For learning me your language! PRO. Hag-feed, hence! Fetch us in fuel; and be quick, th' wert best, What I command, I'll rack thee with old cramps; That beafts shall tremble at thy din. CAL. No, 'pray thee! I must obey: his art is of such power, And make a vassal of him. PRO. (Afide. So, flave; hence! (Exit CALIBAN. Re-enter ARIEL invisible, playing and finging; The word rid, which has not been explained, means to destroy. So, in K. Henry VI. P. II: 4 66 -If you ever chance to have a child, " Look, in his youth, to have him so cut off, " As, deathfmen! you have rid this sweet young prince." MALONE. my dam's god, Setebos,) A gentleman of great merit, Mr. Warner, has observed on the authority of John Barbot, that the Patagons are reported to dread a great horned devil, called Setebos." It may be asked however, how Shakspeare knew any thing of this, as Barbot was a voyager of the present century?Perhaps he had read Eden's History of Travayle, 1577, who tells us, p. 434, that the giantes, when they found themselves fettered, roared like bulls, and cried upon Setebos to help them."The metathesis in Caliban from Canibal is evident. FARMER. We learn from Magellan's voyage, that Setebos was the fupreme god of the Patagons, and Cheleule was an inferior one. TOLLET. FER. Where should this musick be? i' the air, or the earth? It founds no more: - and fure, it waits upon Setebos is also mentioned in Hackluyt's Voyages, 1589. MALONE, 5 Re-enter Ariel invisible,) In the wardrobe of the Lord Admiral's men (i. e. company of comedians) 1598, was a robe for to goo invisebell." See the Mf. from Dulwich college, quoted by Mr. Malone. STEEVENS. • Court'fied when you have, and kiss'd,) As was anciently done at the beginning of some dances. So, in K. Henry VIII. that prince says to Anna Bullen ،، I were unmannerly to take you out, " And not to kiss you." The wild waves whist;) i. e. the wild waves being filent. So, in Spenser's Fairy Queen, B. VII. c. 7. f. 59: " So was the Titaness put down, and whift." And Milton seems to have had our author in his eye. stanza 5. of his Hymn on the Nativity: " Smoothly the waters kiss'd." See : So again, both Lord Surrey and Phaer, in their translations of and Lylly, in his Maid's Metamorphosis, 1600: « But every thing is quiet, whist, and still." STEEVENS. the burden bear.) Old copy-bear the burden. Correded by Mr. Theobald. MALONE. 4 9 Weeping again the king my father's wreck, * Weeping again the king my father's wreck,) Thus the old copy; but in the books of Shakspeare's age again is sometimes printed instead of against (i. e. oppotite to), which I am perfuaded was our author's word. The placing Ferdinand in fuch a fituation that he could ftill gaze upon the wrecked veffel, is one of Shakspeare's touches of nature. Again is inadmisible; for this would import that Ferdinand's tears had ceased for a time; whereas he himself tells us, afterwards, that from the hour of his father's wreck they had never ceased to flow: ---Myself am Naples, ، Who with mine eyes, ne'er since at ebb, beheld However, as our author sometimes forgot to compare the different parts of his play, I have made no change. MALONE. By the word-again, I suppose the Prince means only to describe the repetition of his sorrows. Besides, it appears from Miranda's description of the storm, that the ship had been swallowed by the waves, and consequently could no longer be an object of fight. STEEVENS. This musick crept by me upon the waters;) So, in Milton's Masque : "-a soft and folemn breathing found " Rofe like a steam of rich distill'd perfumes, " And stole upon the air." STEEVENS. • Full fathom five thy father lies, &c.) Ariel's lays, (which have been condemned by Gildon as trifling, and defended not very fuccefsfully by Dr. Warburton) however seasonable and efficacious, must be allowed to be of no supernatural dignity or elegance: they exprefs nothing great, nor reveal any thing above mortal discovery. But doth fuffer a fea-change (Burden, ding-dong. FER. The ditty does remember my drown'd father; This is no mortal business, nor no found The reason for which Ariel is introduced thus trifling is, that he and his companions are evidently of the fairy kind, an order of beings to which tradition has always ascribed a fort of diminutive agency, powerful but ludicrous, a humorous and frolick controlment of nature, well expressed by the songs of Ariel. JOHNSON. The fougs in this play, Dr. Wilson, who refet and published two of them, tells us, in his Court Ayres, or Ballads, published at Oxford, 1660, that "Full fathom five," and "Where the bee fucks," had been first set by Robert Johnson, a composer contemporary with Shakspeare. BURNEY. • Nothing of him that doth fade, But doth fuffer a sea-change-) The meaning is Every thing about him, that is liable to alteration, is changed. STEEVENS. 4 But doth fuffer a fea-change-) So, in Milton's Masque: " And underwent a quick immortal change." 3 Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell: Hark! now I hear them, -Ding, dong bell. STEEVENS. Burden, ding-dong.) So, in The Golden Garland of Princely Delight, &c. 13th edition, 1690: 1 A " Corydon's doleful knell to the tune of Ding, dong." Yet will I ring her knell, Ding, dong." The fame burthen to a song occurs in The Merchant of Venice, A& III. fc. ii. STEEVENS. 6 That the earth owes :) To owe, in this place, as well as in many others, fignifies to own. So, in Othello : "-that sweet fleep « Which thou ow'dft yesterday." PRO. The fringed curtains of thine eye ad vance, And say, what thou seest yond'. What is't? a spirit? MIKA. PRO. No, wench; it eats and fleeps, and hath As we have, fuch: This gallant, which thou seest, call him A goodly perfon: he hath lost his fellows, And ftrays about to find them. A thing divine; for nothing natural MIRA. I might call him (Afide. I ever faw so noble. PRO. It goes on, 8 As my foul prompts it: - Spirit, fine fpirit, I'l free thee Within two days for this. Again, in the Tempeft: " -thou doft here ufurp " The name thou ow'st not." To use the word in this sense, is not peculiar to Shakspeare, I meet with it in Beaumont and Fletcher's Beggar's Bush: If now the beard be fuch, what is the prince That owes the beard?" STEEVENS. The fringed curtains, &c.) The fame expression occurs in Pericles Prince of Tyre, 1609: "-her eyelids " Begin to part their fringes of bright gold." Again, in Sidney's Arcadia Lib. I: "Sometimes my eyes would lay themselves open-or cast my lids, as curtains, over the image of beauty her presence had painted in them." STEEVENS. 8 It goes on,) The old copy reads-" It goes on, I fee, &c. Butas the words I fee, are useless, and an incumbrance to the metre, I have omitted them. STEEVENS. E |