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 Follow me.
Speak not you for him; he’s a traitor. Come;
I’ll manacle thy neck and feet together:
Sea-water shalt thou drink; thy food shall be
The fresh-brook muscles, wither’d roots and husks
Wherein the acorn cradled. Follow.
FERDINAND No;
I will resist such entertainment till
Mine enemy has more power.
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 makest a show but darest not strike, thy conscience
Is so possess’d 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 Silence! one word more
Shall make me chide thee, if not hate thee. What!
An advocate for an imposter! hush!
Thou think’st there is no more such shapes as he,
Having seen but him and Caliban: foolish wench!
To the 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 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
Behold this maid: all corners else o’ the earth
Let liberty make use of; space enough
Have I in such a prison.
PROSPERO [Aside]
It works.
To FERDINAND
Come on.
Thou hast done well, fine Ariel!
To FERDINAND
Follow me.
To ARIEL
Hark what thou else shalt do me.
MIRANDA Be of comfort;
My father’s of a better nature, sir,
Than he appears by speech: this is unwonted
Which now came from him.
PROSPERO Thou shalt be free
As mountain winds: but then exactly do
All points of my command.
ARIEL To the syllable.
PROSPERO Come, follow. Speak not for him.
Exeunt
Act 2
Scene 1
Another part of the island.
Enter ALONSO, SEBASTIAN, ANTONIO, GONZALO, ADRIAN, FRANCISCO, and others
GONZALO Beseech you, sir, be merry; you have cause,
So have we all, of joy; for our escape
Is much beyond our loss. Our hint of woe
Is common; every day some sailor’s wife,
The masters of some merchant and the merchant
Have just our theme of woe; but for the miracle,
I mean our preservation, few in millions
Can speak like us: then wisely, good sir, weigh
Our sorrow with our comfort.
ALONSO Prithee, peace.
SEBASTIAN He receives comfort like cold porridge.
ANTONIO The visitor will not give him o’er so.
SEBASTIAN Look he’s winding up the watch of his wit;
by and by it will strike.
GONZALO Sir,–
SEBASTIAN One: tell.
GONZALO When every grief is entertain’d that’s offer’d,
Comes to the entertainer–
SEBASTIAN A dollar.
GONZALO Dolour comes to him, indeed: you
have spoken truer than you purposed.
SEBASTIAN You have taken it wiselier than I meant you should.
GONZALO Therefore, my lord,–
ANTONIO Fie, what a spendthrift is he of his tongue!
ALONSO I prithee, spare.
GONZALO Well, I have done: but yet,–
SEBASTIAN He will be talking.
ANTONIO Which, of he or Adrian, for a good
wager, first begins to crow?
SEBASTIAN The old cock.
ANTONIO The cockerel.
SEBASTIAN Done. The wager?
ANTONIO A laughter.
SEBASTIAN A match!
ADRIAN Though this island seem to be desert,–
SEBASTIAN Ha, ha, ha! So, you’re paid.
ADRIAN Uninhabitable and almost inaccessible,–
SEBASTIAN Yet,–
ADRIAN Yet,–
ANTONIO He could not miss’t.
ADRIAN It must needs be of subtle, tender and delicate
temperance.
ANTONIO Temperance was a delicate wench.
SEBASTIAN Ay, and a subtle; as he most learnedly delivered.
ADRIAN The air breathes upon us here most sweetly.
SEBASTIAN As if it had lungs and rotten ones.
ANTONIO Or as ’twere perfumed by a fen.
GONZALO Here is everything advantageous to life.
ANTONIO True; save means to live.
SEBASTIAN Of that there’s none, or little.
GONZALO How lush and lusty the grass looks! how green!
ANTONIO The ground indeed is tawny.
SEBASTIAN With an eye of green in’t.
ANTONIO He misses not much.
SEBASTIAN No; he doth but mistake the truth totally.
GONZALO But the rarity of it is,–which is indeed almost
beyond credit,–
SEBASTIAN As many vouched rarities are.
GONZALO That our garments, being, as they were, drenched in
the sea, hold notwithstanding their freshness and
glosses, being rather new-dyed than stained with
salt water.
ANTONIO If but one of his pockets could speak, would it not
say he lies?
SEBASTIAN Ay, or very falsely pocket up his report
GONZALO Methinks our garments are now as fresh as when we
put them on first in Afric, at the marriage of
the king’s fair daughter Claribel to the King of Tunis.
SEBASTIAN ‘Twas a sweet marriage, and we prosper well in our return.
ADRIAN Tunis was never graced before with such a paragon to
their queen.
GONZALO Not since widow Dido’s time.
ANTONIO Widow! a pox o’ that! How came that widow in?
widow Dido!
SEBASTIAN What if he had said ‘widower AEneas’ too? Good Lord,
how you take it!
ADRIAN ‘Widow Dido’ said you? you make me study of that:
she was of Carthage, not of Tunis.
GONZALO This Tunis, sir, was Carthage.
ADRIAN Carthage?
GONZALO I assure you, Carthage.
SEBASTIAN His word is more than the miraculous harp; he hath
raised the wall and houses too.
ANTONIO What impossible matter will he make easy next?
SEBASTIAN I think he will carry this island home in his pocket
and give it his son for an apple.
ANTONIO And, sowing the kernels of it in the sea, bring
forth more islands.
GONZALO Ay.
ANTONIO Why, in good time.
GONZALO Sir, we were talking that our garments seem now
as fresh as when we were at Tunis at the marriage
of your daughter, who is now queen.
ANTONIO And the rarest that e’er came there.
SEBASTIAN Bate, I beseech you, widow Dido.
ANTONIO O, widow Dido! ay, widow Dido.
GONZALO Is not, sir, my doublet as fresh as the first day I
wore it? I mean, in a sort.
ANTONIO That sort was well fished for.
GONZALO When I wore it at your daughter’s marriage?
ALONSO You cram these words into mine ears against
The stomach of my sense. Would I had never
Married my daughter there! for, coming thence,
My son is lost and, in my rate, she too,
Who is so far from Italy removed
I ne’er again shall see her. O thou mine heir
Of Naples and of Milan, what strange fish
Hath made his meal on thee?
FRANCISCO Sir, he may live:
I saw him beat the surges under him,
And ride upon their backs; he trod the water,
Whose enmity he flung aside, and breasted
The surge most swoln that met him; his bold head
‘Bove the contentious waves he kept, and oar’d
Himself with his good arms in lusty stroke
To the shore, that o’er his wave-worn basis bow’d,
As stooping to relieve him: I not doubt
He came alive to land.
ALONSO No, no, he’s gone.
SEBASTIAN Sir, you may thank yourself for this great loss,
That would not bless our Europe with your daughter,
But rather lose her to an African;
Where she at least is banish’d from your eye,
Who hath cause to wet the grief on’t.
ALONSO Prithee, peace.
SEBASTIAN You were kneel’d to and importuned otherwise
By all of us, and the fair soul herself
Weigh’d between loathness and obedience, at
Which end o’ the beam should bow. We have lost your
son,
I fear, for ever: Milan and Naples have
More widows in them of this business’ making
Than we bring men to comfort them:
The fault’s your own.
ALONSO So is the dear’st o’ the loss.
GONZALO My lord Sebastian,
The truth you speak doth lack some gentleness
And time to speak it in: you rub the sore,
When you should bring the plaster.
SEBASTIAN Very well.
ANTONIO And most chirurgeonly.
GONZALO It is foul weather in us all, good sir,
When you are cloudy.
SEBASTIAN Foul weather?
ANTONIO Very foul.
GONZALO Had I plantation of this isle, my lord,–
ANTONIO He’ld sow’t with nettle-seed.
SEBASTIAN Or docks, or mallows.
GONZALO And were the king on’t, what would I do?
SEBASTIAN ‘Scape being drunk for want of wine.
GONZALO I’ the commonwealth I would by contraries