IVICA AND FORMENTERA.

IT is almost a vain labour to endeavour to fix the locality of a scene which, in all probability, had no existence save in the Poet's imagination; but while selecting a fitting spot for the illustration of a text left in so much doubt, it is as well to consider the very few hints thrown out, and by connecting them together, endeavour to arrive at some conclusion as near the truth as possible. Whilst many islands, from Bermuda to Lampedusa, have been called by the name of Prospero, and honoured as the undoubted scene of the Tempest, the little isle of Formentera has been entirely overlooked.

Formentera is one of the Balearic isles, and but a few miles in extent, not far south of Iviça; the northern portion is flat, but terminates to the south in a high and precipitous rock. Against this rock might the navy of Naples have been wrecked, while they who were landed at its base could have wandered long in the vain search after those who had been parted from them by the tempest and the wave. The great difficulty in coming to a conclusion lies in the situation of Milan, which, being an inland city surrounded by various and jealous states, would render a journey through one or more of these states absolutely necessary before arriving at the sea. We may suppose, however, that the king of Naples, being the confederate in the abduction of the duke of Milan and his daughter, would choose the shortest way for the assistants in the tragedy to traverse: thus the vessels might sail from Naples to Genoa, whence, entering into the dukedom of Milan, where the road was open for the enterprise, small difficulties would remain to be encountered. The vessel sailing from Genoa would direct its course southward on its return for Naples, and the "rotten carcase of a boat, not rigged, nor tackle, sail, nor mast, which the very rats instinctively had left," would have been borne by the current, setting strong to the south-west, direct to the island of Iviça. That the Mediterranean is full of conflicting currents, every one can tell who has floated on its blue 'waters; in fact, it was during a voyage in that most beauteous of all seas, that the idea first arose as to the fitness of Formentera to the descriptions of Shakespeare. The current sets two ways into this rocky yet fertile isle, that from the north running by the western, and that from the south by the eastern side, so that in calms, for it must have been calm, or Prospero's boat, as it is described, could not have lived an hour, vessels often find it difficult to clear off on account of the strong currents. Besides, the voyage would not have been half the length, nor the distance from Milan to the sea nearly so great, as in the case of Lampedusa; nor is it likely that the Neapolitans, who were always timid seamen, would venture the longer road by the south of Italy, coasting the entire island of Sicily, as well as the dreaded Barbary coast, when so much more convenient and secure a road lay open by Genoa.

THE TEMPEST.

ACT III. SCENE 1.

In the Island of Iviça.

Enter FERDINAND, bearing a Log.

Fer. 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 ne'er like éxecutor. I forget:

But these sweet thoughts do even refresh my labours;
Most busy-less, when I do it.