The Oxford Shakespeare: The Complete Works
Page 393
BOATSWAIN
MARINERS
SPIRITS
The Masque
Spirits appearing as:
IRIS
CERES
JUNO
Nymphs, reapers
The Tempest
1.1 A tempestuous noise of thunder and lightning heard. Enter ⌈severally⌉ a Shipmaster and a Boatswain
MASTER Boatswain!
BOATSWAIN Here, Master. What cheer?
MASTER Good, speak to th’ mariners. Fall to’t yarely, or we run ourselves aground. Bestir, bestir!
Exit
Enter Mariners
BOATSWAIN Heigh, my hearts! Cheerly, cheerly, my hearts! Yare, yare! Take in the topsail! Tend to th’ Master’s whistte!—Blow till thou burst thy wind, if room enough. Enter Alonso, Sebastian, Antonio, Ferdinand, Gonzalo, and others
ALONSO Good Boatswain, have care. Where’s the Master? (To the Mariners) Play the men!
BOATSWAIN I pray now, keep below.
ANTONIO Where is the Master, Boatswain?
BOATSWAIN Do you not hear him? You mar our labour. Keep your cabins; you do assist the storm.
GONZALO Nay, good, be patient.
BOATSWAIN When the sea is. Hence! What cares these roarers for the name of king? To cabin! Silence; trouble us not.
GONZALO Good, yet remember whom thou hast aboard.
BOATSWAIN None that I more love than myself. You are a councillor; if you can command these elements to silence and work peace of the present, we will not hand a rope more. Use your authority. If you cannot, give thanks you have lived so long and make yourself ready in your cabin for the mischance of the hour, if it so hap. (To the Mariners) Cheerly, good hearts! (To Gonzalo) Out of our way, I say!
Exit
GONZALO I have great comfort from this fellow. Methinks he hath no drowning mark upon him; his complexion is perfect gallows. Stand fast, good Fate, to his hanging. Make the rope of his destiny our cable, for our own doth little advantage. If he be not born to be hanged, our case is miserable.
Exeunt ⌈Courtiers⌉
Enter Boatswain
BOATSWAIN Down with the topmast! Yare! Lower, lower! Bring her to try wi’th’ main-course!
A cry within
A plague upon this howling! They are louder than the weather, or our office.
Enter Sebastian, Antonio, and Gonzalo
Yet again? What do you here? Shall we give o’er and drown? Have you a mind to sink?
SEBASTIAN A pox o’your throat, you bawling, blasphemous, incharitable dog!
BOATSWAIN Work you, then.
ANTONIO Hang, cur, hang, you whoreson insolent noisemaker. We are less afraid to be drowned than thou art.
⌈Exeunt Mariners⌉
GONZALO I’ll warrant him for drowning, though the ship were no stronger than a nutshell and as leaky as an unstanched wench.
BOATSWAIN Lay her a-hold, a-hold! Set her two courses! Off to sea again! Lay her off!
Enter Mariners, wet
MARINERS All lost! To prayers, to prayers! All lost!
⌈Exeunt Mariners⌉
BOATSWAIN What, must our mouths be cold?
GONZALO
The King and Prince at prayers! Let’s assist them,
For our case is as theirs.
SEBASTIAN
I’m out of patience.
ANTONIO
We are merely cheated of our lives by drunkards.
This wide-chopped rascal—would thou mightst lie
drowning
The washing of ten tides.
GONZALO
He’ll be hanged yet,
Though every drop of water swear against it
And gape at wid’st to glut him.
A confused noise within
MARINERS (within)
Mercy on us!
We split, we split! Farewell, my wife and children!
Farewell, brother! We split, we split, we spht!
⌈Axit Boatswain⌉
ANTONIO
Let’s all sink wi’th’ King.
SEBASTIAN
Let’s take leave of him.
Exeunt Antonio and Sebastian
GONZALO Now would I give a thousand furlongs of sea for an acre of barren ground: long heath, broom, furze, anything. The wills above be done, but I would fain die a dry death. Exit
1.2 Enter Prospero ⌈in his magic cloak, with a staff⌉, and Miranda
MIRANDA
If by your art, my dearest father, you have
Put the wild waters in this roar, allay them.
The sky, it seems, would pour down stinking pitch,
But that the sea, mounting to th’ 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,
Dashed all to pieces! O, the cry did knock
Against my very heart! Poor souls, they perished.
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 swallowed and
The fraughting souls within her.
PROSPERO
Be collected.
No more amazement. Tell your piteous heart
There’s no harm done.
MIRANDA
O woe the day!
PROSPERO
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, naught knowing
Of whence I am, nor that I am more better
Than Prospero, master of a full poor cell
And thy no greater father.
MIRANDA
More to know
Did never meddle with my thoughts.
PROSPERO
’Tis time
I should inform thee farther. Lend thy hand,
And pluck my magic garment from me.
Miranda removes Prospero’s cloak, ⌈and he lays it
on the ground⌉
So.
Lie there, my art.—Wipe thou thine eyes; have comfort.
The direful spectacle of the wreck, which touched
The very virtue of compassion in thee,
I have with such provision in mine 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. Sit
down,
For thou must now know farther.
Miranda sits
MIRANDA
You have often
Begun to tell me what I am, but stopped
And left me to a bootless inquisition,
Concluding ‘Stay; not yet’.
PROSPERO
The hour’s now come.
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.
MIRANDA
Certainly, sir, I can.
PROSPERO
By what? By any other house or person?
Of anything the image tell me that
Hath kept with thy remembrance.
MIRANDA
’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?
PROSPERO
Thou hadst, and more, Miranda. But how is it
That this lives in thy mind? What seest thou else
In the dark backward and abyss of time?
If thou rememb‘rest aught ere thou cam’st here,
How thou cam’st here thou mayst.
MIRANDA
But that I do no
t.
PROSPERO
Twelve year since, Miranda, twelve year since,
Thy father was the Duke of Milan, and
A prince of power—
MIRANDA
Sir, are not you my father?
PROSPERO
Thy mother was a piece of virtue, and
She said thou wast my daughter; and thy father
Was Duke of Milan, and his only heir
And princess no worse issued.
MIRANDA
O the heavens!
What foul play had we that we came from thence?
Or blessed was’t we did?
PROSPERO
Both, both, my girl.
By foul play, as thou sayst, were we heaved thence,
But blessedly holp hither.
MIRANDA
O, my heart bleeds
To think o’th’ teen that I have turned you to,
Which is from my remembrance. Please you, farther.
PROSPERO
My brother and thy uncle called Antonio—
I 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 my state grew stranger, being transported
And rapt in secret studies. Thy false uncle—
Dost thou attend me?
MIRANDA
Sir, most heedfully.
PROSPERO
Being once perfected how to grant suits,
How to deny them, who t‘advance and who
To trash for over-topping, new created
The creatures that were mine, I say—or changed ’em
Or else new formed ’em; having both the key
Of officer and office, set all hearts i’th’ state
To what tune pleased his ear, that now he was
The ivy which had hid my princely trunk
And sucked my verdure out on’t. Thou attend’st not!
MIRANDA
O good sir, I do.
PROSPERO
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-priced 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 oft,
Made such a sinner of his memory
To credit his own lie, he did believe
He was indeed the Duke. Out o’th’ substitution,
And executing th’outward face of royalty
With all prerogative, hence his ambition growing—
Dost thou hear?
MIRANDA
Your tale, sir, would cure deafness.
PROSPERO
To have no screen between this part he played
And him he played it for, he needs will be
Absolute Milan. Me, poor man—my library
Was dukedom large enough—of temporal royalties
He thinks me now incapable; confederates,
So dry he was for sway, wi’th’ King of Naples
To give him annual tribute, do him homage,
Subject his coronet to his crown, and bend
The dukedom, yet unbowed—alas,poor Milan—
To most ignoble stooping.
MIRANDA
O the heavens!
PROSPERO
Mark his condition and th’event, then tell me
If this might be a brother.
MIRANDA
I should sin
To think but nobly of my grandmother.
Good wombs have borne bad sons.
PROSPERO
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‘th’ 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 honours, on my brother. Whereon,
A treacherous army levied, one midnight
Fated to th’ purpose did Antonio open
The gates of Milan; and, i’th’ dead of darkness,
The ministers for th’ purpose hurried thence
Me and thy crying self.
MIRANDA
Alack, for pity!
I, not rememb’ring how I cried out then,
Will cry it o’er again; it is a hint
That wrings mine eyes to’t.
PROSPERO ⌈sitting⌉
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.
MIRANDA
Wherefore did they not
That hour destroy us?
PROSPERO Well demanded, wench;
My tale provokes that question. Dear, they durst not,
So dear the love my people bore me; nor set
A mark so bloody on the business, but
With colours fairer painted their foul ends.
In few, they hurried us aboard a barque,
Bore us some leagues to sea, where they prepared
A rotten carcass of a butt, not rigged,
Nor tackle, sail, nor mast—the very rats
Instinctively have quit it. There they hoist us,
To cry to th’ sea that roared to us, to sigh
To th’winds, whose pity, sighing back again,
Did us but loving wrong.
MIRANDA
Alack, what trouble
Was I then to you!
PROSPERO
O,a cherubin
Thou wast that did preserve me. Thou didst smile,
Infused with a fortitude from heaven,
When I have decked the sea with drops full salt,
Under my burden groaned; which raised in me
An undergoing stomach, to bear up
Against what should ensue.
MIRANDA How came we ashore?
PROSPERO By providence divine.
Some food we had, and some fresh water, that
A noble Neapolitan, Gonzalo,
Out of his charity—who 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 gentleness,
Knowing I loved my books, he furnished me
From mine own library with volumes that
I prize above my dukedom.
MIRANDA
Would I might
But ever see that man!
PROSPERO
Now I arise.
⌈He stands and puts on his cloak⌉
Sit still, and hear the last of our sea-sorrow.
Here in this island we arrived, and here
Have I thy schoolmaster made thee more profit
Than other princes can, that have more time
For vainer hours and tutors not so careful.
MIRANDA
Heavens thank you for’t. And now I pray you, sir—
For still ’tis beating in my mind—your reason
For ra
ising this sea-storm.
PROSPERO
Know thus far forth.
By accident most strange, bountiful Fortune,
Now my dear lady, hath mine enemies
Brought to this shore; and by my prescience
I find my zenith doth depend upon
A most auspicious star, whose influence
If now I court not, but omit, my fortunes
Will ever after droop. Here cease more questions.
Thou art inclined to sleep; ’tis a good dullness,
And give it way. I know thou canst not choose.
Miranda sleeps
Come away, servant, come! I am ready now.
Approach, my Ariel, come!
Enter Ariel
ARIEL
All hail, great master, grave sir, hail. I come
To answer thy best pleasure. Be’t to fly,
To swim, to dive into the fire, to ride
On the curled clouds, to thy strong bidding task
Ariel and all his quality.
PROSPERO
Hast thou, spirit,
Performed to point the tempest that I bade thee?
ARIEL
To every article.
I boarded the King’s ship. Now on the beak,
Now in the waste, the deck, in every cabin,
I flamed amazement. Sometime I’d divide,
And burn in many places; on the top-mast,
The yards, and bowsprit, would I flame distinctly;
Then meet and join. Jove’s lightning, the precursors
O’th’ dreadful thunderclaps, more momentary
And sight-outrunning were not. The fire and cracks
Of sulphurous roaring the most mighty Neptune
Seem to besiege, and make his bold waves tremble,
Yea, his dread trident shake.
PROSPERO
My brave spirit!
Who was so firm, so constant, that this coil
Would not infect his reason?
ARIEL
Not a soul
But felt a fever of the mad, and played
Some tricks of desperation. All but mariners
Plunged in the foaming brine and quit the vessel,
Then all afire with me. The King’s son Ferdinand,
With hair upstaring—then like reeds, not hair—
Was the first man that leaped; cried ‘Hell is empty,
And all the devils are here’.
PROSPERO