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;a
Be subject to no sight but thine and mine; invisible

To every eyeball else. Go, take this shape,

And hither come in 't: go, hence, with diligence. [Exit ARI. Awake, dear heart, awake! thou hast slept well;

Awake!

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

We'll visit Caliban, my slave, who never

Yields us kind answer.

We cannot miss him he does make our fire,

:

Fetch in our wood, and serves in offices

a The second folio reads " to a nymph of the sea."
b Steevens omits thine and.

That profit us.

What ho! slave! Caliban!

Thou earth, thou! speak.

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

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

Re-enter ARIEL, like a water-nymph.

Fine apparition! My quaint Ariel,

Hark in thine ear.

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,

Drop on you both! a south-west blow on ye,

And blister you all o'er.

[Exit.

Pro. For this, be sure, to-night thou shalt have cramps, Side-stitches that shall pen thy breath up; urchins

b

Shall, for that vast of night that they may work,

All exercise on thee: thou shalt be pinch'd

As thick as honeycomb, each pinch more stinging
Than bees that made them.

Cal.

I must eat my dinner.

When thou camest first,

This island's mine, by Sycorax my mother,

Which thou tak'st from me.

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' the 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!

a When an expression of great impatience.

b Vast of night. In Hamlet' we have

"In the dead waste and middle of the night."

The quarto edition of Hamlet,' 1603, reads dead vast.

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 of the 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. O ho, O ho!'would it had been done! Thou didst prevent me; I had peopled else This isle with Calibans.

Which any print of goodness will not take,
Being capable of all ill! I pitied thee,

Took pains to make thee speak, taught thee each hour
One thing or other: when thou didst not, savage,
Know thine own meaning, but wouldst gabble like

A thing most brutish, I endow'd thy purposes

With words that made them known: But thy vile race, Though thou didst learn, had that in 't which good natures Could not abide to be with; therefore wast thou

Deservedly confin'd into this rock,

Who hadst deserv'd more than a prison.

Cal. You taught me language; and my profit on 't Is, I know how to curse: the red plague rid you,

For learning me your language!

Hag-seed, hence!

Pro.
Fetch us in fuel; and be quick, thou wert best,

To answer other business. Shrugg'st thou, malice?
If thou neglect'st, or dost unwillingly

What I command, I'll rack thee with old cramps;
Fill all thy bones with aches; make thee roar

That beasts shall tremble at thy din.

Cal.

I must obey his art is of such power,
It would control my dam's god, Setebos,
And make a vassal of him.

Pro..

No, pray thee!

[Aside.

Re-enter ARIEL invisible, playing and singing; FERDINAND

Fer. Where should this music be? i' the air, or the earth?

It sounds no more :-and sure it waits upon
Some god of the island. Sitting on a bank,
Weeping again the king my father's wrack,
This music crept by me upon the waters;
Allaying both their fury, and my passion,
With its sweet air: thence I have follow'd it,
Or it hath drawn me rather :-But 't is gone.
No, it begins again.

ARIEL sings.

Full fathom five thy father lies;

Of his bones are coral made;
Those are pearls that were his eyes :
Nothing of him that doth fade,

a We follow the punctuation of the original. In all modern editions the passage stands thus:

"Courtsied when you have, and kiss'd,
(The wild waves whist)

Foot it featly here and there."

Steevens explains the line in parenthesis as the wild waves being silent. But the original punctuation may allow us to interpret the passage thus: When you have courtesied to the wild waves, and kissed them into silence,

"Foot it featly here and there."

b We print the burden, also, as in the original. The modern editors, contrary to this, give the first "Hark, hark!" to Ariel; and there make his song terminate : whereas the three last lines give us again the voice of the delicate spirit.

But doth suffer a sea-change

Into something rich and strange.

Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell:

[Burthen, ding-dong.

Hark! now I hear them,-ding-dong, bell.a

Fer. The ditty does remember my drown'd father:—

This is no mortal business, nor no sound

That the earth owes:— -I hear it now above me.

Pro. The fringed curtains of thine eye advance,
And say, what thou seest yond'.

Mira.
What is 't? a spirit?
Lord, how it looks about! Believe me, sir,

It carries a brave form :-But 't is a spirit.

Pro. No, wench; it eats, and sleeps, and hath such senses As we have, such: This gallant, which thou seest,

Was in the wrack; and but he's something stain'd

With grief, that 's beauty's canker, thou mightst call him A goodly person: he hath lost his fellows,

And strays about to find them.

Mira.

I might call him

A thing divine; for nothing natural

I ever saw so noble.

Pro.

It goes on, I see,

[Aside.

As my soul prompts it:-Spirit, fine spirit! I'll free thee Within two days for this.

Fer.

Most sure, the goddess

On whom these airs attend!-Vouchsafe my prayer
May know if you remain upon this island;
And that you will some good instruction give,
How I may bear me here: My prime request,
Which I do last pronounce, is, O you wonder!
If you be maid or no?

a We have here an absurd corruption of the text by the modern editors. When Ariel sings

"Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell,"

the burden comes in "ding-dong;" and then Ariel again sings

"Hark! now I hear them,-ding-dong, bell."

The modern editors transpose the lines, and make the burden a mere chorus to Ariel's song.

b Maid. The fourth folio substituted made, which has since kept its place in many editions, amidst endless controversy. We follow the reading of the original.