SCENE III.

_Enter Lord, Lady_ DUPE, _and_ CHRISTIAN.

_L. Dupe._ Nay! good my lord, be patient.

_Lord._ Does he think to give fiddles and treatments in a house, where he has wronged a lady? I'll never suffer it.

_L. Dupe._ But upon what ground will you raise your quarrel?

_Lord._ A very just one,--as I am her kinsman.

_L. Dupe._ He does not know yet why he was to be arrested; try that way again.

_Lord._ I'll hear of nothing but revenge.

_Enter_ ROSE.

_Rose._ Yes, pray hear me one word, my lord; Sir Martin himself has made a plot.

_Chr._ That's like to be a good one.

_Rose._ A fool's plot may be as lucky as a fool's handsel; 'tis a very likely one, and requires nothing for your part, but to get a parson in the next room; we'll find work for him.

_L. Dupe._ That shall be done immediately; Christian, make haste, and send for Mr Ball, the non-conformist; tell him, here are two or three angels to be earned.

_Chr._ And two or three possets to be eaten: May I not put in that, madam?

_L. Dupe._ Surely you may. [_Exit_ CHR.

_Rose._ Then for the rest--'tis only this--Oh! they are here! pray take it in a whisper: My lady knows of it already.

_Enter_ MOODY, _Sir_ JOHN, _and Mrs_ MILLISENT.

_Mill._ Strike up again, fiddle, I'll have a French dance.

_Sir John._ Let's have the brawls.

_Mood._ No, good sir John, no quarrelling among friends.

_L. Dupe._ Your company is like to be increased, sir; some neighbours, that heard your fiddles, are come a mumming to you.

_Mood._ Let them come in, and we'll be jovy; an I had but my hobby-horse at home----

_Sir John._ What, are they men, or women?

_L. Dupe._ I believe some 'prentices broke loose.

_Mill._ Rose, go, and fetch me down two Indian gowns and vizard-masks----you and I will disguise too, and be as good a mummery to them, as they to us. [_Exit_ ROSE.

_Mood._ That will be most rare.

_Enter Sir_ MARTIN MAR-ALL, WARNER, _Landlord, disguised like a Tony_.

_Mood._ O here they come! Gentlemen maskers, you are welcome--[WARNER _signs to the music for a dance_.] He signs for a dance, I believe; you are welcome. Mr Music, strike up; I'll make one, as old as I am.

_Sir John._ And I'll not be out. [_Dance._

_Lord._ Gentlemen maskers, you have had your frolic, the next turn is mine; bring two flute-glasses and some stools, ho! we'll have the ladies' healths.

_Sir John._ But why stools, my lord?

_Lord._ That you shall see: the humour is, that two men at a time are hoisted up: when they are above, they name their ladies, and the rest of the company dance about them while they drink: This they call the frolic of the altitudes.

_Mood._ Some highlander's invention, I'll warrant it.

_Lord._ Gentlemen-maskers, you shall begin. [_They hoist Sir_ MART. _and_ WARN.

_Sir John._ They point to Mrs Millisent and Mrs Christian, _A Lou's touche! touche!_

[_While they drink, the company dances and sings: They are taken down._

_Mood._ A rare toping health this: Come, Sir John, now you and I will be in our altitudes.

_Sir John._ What new device is this, trow?

_Mood._ I know not what to make on't.

[_When they are up, the company dances about them: They dance off. Tony dances a jigg._

_Sir John._ Pray, Mr Fool, where's the rest of your company? I would fain see 'em again. [_To Tony._

_Land._ Come down, and tell them so, Cudden.

_Sir John._ I'll be hanged if there be not some plot in it, and this fool is set here to spin out the time.

_Mood._ Like enough! undone! undone! my daughter's gone! let me down, sirrah.

_Land._ Yes, Cudden.

_Sir John._ My mistress is gone, let me down first.

_Land._ This is the quickest way, Cudden. [_He offers to pull down the stools._

_Sir John._ Hold! hold! or thou wilt break my neck.

_Land._ An you will not come down, you may stay there, Cudden. [_Exit Landlord, dancing._

_Mood._ O scanderbag villains!

_Sir John._ Is there no getting down?

_Mood._ All this was long of you, Sir Jack.

_Sir John._ 'Twas long of yourself, to invite them hither.

_Mood._ O you young coxcomb, to be drawn in thus!

_Sir John._ You old Scot you, to be caught so sillily!

_Mood._ Come but an inch nearer, and I'll so claw thee.

_Sir John._ I hope I shall reach to thee.

_Mood._ An 'twere not for thy wooden breast-work there----

_Sir John._ I hope to push thee down from Babylon.

_Enter Lord, Lady_ DUPE, _Sir_ MARTIN, WARNER, ROSE, MILLISENT _veiled, and Landlord_.

_Lord._ How, gentlemen! what, quarrelling among yourselves!

_Mood._ Coxnowns! help me down, and let me have fair play; he shall never marry my daughter.

_Sir Mart._ [_Leading_ ROSE.] No, I'll be sworn that he shall not; therefore never repine, sir, for marriages, you know, are made in heaven; in fine, sir, we are joined together in spite of fortune.

_Rose._ [_Pulling off her mask_.] That we are, indeed, Sir Martin, and these are witnesses; therefore, in fine, never repine, sir, for marriages, you know, are made in heaven.

_Omn._ Rose!

_Warn._ What, is Rose split in two? Sure I have got one Rose!

_Mill._ Ay, the best Rose you ever got in all your life. [_Pulls off her mask._

_Warn._ This amazeth me so much, I know not what to say, or think.

_Mood._ My daughter married to Warner!

_Sir Mart._ Well, I thought it impossible that any man in England should have over-reached me: Sure, Warner, there is some mistake in this: Pr'ythee, Billy, let's go to the parson to make all right again, that every man have his own, before the matter go too far.

_Warn._ Well, sir! for my part, I will have nothing farther to do with these women, for, I find, they will be too hard for us; but e'en sit down by the loss, and content myself with my hard fortune: But, madam, do you ever think I will forgive you this, to cheat me into an estate of two thousand pounds a-year?

_Sir Mart._ An I were as thee, I would not be so served, Warner.

_Mill._ I have served him but right, for the cheat he put upon me, when he persuaded me you were a wit----now, there's a trick for your trick, sir.

_Warn._ Nay, I confess you have outwitted me.

_Sir John._ Let me down, and I'll forgive all freely. [_They let him down._

_Mood._ What am I kept here for?

_Warn._ I might in policy keep you there, till your daughter and I had been in private, for a little consummation: But for once, sir, I'll trust your good nature. [_Takes him down too._

_Mood._ An thou wert a gentleman, it would not grieve me.

_Mill._ That I was assured of before I married him, by my lord here.

_Lord._ I cannot refuse to own him for my kinsman, though his father's sufferings in the late times have ruined his fortunes.

_Mood._ But yet he has been a serving man.

_Warn._ You are mistaken, sir, I have been a master; and, besides, there is an estate of eight hundred pounds a year, only it is mortgaged for six thousand pounds.

_Mood._ Well, we'll bring it off; and, for my part, I am glad my daughter has missed _in fine_ there.

_Sir John._ I will not be the only man that must sleep without a bed-fellow to-night, if this lady will once again receive me.

_L. Dupe._ She's yours, sir.

_Lord._ And the same parson, that did the former execution, is still in the next chamber; what with candles, wine, and quidding, which he has taken in abundance, I think he will be able to wheedle two more of you into matrimony.

_Mill._ Poor Sir Martin looks melancholy! I am half afraid he is in love.

_Warn._ Not with the lady that took him for a wit, I hope.

_Rose._ At least, Sir Martin can do more than you, Mr Warner; for he can make me a lady, which you cannot my mistress.

_Sir Mart._ I have lost nothing but my man, and, in fine, I shall get another.

_Mill._ You'll do very well, Sir Martin, for you'll never be your own man, I assure you.

_Warn._ For my part, I had loved you before, if I had followed my inclination.

_Mill._ But now I am afraid you begin of the latest, except your love can grow up, like a mushroom, at a night's warning.

_Warn._ For that matter, never trouble yourself; I can love as fast as any man, when I am nigh possession; my love falls heavy, and never moves quick till it comes near the centre; he's an ill falconer, that will unhood before the quarry be in sight.

Love's an high-mettled hawk that beats the air, But soon grows weary when the game's not near. [_Exeunt omnes._

[Footnote B: This song is translated from Voiture.]

EPILOGUE.

As country vicars, when the sermon's done, Run headlong to the benediction; Well knowing, though the better sort may stay, The vulgar rout will run unblest away: So we, when once our play is done, make haste With a short epilogue to close your taste. In thus withdrawing, we seem mannerly; But, when the curtain's down, we peep, and see A jury of the wits, who still stay late, And in their club decree the poor play's fate; Their verdict back is to the boxes brought, Thence all the town pronounces it their thought. Thus, gallants, we, like Lilly, can foresee; But if you ask us what our doom will be, We by to-morrow will our fortune cast, As he tells all things when the year is past.

THE

TEMPEST;

OR, THE

ENCHANTED ISLAND.

A

COMEDY.

THE TEMPEST.

In this alteration of the "Tempest," Dryden acknowledges his obligation to Sir William Davenant, whom he extols for his quick and piercing imagination. Sir William was the son of an inn-keeper in Oxford, whose house was frequented by our immortal Shakespeare; and hence an ill-founded tradition ascribed to him a paternal interest in young Davenant: But this slander on Shakespeare's moral character has been fully refuted in the Prolegomena to Johnson and Steevens' edition of his plays. Davenant was appointed poet laureat upon the death of Ben Jonson. During the civil wars, he distinguished himself on the royal side, was lieutenant-general of ordnance to the earl of Newcastle, and was knighted by Charles at the siege of Gloucester. He was afterwards much trusted by Henrietta, the queen-dowager; and was finally made prisoner by an English man of war, in attempting to convey a colony of loyalists to Virginia. After a long captivity in the Tower, he was liberated through the intercession of the lord-keeper, Whitelocke; the wisest and most temperate of the counsellors of the ruling power. Through his countenance, Sir William was protected, or connived at, in bringing forward certain interludes and operas, even during the rigid sway of fanaticism. After the restoration, he became manager of a company of players, called the duke of York's servants, in distinction to the king's company, which was directed by Killigrew. He introduced upon the stage much pomp in dress, scenery, and decoration, as if to indemnify the theatrical muses for the poor shifts to which they had been reduced during the usurpation. Sir William Davenant died in 1668, at the age of 63.

"Gondibert," his greatest performance, incurred, when first published, more ridicule, and in latter times more neglect, than its merits deserve. An epic poem, in elegiac stanzas, must always be tedious, because no structure of verse is more unfavourable to narration than that which almost peremptorily requires each sentence to be restricted, or protracted, to four lines. But the liveliness of Davenant's imagination, which Dryden has pointed out as his most striking attribute, has illuminated even the dull and dreary path which he has chosen; and perhaps few poems afford more instances of vigorous conceptions, and even felicity of expression, than the neglected "Gondibert.[C]"

The alteration of the Tempest was Davenant's last work; and it seems to have been undertaken, chiefly, with a view to give room for scenical decoration. Few readers will think the play much improved by the introduction of the sea-language, which Davenant had acquired during the adventurous period of his life. Nevertheless, the ludicrous contest betwixt the sailors, for the dukedom and viceroyship of a barren island, gave much amusement at the time, and some of the expressions were long after proverbial[D]. Much cannot be said for Davenant's ingenuity, in contrasting the character of a woman, who had never seen a man, with that of a man, who had never seen a woman, or in inventing a sister monster for Caliban. The majestic simplicity of Shakespeare's plan is injured by thus doubling his characters; and his wild landscape is converted into a formal parterre, where "each alley has its brother." In sketching characters drawn from fancy, and not from observation, the palm of genius must rest with the first inventor; others are but copyists, and a copy shews no where to such disadvantage as when placed by the original. Besides, although we are delighted with the feminine simplicity of Miranda, it becomes unmanly childishness in Hippolito; and the premature coquetry of Dorinda is disgusting, when contrasted with the maidenly purity that chastens the simplicity of Shakespeare's heroine. The latter seems to display, as it were by instinct, the innate dignity of her sex; the former, to shew, even in solitude, the germ of those vices, by which, in a voluptuous age, the female character becomes degraded. The wild and savage character of Caliban is also sunk into low and vulgar buffoonery.

Dryden has not informed us of the share he had in this alteration: It was probably little more than the care of adapting it to the stage. The prologue is one of the most masterly tributes ever paid at the shrine of Shakespeare.

From the epilogue, the Tempest appears to have been acted in 1667. Although Dryden was under engagements to the king's company, this play was performed by the duke's servants, probably because written in conjunction with Davenant, their manager. It was not published until 1670.

Footnotes.

[Footnote C: An excellent critical essay upon the beauties and defects of Davenant's epic, may be found in Aikin's Miscellanies. Those who are insensible to theme rits of the poem, may admire the courage of the author, who wrote some part of it when he conceived himself within a week of being hanged. A tradition prevails, that his life was saved by Milton, whose life, in return, he saved at the Restoration. Were the story true, how vast was the requital!]

[Footnote D: As, "Peace and the But," &c.]

PREFACE.

The writing of prefaces to plays was probably invented by some very ambitious poet, who never thought he had done enough: Perhaps by some ape of the French eloquence, which uses to make a business of a letter of gallantry, an examen of a farce; and, in short, a great pomp and ostentation of words on every trifle. This is certainly the talent of that nation, and ought not to be invaded by any other. They do that out of gaiety, which would be an imposition[E] upon us.

We may satisfy ourselves with surmounting them in the scene, and safely leave them those trappings of writings, and flourishes of the pen, with which they adorn the borders of their plays, and which are indeed no more than good landscapes to a very indifferent picture. I must proceed no farther in this argument, lest I run myself beyond my excuse for writing this. Give me leave, therefore, to tell you, reader, that I do not set a value on any thing I have written in this play, but out of gratitude to the memory of Sir William Davenant, who did me the honour to join me with him in the alteration of it.

It was originally Shakespeare's; a poet for whom he had particularly a high veneration, and whom he first taught me to admire. The play itself had formerly been acted with success in the Black Friars: And our excellent Fletcher had so great a value for it, that he thought fit to make use of the same design, not much varied, a second time. Those, who have seen his "Sea-Voyage," may easily discern that it was a copy of Shakespeare's "Tempest:" The storm, the desert island, and the woman who had never seen a man, are all sufficient testimonies of it. But Fletcher was not the only poet who made use of Shakespeare's plot: Sir John Suckling, a professed admirer of our author, has followed his footsteps in his "Goblins;" his _Regmella_ being an open imitation of Shakespeare's _Miranda_, and his spirits, though counterfeit, yet are copied from _Ariel_. But Sir William Davenant, as he was a man of a quick and piercing imagination, soon found that somewhat might be added to the design of Shakespeare, of which neither Fletcher nor Suckling had ever thought: And, therefore, to put the last hand to it, he designed the counter-part to Shakespeare's plot, namely, that of a man who had never seen a woman; that by this means those two characters of innocence and love might the more illustrate and commend each other. This excellent contrivance he was pleased to communicate to me, and to desire my assistance in it. I confess, that from the very first moment it so pleased me, that I never writ any thing with more delight. I must likewise do him that justice to acknowledge, that my writing received daily his amendments; and that is the reason why it is not so faulty, as the rest which I have done, without the help or correction of so judicious a friend. The comical parts of the sailors were also of his invention, and, for the most part, his writing, as you will easily discover by the style. In the time I writ with him, I had the opportunity to observe somewhat more nearly of him, than I had formerly done, when I had only a bare acquaintance with him: I found him then of so quick a fancy, that nothing was proposed to him, on which he could not suddenly produce a thought, extremely pleasant and surprising: and those first thoughts of his, contrary to the old Latin proverb, were not always the least happy. And as his fancy was quick, so likewise were the products of it remote and new. He borrowed not of any other; and his imagination's were such as could not easily enter into any other man. His corrections were sober and judicious: and he corrected his own writings much more severely than those of another man, bestowing twice the time and labour in polishing, which he used in invention. It had perhaps been easy enough for me to have arrogated more to myself than was my due, in the writing of this play, and to have passed by his name with silence in the publication of it, with the same ingratitude which others have used to him, whose writings he hath not only corrected, as he hath done this, but has had a greater inspection over them, and sometimes added whole scenes together, which may as easily be distinguished from the rest, as true gold from counterfeit, by the weight. But, besides the unworthiness of the action, which deterred me from it, (there being nothing so base as to rob the dead of his reputation,) I am satisfied I could never have received so much honour, in being thought the author of any poem, how excellent soever, as I shall from the joining my imperfections with the merit and name of Shakespeare and Sir William Davenant. JOHN DRYDEN.

_December 1. 1669._

[Footnote E: A task imposed on us.]

PROLOGUE.

As when a tree's cut down, the secret root Lives under ground, and thence new branches shoot; So, from old Shakespeare's honoured dust, this day Springs up and buds a new-reviving play: Shakespeare, who (taught by none) did first impart To Fletcher wit, to labouring Jonson art. He, monarch-like, gave those, his subjects, law; And is that nature which they paint and draw. Fletcher reached that which on his heights did grow, Whilst Jonson crept, and gathered all below. This did his love, and this his mirth, digest: One imitates him most, the other best. If they have since outwrit all other men, 'Tis with the drops which fell from Shakespeare's pen, The storm, which vanished on the neighbouring shore, Was taught by Shakespeare's Tempest first to roar. That innocence and beauty, which did smile In Fletcher, grew on this enchanted isle. But Shakespeare's magic could not copied be; Within that circle none durst walk but he. I must confess 'twas bold, nor would you now That liberty to vulgar wits allow, Which works by magic supernatural things: But Shakespeare's power is sacred as a king's. Those legends from old priesthood were received, And he then writ, as people then believed. But if for Shakespeare we your grace implore, We for our theatre shall want it more: Who, by our dearth of youths, are forced to employ One of our women to present a boy; And that's a transformation, you will say, Exceeding all the magic in the play. Let none expect, in the last act, to find Her sex transformed from man to womankind. Whate'er she was before the play began, All you shall see of her is perfect man. Or, if your fancy will be farther led To find her woman--it must be a-bed.

DRAMATIS PERSONÆ.

ALONZO, _Duke of Savoy, and Usurper of the Dukedom of Mantua_.

FERDINAND, _his Son_.

PROSPERO, _right Duke of Milan_.

ANTONIO, _his Brother, Usurper of the Dukedom_.

GONZALO, _a Nobleman of Savoy_.

HIPPOLITO, _one that never saw woman, right Heir of the Dukedom of Mantua_.

STEPHANO, _Master of the Ship_.

THE

TEMPEST;

OR, THE

ENCHANTED ISLAND.

A

COMEDY.

MUSTACHO, _his Mate_.

TRINCALO, _Boatswain_.

VENTOSO, _a Mariner_.

_Several Mariners_.

_A Cabin-Boy_.

MIRANDA, } _Daughters to_ PROSPERO, DORINDA, } _that never saw man_.

ARIEL, _an airy Spirit, Attendant on_ PROSPERO.

_Several Spirits, Guards to_ PROSPERO.

CALIBAN, } _Two Monsters of the Isle_. SYCORAX, _his Sister_. }

THE

TEMPEST.