SCENE I.

ACT I.

On a Ship at sea. A Storm, with Thunder and
Lightning.

Enter Master and Boatswain severally.

Mast. Boatswain !

Boats. Here, master; what cheer?

Mast. Good,' speak to th' mariners: fall to't yarely, or we run ourselves a-ground: bestir, bestir.

[Exit.

1 Here, as in many other places, good is used just as we now use well. So a little after: " Good, yet remember whom thou hast aboard." Also in Hamlet, i. 1: "Good now, sit down, and tell me," &c.

2 Yarely is nimbly, briskly, or alertly. So, in the next speech, yare, an imperative verb, is be nimble, or be on the alert. In North's Plutarch we

Enter Mariners.

Boats. Heigh, my hearts! cheerly, cheerly, my hearts! yare, yare! Take in the topsail. Tend to th' master's whistle. [Exeunt Mariners.] - Blow till thou burst thy wind, if room enough! 4

Enter ALONSO, SEBASTIAN, ANTONIO, FERDINAND, GONZALO, and others.

Alon. Good boatswain, have care. Where's the master? Play the men.5

Boats. I pray now, keep below.

Anto. Where is the master, boatswain?

Boats. Do you not hear him? You mar our labour: keep your cabins; you do assist the storm.

Hence ! What care these

Gonza. Nay, good, be patient. Boats. When the sea is. roarers for the name of king?

us not.

To cabin: silence! trouble

Gonza. Good, yet remember whom thou hast aboard. Boats. None that I more love than myself. You are a counsellor if you can command these elements to silence, and work the peace of the present, we will not hand a rope more; use your authority: if you cannot, give thanks you have lived so long, and make yourself ready in your cabin.

6

have such phrases as "galleys not yare of steerage," and "ships light of yarage," and "galleys heavy of yarage."

3 In Shakespeare's time, the wind was often represented pictorially by the figure of a man with his cheeks puffed out to their utmost tension with the act of blowing. Probably the Poet had such a figure in his mind. So “Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks!"

in King Lear, iii. 2:

4 That is, "if we have sea-room enough." So in Pericles, iii. 1: But sea-room, an the brine and cloudy billow kiss the Moon, I care not."

5 Act with spirit, behave like men. So in 2 Samuel, x. 12: "Be of good courage, and let us play the men for our people."

6 Present for present time. So in the Prayer-Book: "That those things may please Him which we do at this present."

for the mischance of the hour, if it so hap.—Cheerly, good hearts! Out of our way, I say.

:

[Exit.

Gonza. I have great comfort from this fellow methinks he hath no drowning-mark upon him; his complexion is perfect gallows. Stand fast, good Fate, to his hanging! make the rope of his destiny our cable, for our own doth little advantage! If he be not born to be hang'd, our case is miserable. [Exeunt.

Re-enter Boatswain.

Boats. Down with the top-mast 8 yare; lower, lower! Bring her to try wi' th' main-course.9 [A cry within.] A plague upon this howling! they are louder than the weather. or our office.10

Re-enter SEBASTIAN, ANTONIO, and GONZALO.

Yet again! what do you here? Shall we give o'er, and drown? Have you a mind to sink?

Sebas. A pox o' your throat, you bawling, blasphemous, incharitable dog!

Boats. Work you, then.

Anto. Hang, cur, hang! you whoreson, insolent noisemaker, we are less afraid to be drown'd 11 than thou art.

7 Complexion was often used for nature, native bent or aptitude.

8 Of this order Lord Mulgrave, a sailor critic, says, "The striking the top-mast was a new invention in Shakespeare's time, which he here very properly introduces. He has placed his ship in the situation in which it was indisputably right to strike the top-mast, where he had not sea-room.'

9 This appears to have been a common nautical phrase. So in Hackluyt's Voyages, 1598: "And when the bark had way we cut the hauser, and so gat the sea to our friend, and tried out all the day with our maine course." Also in Smith's Sea Grammar, 1627: “Let us lie at trie with our maine course." And Sir Walter Raleigh speaks of being "obliged to lye at trye with our maine course and mizen." To lie at try is to keep as close to the wind as possible.

10 Weather for storm. "Their howling drowns both the roaring of the tempest and the commands of the officer," or "our official orders."

11 "Less afraid of being drown'd." gerundively, or like the Latin gerund.

So the Poet often uses the infinitive

See vol. i. page 207, note 12.

Gonza. I'll warrant him for drowning, 12 though the ship were no stronger than a nut-shell, and as leaky as an unstanch wench.13

Beats. Lay her a-hold, a-hold! set her two courses ! 14 off to sea again; lay her off!

Re-enter Mariners, wet.

Mariners. All lost! to prayers, to prayers! all lost!

Boats. What, must our mouths be cold?

[Exeunt.

Gonza. The King and Prince at prayers! let us assist

them,

For our case is as theirs.

Sebas.

I'm out of patience.

Anto. We're merely 15 cheated of our lives by drunkards. This wide-chopp'd rascal — would thou mightst lie drown

ing,

The washing of ten tides !

12 As to, or as regards, drowning. A not uncommon use of for. — Gonzalo has in mind the old proverb, "He that is born to be hanged will never be drowned."

13 The meaning of this may be gathered from a passage in Fletcher's Mad Lover: Chilias says to the Priestess, "Be quiet, and be stanch too; no inundations."

14 A ship's courses are her largest lower sails; "so called," says Holt, "because they contribute most to give her way through the water, and thus enable her to feel the helm, and steer her course better than when they are not set or spread to the wind." Captain Glascock, another sailor critic, comments thus: "The ship's head is to be put leeward, and the vessel to be drawn off the land under that canvas nautically denominated the two courses." To lay a ship a-hold is to bring her to lie as near the wind as she can, in order to keep clear of the land, and get her out to sea. So Admiral Smith, in his Sailors' Wordbook: "A hold: A term of our early navigators, for bringing a ship close to the wind, so as to hold or keep to it."

15 Merely, here, is utterly or absolutely. A frequent usage. So in Hamlet, i. 2: "Things rank and gross in nature possess it merely."

Gonza.

He'll be hang'd yet,

Though every drop of water swear against it,

And gape at widest to glut him.16

A confused noise within. Mercy on us! We split, we split ! - Farewell, my wife and children! - Farewell, bro

ther! We split, we split, we split !

Anto. Let's all sink wi' th' King.17

Sebas. Let's take leave of him.

[Exit Boatswain.

[Exit.

[Exit.

Gonza. Now would I give a thousand furlongs of sea for an acre of barren ground; ling, heath, broom, furze, any thing.18 The wills above be done! but I would fain die a dry death. 19

[Exit.

16 Glut for englut; that is, swallow up.— Widest is here a monosyllable The same with many words that are commonly two syllables.

17 This double elision of with and the, so as to draw the two into one syllable, is quite frequent, especially in the Poet's later plays. So before in this scene: "Bring her to try wi' th' main course." Single elisions for the same purpose, such as by th', for th', to th', &c., are still more frequent. So in the first speech of the next scene: "Mounting to th' welkin's cheek."

18 Ling, heath, broom, and furze were names of plants growing on British barrens. So in Harrison's description of Britain, prefixed to Holinshed: 'Brome, heth, firze, brakes, whinnes, ling, &c."

19 The first scene of The Tempest is a very striking instance of the great accuracy of Shakespeare's knowledge in a professional science, the most difficult to attain without the help of experience. He must have acquired it by conversation with some of the most skilful seamen of that time. The succession of events is strictly observed in the natural progress of the distress described; the expedients adopted are the most proper that could have been devised for a chance of safety: and it is neither to the want of skill of the seamen or the bad qualities of the ship, but solely to the power of Prospero, that the shipwreck is to be attributed. The words of command are not only strictly proper, but are only such as point the object to be attained, and no superfluous ones of detail. Shakespeare's ship was too well manned to make it necessary to tell the seamen how they were to do it, as well as what they were to do. — LORD MULgrave.