The Tempest
The Play The Commentary The Cast

ACT III, SCENE 3.

                                                Scene 3

Enter Alonso, Sebastian, Antonio, Gonzalo, Adrian, Francisco, etc.

GONZALO
By'r lakin, I can go no further, sir.                                             1
My old bones aches. Here's a maze trod indeed
Through forthrights and meanders. By your patience,              3
I needs must rest me.
ALONSO                            Old lord, I cannot blame thee,
Who am myself attached with weariness                                  5
To th' dulling of my spirits. Sit down and rest.                         6
Even here I will put off my hope and keep it                            7
No longer for my flatterer. He is drowned                                8
Whom thus we stray to find, and the sea mocks
Our frustrate search on land. Well, let him go.                         10
ANTONIO,⎾aside to Sebastian⏋
I am right glad that he's so out of hope.
Do not, for one repulse, forgo the purpose                               12
That you resolved t' effect.
SEBASTIAN,⎾aside to Antonio⏋The next advantage
We will take throughly.
ANTONIO,⎾aside to Sebastian⏋Let it be tonight;
For now they are oppressed with travel, they                           15
Will not nor cannot use such vigilance
As when they are fresh.
SEBASTIAN,⎾aside to Antonio⏋ I say tonight. No more.

Solemn and strange music, and⎾enter⏋Prospero on the top visible.

ALONSO
What harmony is this? My good friends, hark.
GONZALO
Marvelous sweet music!

Enter several strange shapes, bringing in a banquet,
and dance about it with gentle actions of salutations.

ALONSO
Give us kind keepers, heavens! What were these?                   20
SEBASTIAN
A living drollery! Now I will believe                                        21
That there are unicorns, that in Arabia
There is one tree, the phoenix' throne, one phoenix
At this hour reigning there.
ANTONIO                                    I'll believe both;
And what does else want credit, come to me                            25
And I'll be sworn 'tis true. Travelers ne'er did lie,                     26
Though fools at home condemn 'em.
GONZALO                                                  If in Naples
I should report this now, would they believe me?
If I should say I saw such⎾islanders⏋—
For, certes, these are people of the island—                             30
Who, though they are of monstrous shape, yet note
Their manners are more gentle, kind, than of                           32
Our human generation you shall find
Many, nay, almost any.
PROSPERO,⎾aside⏋           Honest lord,
Thou has said well, for some of you there present
Are worse than devils.
ALONSO                              I cannot too much muse
Such shapes, such gesture, and such sound, expressing—
Although they want the use of tongue—a kind
Of excellent dumb discourse.
PROSPERO,⎾aside⏋
                      Praise in departing.

Inviting the King, etc., to eat,⎾the shapes⏋depart.

FRANCISCO
They vanished strangely.
SEBASTIAN
No matter, since
They have left their viands behind, for we have stomachs.
Will 't please you taste of what is here?
ALONSO
                                                                Not I.
GONZALO
Faith, sir, you need not fear. When we were boys,
Who would believe that there were mountaineers
Dewlapped like bulls, whose throats had hanging at 'em
Wallets of flesh? Or that there were such men
Whose heads stood in their breasts? Which now we find
Each putter-out of five for one will bring us
Good warrant of.
ALONSO                       I will stand to and feed.
Although my last, no matter, since I feel
The best is past. Brother, my lord the Duke,
Stand to, and do as we.

                                              ⎾Alonso, Sebastian, and Antonio
                                                              move toward the table.⏋

Thunder and lightning. Enter Ariel, like a Harpy, claps his wings
upon the table, and with a quaint device the banquet vanishes.

ARIEL⎾as Harpy⏋
You are three men of sin, whom Destiny,
That hath to instrument this lower world
And what is in 't, the never-surfeited sea
Hath caused to belch up you, and on this island,
Where man doth not inhabit, you 'mongst men
Being most unfit to live. I have made you mad;
And even with such-like valor, men hand and drown
Their proper selves.
 ⎾Alonso, Sebastian, and Antonio draw their swords.⏋
                                 You fools, I and my fellows
Are ministers of Fate. The elements
Of whom your swords are tempered may as well
Kill the still-closing waters as diminish
One dowl that's in my plume. My fellow ministers
Are like invulnerable. If you could hurt,
Your swords are now too massy for your strengths
And will not be uplifted. But remember—
For that's my business to you—that you three
From Milan did supplant good Prospero,
Exposed unto the sea, which hath requit it,
Him and his innocent child, for which foul deed,
The powers—delaying, not forgetting—have
Incensed the seas and shores, yea, all the creatures
Against your peace. Thee of thy son, Alonso,
They have bereft; and do pronounce by me
Ling'ring perdition, worse than any death
Can be at once, shall step by step attend
You and your ways, whose wraths to guard you from—
Which here, in this most desolate isle, else falls
Upon your heads—is nothing but heart's sorrow
And a clear life ensuing.              He vanishes in thunder.

Then, to soft music, enter the shapes again, and dance,
with mocks and mows, and carrying out the table.

PROSPERO,⎾aside⏋
Bravely the figure of this Harpy hast thou
Performed, my Ariel. A grace it had, devouring.
Of my instruction hast thou nothing bated
In what thou hadst to say. So, with good life
And observation strange, my meaner ministers
Their several kinds have done. My high charms work,
And these mine enemies are all knit up
In their distractions. They now are in my power;
And in these fits I leave them while I visit
Young Ferdinand, whom they suppose is drowned,
And his and mine loved darling.      ⎾He exits, above.⏋
GONZALO,⎾to Alonso⏋
I' th' name of something holy, sir, why stand you
In this strange stare?
ALONSO                           O, it is monstrous, monstrous!
Methought the billows spoke and told me of it;
The winds did sing it to me, and the thunder,
That deep and dreadful organ pipe, pronounced
The name of Prosper. It did bass my trespass.
Therefor my son i' th' ooze is bedded, and
I'll seek him deeper than e'er plummet sounded,
And with him there lie mudded.         He exits.
SEBASTIAN   But one fiend at a time,
I'll fight their legions o'er.
ANTONIO                            I'll be thy second.
                                                          They exit.
GONZALO
All three of them are desperate. Their great guilt,
Like poison given to work a great time after,
Now 'gins to bite the spirits. I do beseech you
That are of suppler joints, follow them swiftly
And hinder them from what this ecstasy
May now provoke them to.
ADRIAN                     Follow, I pray you.
                                                          They all exit.

Links to Additional Material

stevekarls@mansfieldct.com
Expanded Text—Folger Shakespeare Library: The Tempest. Act III, Scene 3.