But that the sea, mounting to the welkin's cheek,
Dashes the fire out. O, I have suffered
With those that I saw suffer: a brave vessel,
Who had, no doubt, some noble creature 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 ere
It should the good ship so have swallow'd and
The fraughting souls within her.
Pros.
Be collected:
No more amazement: tell your piteous heart
There's no harm done.
Mir.
O, woe the day!
Pros.
No harm.
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 Prospero, master of a full poor cell,
And thy no greater father.
Sit down;
For thou must now know farther.
Mir. More to know Did never meddle with my thoughts. Pros. 'Tis time I should inform thee farther. Lend thy hand, And pluck my magic garment from me. So: [Lays down his mantle. Lie there, my art. Wipe thou thine eyes; have comfort.
ALLE
rack The direful spectacle of the wreck, which touch'd
The very virtue of compassion in thee,
I have with such provision in nine art
So safely ordered 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.
30
Mir.
Begun to tell me what I am, but stopp'd
And left me to a bootless inquisition,
Concluding 'Stay: not yet.'
Pros.
The very minute bids thee ope thine ear;
Obey and be attentive. Canst thou remember
A time before we came unto this cell?
I do not think thou canst, for then thou wast not
Out three years old.
41
Mir.
Certainly, sir, I can.
Pros. By what? by any other house or person? Of any thing the image tell me that Hath kept with thy remembrance.
Mir.
'Tis far off, And rather like a dream than an assurance That my remembrance warrants. Had I not Four or five women once that tended me? Pros. Thou hadst, and more, Miranda. how is it
But
That this lives in thy mind? What seest thou else
50
In the dark backward and abysm of time?
If thou remember'st aught ere thou camest here,
How thou camest here, thou mayst.
Mir.
But that I do not. Pros. Twelve years since, Miranda, twelve years since,
Thy father was the Duke of Milan and
A prince of power.
Mir. Sir, are not you my father? Pros. Thy mother was a piece of virtue, and She said thou wast my daughter; and thy father Was Duke of Milan; and thou his only heir And princess no worse issued.
Mir.
O the heavens! What foul play had we, that we came from thence? Or blessed was't we did?
Pros.
By foul play, as thou thence,
But blessedly holp hither.
Both, both, my girl: 61 say'st, were we heaved
Mir.
O, my heart bleeds To think o' the teen that I have turn'd you to, Which is from my remembrance!
Please you,
farther.
Pr. My brother and thy uncle, call'd AntonioI pray thee, mark me-that a brother should
Be so perfidious !—he whom next thyself
Of all the world I loved, and to him put
The manage of my State; as at that time
Through all the signories 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,
The government I cast upon my brother
And to myState grew stranger, being transported
And rapt in secret studies. Thy false uncle-
Dost thou attend me?
Mir.
Sir, most heedfully.
Pros. Being once perfected how to grant suits,
How to deny them, who to advance and who 80
To trash for over-topping, new created
The creatures that were mine, I say, or changed
'em,
Or else new form'd 'em; having both the key
Of officer and office, set all hearts i' the state
To what tune pleased his ear; that now he was
The ivy which had hid my princely trunk,
And suck'd my verdure out on't. Thou attend'st
not.
O, good sir, I do.
Mir.
Pros.
I pray thee, mark me.
I, thus neglecting worldly ends, all dedicated
To closeness and the bettering of my mind
With that which, but by being so retired,
O'er-prized all popular rate, in my false brother
Awaked an evil nature; and my trust,
Like a good parent, did beget of him
A falsehood in its contrary as great
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, like one
Who having into truth, by telling of it,
Made such a sinner of his memory,
To credit his own lie, he did believe
He was indeed the duke; out o' the substitution,
And executing the outward face of royalty,
With all prerogative: hence his ambition growing-
Dost thou hear?
Mir.
Your tale, sir, would cure deafness.
Pros. To have no screen 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 roy- atrial
IIO
alties
He thinks me now incapable; confederates-
So dry he was for sway-wi' 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.
O the heavens !
Mark his condition and the event; then
Mir.
Pros.
tell me
If this might be a brother.
Mir.
I should sin
To think but nobly of my grandmother:
Good wombs have borne bad sons.
Pros.
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 honors 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 131
Me and thy crying self.
Mir.
Alack, for pity!
I, not remembering how I cried out then,
Will cry it o'er again: it is a hint
That wrings mine eyes to't.
Pros.
Hear a little further
And then I'll bring thee to the present business
Which now's upon's; without the which this story
Were most impertinent.
Mir.
Wherefore did they not
That hour destroy us?
Pros.
Well demanded, wench:
My tale provokes that question.
durst not,
So dear the love my people bore me, nor set
A mark so bloody on the business, but
With colors fairer painted their foul ends.
In few, they hurried us aboard a bark,
Bore us some leagues to sea; where they prepared
A rotten carcass of a boat, not rigg'd,
Nor tackle, sail, nor mast; the very rats
Instinctively had quit it: there they hoist us,
To cry to the sea that roar'd to us, to sigh
To the winds whose pity, sighing back again, 150
Did us but loving wrong.
Alack, what trouble.
Mir.
Was I then to you!
Pros.
O, a cherubim
Thou wast that did preserve me. Thou didst
smile,
Infused with a fortitude from heaven,
When I have deck'd the sea with drops full salt, Under my burthen groan'd; which raised in me An undergoing stomach, to bear up
Against what should ensue.
Mir.
Pros. By Providence divine.
Some food we had and some fresh water that 160
A noble Neapolitan, Gonzalo,
Out of his charity, being then appointed
Master of this design, did give us, with
Rich garments, linens, stuffs and necessaries, Which since have steaded much so, of his gen
tleness,
Knowing I loved my books, he furnish'd me
From mine own library with volumes that
I prize above my dukedom.
Mir.
Would I might
But ever see that man!
Pros. Now I arise:
[Resumes his mantle.
Sit still, and hear the last of our sea-sorrow. 170
Here in this island we arrived; and here
Have I, thy schoolmaster, made thee more profit
Than other princesses can that have more time
|