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Notes

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A list of the "Names of the Actors was given in the First Folio at the end of the play. The notes of place, and the stage directions that are inclosed in brackets, were added by eighteenth century editors.

I. i. 9. if room enough. Sea room. The ship is near a lee shore in a gale of wind; she is seaworthy, and the boatswain cares not how much wind there may be, if the ship has room enough to work in.

I. i. 15. assist the storm. By getting in our way.

I. i. 17. cares. Singular verbs with plural subjects are common in Shakespeare. Perhaps the -s is here a survival of the Northern plural, as in IV. i. 264 and V. i. 105. It may be due to carelessness; see I. ii. 478, and V. i. 216. I. i. 18. these roarers. The winds and waves. Perhaps an allusion to the Elizabethan use of " roarer to mean a blustering bully.

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I. i. 31. no drowning mark . . . perfect gallows. A reference to the proverb, " He that's born to be hanged need fear no drowning." See lines 35, 49, and 61, and V. i. 217. I. i. 34. rope of his destiny. The hangman's rope. I. i. 39. louder than .. our office. Prayers might well be in the heart and lips, but drowned in the outcries of the officers." Strachey's Reportory. See Introduction.

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I. i. 49. for. I.e., against.

I. i. 52.

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lay her a-hold. Keep her close to the wind. I. i. 56. must our mouths be cold? In death.

I. i. 61. the washing of ten tides. "Pirates and robbers by sea are condemned in the court of admiraltie, and hanged on the shore at low water marke, where they are left till three tides have overwashed them." Harrison's

Description of England (1577). Three tides are not enough for this scoundrel.

I. i. 70, 71. long heath, brown furze. Long heath is the name of a distinct plant. Notwithstanding this, Hanmer's emendation has been adopted by many editors; "ling. heath, broom, furze."

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I. ii. 2-5. The storm swelling and roaring length did beate all light from heaven; which like a hell of darkness turned blacke upon us.

the sea swelled above

Strachey's

the clouds, and gave battle unto heaven."

Reportory.

I. ii. 5. fire. Two syllables.

I. ii. 7. creature. Perhaps a collective noun; creatures. I. ii. 10. god of power. Powerful god. Cf. line 55.

I. ii. 11. or ere. Before. In this redundant locution or and ere are both derived from Anglo-Saxon ær, and each means before."

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I. ii. 14.

your.

Miranda in this scene addresses her father with the respectful "you"; except in this line, Prospero addresses his daughter with the affectionate and familiar "thou."

I. ii. 19. more better. Double comparatives and superlatives are frequent in Shakespeare.

I. ii. 439, and "worser," IV. i. 27.

Cf. "

more braver,"

thoughts. The

Lost, Prospero was about to add.

I. ii. 21, 22. more to know thought of knowing more never entered into my mind.

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I. ii. 43. Tell me the image of anything that.

I. ii. 53. word.

A nine-syllable line, beginning with an accented

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I. ii. 66. My brother. The predicate for this nominative, if, indeed, there is one, - is created," line 81. This play contains many instances of anacoluthon, of broken sentences such as frequently occur in actual conversation, especially under the stress of emotion.

I. ii. 80. who. Shakespeare frequently neglects to use the inflected form " whom." Cf. I. ii. 231; IV. i. 4.

I. ii. 81. To trash for overtopping. To hold in check, as hounds which outran the pack were held back by a weight fastened about the neck. Overtopping, however, seems a term from gardening rather than from hunting.

I. ii. 87. Thou attendst not. These and other similar remarks and questions serve to break up Prospero's long narrative, and to give an air of reality to the conversation.

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I. ii. 94. Like a good parent. A father above the common rate of men has commonly a son below it." Johnson.

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I. ii. 98. revenue. The second syllable is accented. I. ii. 99-102. like one. . his own lie. Like one who having by telling a lie made his memory such a sinner unto truth that it credited his own lie. In l. 100, into means unto, and it refers to lie, 1. 102.

I. ii. 104. executing the outer face of royalty. Performing the external duties of royalty; keeping up the appearances.

I. ii. 107. To have no screen. To remove Prospero, who stood between the substitute and complete sovereignty ("absolute Milan ").

I. ii. 109.

I. ii. 123.

Me. For me.

in lieu o'. In return for; not "in place of." I. ii. 144. aboard a bark. Milan appears to be a seaport in this play,

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as also in The Two Gentlemen of Verona.

I. ii. 146. a butt. The meaning of this word is not certainly known. The emendation "boat," by Rowe (1709), is not to be accepted. Italian botto, a sloop-rigged galliot with flattish bottom, has been suggested by Brinsley Nicholson. Butt may perhaps be an imitation of botto in a lost Italian story upon which The Tempest is based. I. ii. 152. a cherubin. The Chaldee plural of cherub, used as a singular. This has become the standard form in French, Spanish, and Italian, but not in English.

I. ii. 173. than other princess can. Than other princesses are able to profit.

I. ii. 181-184. The crisis in Prospero's life, because his star is now at the zenith. The same thought is expressed by a different metaphor in the familiar lines, Julius Cæsar, IV. iii. 218-221. Note the word " omit " in both passages. I. ii. 186. give it way. Yield to it.

I. ii. 187. away. Hither.

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I. ii. 189. The name Ariel (variously interpreted, perhaps meaning "altar of God") occurs several times in Isaiah xxix. The meaning that Shakespeare intended, an ayrie spirit," - is indicated in the list of characters. I. ii. 196-210. Strachey's Reportory has a description of the phenomenon known as St. Elmo's fire. The word amazement occurs three times.

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I. ii. 229. Bermoothes. An attempt to indicate the Spanish pronunciation of Bermudez, the name of the discoverer of the Bermuda Islands. The word "from" makes

it clear that Prospero's island was not one of the Bermudas, though the accounts of those islands supplied material for the play.

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I. ii. 230. under hatches stow'd. Cf. V. i. 99, 231. Being utterly spent were even resolved without any hope of their lives to shut up the hatches." Jourdan's Discovery.

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I. ii. 232. asleep. 'They were so overwearied and spent with long . . . continuance of their labour that for the most part they were fallen asleep in corners.' Jourdan's Discovery.

I. ii. 240. two glasses. Two hours. See note on V.

i. 223.

I. ii. 258. Sycorax. The meaning of this name is uncertain. Various suggestions have been made, e.g., the Greek words for sow (σûs) and raven (kópaέ), both of them associated with witchcraft. Cf. Macbeth, I. iii. 2, and I. v. 39.

I. ii. 266. for one thing she did. Not indicated in the play; perhaps mentioned in the lost story or play on which The Tempest is based. Charles Lamb refers to an account by John Ogilby of a witch who saved Algier from an attack by Charles V. Yet another suggestion is that Shakespeare never troubled himself to decide what the one thing" might be.

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I. ii. 284. Caliban. Usually explained as a metathesis of Canibal, for Caribal, a Carib, native of the Caribbee Islands. Though the Caribs are said to have been cannibals, it is not intended to imply that Caliban was an eater of human flesh. Another suggestion is that the name comes from the region called Calibia, and that "Shake

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