THE TEMPEST
103
ACT THE THIRD.
SCENE I.
Before Prospero’s cell.
Enter Ferdinand, bearing a log.
Ferdinand.
There be some sports are painful, and their labour
Delight in them sets off: some kinds of baseness
Are nobly undergone and most poor matters
Point to rich ends. This my mean task
Would be as heavy to me as odious, but
The mistress which I serve quickens what ’s dead
And makes my labours pleasures: O, she is
Ten times more gentle than her father ’s crabbed,
And he ’s composed of harshness. I must remove
Some thousands of these logs and pile them up,
Upon a sore injunction: my sweet mistress
Weeps when she sees me work, and says, such baseness
Had never like executor. I forget:
But these sweet thoughts do even refresh my labours,
Most busiest, when I do it.
Delight in them sets off: some kinds of baseness
Are nobly undergone and most poor matters
Point to rich ends. This my mean task
Would be as heavy to me as odious, but
The mistress which I serve quickens what ’s dead
And makes my labours pleasures: O, she is
Ten times more gentle than her father ’s crabbed,
And he ’s composed of harshness. I must remove
Some thousands of these logs and pile them up,
Upon a sore injunction: my sweet mistress
Weeps when she sees me work, and says, such baseness
Had never like executor. I forget:
But these sweet thoughts do even refresh my labours,
Most busiest, when I do it.
Enter Miranda; and Prospero at a distance, unseen.
105
