Boatswain [shouting]. Lay her a-hold, a-hold! Set her two courses. Off to sea again! [in despair] lay her off!

The ship strikes. Fireballs flame along the rigging and from beak to stern. 'Enter mariners wet.'

Mariners. All lost! to prayers, to prayers! all lost! Boatswain [stupefied, slowly pulling out a bottle]. 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 am 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.

Mercy on us!

‘A confused noise' below We split, we split!-Farewell, my wife and children!Farewell, brother! We split, we split, we split! Antonio. Let's all sink with' king.

Sebastian. Let's take leave of him. [they go below Gonzalo. Now would I give a thousand furlongs of sea -for an acre of barren ground...long heath, brown firs, any thing...The wills above be done, but I would fain die a dry death!

A crowd bursts upon deck, making for the ship's side, in the glare of the fireballs. Of a sudden these are quenched. A loud cry of many voices.

[1. 2.] The Island. A green plat of undercliff, approached by a path descending through a grove of lime-trees alongside the upper cliff, in the face of which is the entrance of a tall cave, curtained. MIRANDA, gazing out to sea; PROSPERO, in wizard's mantle and carrying a staff, comes from the cave.

Miranda [turning]. 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,

[in a whisper

(Who had no doubt some noble creature in her!)
Dashed all to pieces: [sobbing] 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 e'er

It should the good ship so have swallowed, and
The fraughting souls within her.

I have done nothing, but in care of thee

(Of thee, my dear one; thee, my daughter) who

Art ignorant of what thou art....nought 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 [her eyes on the sea again]. 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... So,

[he lays aside his mantle

Lie there my art: Wipe thou thine eyes, have comfort, The direful spectacle of the wrack, which touched

The very virtue of compassion in thee...

I have with such provision in mine art
†So safely ordered, that there is no soil,
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.

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....

[he sits on a bench of rock, Miranda beside him

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 any thing 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 abysm of time?

If thou remembrest aught ere thou cam'st here,

How thou cam'st here thou mayst.

Miranda.

But that I do not.

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

A princess; no worse issued.

Miranda.

O the heavens,

What foul play had we, that we came from thence?

Or blesséd 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 [recalling her eyes from the sea]. 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 [guiltily]. 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-prized 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 of it,
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.