within.] A plague upon this howling! they are louder than the weather, or our office.— Re-enter SEBASTIAN, ANTONIO, and GONZALO. Yet again! what do you here? Shall we give o'er, and drown? Have you a mind to sink? 'Seb. A pox phemous, uncharitable dog! Boats. Work you, then. you bawling, blas Ant. Hang, cur, hang! you whoreson, insolent noise-maker, we are less afraid to be drowned than thou art. Gon. I'll warrant him for drowning; though the ship were no stronger than a nut-shell, and as leaky as an unstanched wench. Boats. Lay her a-hold, a-hold! courses5; off to sea again; lay her off. Enter Mariners, wet. set her two Mar. All lost! to prayers, to prayers! all lost! Boats. What, must our mouths be cold? [Exeunt. Gon. The king and prince at prayers! let us as sist them, For our case is as theirs. Seb. I am out of patience. Ant. We are merely cheated of our lives by drunkards. This wide-chapp'd rascal ;-Would, thou might'st lie drowning, The washing of ten tides! Gon. He'll be hanged yet, To lay a ship 5 The courses are the main sail and fore sail. a-hold, is to bring her to lie as near the wind as she can, in order to keep clear of the land and get her out to sea. Merely, absolutely, entirely; Merè, Lat. Though every drop of water swear against it, [A confused Noise within.] Mercy on us!— We split, we split !-Farewell my wife and children! Farewell, brother!-We split, we split, we split.Ant. Let's all sink with the king. Seb. Let's take leave of him. [Exit. [Exit. Gon. Now would I give a thousand furlongs of sea for an acre of barren ground; ling3, heath, broom, furze, any thing: The wills above be done! but I would fain die a dry death. [Exit. SCENE II. The Island: before the Cell of Prospero. Enter PROSPERO and MIRANDA. Mira. If by your art, my dearest father, you have With those that I saw suffer: a brave vessel, Dash'd all to pieces. Against my very heart. Had I been any god of O! the cry did knock Poor souls! they perish'd. power, I would Have sunk the sea within the earth, or e'er1 7 To englut, to swallow him. 8 The old copy reads, long heath, brown furze, &c. The cor rection was made by Sir Thomas Hanmer, who, in his edition, substituted the words ling and broom. 9 The folios have stinking, probably a press error. I should prefer to read flaming, the words, as written or printed with the long fl and ft, as in the old copies, are easily confounded. The subsequent dashes the fire out may serve to confirm this conjecture. i. e. or ever, ere ever; signifying, in modern English, sooner than at any time. Or is a contraction of ere, aen, Sax. prius, antequam, priusquam; ever, from aeƑɲe, aliquando, unquam. It should the good ship so have swallowed, and I have done nothing but in care of thee, No harm. (Of thee, my dear one! thee, my daughter!) who I should inform thee further. Lend thy hand, [Lays down his mantle. Lie there, my art.-Wipe thou thine eyes; have comfort. The direful spectacle of the wrack", which touch'd The very virtue of compassion in thee, I have with such prevision in mine art ? The double comparative is in frequent use among our elder writers. 3 To medille, is to mix, or interfere with. Lord Burleigh, when he put off his gown at night, used to say "Lie there, Lord Treasurer."-Fuller's Holy State, p. 257. 5 Shakspeare, and most of his cotemporaries, wrote wrack for wreck, and there seems to be no reason for change, as the euphony of the verse would suffer by it. In Tarquin and Lucrece we have: O, this dread night, would'st thou one hour come back I could prevent this storm, and shun thy wrack. I entirely coincide with Mr. Hunter in this suggestion. He has also shown that the poet wrote prevision instead of provision, in a subsequent line. Thus anticipating the correction in Mr. Collier's folio. So safely order'd, that there is no soul— Which thou heard'st cry, which thou saw'st sink. Sít down; For thou must now know further. Mira. You have often Begun to tell me what I am; but stopp'd, Pro. The hour's now come; The very minute bids thee ope thine ear; I do not think thou can'st; for then thou wast not Mira. years old. Certainly, sir, I can. Pro. By what? by any other house, or person? Of any thing the image, tell me, that Hath kept with thy remembrance. Mira. 'Tis far off; And rather like a dream than an assurance Pro. Thou had'st, and more, Miranda. But how is it, That this lives in thy mind? What seest thou else In the dark backward and abysm7 of time? If thou remember'st aught ere thou cam'st here, But that I do not. Mira. since, 6 Out is used for entirely, quite. Thus in Act iv: "And be a oy right out." 7 Abysm was the old mode of spelling abyss; from its French inal abisme. Thy father was the duke of Milan, and Mira. Sir, are not you my father? Pro. Thy mother was a piece of virtue, and She said thou wast my daughter; and thy father Was duke of Milan; thouR his only heir And princess-no worse issued. Mira. O, the heavens ! What foul play had we, that we came from thence? Or blessed was't we did? Pro. Both, both, my girl: By foul play, as thou say'st, were we heav'd thence; But blessedly holp hither. I Mira. pray O! my heart bleeds Without a parallel: those being all my study, The old copy reads and thy father Was duke of Milan; and his only heir, &c. Nothing is more common than for the compositor's eye to take by mistake a wrong word occurring in a preceding line; and has here been so taken instead of thou. In the second folio, in the same page and column, compassion has been so taken instead of the true word prevision. This note was written in 1851 9 Teen is grief, sorrow. 10 The second folio has, Though, which, if read as an elision for Though of, as Mr. Hunter proposes, would give better sense. Or we may suppose Throughout to be intended. |