William Shakespeare - The Complete Works of William Shakespeare

Which since have steaded much: so, of his gentleness,

Knowing I lov’d my books, he furnish’d 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:—

[Resumes his mantle]

Sit still, and hear the last of our sea-sorrow.

Here in this island we arriv’d: 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 raising 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 inclin’d to sleep; ‘tis a good dulness,

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 curl’d clouds; to thy strong bidding task

Ariel and all his quality.

PROSPERO.

Hast thou, spirit,

Perform’d 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 waist, the deck, in every cabin,

I flam’d amazement; sometime I’d divide,

And burn in many places; on the topmast,

The yards, and boresprit, 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 play’d

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 leapt; cried ‘Hell is empty,

And all the devils are here.’

PROSPERO.

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 perish’d;

On their sustaining garments not a blemish,

But fresher than before: and, as thou bad’st me,

In troops I have dispers’d 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 dispos’d,

And all the rest o’ th’ fleet?

ARIEL.

Safely in harbour

Is the King’s ship; in the deep nook, where once

Thou call’dst me up at midnight to fetch dew

From the still-vex’d Bermoothes; there she’s hid:

The mariners all under hatches stowed;

Who, with a charm join’d to their suff’red labour,

I have left asleep: and for the rest o’ th’ fleet

Which I dispers’d, they all have met again,

And are upon the Mediterranean flote

Bound sadly home for Naples,

Supposing that they saw the king’s ship wrack’d,

And his great person perish.

PROSPERO.

Ariel, thy charge

Exactly is perform’d; 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 promis’d,

Which is not yet perform’d 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 no mistakings, serv’d

Without or grudge or grumblings: thou didst 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 bak’d 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 Argier.

PROSPERO.

O! was she so? I must

Once in a month recount what thou hast been,

Which thou forget’st. This damn’d witch Sycorax,

For mischiefs manifold, and sorceries terrible

To enter human hearing, from Argier,

Thou know’st,was banish’d: for one thing she did

They would not take her life. Is not this true?

ARIEL.

Ay, sir.

PROSPERO.

This blue-ey’d hag was hither brought with child,

And here was left by the sailors. Thou, my slave,

As thou report’st thyself, wast then her servant:

And, for thou wast a spirit too delicate

To act her earthy and abhorr’d 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

Imprison’d, 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 freckl’d whelp, hag-born—not honour’d 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 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.

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 howl’d 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 a nymph o’ th’ sea: be subject

To no sight but thine and mine; invisible

To every eyeball else. Go, take this shape,