**MIRANDA** If by your art, my dearest f...

MIRANDA If by your art, my dearest father, you have

Put the wild waters in this roar, allay them.

The sky, it seems, would pour down stinking pitch,

But that the sea, mounting to the welkin's cheek,

Dashes the fire out. O, I have suffered

With those that I saw suffer: a brave vessel,

Who had, no doubt, some noble creature in her,

Dash'd all to pieces. O, the cry did knock

Against my very heart. Poor souls, they perish'd.

Had I been any god of power, I would

Have sunk the sea within the earth or ere

It should the good ship so have swallow'd and

The fraughting souls within her.

PROSPERO Be collected:

No more amazement: tell your piteous heart

There's no harm done.

MIRANDA O, woe the day!

PROSPERO 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 Prospero, master of a full poor cell,

And thy no greater father.

MIRANDA More to know

Did never meddle with my thoughts.

PROSPERO 'Tis time

I should inform thee farther. Lend thy hand,

And pluck my magic 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 compassion in thee,

I have with such provision in mine art

So safely ordered that there is no soul--

No, not so much perdition as an hair

Betid to any creature in the vessel

Which thou heard'st cry, which thou saw'st sink. Sit down;

For thou must now know farther.

MIRANDA You have often

Begun to tell me what I am, but stopp'd

And left me to a bootless inquisition,

Concluding 'Stay: not yet.'

PROSPERO The hour's now come;

The very minute bids thee ope thine ear;

Obey and be attentive. Canst thou remember

A time before we came unto this cell?

I do not think thou canst, for then thou wast not

Out three years old.

MIRANDA Certainly, sir, I can.

PROSPERO By what? by any other house or person?

Of any thing the image tell me that

Hath kept with thy remembrance.

MIRANDA '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?

PROSPERO Thou hadst, and more, Miranda. But how is it

That this lives in thy mind? What seest thou else

In the dark backward and abysm of time?

If thou remember'st aught ere thou camest here,

How thou camest here thou mayst.

MIRANDA But that I do not.

PROSPERO Twelve year since, Miranda, twelve year since,

Thy father was the Duke of Milan and

A prince of power.

MIRANDA Sir, are not you my father?

PROSPERO Thy mother was a piece of virtue, and

She said thou wast my daughter; and thy father

Was Duke of Milan; and thou his only heir

And princess no worse issued.

MIRANDA O the heavens!

What foul play had we, that we came from thence?

Or blessed was't we did?

PROSPERO Both, both, my girl:

By foul play, as thou say'st, were we heaved thence,

But blessedly holp hither.

MIRANDA O, my heart bleeds

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

Which is from my remembrance! Please you, farther.

PROSPERO My brother and thy uncle, call'd Antonio--

I pray thee, mark me--that a brother should

Be so perfidious!--he whom next thyself

Of all the world I loved and to him put

The manage of my state; as at that time

Through all the signories it was the first

And Prospero the prime duke, being so reputed

In dignity, and for the liberal arts

Without a parallel; those being all my study,

The government I cast upon my brother

And to my state grew stranger, being transported

And rapt in secret studies. Thy false uncle--

Dost thou attend me?

MIRANDA Sir, most heedfully.

PROSPERO Being once perfected how to grant suits,

How to deny them, who to advance and who

To trash for over-topping, new created

The creatures that were mine, I say, or changed 'em,

Or else new form'd 'em; having both the key

Of officer and office, set all hearts i' the state

To what tune pleased his ear; that now he was

The ivy which had hid my princely trunk,

And suck'd my verdure out on't. Thou attend'st not.

MIRANDA O, good sir, I do.

PROSPERO I pray thee, mark me.

I, thus neglecting worldly ends, all dedicated

To closeness and the bettering of my mind

With that which, but by being so retired,

O'er-prized all popular rate, in my false brother

Awaked an evil nature; and my trust,

Like a good parent, did beget of him

A falsehood in its contrary as great

As my trust was; which had indeed no limit,

A confidence sans bound. He being thus lorded,

Not only with what my revenue yielded,

But what my power might else exact, like one

Who having into truth, by telling of it,

Made such a sinner of his memory,

To credit his own lie, he did believe

He was indeed the duke; out o' the substitution

And executing the outward face of royalty,

With all prerogative: hence his ambition growing--

Dost thou hear?

MIRANDA Your tale, sir, would cure deafness.

PROSPERO To have no screen between this part he play'd

And him he play'd it for, he needs will be

Absolute 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--wi' 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 most ignoble stooping.

MIRANDA O the heavens!

PROSPERO Mark his condition and the event; then tell me

If this might be a brother.

MIRANDA I should sin

To think but nobly of my grandmother:

Good wombs have borne bad sons.

PROSPERO Now the condition.

The King of Naples, being an enemy

To me inveterate, hearkens my brother's suit;

Which was, that he, in lieu o' the premises

Of homage and I know not how much tribute,

Should presently extirpate me and mine

Out of the dukedom and confer fair Milan

With all the honours on my brother: whereon,

A treacherous army levied, 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.

MIRANDA Alack, for pity!

I, not remembering how I cried out then,

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

That wrings mine eyes to't.

PROSPERO Hear a little further

And then I'll bring thee to the present business

Which now's upon's; without the which this story

Were most impertinent.

MIRANDA Wherefore did they not

That hour destroy us?

PROSPERO Well demanded, wench:

My tale provokes that question. Dear, they durst not,

So dear the love my people bore me, nor set

A mark so bloody on the business, but

With colours fairer painted their foul ends.

In few, they hurried us aboard a bark,

Bore us some leagues to sea; where they prepared

A rotten carcass of a boat, not rigg'd,

Nor tackle, sail, nor mast; the very rats

Instinctively had quit it: there they hoist us,

To cry to the sea that roar'd to us, to sigh

To the winds whose pity, sighing back again,

Did us but loving wrong.

MIRANDA Alack, what trouble

Was I then to you!

PROSPERO O, a cherubim

Thou wast that did preserve me. Thou didst smile.

Infused with a fortitude from heaven,

When I have deck'd the sea with drops full salt,

Under my burthen groan'd; which raised in me

An undergoing stomach, to bear up

Against what should ensue.

MIRANDA How came we ashore?

PROSPERO By Providence divine.

Some food we had and some fresh water that

A noble Neapolitan, Gonzalo,

Out of his charity, being then appointed

Master of this design, did give us, with

Rich garments, linens, stuffs and necessaries,

Which since have steaded much; so, of his gentleness,

Knowing I loved my books, he furnish'd me

From mine own library with volumes that

I prize above my dukedom.

MIRANDA Would I might

But ever see that man!

PROSPERO Now I arise:

Resumes his mantle

Sit still, and hear the last of our sea-sorrow.

Here in this island we arrived; and here

Have I, thy schoolmaster, made thee more profit

Than other princesses can that have more time

For vainer hours and tutors not so careful.

MIRANDA Heavens thank you for't! And now, I pray you, sir,

For still 'tis beating in my mind, your reason

For raising this sea-storm?

PROSPERO Know thus far forth.

By accident most strange, bountiful Fortune,

Now my dear lady, hath mine enemies

Brought to this shore; and by my prescience

I find my zenith doth depend upon

A most auspicious star, whose influence

If now I court not but omit, my fortunes

Will ever after droop. Here cease more questions:

Thou art inclined to sleep; 'tis a good dulness,

And give it way: I know thou canst not choose.

MIRANDA sleeps

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