Pros. This blue-eyed hag[383-80] was hither brought,
And here was left by th’ sailors. Thou, my slave,
As thou report’st thyself, wast then her servant;
And, for[383-81] thou wast a spirit too delicate
To act her earthy and abhorr’d commands,
Refusing her grand hests,[384-82] she did confine thee,
By help of her more potent ministers,
And in her most unmitigable rage,
Into[384-83] a cloven pine; within which rift
Imprison’d thou didst painfully remain
A dozen years; within which space she died,
And left thee there; where thou didst vent thy groans
As fast as mill-wheels strike. Then was this island—
Save for the son that she did litter here,[384-84]
A freckled whelp, hag-born—not honour’d with
A human shape.
Ari. Yes, Caliban her son.
Pros. Dull thing, I say so; he, that Caliban,
Whom now I keep in service. Thou best know’st
What torment I did find thee in: thy groans
Did make wolves howl, and penetrate the breasts
Of ever-angry bears. It was a torment
To lay upon the damn’d, which Sycorax
Could not again undo: it was mine art,
When I arrived and heard thee, that made gape
The pine, and let thee out.
Ari. I thank thee, master.
Pros. If thou more murmur’st, I will rend an oak,
And peg thee in his knotty entrails, till
Thou’st howl’d away twelve Winters.
Ari. Pardon, master:
I will be correspondent[384-85] to command,
And do my spriting gently.
Pros. Do so; and after two days
I will discharge thee.
Ari. That’s my noble master!
What shall I do? say what; what shall I do?
Pros. Go make thyself like to a nymph o’ the sea:
Be subject to no sight but mine; invisible
To every eyeball else. Go take this shape,
And hither come in’t: hence, with diligence!—
[Exit Ariel.
Awake, dear heart, awake! thou hast slept well;
Awake!
Mira. [Waking.] The strangeness of your story put
Heaviness in me.