That, if I then had waked after long sleep, Will make me sleep again: and then, in dreaming, Ste. This will prove a brave kingdom to me, where I shall have my music for nothing. Cal. When Prospero is destroyed. Ste. That shall be by and by: I remember the story. Trin. The sound is going away: let's follow it, and, after, do our work. Ste. Lead, monster; we'll follow.-I would, I could see this taborer: he lays it on. 1 Trin. Wilt come? I'll follow, Stephano. [Exeunt. SCENE III.—Another Part of the Island. Enter ALONZO, SEBASTIAN, ANTOnio, Gonzalo, ADRIAN, FRANCISCO, and others. 2 Gon. By'r lakin, I can go no further, sir; My old bones ache; here's a maze trod, indeed, Through forth-rights, and meanders! by your patience, I needs must rest me. Alon. Old lord, I cannot blame thee, Who am myself attached with weariness, To the dulling of my spirits: sit down, and rest. Even here I will put off my hope, and keep it No longer for my flatterer: he is drowned, 1 "You shall heare in the ayre the sound of tabors and other instruments, to put the trauellers in feare, &c. by evill spirites that make these soundes, and also do call diuerse of the trauellers by their names, &c."-Trauels of Marcus Paulus, by John Frampton, 4to. 1579. To some of these circumstances Milton also alludes: "————calling shapes, and beckoning shadows dire; 5 By'r lakin is a contraction of By our ladykin, the diminutive of our lady. Whom thus we stray to find; and the sea mocks Aside to SEBASTIAN. Do not, for one repulse, forego the purpose Seb. Will we take thoroughly. Ant. The next advantage Let it be to-night: For, now they are oppressed with travel, they As when they are fresh. Seb. I say, to-night: no more. Solemn and strange music; and PROSPERO above, invisible. Enter several strange Shapes, bringing in a banquet; they dance about it with gentle actions of salutation; and inviting the king, &c. to eat, they depart. Alon. What harmony is this? my good friends, hark! Gon. Marvellous sweet music! Alon. Give us kind keepers, heavens! What were these? Seb. A living drollery:1 Now I will believe That there are unicorns; that, in Arabia 2 There is one tree, the phoenix' throne; one phoenix At this hour reigning there. Ant. I'll believe both; And what does else want credit, come to me, And I'll be sworn 'tis true: Travellers ne'er did lie, Though fools at home condemn them. 1 Shows, called Drolleries, were in Shakspeare's time performed by puppets only. From these our modern drolls, exhibited at fairs, &c., took their name. "A living drollery " is therefore a drollery not by wooden but by living personages. 2 "I myself have heard straunge things of this kind of tree; namely in regard of the bird Phoenix, which is supposed to have taken that name of this date-tree (called in Greek govi); for it was assured unto me, that the said bird died with that tree, and revived of itselfe as the tree sprung againe." ----Holland's Translation of Pliny, B. xiii. C. 4. |