Scene I

Before Prospero's cell.

[Enter Prospero in his magic robes, and Ariel]

PROSP:

Now does my project gather to a head.
My charms crack not, my spirits obey, and time
Goes upright with his carriage. How's the day?

ARIEL:

On the sixth hour; at which time, my lord,
You said our work should cease.(5)

PROSP:

I did say so
When first I raised the tempest. Say, my spirit,
How fares the King and's followers?

ARIEL:

Confined together
In the same fashion as you gave in charge,(10)
Just as you left them; all prisoners, sir
In the lime-grove which weather-fends your cell;
They cannot budge till your release. The King,
His brother and yours, abide all three distracted,
And the remainder mourning over them,(15)
Brimful of sorrow and dismay; but chiefly
Him that you termed, sir, ’the good old lord Gonzalo:
His tears run down his beard like winter's drops
From eaves of reeds. Your charm so strongly works ’em
That if you now beheld them your affections(20)
Would become tender.

PROSP:

Dost thou think so, spirit?

ARIEL:

Mine would, sir, were I human.

PROSP:

And mine shall
Hast thou, which art but air, a touch, a feeling(25)
Of their afflictions, and shall not myself,
One of their kind, that relish all as sharply
Passion as they, be kindlier moved than thou art?
Though with their high wrongs I am struck to th’ quick,
Yet with my nobler reason ’gainst my fury(30)
Do I take part. The rarer action is
In virtue than in vengeance. They being penitent,
The sole drift of my purpose doth extend
Not a frown further. Go release them, Ariel.
My charms I'll break, their senses I'll restore,(35)
And they shall be themselves.

ARIEL:

I'll fetch them, sir.

[Exit]

[Prospero draws a magic circle with his staff]

PROSP:

Ye elves of hills, brooks, standing lakes and groves,
And ye that on the sands with printless foot
Do chase the ebbing Neptune and do fly him(40)
When he comes back; you demi-puppets that
By moonshine do the green sour ringlets make,
Whereof the ewe not bites, and you whose pastime
Is to make midnight mushrooms, that rejoice
To hear the solemn curfew; by whose aid,(45)
Weak masters though ye be, I have bedimmed
The noontide sun, called forth the mutinous winds,
And ’twixt the green sea and the azured vault
Set roaring war—to the dread rattling thunder
Have I given fire, and rifted Jove's stout oak(50)
With his own bolt; the strong-based promontory
Have I made shake, and by the spurs plucked up
The pine and cedar: graves at my command
Have waked their sleepers, oped, and let ’em forth
By my so potent art. But this rough magic(55)
I here abjure. And, when I have required
Some heavenly music—which even now I do—
To work mine end upon their senses that
This airy charm is for, I'll break my staff,
Bury it certain fathoms in the earth,(60)
And deeper than did ever plummet sound
I'll drown my book. [Solemn music]

[Re-enter Ariel, followed by Alonso, with a frantic gesture, attended by Gonzalo; Sebastian and Antonio in like manner, attended by Adrian and Francisco. They all enter the circle which Prospero had made, and there stand charmed; which Prospero observing, speaks]

[to Alonso] A solemn air, and the best comforter
To an unsettled fancy, cure thy brains,
Now useless, boiled within thy skull.(65)
[to Sebastian and Antonio] There stand,
For you are spell-stopped.—
Holy Gonzalo, honourable man,
Mine eyes, even sociable to the show of thine,
Fall fellowly drops. [aside] The charm dissolves apace,(70)
And as the morning steals upon the night,
Melting the darkness, so their rising senses
Begin to chase the ignorant fumes that mantle
Their clearer reason.—O good Gonzalo,
My true preserver, and a loyal sir(75)
To him you follow'st! I will pay thy graces
Home both in word and deed. Most cruelly
Didst thou, Alonso, use me and my daughter.
Thy brother was a furtherer in the act—
Thou art pinched for't now, Sebastian.(80)
[to Antonio] Flesh and blood,
You, brother mine, that entertained ambition,
Expelled remorse and nature; whom, with Sebastian—
Whose inward pinches therefore are most strong,—
Would here have killed your king; I do forgive thee,(85)
Unnatural though thou art. [Aside] Their understanding
Begins to swell, and the approaching tide
Will shortly fill the reasonable shore
That now lie foul and muddy. Not one of them
That yet looks on me, or would know me—Ariel,(90)
Fetch me the hat and rapier in my cell:
I will discase me, and myself present
As I was sometime Milan. Quickly, spirit!
Thou shalt ere long be free.

[Ariel sings and helps to attire him as Duke of Milan]

ARIEL:

Where the bee sucks, there suck I:(95)
In a cowslip's bell I lie;
There I couch when owls do cry.
On the bat's back I do fly
After summer merrily.
Merrily, merrily shall I live now(100)
Under the blossom that hangs on the bough.

PROSP:

Why, that's my dainty Ariel! I shall miss thee,
But yet thou shalt have freedom—So, so, so.—
To the King's ship, invisible as thou art!(105)
There shalt thou find the mariners asleep
Under the hatches. The Master and the Boatswain
Being awake, enforce them to this place,
And presently, I prithee.

ARIEL:

I drink the air before me, and return(110)
Or ere your pulse twice beat.

[Exit]

GONZALO:

All torment, trouble, wonder, and amazement
Inhabits here. Some heavenly power guide us
Out of this fearful country!

PROSP:

Behold, sir King,(115)
The wrongéd Duke of Milan, Prospero:
For more assurance that a living prince
Does now speak to thee, I embrace thy body;
And to thee and thy company I bid
A hearty welcome.(120)

[He embraces Alonso]

ALONSO:

Whe'er thou beest he or no,
Or some enchanted trifle to abuse me,
As late I have been, I not know. Thy pulse
Beats as of flesh and blood; and, since I saw thee,
Th’ affliction of my mind amends, with which(125)
I fear a madness held me. This must crave,
An if this be at all—a most strange story.
Thy dukedom I resign, and do entreat
Thou pardon me my wrongs. But how should Prospero
Be living and be here?(130)

PROSP:

[to Gonzalo] First, noble friend,
Let me embrace thine age, whose honour cannot
Be measured or confined. [He embraces Gonzalo]

GONZALO:

Whither this be
Or be not, I'll not swear.(135)

PROPSP:

You do yet taste
Some subtilties o'th’ isle that will not let you
Believe things certain.—Welcome, my friends all!

[aside to Sebastian and Antonio]

But you, my brace of lords, were I so minded,
I here could pluck his highness’ frown upon you(140)
And justify you traitors. At this time
I will tell no tales.

SEBASTIAN:

[aside]

The devil speaks in him.

PROSP:

No.
[to Antonio] For you, most wicked sir, whom to call(145)
brother
Would even infect my mouth, I do forgive
Thy rankest fault, all of them, and require
My dukedom of thee, which perforce I know
Thou must restore.(150)

ALONSO:

If thou beest Prospero,
Give us particulars of thy preservation;
How thou hast met us here, who three hours since
Were wrecked upon this shore; where I have lost—
How sharp the point of this remembrance is!—(155)
My dear son Ferdinand.

PROSP:

I am woe for't, sir.

ALONSO:

Irreparable is the loss, and patience
Says it is past her cure.

PROSP

I rather think(160)
You have not sought her help, of whose soft grace
For the like loss I have her sovereign aid,
And rest myself content.

ALONSO:

You the like loss?

PROSP:

As great to me as late; and supportable(165)
To make the dear loss have I means much weaker
Than you may call to comfort you, for I
Have lost my daughter.