Burnt up those logs that you're enjoin'd to pile ! Ferd. O most dear mistress, The Sun will set before I shall discharge What I must strive to do. Mira. If you'll sit down, I'll bear your logs the while: pray, give me that; Ferd. No, precious creature ; I had rather crack my sinews, break my back, Ferd. No, noble mistress; 'tis fresh morning with me When you are by at night. I do beseech you, Chiefly that I might set it in my prayers,— Indeed the top of admiration; worth What's dearest to the world! Full many a lady Have I liked several women; never any One of my sex; no woman's face remember, The jewel in my dower, Any companion in the world but you; Besides yourself, to like of. But I prattle Something too wildly, and my father's precepts Ferd. I am, in my condition, A prince, Miranda; I do think, a king, I would, not so! and would no more endure This wooden slavery than to suffer tamely 4 The flesh-fly blow my mouth. Hear my soul speak: instant that I saw you, did The very My heart fly to your service; there resides, To make me slave to it; and for your sake Mira. Do you love me? 3 I am not quite clear as to the meaning of this. The Poet often uses foil for sword; and so the sense may be, "put it to the use of its weapon in selfdefence." Probably, however, putting it to the foil has the sense merely of foiling it. To foil is to baffle, to frustrate, to render nugatory. 4 The flesh-fly is the fly that blows dead flesh, that is, lays maggot-eggs upon it, and so hastens its putrefaction. Ferd. O Heaven, O Earth, bear witness to this sound, And crown what I profess with kind event, If I speak true! if hollowly, invert What best is boded me to mischief! I, Beyond all limit of what else 5 i' the world, Do love, prize, honour you. Mira. To weep at what I'm glad of. I am a fool Fair encounter Of two most rare affections! Heavens rain grace Ferd. Wherefore weep you? Mira. At mine unworthiness, that dare not offer What I shall die to want. But this is trifling; The bigger bulk it shows. Hence, bashful cunning! If not, I'll die your maid: to be your fellow7 Ferd. And I thus humble ever. Mira. My mistress, dearest, My husband, then? Ferd. Ay, with a heart as willing As bondage e'er of freedom:8 here's my hand. 5" What else" for whatsoever else. The Poet has many instances of relative pronouns thus used indefinitely. So in King Lear, v. 3: "What in the world he is that names me traitor, villain-like he lies." 6 Die from wanting, or by wanting. Another gerundial infinitive. We have a like expression in Much Ado : "You kill me to deny it." 7 Fellow for companion or equal, as before. See page 51, note 50. 8 The abstract for the concrete. "I accept you for my wife as willingly as ever a bondman accepted of freedom." Mira. And mine, with my heart in't: and now farewell Till half an hour hence. Ferd. A thousand thousand !9 [Exeuut FERDINAND and MIRANDA. Pros. So glad of this as they, I cannot be, Who am surprised withal; but my rejoicing At nothing can be more. I'll to my book ; For yet, ere supper-time, must I perform Much business appertaining. [Exit. SCENE II. Another Part of the Island. Enter CALIBAN, STEPHANO, and TRINCULO, with a bottle. Steph. Tell not me: when the butt is out, we will drink water; not a drop before: therefore bear up, and board 'em.1 - Servant-monster, drink to me. Trin. Servant-monster! the folly of this island! They say there's but five upon this isle: we are three of them; if th' other two be brain'd like us, the State totters. Steph. Drink, servant-monster, when I bid thee: thy eyes are almost set in thy head. [CALIBAN drinks. Trin. Where should they be set else? he were a brave monster indeed, if they were set in his tail. Steph. My man-monster hath drown'd his tongue in sack: for my part, the sea cannot drown me; I swam, ere I could recover the shore, five-and-thirty leagues off and on, by this 9 Meaning a thousand thousand farewells; this word being taken literally, like the Latin bene vale. 1" To bear up, put the helm up, and keep a vessel off her course." So says Admiral Smith. 2 Set here means, I suppose, fixed in a vacant stare. So in Twelfth Night, V. I: "He's drunk, Sir Toby, an hour agone; his eyes were set at eight i' the morning." light. Thou shalt be my lieutenant, monster, or my standard.3 Trin. Your lieutenant, if you list; he's no standard.4 Trin. Nor go neither: but you'll lie, like dogs; and yet say nothing neither. Steph. Moon-calf, speak once in thy life, if thou be'st a good moon-calf. Cal. How does thy Honour? Let me lick thy shoe. I'll not serve him, he is not valiant. Trin. Thou liest, most ignorant monster: I am in case to justle a constable.5 Why, thou debosh'd fish, thou, was there ever man a coward that hath drunk so much sack as I to-day? Wilt thou tell a monstrous lie, being but half a fish and half a monster? Cal. Lo, how he mocks me! wilt thou let him, my lord? Trin. Lord, quoth he. That a monster should be such a natural! 7 Cal. Lo, lo, again! bite him to death, I pr'ythee. Steph. Trinculo, keep a good tongue in your head: if you prove a mutineer, - the next tree. The poor monster's my subject, and he shall not suffer indignity. - Cal. I thank my noble lord. Wilt thou be pleased To hearken once again the suit I made thee? Steph. Marry, will I: kneel, and repeat it; I will stand, and so shall Trinculo. 3 Standard, like ensign, is put for the bearer of a standard. 4 Trinculo is punning upon standard, and probably means that Caliban is too drunk to stand. 5 The jester is breaking jests upon himself; his meaning being, "One so deep in drink as I am is valiant enough to quarrel with an officer of the law." 6 Debosh'd is an old form of debauched. Cotgrave explains, "Deboshed, lewd, incontinent, ungracious, dissolute, naught." 7 Natural was used for simpleton or fool. There is also a quibble intended between monster and natural, a monster being unnatural. |