MIRANDA [Calling joyously.] Muses, sweet friends to mirth! Come forth again And fetch your little Fauns, that drowsed so long In mildew’d vaults of antique vellum, through all The winters of dark ages. Come, sad Clio, Unpucker your frown! You, pale Melpomene, Blush to a lovelier time. Yond yellow sands, That ran blood-red with orgies of old Rome, Shine golden now with young renascence. The ages Renew their summer. Joy hath its June once more, For once more Prosper reigns.
PROSPERO [As Miranda comes to him.] ’Tis thy returning Restores my summer time. I see thou hast Been rummaging old lockers.
MIRANDA Aye, sir, and found These sharp-eared Fauns, hiding like wintered field-mice In attic parchments. So I set ’em free To play, while Care the Cat’s away.—Come, now, Sicilian boys, caper your shag-hair shins, And thou, Terpsychore, lead on their dance To please my father.
[At her command, Terpsychore and the Fauns—to instruments played by the Muses—perform a joyous dance before Prospero. As they conclude, he greets them with a smile.]
PROSPERO Thanks, you hearts upleaping! After long ominous hours, thanks for your festa! And you, dear child incorrigible for joy, Come now, I will requite you—not in gold, But golden fantasy, wrought all one glow Of shadowless shining.
MIRANDA Ah, another vision?
PROSPERO Aye, ’tis a vision, that myself beheld Shine on the soil of France. I’ll show you Peace: The kings of earth at peace, after red battle; Two kings of men, each clasping brother’s hand Warm with the golden passion of strong peace.
MIRANDA What kings were they, and where?
PROSPERO England and France: ’They met in the vale of Andren, ’twixt Guynes and Arde; I was then present, saw them salute on horseback; Beheld them, when they lighted, how they clung In their embracement, as they grew together.’—[17] But tell us, Ariel, what I told thee remember, How Peace was crowned on the Field of the Cloth of Gold.
MIRANDA How brave a name! Would I had been there!