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(Of thee, my dear one! thee my daughter,) who
Art ignorant of what thou art, naught knowing
Of whence I am; nor that I am more better
Than Prospero, master of a full poor cell,
And thy no greater father.

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I should inform thee farther. Lend thy hand

And pluck my magic garment from me—so;

Lie there, my art.-Wipe thou thine eyes; have comfort.

[He lays down his mantle.

The direful spectacle of the wreck which touched

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 a hair,

Betid to any creature in the vessel

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

For now thou must know further.

Mira. You have often

Began to tell me what I am; but stopped

And left me to a bootless inquisition;

Concluding 'stay, not yet.'

Pros. 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 into this cell?

I do not think thou canst; for then thou wast not
Out three years old.

Mira. Certainly, sir, I can.

Pros. By what? by any other house or person? Of anything 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?

Pros. Thou hadst, and more, Miranda. But how is it That this lives in thy mind? What see'st thou else

In the dark backward and abysm of time?

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

Mira. But that I do not.

Pro. Twelve years since, Miranda, twelve years since, Thy father was the Duke of Milan, and

A prince of power.

* *

Mira. Oh, the heavens!

What foul play had we that we came from thence?

Or blessed was 't we did?

Pro. Both, both, my girl;

By foul play, as thou say'st, were we heaved thence,
But blessedly holp hither.

Mira. Oh, my heart bleeds

To think of the teen* that I have turned you to,

I

Which is from my remembrance. Please you, farther.
Pro. My brother and thy uncle, called Antonio,—
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,
Thro' all the signiories 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?

Mira. O, good sir, I do.

Pro. I pray thee mark me.

I thus neglecting worldly ends, all dedicated
To closeless, and the bettering of my mind
With that, which, but by being so retired,
O'erprized 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 unto truth, by telling of it,

Made such a sinner of his memory
To credit his own lie-he did believe

*Teen-grief, sorrow.

He was indeed the duke. *** Hence, his ambition growingDost thou hear?

Mira. Your tale, sir, would cure deafness.

Pro. To have no screen between this part he played
And him he played 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
With the king of Naples

To give him annual tribute, do him homage;
Subject his coronet to his crown, and bend

The dukedom, yet unbowed (alas! poor Milan!)
To most ignoble stooping.

Mira. O, the heavens!

Pro. Now the condition.

This King of Naples, being an enemy

To me inveterate, hearkens my brother's suit,
Which was, that he, in lieu of 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 honors, on my brother.
A treacherous army levied, one midnight
Fated to the purpose, did Antonio open

Whereon

The gates of Milan; and in the dead of darkness
The ministers for the purpose hurried thence,

Me, and they crying self.

Mira. 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 it.

*

Wherefore did they not that hour destroy us?

Pro. 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 colors 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 boat; not rigged,

Nor tackle, sail, nor mast; the very rats

Instinctively have quit it; there they hoist us,

To cry to the sea that roared to us; to sigh

To the winds, whose pity, sighing back again,

Did us but loving wrong.

Mira. Alack! what trouble

Was I then to you.

Pro. O! a cherubim

Thou wast that did preserve me! Thou didst smile,
Infused with a fortitude from Heaven,

When I have decked the sea with drops full salt,
Under my burden groaned; which raised in me
An undergoing stomach, to bear up
Against what should ensue.

TALK XXV.

ON THE DRAMATIC POETS WHO LIVED IN SHAKSPEARE'S TIME: BEN JONSON; BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER.

THERE was no branch of literature which grew so suddenly, and blossomed so richly, as this of dramatic poetry. The names that appear as writers for the stage, between the dates of Shakspeare's birth and death, are almost legion. I do not think it would be worth my pains to tell you, or yours to remember, the names even of half these writers. They had merits, and won some success in their day; but we should hardly be better or wiser for knowing more than a small share of these works. I will only mention the names of some of the greatest writers and their most noted dramas, and give here and there an illustration of the quality of their poetry.

Ben Jonson generally comes next Shakspeare in our thoughts of the drama. Rare Ben Jonson he is Born 1578. called in his epitaph in Westminster Abbey. I do Died 1637. not think he should rank next Shakspeare as a poet; and I think his plays neither so poetical nor so powerful as those of some others of his fellows. They were very well adapted to the time for which they were written, although the wit

which may have been relished in that day, seems to me heavy and dull. The characters in his comedies are distinct and individual, although more like caricatures than real types. He is learned and painstaking in his tragedy, but he never moves me by any touch of sympathy or human interest in his characters or their actions; and I do not believe his plays are now interesting, or will ever again interest anyone, except the scholar who makes the study of literature his special pursuit.

I think, therefore, that the position Jonson gained in his own time, and the reputation he has held ever since, he gained more by certain mental powers he possessed than by the pre-eminence of his poetry. He was a man who, by force of character and a power of criticism, held a strong influence over his age. We shall see in several later periods in literature certain men who, impressing themselves and their opinions vividly upon their fellows, get great supremacy over them. Ben Jonson was something such a power in his age as two centuries later Samuel Johnson was in his. It takes a great man to gain such a position, and, therefore, I do not underrate rare old Ben when I say that he owes as much to this power as to his ability as a poet. Certainly he had good taste and good judgment. He did much towards establishing rules for criticism and language. He is the author of an English grammar, among his other works, which is now a curiosity among text-books.

Ben had known hard fortune when he came to London and began to write for the stage. He was first an actor, like almost all the other play-writers, but does not seem to have been brilliantly successful in this calling. One of his fellows says that "he left bricklaying and took to play-acting," as if he meant to hint that neither trade had gained by Jonson's change. There is an old story to the effect that Jonson sent his first comedy to the theater in which Shakspeare was already a prosperous and influential member. The comedy had been rejected, and the poor author

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