitable dog!

Boat. Work you, then.

Ant. Hang, cur, hang! you whorefon, infolent noifemaker, we are lefs afraid to be drown'd than thou art. Gon. I'll warrant him from drowning; though the fhip were no ftronger than a nut-fhell, and as leaky as an unftanch'd wench.

Boats. Lay her a-hold, a-hold '; fet her two courses 2 ; off to fea again, lay her off.

Enter Mariners wet.

Mar. All loft! to prayers, to prayers! all loft!

[Exeunt.

man that appears with the king, he is the only man that preferves his cheerfulness in the wreck, and his hope on the ifland. JOHNSON.

8 - bring ber to try with main-courfe.] Probably from Hackluyt's Voyages, 1598: "And when the barke had way, we cut the haufer, and fo gate the fea to our friend, and tried out all that day with our maine courfe." MALONE.

9 - an unstanch'd wench.] Unftanck`d, I believe, means inconti nent. STEEVENS.

Lay ker a-bold, a-bold;] To lay a fhip a-bold, is to bring her to lie as near the wind as he can, in order to keep clear of the land, and get her out to fea. STEEVENS.

2.

•fet ber two courfes;] The courfes are the main-fail and forefail. JOHNSON.

Boatf

Boat. What must our mouths be cold?

Gon. The king and prince at prayers! let us affift

them,

For our cafe is as theirs.

Seb. I am out of patience.

3

Ant. We are merely cheated of our lives by drunkards.

This wide-chopp'd rafcal;-Would thou might'ft lie drowning,

The washing of ten tides!

Gon. He'll be hang'd yet;

Though every drop of water fwear against it,
And gape at wid'it to glut him 4.

[A confufed noife within.] Mercy on us!-We split! we fplit!-Farewell, my wife and children!-Farewell, brother!We fplit, we fplit, we split 5. Ant. Let's all fink with the king.

Seb. Let's take leave of him.

[Exit. [Exit.

Gon. Now would I give a thousand furlongs of fea 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.

The inchanted island: before the cell of Profpero.

Enter PROSPERO and MIRANDA.

Mira. If by your art, my

deareft father, you have Put the wild waters in this roar, allay them: The sky, it seems, would pour down ftinking pitch,

3

merely in this place fignifies abfolutely. STEEVENS. 4 to glut bim.] i. e. to englut or fwallow him. MALONE. 5 Mercy on us! we split, we split! Farewell, my wife and chil dren, &c. Thefe lines (as Dr. Johnfon has obferved) fhould be confidered as ipoken not by any determinate characters of the prefent play, but by various failors on board the veffel. MALONE.

6

long beath,] Sir T. Hanmer reads ling, heath, broom, furze. Perhaps rightly, though he has been charged with tautology. I find in Harrifon's Defcription of Britain, prefixed to our author's good friend Holinshed, p. 91: "Brome, beth, firze, brakes, whinnes, ling," &c. FARMER.

B 4

But

But that the fea", mounting to the welkin's cheek,"
Dakes the fire out. O, I have fafer'd

With thofe that I faw fuffer! a brave veel,
Who had no doubt fome noble creature in her,
Dafh'd all to pieces. O, the cry did knock
Again my very heart! Poor fouls! they perish'd.
Had I been any god of power, I would
Have funk the lea within the earth, or ere $
It fhould the good fhip fo have swallow'd, and
The freighting foals within her.

Pro. Be conected;

No more amazement: tell your piteous heart,
There's no harm done.

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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 3.

7 But that the fea, &c.] So, in King Lear:

"The fea in fuch a ftorm as his bare head

"In hell-black night endur'd, would have buoy'd up,
"And quench'd the ftelled fires." MALONE.

Or ere, is before. STEEVENS.

9 Pro. No barm.] I know not whether Shakspeare did not make Miranda fpeak thus: 0, woe the day! no karm ?

To which Profpero properly anfwers:

I have done nothing but in care of thee.

Miranda, when the fpeaks the words, O, quoe the day! fuppofes, not that the crew had efcaped, but that her father thought differently from her, and counted their deftruction no barm. JOHNSON.

more better-] This ungrammatical exprellion is very frequent among our oldeft writers. STEEVENS.

2

full poor cell,] i. e. a cell in a great degree of poverty. So, in Antony and Cleopatra: "I am full forry." STEETENS.

3 Did never meddle with my thoughts.] To meddle, in this inftance, feems to fignify to mingle. Hence the fubftantive medley. STEEVENS. See Howell's DICT. 1660, in v. to meddle; "fe mefler de." MALONE.

Pro.

Pro. 'Tis time

I fhould inform thee further. Lend thy hand,
And pluck my magick garment from me.-So;

[Lays down his mantle.
Lie there my art.-Wipe thou thine eyes; have comfort.
The direful spectacle of the wreck, which touch'd
The very virtue of compaffion 5 in thee,

I have with fuch provifion in mine art
So fafely order'd, that there is no foul—
No, not fo much perdition as an hair,
Betid to any creature in the vessel

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,
And left me to a bootlefs inquifition;
Concluding, Stay, not yet.-

Pro. The hour's now come;
The very minute bids thee ope

thine ear;

Obey, and be attentive. Canft thou remember
A time before we came unto this cell?

I do not think thou canft; for then thou waft not
Out three years old 7.

Mira. Certainly, fir, I can.

Pro. By what? by any other house, or perfon? Of any thing the image tell me, that

Hath kept with thy remembrance.

Mira. 'Tis far off;

4 Lie there my art.] Sir W. Cecil, lord Burleigh, lord high treafurer, &c. in the reign of queen Elizabeth, when he put off his gown at night, used to fay, Lie there, lord treasurer. Fuller's Holy State, P. 257.

5

STEEVENS.

virtue of compaffion-] Virtue, the most efficacious part, the energetick quality; in a like fenfe we fay, The virtue of a plant is in the extract. JOHNSON.

6 -no foul-] Such interruptions as the prefent are not uncommon to Shakspeare. He fometimes begins a fentence, and before he concludes it, entirely changes the conftruction, becaufe another, more forcible, occurs. As this change frequently happens in converfation, it may be fuffered to pafs uncenfured in the language of the ftage. STEEVENS. 7 Out three years old.] i. e. quite three years old, three years old full-out, complete. STEEVENS.

And

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