. . .Prospero is living. What the audience is curious to see, then, in the second act, is not noblemen who are suffering from shipwreck, but ignoble men, who merit the contempt of those who look upon them, and who deserve the just rebuke they receive from the man who is once more restored to his rights. The question as to what these noblemen have themselves suffered in the course of being shipwrecked, Shakespeare[Pg 56] rightly judged was not one that an audience, under the circumstances, could be interested in. Then, again, to take a textual illustration from “King Lear” quoted by Steevens, the commentator. He writes in his “Advertisement to the Reader”:

“The dialogue might, indeed, sometimes be lengthened by yet other insertions than have been made (from the quartos), without advantage either to its spirit or beauty, as in the following instance:

“‘Lear. No.
“‘Kent. Yes.
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