deed: How cam'st thou to be the siege of this moon-calf? Can he vent Trinculos ? TRIN. I took him to be killed with a thunderstroke-But art thou not drowned, Stephano ? I hope now, thou art not drowned. Is the storm overblown? I hid me under the dead moon-calf's gaberdine, for fear of the storm: And art thou living, Stephano? O Stephano, two Neapolitans 'scap'd! STE. Pr'ythee, do not turn me about; my stomach is not constant. CAL. These be fine things, an if they be not sprites. That's a brave god, and bears celestial liquor : STE. How did'st thou 'scape? How cam'st thou hither? swear by this bottle, how thou cam'st hither. I escaped upon a butt of sack, which the sailors heaved over-board, by this bottle! which I made of the bark of a tree, with mine own hands, since I was cast a-shore. CAL. I'll swear, upon that bottle, to be thy true subject; for the liquor is not earthly. STE. Here; swear then how thou escap❜dst *. 3 to be the SIEGE of this MOON-CALF?] Siege signifies stool in every sense of the word, and is here used in the dirtiest. So, in Holinshed, p. 705: "In this yeare also, a house on London Bridge, called the common siege, or privie, fell downe into the Thames." A moon-calf is an inanimate shapeless mass, supposed by Pliny to be engendered of woman only. See his Nat. Hist. b. x. ch. 64. Again, in Philemon Holland's translation of book xxx. ch. 14, edit. 1601: " there is not a better thing to dissolve and scatter moon-calves, and such like false conceptions in the wombe." STEEVENS. 4 Cal. I'll swear, upon that bottle, to be thy True subject, &c. Ste. Here; swear then how thou escap'dst.] The passage should probably be printed thus: TRIN. Swam a-shore, man, like a duck; I can swim like a duck, I'll be sworn. STE. Here, kiss the book: Though thou canst swim like a duck, thou art made like a goose. TRIN. O Stephano, hast any more of this? STE. The whole butt, man; my cellar is in a rock by the sea-side, where my wine is hid. How now, moon-calf? how does thine ague? CAL. Hast thou not dropped from heaven 5 ? the man in the moon, when time was. CAL. I have seen thee in her, and I do adore thee; My mistress shewed me thee, and thy dog, and thy bush 6. STE. Come, swear to that; kiss the book: I will furnish it anon with new contents: swear. TRIN. By this good light, this is a very shallow monster:-I afeard of him ?-a very weak monster 7: The man i̇' the moon ?- -a most poor cre "Ste. [To Cal.] Here, swear then.. [To Trin.] How escap❜dst thou? The speaker would naturally take notice of Caliban's proffered allegiance. Besides, he bids Trinculo kiss the book after he has answered the question; a sufficient proof of the rectitude of the proposed arrangement. RITSON. Ritson's arrangement of the preceding line is well imagined. M. MASON. 5 Hast thou not dropped from heaven ?] The new-discovered Indians of the island of St. Salvador, asked, by signs, whether Columbus and his companions were not come down from heaven. TOLLET. 6 My mistress shewed me thee, thy dog, and bush.] The old copy, which exhibits this and several preceding speeches of Caliban as prose, (though it be apparent they were designed for verse,) reads "My mistress shewed me thee, and thy dog, and thy bush." Let the editor who laments the loss of the words—and and thy, compose their elegy. STEEVENS. He need not compose their elegy if he can restore them to life. BOSWELL. 7 I AFEARD OF HIM?-a very weak monster, &c.] It is to be observed, that Trinculo, the speaker, is not charged with being dulous monster :-Well drawn, monster, in good sooth. CAL. I'll shew thee every fertile inch o' the island; And I will kiss thy foot: I pr'ythee, be my god 9. TRIN. By this light, a most perfidious and drunken monster; when his god's asleep, he'll rob his bottle. CAL. I'll kiss thy foot: I'll swear myself thy subject. STE. Come on then; down, and swear. TRIN. I shall laugh myself to death at this puppyheaded monster: A most scurvy monster! I could find in my heart to beat him,— STE. Come, kiss. TRIN. -but that the poor monster's in drink : An abominable monster! CAL. I'll shew thee the best springs; I'll pluck thee berries; I'll fish for thee, and get thee wood enough, A plague upon the tyrant that I serve! I'll bear him no more sticks, but follow thee, TRIN. A most ridiculous monster; to make a wonder of a poor drunkard. CAL. I pr'ythee, let me bring thee where crabs grow; afraid; but it was his consciousness that he was so that drew this brag from him. This is nature. WARBURTON. 9 And kiss thy foot: I pr'ythee, be my god.] The old copy redundantly reads: "And I will kiss thy foot," &c. RITSON. This is a common expression, to denote profound obeisance, So, in Timon of Athens: "Follow his strides, his lobbies fill with tendance,- "Drink the free air." Again, in Titus Andronicus: "When you come to him, [the emperor,] at the first approach, you must kneel, then kiss his foot, then deliver your pigeons." MALONE, And I with my long nails will dig thee pig-nuts; I STE. I pr'ythee now, lead the way, without any sea-mells] [Old copy, scamels.] This word has puzzled the commentators: Dr. Warburton reads shamois; Mr. Theobald would read any thing rather than scamels. Mr. Holt, who wrote notes upon this play, observes, that limpets are in some places called scams, and therefore I had once suffered scamels to stand. JOHNSON. Theobald had very reasonably proposed to read sea-malls, or seamells. An e, by these careless printers, was easily changed into a c, and from this accident, I believe, all the difficulty arises, the word having been spelt by the transcriber, seamels. Willoughby mentions the bird, as Theobald has informed us. Had Mr. Holt told us in what part of England limpets are called scams, more regard would have been paid to his assertion. I should suppose, at all events, a bird to have been design'd, as young and old fish are taken with equal facility; but young birds are more easily surprised than old ones. Besides, Caliban had already proffered to fish for Stephano. In Cavendish's second voyage, the sailors eat young gulls at the isle of Penguins. STEEVENS. I have adopted the emendation proposed by Mr. Theobald. In Lincolnshire, as I learn from Sir Joseph Banks, the name seamall is applied to all the smaller species of gulls. Plott, the same gentleman adds, in his History of Staffordshire, p. 231, gives an account of the mode of taking a species of gull called in that country 'pewits (the black-capped gull of Lincolnshire,) with a plate annexed, at the end of which he writes-" they being accounted a good dish at the most plentiful tables." With regard to the place from which Caliban says he will fetch them, we find in Holland's Pliny, 1600: "As touching the gulls or sea-cobs, they build in rockes." P. 237. MALONE. Sir Joseph Banks informs me, that in Willoughby's, or rather John Ray's Ornithology, p. 34, No. 3, is mentioned the common sea-mall, Larus cinereus minor. Sir Robert Sibbald, in his Ancient State of the Shire of Fife, mentions, amongst fowls which frequent a neighbouring island, several sorts of sea-malls, and one in particular, the katiewake, a fowl of the Larus or mall kind, of the bigness of an ordinary pigeon, which some hold, says he, to be as savoury and as good meat as a partridge is. REED. more talking.-Trinculo, the king and all our company else being drowned, we will inherit here.Here; bear my bottle. Fellow Trinculo, we'll fill him by and by again. CAL. Farewell master; farewell, farewell. TRIN. A howling monster; a drunken monster. Nor scrape trenchering, nor wash dish Has a new master-Get a new man*. Freedom, hey-day! hey-day, freedom! freedom, hey-day, freedom! STE, O brave monster! lead the way. [Exeunt, ACT III. SCENE I. Before PROSPERO'S Cell. Enter FERDINAND, bearing a log. FER. There be some sports are painful; and their labour 2 Nor scrape trenchering,] In our author's time trenchers were in general use; and male domesticks were sometimes employed in cleansing them. "I have helped (says Lyly, in his History of his Life and Times, ad an. 1620,) to carry eighteen tubs of water in one morning;-all manner of drudgery I willingly performed; scrape-trenchers," &c. MALONE. 3Ban 'Ban, Ca-Caliban,] Perhaps our author remembered a song of Sir P. Sidney's : 66 Da, da, da-Daridan." Astrophel and Stella, fol. 1627. MALONE. Get a new man.] When Caliban sings this last part of his ditty, he must be supposed to turn his head scornfully toward the cell of Prospero, whose service he had deserted. STEEVENS, |