The Oxford Shakespeare: The Complete Works
Page 394
Why, that’s my spirit!
But was not this nigh shore?
ARIEL
Close by, my master.
PROSPERO
But are they, Ariel, safe?
ARIEL
Not a hair perished.
On their sustaining garments not a blemish,
But fresher than before. And, as thou bad’st me,
In troops I have dispersed them ’bout the isle.
The King’s son have I landed by himself,
Whom I left cooling of the air with sighs
In an odd angle of the isle, and sitting,
His arms in this sad knot.
PROSPERO
Of the King’s ship,
The mariners, say how thou hast disposed,
And all the rest o’th’ fleet.
ARIEL
Safely in harbour
Is the King’s ship, in the deep nook where cnce
Thou called‘st me up at midnight to fetch dew
From the still-vexed Bermudas, there she’s hid;
The mariners all under hatches stowed,
Who, with a charm joined to their suffered labour,
I have left asleep. And for the rest o’th’ fleet,
Which I dispersed, they all have met again,
And are upon the Mediterranean float
Bound sadly home for Naples,
Supposing that they saw the King’s ship wrecked,
And his great person perish.
PROSPERO
Ariel, thy charge
Exactly is performed; but there’s more work.
What is the time o’th’ day?
ARIEL
Past the mid season.
PROSPERO
At least two glasses. The time ’twixt six and now
Must by us both be spent most preciously.
ARIEL
Is there more toil? Since thou dost give me pains,
Let me remember thee what thou hast promised
Which is not yet performed me.
PROSPERO
How now? Moody?
What is’t thou canst demand?
ARIEL My liberty.
PROSPERO
Before the time be out? No more!
ARIEL
I prithee,
Remember I have done thee worthy service,
Told thee no lies, made thee no mistakings, served
Without or grudge or grumblings. Thou did promise
To bate me a full year.
PROSPERO
Dost thou forget
From what a torment I did free thee?
ARIEL
No.
PROSPERO
Thou dost, and think‘st it much to tread the ooze
Of the salt deep,
To run upon the sharp wind of the north,
To do me business in the veins o’th’ earth
When it is baked with frost.
ARIEL
I do not, sir.
PROSPERO
Thou liest, malignant thing. Hast thou forgot
The foul witch Sycorax, who with age and envy
Was grown into a hoop? Hast thou forgot her?
ARIEL
No, sir.
PROSPERO Thou hast. Where was she born? Speak, tell me!
ARIEL
Sir, in Algiers.
PROSPERO
O, was she so! I must
Once in a month recount what thou hast been,
Which thou forget‘st. This damned witch Sycorax,
For mischiefs manifold and sorceries terrible
To enter human hearing, from Algiers
Thou know’st was banished. For one thing she did
They would not take her life. Is not this true?
ARIEL Ay, sir.
PROSPERO
This blue-eyed hag was hither brought with child,
And here was left by th’ sailors. Thou, my slave,
As thou report’st thyself, was then her servant;
And for thou wast a spirit too delicate
To act her earthy and abhorred commands,
Refusing her grand hests, she did confine thee
By help of her more potent ministers,
And in her most unmitigable rage,
Into a cloven pine; within which rift
Imprisoned thou didst painfully remain
A dozen years, within which space she died
And left thee there, where thou didst vent thy groans
As fast as mill-wheels strike. Then was this island—
Save for the son that she did litter here,
A freckled whelp, hag-born—not honoured with
A human shape.
ARIEL
Yes, Caliban her son.
PROSPERO
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 damned, which Sycorax
Could not again undo. It was mine art,
When I arrived and heard thee, that made gape
The pine and let thee out.
ARIEL
I thank thee, master.
PROSPERO
If thou more murmur’st, I will rend an oak,
And peg thee in his knotty entrails till
Thou hast howled away twelve winters.
ARIEL
Pardon, master.
I will be correspondent to command,
And do my spriting gently.
PROSPERO Do so, and after two days
I will discharge thee.
ARIEL
That’s my noble master!
What shall I do? Say what, what shall I do?
PROSPERO
Go make thyself like to a nymph o’th’ sea. 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 Ariel
Awake, dear heart, awake! Thou hast slept well;
Awake.
MIRANDA (awaking) The strangeness of your story put
Heaviness in me.
PROSPERO
Shake it off. Come on;
We’ll visit Caliban my slave, who never
Yields us kind answer.
MIRANDA ’Tis a villain, sir,
I do not love to look on.
PROSPERO
But as ’tis,
We cannot miss him. He does make our fire,
Fetch in our wood, and serves in offices
That profit us.—What ho! Slave, Caliban!
Thou earth, thou, speak!
CALIBAN (within)
There’s wood enough within.
PROSPERO
Come forth, I say! There’s other business for thee.
Come, thou tortoise! When?
Enter Ariel, like a water-nymph
Fine apparition! My quaint Ariel,
Hark in thine ear.
He whispers
ARIEL
My lord, it shall be done. Exit
PROSPERO
Thou poisonous slave, got by the devil himself
Upon thy wicked dam, come forth!
Enter Caliban
CALIBAN
As wicked dew as e’er my mother brushed
With raven’s feather from unwholesome fen
Drop on you both! A southwest blow on ye,
And blister you all o’er!
PROSPERO
For this be sure tonight thou shalt have cramps,
Side-stitches that shall pen thy breath up. Urchins
Shall forth at vast of night, that they may work
All exercise on thee. Thou shalt be pinched
As thick as honeycomb, each pinch more stinging
Than bees that made ’em.
CALIBAN
/> I must eat my dinner.
This island’s mine, by Sycorax my mother,
Which thou tak’st from me. When thou cam’st first,
Thou strok’st me and made 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 loved thee,
And showed thee all the qualities o’th’ 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;
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 o’th’ island.
PROSPERO
Thou most lying slave,
Whom stripes may move, not kindness! I have used
thee,
Filth as thou art, with human care, and lodged thee
In mine own cell, till thou didst seek to violate
The honour of my child.
CALIBAN
O ho,O ho! Would’t had been done!
Thou didst prevent me; I had peopled else
This isle with Calibans.
MIRANDA
Abhorred slave,
Which any print of goodness wilt 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 endowed 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 confined into this rock, Who hadst deserved more than a prison.
CALIBAN
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!
PROSPERO
Hag-seed, hence!
Fetch us in fuel. And be quick, thou’rt best,
To answer other business.—Shrug’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.
CALIBAN
No, pray thee.
(Aside) I must obey. His art is of such power
It would control my dam’s god Setebos,
And make a vassal of him.
PROSPERO
So, slave, hence!
Exit Caliban
Enter Ariel ⌈like a water-nymph⌉,playing and
singing, invisible to Ferdinand, who follows.
⌈Prospero and Miranda stand aside⌉
Song
ARIEL
Come unto these yellow sands, And then take hands;
Curtsied when you have and kissed—
The wild waves whist—
Foot it featly here and there,
And, sweet sprites, bear
The burden. Hark, hark.
⌈SPIRITS⌉ (dispersedly within)
Bow-wow!
⌈ARIEL⌉
The watch-dogs bark.
FSPIRITS] (within) Bow-wow!
ARIEL
Hark, hark, I hear
The strain of strutting Chanticleer
Cry ‘cock-a-diddle-dow’.
FERDINAND
Where should this music be? I’th’ air or th’earth?
It sounds no more; and sure it waits upon
Some god o‘th’ island. Sitting on a bank,
Weeping again the King my father’s wreck,
This music crept by me upon the waters,
Allaying both their fury and my passion
With its sweet air. Thence I have followed it—
Or it hath drawn me rather. But ’tis gone.
No, it begins again.
Song
ARIEL
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
But doth suffer a sea-change
Into something rich and strange.
Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell:
⌈SPIRITS⌉(within) Ding dong.
ARIEL
Hark, now I hear them.
⌈SPIRITS⌉(within)
Ding-dong bell. ⌈etc.⌉
FERDINAND
The ditty does remember my drowned father.
This is no mortal business, nor no sound
That the earth owes.
⌈Music⌉
I hear it now above me.
PROSPERO (to Miranda)
The fringed curtains of thine eye advance,
And say what thou seest yon.
MIRANDA
What is’t? A spirit?
Lord, how it looks about! Believe me, sir,
It carries a brave form. But ’tis a spirit.
PROSPERO
No, wench, it eats and sleeps, and hath such senses
As we have, such. This gallant which thou seest
Was in the wreck, and but he’s something stained
With grief, that’s beauty’s canker, thou mightst call
him
A goodly person. He hath lost his fellows,
And strays about to find ’em.
MIRANDA
I might call him
A thing divine, for nothing natural
I ever saw so noble.
PROSPERO (aside)
It goes on, I see,
As my soul prompts it. (To Ariel) Spirit, fine spirit, I’ll
free thee
Within two days for this.
FERDINAND ⌈aside⌉
Most sure the goddess
On whom these airs attend. (To Miranda) Vouchsafe
my prayer 425
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?
MIRANDA
No wonder, sir,
But certainly a maid.
FERDINAND
My language! Heavens!
I am the best of them that speak this speech,
Were I but where ’tis spoken.
PROSPERO
How, the best?
What wert thou if the King of Naples heard thee?
FERDINAND
A single thing, as I am now that wonders
To hear thee speak of Naples. He does hear me,
And that he does I weep. Myself am Naples,
Who with mine eyes, never since at ebb, beheld
The King my father wrecked.
MIRANDA
Alack, for mercy!
FERDINAND
Yes, faith, and all his lords, the Duke of Milan
And his brave son being twain.
PROSPERO (aside)
The Duke of Milan
And his more braver daughter could control thee,
If now ’twere fit to do’t. At the first sight
They have changed eyes.—Deticate Ariel,
I’ll set thee free for this. (To Ferdinand) A word, good
sir. 445
I fear you have done yourself some wrong. A word.
MIRANDA (aside)
Why speaks my father so ungently? This
Is the third man that e’er I saw, the first
That e’er I sighed for. Pity move my father
To be inclined my way.
FERDINAND
O, if a virgin,
And your affection not gone forth, I’ll make you
The Queen of Naples.
PROSPERO
Soft, sir! One word
more.
(Aside) They are both in either’s powers. But this swift
business
I must uneasy make, lest too light winning
Make the prize light. (To Ferdinand) One word more. I
charge thee
That thou attend me. Thou dost here usurp
The name thou ow’st not; and hast put thyself
Upon this island as a spy, to win it
From me the lord on’t.
FERDINAND
No, as I am a man.
MIRANDA
There’s nothing ill can dwell in such a temple.
If the ill spirit have so fair a house,
Good things will strive to dwell with’t.
PROSPERO (to Ferdinand)
Follow me.
(To Miranda) Speak not you for him; he’s a traitor.
(To Ferdinand) Come!
I’ll manacle thy neck and feet together.
Sea-water shalt thou drink; thy food shall be
The fresh-brook mussels, withered roots, and husks
Wherein the acorn cradled. Follow!
FERDINAND
No.
I will resist such entertainment till
Mine enemy has more power.
He draws, and is charmed from moving
MIRANDA
O dear father,
Make not too rash a trial of him, for
He’s gentle, and not fearful.
PROSPERO
What, I say,
My foot my tutor? Put thy sword up, traitor,
Who mak‘st a show but dar’st not strike, thy
conscience
Is so possessed with guilt. Come from thy ward,
For I can here disarm thee with this stick
And make thy weapon drop.
MIRANDA
Beseech you, father!
PROSPERO
Hence! Hang not on my garments.
MIRANDA
Sir, have pity.
I’ll be his surety.
PROSPERO
Silencel One word more
Shall make me chide thee, if not hate thee. What,
An advocate for an impostor? Hush!
Thou think’st there is no more such shapes as he,
Having seen but him and Caliban. Foolish wench!
To th’ most of men this is a Caliban,
And they to him are angels.
MIRANDA
My affections
Are then most humble. I have no ambition
To see a goodlier man.
PROSPERO (to Ferdinand) Come on; obey.
Thy nerves are in their infancy again,
And have no vigour in them.
FERDINAND
So they are.
My spirits, as in a dream, are all bound up.
My father’s loss, the weakness which I feel,
The wreck of all my friends, nor this man’s threats
To whom I am subdued, are but light to me,
Might I but through my prison once a day