With those that I faw fuffer! a brave vessel,

Who had no doubt some noble creatures in her,
Dafh'd all to pieces. O, the cry did knock
Against my very heart! Poor fouls! they perifh'd,
Had I been any god of power, I would

Have funk the fea within the earth, or e'er

It should the good fhip fo have swallow'd, and
The freighting fouls within her.

PRO. Be collected;

No more amazement: tell your piteous heart,
There's no harm done.

MIRA. O, woe the day!

PRO. No harm.

I have done nothing but in care of thee,

(Of thee, my dear one! thee, my daughter!) who Art ignorant of what thou art, nought knowing

Of whence I am; nor that I am more better

Than Profpero, mafter of a full

And thy no greater father.

MIRA. More to know

poor cell,

Did never meddle with my thoughts.
PRO. 'Tis time

I fhould inform thee further. Lend thy hand,

And pluck my magick garment from me.-So;

[Lays down his mantle,

Lie there my art.-Wipe thou thine eyes; have comfort,
The direful spectacle of the wreck, which touch'd
The very virtue of compaffion in thee,
I have with fuch provifion in mine art
So fafely order'd, that there is no foul-
No, not fo much perdition as an hair,
Betid to any creature in the vessel

Which thou heard'ft cry, which thou faw'ft fink. Sit down;

For thou must now know further.

MIRA. You have often

Begun to tell me what I am; but stopp'd
And left me to a bootlefs inquifition;
Concluding, Stay, not yet.--

PRO. The hour's now come;

The very minute bids thee ope thine ear;
Obey, and be attentive. Can't thou remember
A time before we came unto this cell?

I do not think thou can'ft; for then thou waft not
Out three years old.

MIRA. Certainly, fir, I can.

PRO. By what? by any other house, or perfon?
Of any thing the image tell me, that

Hath kept with thy remembrance.
MIRA. 'Tis far off;

And rather like a dream, than an assurance
That my remembrance warrants: Had I not

Four or five women once, that 'tended me?

PRO. Thou had'ft, and more, Miranda: But how is it,
That this lives in thy mind? What feeft thou elfe
In the dark backward and abyfm of time?

If thou remember'st aught, ere thou cam'ft here,
How thou cam❜ft here, thou may'st,

MIRA. But that I do not.

PRO. Twelve years fince, Miranda, twelve years fince,

Thy father was the duke of Milan, and

A prince of power.

MIRA. Sir, are not you my father?

PRO. Thy mother was a piece of virtue, and

She faid-thou waft my daughter; and thy father

Was duke of Milan; and his only heir

A princefs ;-no worse issued.

MIRA. O the heavens !

What foul play had we, that we came from thence?
Or bleffed was't, we did?

PRO. Both, both, my girl:

By foul play, as thou say'st, were we heav'd thence;
But bleffedly holp hither.

MIRA. O, my heart bleeds

To think o' the teen that I have turn'd you to,'

1

Which is from my remembrance! Please you, further.
PRO. My brother, and thy uncle, call'd Antonio,—

I pray thee, mark me,-that a brother should
Be fo perfidious!—he whom, next thyself,
Of all the world I lov'd, and to him put
The manage of my ftate; as, at that time,
Through all the figniories it was the first,
And Profpero the prime duke; being so reputed
In dignity, and, for the liberal arts,

Without a parallel; thofe being all my ftudy,
The government I caft upon my brother,

And to my state grew ftranger, being transported,
And rapt in fecret studies. Thy falfe uncle—
Doft thou attend me?

MIRA. Sir, moft heedfully.

PRO. Being once perfected how to grant fuits,

How to deny them; whom to advance, and whom

To trash for over-topping; new created

The creatures that were mine; I fay, or chang'd them, Or elfe new-form'd them: having both the key

Of officer and office, fet all hearts

To what tune pleas'd his ear; that now he was

The ivy, which had hid my princely trunk,

And fuck'd my verdure out on't.-Thou attend'st not: I pray thee, mark me.

MIRA. O good fir, I do.

PRO. I thus neglecting worldly ends, all dedicate
To closeness, and the bettering of my mind
With that, which, but by being fo retired,
O'er-priz'd all popular rate, in my false brother
Awak'd an evil nature: and my trust,
Like a good parent, did beget of him

A falfhood, in its contrary as great

As

my

truft was; which had, indeed, no limit,
A confidence fans bound. He being thus lorded,
Not only with what my revenue yielded,

But what my power might elfe exact,—like one,
Who having, unto truth, by telling of it,
Made fuch a finner of his memory,

To credit his own lie,—he did believe
He was the duke; out of the substitution,
And executing the outward face of royalty,
With all prerogative :-Hence his ambition
Growing,-Doft hear?

MIRA. Your tale, fir, would cure deafnefs.

PRO. To have no fcreen between this part he play'd
And him he play'd it for, he needs will be
Abfolute Milan : Me, poor man!—my library
Was dukedom large enough; of temporal royalties
He thinks me now incapable: confederates

(So dry he was for sway) with the king of Naples,
To give him annual tribute, do him homage;
Subject his coronet to his crown, and bend
The dukedom, yet unbow'd, (alas, poor Milan !)
To moft ignoble stooping.

MIRA. O the heavens !

PRO. Mark his condition, and the event; then tell me, If this might be a brother.

MIRA. I fhould fin

To think but nobly of my grandmother :
Good wombs have borne bad fons.

PRO. Now the condition.

This king of Naples, being an enemy

To me inveterate, hearkens my brother's fuit;
Which was, that he in lieu o' the premises,-
Of homage, and I know not how much tribute,—
Should prefently extirpate me and mine
Out of the dukedom; and confer fair Milan,
With all the honours, on my brother: Whereon,
A treacherous army levy'd, one midnight

Fated to the purpose, did Antonio open

The gates of Milan; and, i' the dead of darkness,
The ministers for the purpose hurried thence
Me, and thy crying self.

MIRA. Alack, for pity!

I, not rememb'ring how I cried out then,

Will cry it o'er again; it is a hint

That wrings mine eyes,

PRO. Hear a little further,

And then I'll bring thee to the present business

Which now's upon us; without the which, this story Were most impertinent.

MIRA. Wherefore did they not

That hour deftroy us?

PRO. Well demanded, wench;

My tale provokes that queftion. Dear, they durft not ;

(So dear the love my people bore me) nor fet

A mark fo bloody on the business; but

With colours fairer painted their foul ends.
In few, they hurried us aboard a bark;

Bore us fome leagues to fea; where they prepar'd