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REMARKS ON SHAKESPEARE'S 'TEMPEST.'

hand, Caliban signifies the heavy element of earth. Yet they are neither of them simple, allegorical personifications, but beings individually determined. In general we find in The Midsummer Night's Dream, in The Tempest, in the magical part of Macbeth, and wherever Shakespeare avails himself of the popular belief in the invisible presence of spirits, and the possibility of coming in contact with them, a profound view of the inward life of Nature and her mysterious springs, which, it is true, can never be altogether unknown to the genuine poet, as poetry is altogether incompatible with mechanical physics, but which few have possessed in an equal degree with Dante and himself.'-SCHLEGEL.

'It is observed of The Tempest, that its plan is regular; this the author of The Revisal thinks, what I think too, an accidental effect of the story, not intended or regarded by our author. But, whatever might be Shakespeare's intention in forming or adopting the plot, he has made it instrumental to the production of many characters, diversified with boundless invention, and preserved with profound skill in nature, extensive knowledge of opinions, and accurate observation of life. In a single drama are here exhibited princes, courtiers, and sailors, all speaking in their real characters. There is the agency of airy spirits, and of an earthly goblin; the operations of magic, the tumults of a storm, the adventures of a desert island, the native effusion of untaught affection, the punishment of guilt, and the final happiness of the pair for whom our passions and reason are equally interested.'-JOHNSON.

THE TEMPEST.

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SCENE-THE SEA, WITH A SHIP: AFTERWARDS AN ISLAND.

THE TEMPEST.

ACT I.

SCENE. I.—On a Ship at Sea. A Storm, with Thunder and Lightning.

Enter a Shipmaster and a Boatswain.

Mast. Boatswain !

Boats. Here, master: What cheer?

Mast. Good, speak to the mariners: fall to 't yarely,2 or we run ourselves aground: bestir, bestir.

Enter Mariners.

[Exit.

Boats. Heigh, my hearts! cheerly, cheerly, my hearts! yare, yare! take in the topsail! tend to the master's whistle! [Exeunt Mariners.] Blow till thou burst thy wind, if room enough! 3

Good.] Good boatswain. The word is used similarly in Gonzalo's first speech, and elsewhere in the play.

2 Yarely.] Actively. Yare, as in the next speech, and again in the Boatswain's speech, Act V. sc. 1, means active. 'The Persian galleys being high cargued, heavy, and not yare of steerage.' North's Plutarch, Themistocles. Cæsar's ships were light of yarage' [= action]. Ditto, Antonius. The galleys of the enemies, the which were heavy of yarage, both for their bigness, as also for lack of watermen to row them.' Ibid.

• If room enough.] If we have sea-room enough.

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

Alon. Good boatswain, have care. Where's the master? Play the men.1

Boats. I pray now, keep below.

Ant. Where is the master, boatswain?

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

Gon. Nay, good, be patient.

Boats. When the sea is. Hence ! What care these roarers for the name of king? To cabin: silence! trouble us not.

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

Gon. I have great comfort from this fellow: methinks he hath no drowning mark upon him; his complexion is perfect gallows.2 Stand fast, good Fate, to his hanging!

Play the men.] Play the part of men: behave like men. 'Let us play the men for our people.' 2 Sam. x. 12. 'I will not use long circumstance to encourage you to play the men.' Knolles's Hist. of the Turks (1603), p. 576. The expression occurs also in 1 K. Henry VI. i. 5.

2 Perfect gallows.] Quite that of a fellow destined to be hanged : alluding to the proverb, 'He never will be drowned who is born to be hanged.' Compare Two Gent. of Verona, i. 1:—

'Go, go, begone to save your ship from wrack,
Which cannot perish having thee aboard,

Being destined to a drier death on shore.'

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