B. 6. -set her two courses; off to sea again,] The courses are the main sail and foresail.

JOH.

P. 6. merely cheated of our lives] Merely in this place, signifies absolutely; in which sense it is used in Hamlet, Acti: -Things rank and gross in nature

P. 7.

"Possess it merely."

STE.

full poor cell,] A cell in a great degree of poverty. So, in Antony and Cleopatra : "I am full sorry."

STE.

P. 8. that there is no soul-] Thus the old editions read: but this is apparently defective. Mr. Rowe, and after him Dr. Warburton, read-that there is no soul lost, without any notice of the variation. Mr. Theobald substitutes no foil, and Mr. Pope follows him. To come so near the right, and yet to miss it, is unlucky: the author probably wrote no soil, no stain, no spot; for so Ariel tells :

"Not a hair perish'd ;

"On their sustaining garments not a blemish,
"But fresher than before."

And Gonzalo, "The rarity of it is, that our garments being drenched in the sea, keep notwithstanding their freshness and glosses." Of this emendation I find that the author of notes on The Tempest had a glimpse, but could not keep it.

Јоң.

Such interruptions are not uncommon to Shakspeare. He sometimes begin a sentence, and, before he concludes it, entirely changes its construction, because another, more forcible, occurs. As this change frequently happens in conversation, it may be suffered to pass uncensured in the language of the stage. STE.

P. 10.

-like one,

Who having unto truth by telling of it,
Made such a sinner of his memory,

To credit his own lie] There is, perhaps, no correlative, to which the word it can with grammatical propriety belong. Lie, however, seems to have been the correlative to which the poet meant to refer, however ungrammatically.

STE.

There is a very singular coincidence between this passage and one in Bacon's History of King Henry VII. [Perkin Warbeck] “ did in all things notably acquit himself; insomuch as "it was generally believed, that he was indeed duke Richard. "Nay, himself, with long and continual counterfeiting, and "with oft telling a lye, was turned by habit almost into the "thing he seemed to be; and from a liar to be a believer."

ΜΑΣ

P. 11. deck'd the sea,] To deck, I am told, signifies in the North, to sprinkle. See Ray's DICT. of North Country words, in verb. to deg, and to deck; and his DICT. of South Country words, in verb dag. The latter signifies dew upon the grass ;hence daggle-tailed.

MAL.

A correspondent, who signs himself Eboracensis, proposses that this contested word should be printed degg'd, which, says he, signifies sprinkled, and is in daily use in the North of England. When clothes that have been washed are too much dried, it is necessary to moisten them before they can be ironed, which is always done by sprinkling; this operation the maidens universally call degging. REED.

P.12. Now I arise] Why does Prospero arise ? Or, if he does it to ease himself by change of posture, why need he interrupt his narrative to tell his daughter of it? Perhaps these words belong to Miranda, and we should read:

"Mir. 'Would I might

"But ever see that man ?-Now I arise.

"Pro. Sit still, and hear the last of our sea-sorrow." Prospero in p. 8, had directed his daughter to" sit down," and learn the whole of this history; having previously by some magical charm disposed her to fall asleep. He is watching the progress of this charm; and in the mean time tells her a long story, often asking her whether her attention be still awake. The story being ended (as Miranda supposes) with their coming on shore, and partaking of the conveniences provided for them by the loyal humanity of Gonzalo, she therefore first expresses a wish to see the good old man, and then observes that she 66 may now arise," as the story is done. Prospero, surprised that his charm does not yet work, bids her "sit still ;" and then enters on fresh matter to amuse the time, telling her (what she knew before) that he had been her tutor, &c. But soon perceiving her drowsiness coming on, he breaks off abruptly, and leaves her still sitting to her slumbers. BLACKSTONE.

“

As the words "now I arise"-may signify, "now I rise in my narration,"- now my story heightens in its consequence,' I have left the passage in question undisturbed. We still say, that the interest of a drama rises or declines.

STE.

P. 12. —and all his quality] i. e. all his confederates, all who are of the same profession. So, in Hamlet :

“Come, give us a taste of your quality.”

STE.

P. 15. in Argier] Argier is the ancient English name for Algiers.

STE

P. 16. The strangeness-] Why should a wonderful story produce sleep? I believe, experience will prove, that any violent agitation of the mind easily subsides in slumber, especially when, as in Prospero's relation, the last images are pleasing.

JOHNSON.

The poet seems to have been apprehensive that the audience, as well as Miranda, would sleep over this long but necessary tale, and therefore strives to break it. First, by making Prospero divest himself of his magic robe and wand: then by waking her attention no less than six times by verbal interruption then by varying the action when he rises and bids her continue sitting and lastly, by carrying on the business of the fable while Miranda sleeps, by which she is continued on the stage till the poet has occasion for her again.

:

WARNER. P. 21. He's gentle, and not fearful.] "How have your commentators been puzzled by the following expression in The Tempest, He's gentle, and not fearful;' as if it was a paralogism to say that being gentle, he must of course be courageous: but the truth is, one of the original meanings, if not the sole meaning, of that word was, noble, high minded: and to this day a Scotch woman in the situation of the young lady in The Tempest, would express herself nearly in the same terms.-Don't provoke him; for being gentle, that is, high spirited, he won't tamely bear an insult."

Smollett's Humphrey Clinker, Vol. II. p. 182.

REED.

P. 28. Trebles thee o'er.] You must put on more than your usual seriousness, if you are disposed to pay a proper attention to my proposal; which attention if you bestow, it will in the end make you thrice what you are. STE.

Ibid. You more invest it !] A judicious critic in The Edinburgh Magazine for Nov. 1786, offers the following illustration of this obscure passage, "Sebastian introduces the simile of water. It is taken up by Antonio, who says he will teach his stagnant water to flow. It has already learned to ebb,' says Sebastian. To which Antonio replies, O if you knew how much even that metaphor, which you use in jest, encourages to the design which I hint at; how in stripping the words of their common meaning, and using them figuratively, you adapt them to your own situation!'"

ST.

P. 32. —looks like a foul bumbard.] This term again occurs in The First Part of Henry IV: "that swoln parcel of dropsies, that huge bumbard of sack-" And again, in Henry VIII. "And here you lie baiting of bombards, when ye

should do service." By these several passages, 'tis plain the word meant a large vessel for holding drink, as well as the piece of ordnance so called. THEO.

P. 33. -his gaberdine ;] A gaberdine is properly the coarse frock or outward garment of a peasant. Spanish Gaberdina.

ST.

P. 33. if he have never drunk wine afore, it will go near to remove his fit:] This is no impertinent hint to those who indulge themselves in a constant use of wine. When it is necessary for them as a medicine, it produces no effect. ST.

P. 33. I will not take too much for him.] Let me take what sum I will, however great, I shall not take too much for him : it is impossible for me to sell him too dear.

MAL.

P. 34. to be the siege of this moon-calf?] Siege signifies stool in every sense of the word, and is here used in the dirtiest. A moon-calf is an inanimate shapeless mass, supposed by Pliny to be engendered of woman only. See his Nat. Hist. B. X. ch. 64. STE.

P. 36. Young sea-mells.] Sir Joseph Banks informs me, that in Willoughby's, or rather John Ray's Ornithology, p. 34, No. 3, is mentioned the common sea-mall, Larus cinereus minor; and that young sea-gulls have been esteemed a delicate food in this country, we learn from Plott, who, in his History of Staffordshire, p. 231, gives an account of the mode of taking a species of gulls called in that country pewits, with a plate annexed, at the end of which he writes, "they being accounted a good dish at the most plentiful tables." To this it may be added, that Sir Robert Sibbald in his Ancient State of the Shire of Fife, mentions amongst fowls which frequent a neighbouring island, several sort of sea-malls, and one in particular, the katiewake, a fowl of the Larus or mall kind, of the bigness of an ordinary pigeon, which some hold, says he, to be as savoury and as good meat as a partridge is. REED.

P. 40. Your lieutenant, if you list; he's no standard.] Meaning, he is so much intoxicated, as not to be able to stand. The quibble between standard, an ensign, and standard, a fruit-tree that grows without support, is evident.

ST.

P. 41. Where thou may'st knock a nail into his head.] Perhaps Shakspeare caught this idea from the 4th chapter of Judges, v. 21: "Then Jael, Heber's wife, took a nail of the tent, and took a hammer in her hand, and went softly unto

him, and smote the nail into his temples, &c. for he was fast asleep,"

&c.

STE.

P. 41. What a pied ninny's this?] It should be remembered that Trinculo is no sailor, but a jester; and is so called in the ancient dramatis personæ. He therefore wears the party-coloured dress of one of these characters.

ST.

P. 44. Praise in departing.] i. e. Do not praise your entertainment too soon, lest you should have reason to retract your commendation. It is a proverbial saying. ST.

P. 45. Each putter-out, &c.] The ancient custom here alluded to was this. In this age of travelling, it was a practice with those who engaged in long and hazardous expeditions, to place out a sum of money on condition of receiving great interest for it at their return home. So Puntarvolo, (it is Theobald's quotation,) in Ben Jonson's Every Man out of his Humour: "I do intend,this year of jubilee coming on, to travel; and (because I will not altogether go upon expence) I am determined to put some five thousand pound, to be paid me five for one, upon the return of my wife, myself, and my dog, from the Turk's court in Constantinople.'

ST.

P. 47. -a thread of mine own life.] "A thread of mine own life" is a fibre or a part of my own life. Prospero considers himself as the stock or parent-tree, and his daughter as a fibre or portion of himself, and for whose benefit he himself lives. In this sense the word is used in Markham's English Husbandman, edit. 1635, p. 146: "Cut off all the maine rootes, within half a foot of the tree, only the small thriddes or twist rootes you shall not cut at all."

TOLLET.

P. 51. And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,] Faded means here-having vanished; from the Latin, vado. So, in Hamlet:

"It faded on the crowing of the cock."

To feel the justice of this comparison, and the propriety of the epithet, the nature of these exhibitions should be remembered. The ancient English pageants were shows exhibited on the reception of a prince, or any other solemnity of a similar kind. They were presented on occasional stages erected in the streets. Originally they appear to have been nothing more than dumb shows; but before the time of our author, they had been enlivened by the introduction of speaking personages, who were characteristically habited. The speeches were sometimes in verse; and as the procession moved forward, the speakers, who constantly bore some allusion to the ceremony, either conversed together in the form of a dia