Come away, fervant, come: I am ready now: Enter Ariel. Ari. All hail, great mafter! grave Sir, hail! I come To answer thy best pleasure; be't to fly; On the curl'd clouds: to thy ftrong bidding task Pro. Haft thou, fpirit, 9 Perform'd to point the tempeft that I bad thee? Ari. To every article. I I boarded the king's fhip: now on the beak, Pro. My brave spirit! Who was fo firm, fo conftant, that this coil Ari. Not a foul 3 But felt a fever of the mad, and play'd 9 Perform'd to point- -] i. e. to the minutest article. Some STEEVENS. now on the beak,] The beak was a ftrong pointed body at the head of the ancient gallies; it is ufed here for the forecastle, or the bolt-fprit. JOHNSON. 2 Now in the wafte,-] The part between the quarter-deck and the forecafle. JOHNSON. 3 But felt a fever of the mad, ] In all the later editions this is changed to a fever of the mind, without reafon or authority, nor is any notice given of an alteration. JoHNSON. If Some tricks of defperation: all, but mariners, On their 4 fuftaining garments not a blemish, If it be at all neceffary to explain the meaning, it is this: Not a foul but felt fuch a fever as madmen feel, when the frantic fit is upon them. STEEVENS. 4 -fuftaining- i. e. Their garments that bore them up and fupported them. So K. Lear, A&t 4. Sc. 4. "In our fuftaining corn." Mr. Edwards was of opinion that we should read fea-ftained garments; for (fays he) it was not the floating of their cloaths, but the magic of Profpero which preserved, as it had wrecked them. Nor was the miracle, that their garments had not been at first difcoloured by the fea-water, which even that fuflaining would not have prevented, unless it had been on the air, not on the water; but, as Gonzalo fays, that their garments "being (as they were) drenched in the fea, held notwithflanding their freshness and glofs, being rather new-dyed "than ftained with falt-water." 66 For this, and all fuch notes as are taken from the MSS. of the late Mr. Edwards, I am indebted to the friendship of Benjamin Way, Efq; who very obligingly procured them from the executors of that gentleman, with leave for their publication. Such of them as are omitted in this edition had been fometimes foreftalled by the remarks of others, and fometimes by my own. The reader, however, might have been justly offended, had any other reasons prevented me from communicating the unpublished fentiments of that fprightly critic and most amiable man, as entire as I received them. STEEVENS. This note of Mr. Edwards, with which I fuppofe no reader is fatisfied, fhews with how much greater eafe critical emendations are destroyed than made, and how willingly every man would be changing the text, if his imagination would furnish alterations. JOHNSON. VOL. I. B But But fresher than before. And, as thou bad'st me, Pro. Of the king's fhip The mariners, fay, how thou haft dispos'd, Ari. Safely in harbour Is the king's fhip; in the deep nook, where once Whom, with a charm join'd to their fuffer'd labour, the voyages From the fill-vex'd Bermoothes.] Theobald fays Bermoothes is printed by miftake for Bermudas. No. That was the name by which the islands then went, as we may fee by of that time; and by our author's contemporary poets. Fletcher, in his Woman Pleafed, fays, The devil fhould think of purchafing that egg-fhell to victual out a witch for the Bermoothes. Smith, in his account of these islands, p. 172. fays, that the Bermudas were fo fearful to the world, that many called them The Ifle of Devils.-P. 174.-to all feamen no lefs terrible than an inchanted den of furies. And no wonder, for the clime was extremely fubject to ftorms and hurricanes; and the islands were furrounded with fcattered rocks lying thallowly WARBURTON. hid under the furface of the water. The opinion that Bermudas was haunted with evil fpirits In a little piece of Sir John continued fo late as the civil wars. Berkinhead's, intitled, Two Centuries of Paul's Church-yard, una cum indice expurgatorio, &c. 12o. În page 62. under the title of Cafes of Confcience, is this. 34. "Whether Bermudas and the parliament-house lie under "one planet, feeing both are haunted with devils." PERCY. Flot. Fr. 6 -the Mediterranean flote,] Flote is avave. STEEVENS. Suppofing Suppofing that they faw the king's fhip wreck'd, And his great perfon perish. Pro. Ariel, thy charge Exactly is perform'd; but there's more work. 7 What is the time o' the day? Ari. Paft the mid feason. Pro. At least two glaffes: the time 'twixt fix and now, Muft by us both be spent most preciously. Ari. Is there more toil? Since thou doft give me pains, Let me remember thee what thou haft promis'd, Pro. How now? moody? What is't thou canft demand? Ari. My liberty. Pro. Before the time be out? no more. Ari. I pray thee, Remember, I have done thee worthy service; Told thee no lies, made thee no mistakings, ferv'd Without or grudge or grumblings: thou didst pro mife To bate me a full 8 year. Pro. Doft thou forget From what a torment I did free thee? Ari. What is the time o' the day?] This paffage needs not be difturbed, it being common to ask a question, which the next moment enables us to anfwer; he that thinks it faulty may cafily adjuft it thus: Pro. What is the time o' the day? Paft the mid feafon. Ari. At least two glaffes. Pro. The time 'twixt fix and now- -JOHNSON. 8 Doft thou forget] That the character and conduct of Profpero may be understood, fomething must be known of the fyftem of enchantment, which fupplied all the marvellous found. in the romances of the middle ages. This fyftem feems to be founded on the opinion that the fallen fpirits, having different degrees of guilt, had different habitations allotted them at their expulfion, fome being confined in hell, fome (as Hooker, who delivers the opinion of our poet's age, expreffes it) difperfed Ari. No. Pro. Thou doft; and think'ft it much to tread the ooze Of the falt deep; 9 To run upon the fharp wind of the north; To do me business in the veins o' the earth, When it is bak'd with froft. Ari. I do not, Sir. Pro. Thou ly'ft, malignant thing! Haft thou forgot The foul witch Sycorax, who, with age and envy, Was grown into a hoop? haft thou forgot her? in air, fome on earth, fome in water, others in caves, dens, or minerals under the earth. Of thefe, fome were more malignant and mifchievous than others. The earthy fpirits feem to have been thought the most depraved, and the aerial the least vitiated. Thus Profpero obferves of Ariel: -Thou waft a spirit too delicate To act her earthy and abhorr'd commands. Over thefe fpirits a power might be obtained by certain rites performed or charms learned. This power was called The Black Art, or Knowledge of Enchantment. The enchanter being (as king James obferves in his Demonology) one who commands the devil, whereas the witch ferves him. Thofe who thought best of this art, the exiflence of which was, I am afraid, believed very seriously, held, that certain founds and characters had a phyfical power over fpirits, and compeiled their agency; others who condemned the practice, which in reality was furely never practifed, were of opinion, with more reason, that the power of charms arofe only from compact, and was no more than the fpirits voluntary allowed them for the feduction of The art was held by all, though not equally criminal, yet unlawful, and therefore Caufabon, fpeaking of one who had commerce with fpirits, blames him, though he imagines him one of the best kind who dealt with them by way of command. Thus Profpero repents of his art in the laft fcene. The fpirits were always confidered as in fome meafure enflaved to the enchanter, at leaft for a time, and as ferving with unwillingnefs, therefore Ariel fo often begs for liberty; and Caliban obferves, that the fpirits ferve Profpero with no good will, but bate him rootedly.- Of these trifles enough. JOHNSON. man. To run upon the sharp wind of the north;] Sir W. Davenant and Dryden, in their alteration of this play, have made a very wanton change in the line, and read, To run againft, &c. STEEVENS. |