“In every particular,” replied Ariel; and he told his master how, in the guise of a flame, he had danced all over the storm-driven ship till the whole vessel seemed on fire, and every one on board except the mariners had plunged affrighted into the sea.
“But are they safe, Ariel?”
“Not a hair perished, not a thread of their garments hurt. I have scattered them in troops about the island, as you bade me. The King of Naples’ son, Ferdinand, I have landed by himself, and now he is sitting and sighing alone in an odd corner of the isle.”
“And the King’s ship?”
“Safely in harbour, hidden in a deep nook. The mariners, already weary with their labour, I have charmed away to sleep. The rest of the fleet which I scattered have now all met again, and are in the Mediterranean, bound sadly home for Naples. They believe that they have seen the King’s ship wrecked, and that all on board have perished.”
Prospero was much pleased with the way Ariel had performed his charge, but he said there was still some further work to do. He promised that if all went well Ariel in two days should be set free from service, and henceforward should be his own master. He bade Ariel now take a new shape—that of a nymph of the sea, invisible to all but his own master. In this guise Ariel approached the young Prince of Naples, and began to sing in the sweetest fashion:
“Full fathom five thy father lies; Of his bones a’e coral made; Those are pearls that were his eyes: Nothing of him that doth fade, But doth suffer a sea-change Into something rich and strange. Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell: Hark! now I hear them, ding-dong, bell.”
Lured by the sound of this sweet singing, which came he knew not whence, Ferdinand followed the unseen Ariel into the presence of Prospero and Miranda.
Now, excepting her father, Miranda had never seen a man, and at first she did not know what Ferdinand was.
“Is it a spirit, father?” she asked.