what talk we of these traitorly rascals, whose miseries are to be smiled at, their offences being so capital? Tell me (for you seem to be honest plain men) what you have to the king: being something gently considered, I'll bring you where he is aboard, tender your persons to his presence, whisper him in your behalfs; and, if it be in man, besides the king, to effect your suits, here is man shall do it. Or, from the all that are, took something good, Leon. I think so. Kill'd! She I kill'd? I did so: but thou strik'st me now, would Not at all, good lady: Clo. He seems to be of great authority: close with him, give him gold; and though authority be | You might have spoken a thousand things that a stubborn bear, yet he is oft led by the nose with gold: show the inside of your purse to the outside of his hand, and no more ado: Remember stoned, and flayed alive. Shep. An't please you, sir, to undertake the business for us, here is that gold I have: I'll make it as much more; and leave this young man in pawn, till I bring it you. Aut. After I have done what I promised? Aut. Well, give me the moiety :-Are you party in this business? a Clo. In some sort, sir: but though my case be a pitiful one, I hope I shall not be flayed out of it. Have done the time more benefit, and grac'd Would have him wed again. If you would not so, You pity not the state, nor the remembrance Of his most sovereign dame; consider little, What dangers, by his highness' fail of issue, May drop upon his kingdom, and devour Incertain lookers-on. What were more holy, Than to rejoice, the former queen is well ?2" What holier, than,-for royalty's repair, For present comfort and for future good,Aut. O, that's the case of the shepherd's son :-To bless the bed of majesty again Hang him, he'll be made an example. With a sweet fellow to't? Paul. There is none worthy, Respecting her that's gone. Besides, the gods Will have fulfill'd their secret purposes: For has not the divine Apollo said, Is't not the tenour of his oracle, That king Leontes shall not have an heir, Till his lost child be found? which, that it shall, Is all as monstrous to our human reason, As my Antigonus to break his grave, And come again to me; who, on my life, Did perish with the infant, "Tis your counsel, My lord should to the heavens be contrary, Oppose against their wills.-Care not for issue: [7% LEONTES. The crown will find an heir: Great Alexander Left his to the worthiest; so his successor Was like to be the best. Clo, Comfort, good comfort: we must to the king, and show our strange sights; he must know, 'ús none of your daughter nor my sister; we are gone else. Sir, I will give you as much as this old man does, when the business is performed; and remain, as he says, your pawn, till it be brought you. Aut. I will trust you. Walk before toward the sea-side; go on the right hand; I will but look upon the hedge, and follow you. Clo. We are blessed in this man, as I may say, even blessed. Shep. Let's before, as he bids us; he was provided to do us good. [Exeunt Shepherd and Clown. Aut. If I had a mind to be honest, I see, fortune would not suffer me; she drops booties in my mouth. I am courted now with a double occasion; gold, and a means to do the prince my master good; which, who knows how that may turn back to my advancement? I will bring these two moles, these blind ones, aboard him: if he think it fit to shore them again, and that the complaint they have to the king concerns him nothing, let him call me rogue, for being so far officious: for I am proof against that title, and what shame else belongs to't: To him I will present them; there may be matter | [Exit. in it. Leon. Good Paulina,— Paul. And left them 4 Incense, to instigate or stimulate, was the ancient sense of this word: it is rendered in the Latin dictiona The ries by dare stimulo. 5 i. e. split. Amity too, of your brave father; whom, Flo. Shall be, when your first queen's again in breath; Can send his brother: and, but infirmity Never till then. Paul. O Hermione, As every present time doth boast itself Pardon, madam: Paul. How? not women? Gent. Women will love her, that she is a woman More worth than any man; men, that she is The rarest of all women. Leon. Paul. Leon. and Attendants. Your mother was most true to wedlock, prince; 1 i. e. meet his eye, or encounter it. Affrontare, Ital. Shakspeare uses this word with the same meaning again in Hamlet, Act iii. Sc. 1: "That he, as 'twere by accident, may here 2 i. e. thy beauties which are buried in the grave. 3 So relates not to what precedes, but to what follows: that she had not been equall'd. 4 i, e. than the corse of Hermione, the subject of your writing. 6 The old copy reads, "Pr'ythee, no more: cease; 5 (Which waits upon worn times) hath something seiz'd The lands and waters 'twixt your throne and his Leon. Of my behind-hand slackness!-Welcome hither, She came from Libya. Leon. Good my lord, Where the warlike Smalus, That noble honour'd lord, is fear'd, and lov'd? Flo. Most royal sir, from thence; from him, whose Lord. Enter a Lord. Most noble sir, That, which I shall report, will bear no credit, Leon. thou know'st,' &c. Steevens made the omission of the redundant word, which he considers a mere marginal gloss or explanation of no more. 6 Steevens altered this to look upon, but there are many instances of similar construction in Shakspeare, incorrect as they may now appear. 7 i. e. at amity, as we now say. Malone, Contrary to his usual custom, would here desert the old reading: and says he has met with no example of similar phraseology! He surely must have read very inattentively. 8 ì. e. full of grace and virtue. He's with the king your father. Who? Camillo? Per. Leon. You are married? Flo. We are not, sir, nor are we like to be; Is this the daughter of a king? My lord, She is, Leon. That once, I see, by your good father's Will come on very slowly. I am sorry, Flo. Dear, look up: Though fortune, visible an enemy, mistress, Which he counts but a trifle. Paul. gazes Than what you look on now. I thought of her, Aut. 'Beseech you, sir, were you present at this relation? 1 Gent. I was by at the opening of the fardel, heard the old shepherd deliver the manner how he found it; whereupon, after a little amazedness, we were all commanded out of the chamber; only this, methought, I heard the shepherd say, he found the child. Aut. I would most gladly know the issue of it. 1 Gent. I make a broken delivery of the business; -But the changes I perceived in the king, and Camillo, were very notes of admiration: they seemed almost, with staring on one another, to tear the cases of their eyes; there was speech in their dumb 1 i. e. conversation. 2 Worth for descent or wealth. 4 In Shakspeare's time, to affect a thing meant, to have a tendency or disposition to it. The affections were the dispositions, Appetitus animi. ness, language in their very gesture; they looked, Enter another Gentleman. 2 Gent. Nothing but bonfires: The oracle is fulfilled; the king's daughter is found: such a deal of wonder is broken out within this hour, that balladmakers cannot be able to express it. Enter a third Gentleman. Here comes the lady Paulina's steward; he can deliver you more.-How goes it now, sir? this news, which is called true, is so like an old tale, that the verity of it is in strong suspicion: Has the king found his heir? 3 Gent. Most true; if ever truth were pregnant by circumstance: that, which you hear, you'll swear you see, there is such unity in the proofs. The mantle of queen Hermione :-her jewel about the neck of it: the letters of Antigonus, found with it, which they know to be his character:-the majesty of the creature, in resemblance of the mother;-the affection of nobleness, which nature shows above her breeding,-and many other evidences, proclaim her, with all certainty, to be the king's daughter. Did you see the meeting of the two kings? 2 Gent. No. 3 Gent. Then have you lost a sight, which was to be seen, cannot be spoken of. There might you have beheld one joy crown another; so, and in such manner, that, it seemed, sorrow wept to take leave There was of them; for their joy waded in tears. casting up of eyes, holding up of hands; with countenance of such distraction, that they were to be known by garment, not by favour. Our king, being ready to leap out of himself for joy of his found daughter; as if that joy were now become a loss, cries, O, thy mother, thy mother! then asks Bohemia forgiveness; then embraces his son-in-law; then again worries he his daughter, with clipping her; now he thanks the old shepherd, which stands by like a weather-bitten conduit of many kings' reigns." I never heard of such another encounter, which lames report to follow it, and undoes description to do it. 2 Gent. What, pray you, became of Antigonus, that carried hence the child? 3 Gent. Like an old tale still; which will have matter to rehearse, though credit be asleep, and not an ear open: He was torn to pieces with a bear; this avouches the shepherd's son; who has not only his innocence (which seems much) to justify him, but a handkerchief, and rings, of his, that Paulina knows. 1 Gent. What became of his bark, and his followers? 3 Gent. Wrecked the same instant of their master's death and in the view of the shepherd: so that all the instruments, which aided to expose the child, were even then lost, when it was found. But, 0, the noble combat, that, 'twixt joy and sorrow, was fought in Paulina! She had one eye declined for the loss of her husband; another elevated that the oracle was fulfilled: She lifted the princess from the earth; and so locks her in embracing, as if she would pin her to her heart, that she might no more be in danger of losing. 1 Gent. The dignity of this act was worth the audience of kings and princes; for by such was it acted. 3 Gent. One of the prettiest touches of all, and 5 Favour here stands for mien, feature. 7 Conduits or fountains were frequently representa. tions of the human figure. One of this kind has been already referred to in As You Like It, Act iv. Sc. 1. that which angled for mine eyes (caught the water, though not the fish) was, when at the relation of the queen's death, with the manner how she came to it (bravely confessed, and lamented by the king,) how attentiveness wounded his daughter: till, from one sign of dolour to another, she did, with an alas! I would fain say, bleed tears; for, I am sure, my heart wept blood. Who was most marble there changed colour; some swooned, all sorrowed: if all the world could have seen it, the woe had been universal. 1 Gent. Are they returned to the court? 3 Gent. No: the princess, hearing of her mother's statue, which is in the keeping of Paulina,-a piece many years in doing, and now newly performed by that rare Italian master, Julio Romano; who, had he himself eternity, and could put breath into his work, would beguile nature of her custom, so perfectly he is her ape: he so near to Hermione hath done Hermione, that, they say, one would speak to her, and stand in hope of answer: thither with all greediness of affection, are they gone; and there they intend to sup. 2 Gent. I thought, she had some great matter there in hand; for she hath privately, twice or thrice a day, ever since the death of Hermione, visited that removed house. Shall we thither, and with our company piece the rejoicing? 1 Gent. Who would be thence, that has the benefit of access? every wink of an eye, some new grace will be born: our absence makes us unthrifty to our knowledge. Let's along. [Exeunt Gentlemen. Aut. Now, had I not the dash of my former life in me, would preferment drop on my head. I brought the old man and his son aboard the prince; told him, I heard them talk of a fardel, and I know not what: but he at that time, over-fond of the shepherd's daughter (so he then took her to be,) who began to be much sea-sick, and himself little better, extremity of weather continuing, this mystery remained undiscovered. But 'tis all one to me: for had I been the finder-out of this secret, it would not have relished among my other discredits. Enter Shepherd and Clown. Aut. Ay, an it like your good worship Shep. You may say it, but not swear it. Clo. Not swear it, now I am a gentleman? Let boors and franklins say it, I'll swear it. Shep. How if it be false, son? Shep. Come, boy; I am past more children; but thy sons and daughters will be all gentlemen born. Clo. Your are well met, sir: You denied to fight with me this other day, because I was no gentleman born: See you these clothes? say, you see them not, and think me still no gentleman born: you were best say, these robes are not gentleman born. Give me the lie; do; and try whether I am not now a gentleman born. Clo. If it be ne'er so false, a true gentleman may swear it in the behalf of his friend :—And I'll swear to the prince, thou art a tall fellow of thy hands, and that thou wilt not be drunk; but I know thou art no tall fellow of thy hands, and that thou wilt be drunk; but I'll swear it: and I would, thou would'st be a tall fellow of thy hands. Aut. I know, you are now, sir, a gentleman born. Clo. Ay, and have been so any time these four hours. Shep. And so have I, boy. Clo. So you have :-but I was a gentleman born before my father: for the king's son took me by the hand, and called me, brother; and then the two kings called my father, brother; and then the prince, my brother, and the princess, my sister, called my father, father; and so we wept: and there was the first gentlemanlike tears that ever we shed. Aut. I will prove so, sir, to my power. Clo. Ay, by any means prove a tall fellow: If I do not wonder how thou darest venture to be drunk, not being a tall fellow, trust me not.-Hark! the kings and the princes, our kindred, are going to see the queen's picture. Come, follow us: we'll be thy good masters. [Exeunt. Shep. We may live, son, to shed many more. Clo. Ay; or else 'twere hard luck, being in so preposterous estate as we are. Aut. I humbly beseech you, sir, to pardon me all the faults I have committed to your worship, and to give me your good report to the prince my master. Shep. 'Pr'ythee, son, do; for we must be gentle, now we are gentlemen." Clo. Thou wilt amend thy life? 1 Who was most marble: that is, those who had the hardest hearts. 2 However misplaced the praise, it is no small honour to Julio Romano to be thus mentioned by the poet. By eternity Shakspeare only means immortality. 3 i. e. remote. SCENE III. The same. A Room in Paulina's Leon. O grave and good Paulina, the great comfort Paul. What, sovereign sir, You have paid home: but that you have vouchsaf'd I did not well, I meant well: All my services, With your crown'd brother, and these your con tracted Heirs of your kingdoms, my poor house to visit, Paul. O Paulina, To see the statue of our queen: your gallery We honour you with trouble: But we came Have we pass'd through, not without much content In many singularities; but we saw no That which my daughter came to look upon, The statue of her mother. As she liv'd peerless, So her dead likeness, I do well believe, Excels whatever yet you look'd upon, Or hand of man hath done; therefore I keep it Lonely, apart: But here it is: prepare To see the life as lively mock'd, as ever Still sleep mock'd death: behold; and say, [PAUL. undraws a curtain and discovers a Statue. I like your silence, it the more shows off Your wonder: But yet speak ;-first, you, my lege, Comes it not something near? Her natural posture !— Chide me, dear stone; that I may say, indeed, Thou art Hermione: or, rather, thou art she, In thy not chiding; for she was as tender As infancy and grace.-But yet, Paulina, Hermione was not so much wrinkled, nothing So aged, as this seems. Leon. 'tis well. Pol. O, not by much. Paul. So much the more our carver's excellence; Which lets go by some sixteen years, and makes her As she liv'd now. Leon. As now she might have done So much to my good comfort, as it is Now piercing to my soul. O, thus she stood, Even with such life of majesty (warm life, As now it coldly stands), when first I woo'd her! I am asham'd: Does not the stone rebuke me, For being more stone than it ?-O, royal piece. There's magic in thy majesty; which has My evils conjured to remembrance; and From thy admiring daughter took the spirits, Standing like stone with thee: 4 i. e. Yeomen. 5 i. e. a bold, courageous fellow. 6 Good masters. It was a common petitionary phrase to ask a superior to be rood lord or good master to the supplicant. 7 The old copy reads lovely. Music; awake her: strike.[Music. Cam. My lord, your sorrow was too sore laid on; "Tis time; descend; be stone no more: approach, Which sixteen winters cannot blow away, If I had thought the sight of my poor image Strike all that look upon with marvel. Come: Would thus have wrought you (for the stone is Is she become the suitor. Quit presently the chapel; or resolve you Leon. Leon. O, she's warm! Pol. [Embracing her She embraces him. Cam. She hangs about his neck; Thy father's court? for thou shalt hear, that I,- Paul. Leon. And made between's by vows. Thou hast found mine; But how is it to be question'd: for I saw her, And take her by the hand: whose worth, and Is10 richly noted; and here justified What you can make her do, By us, a pair of kings.-Let's from this place I am content to look on: what to speak, I am content to hear; for 'tis as easy To make her speak, as move. 1 Worked, agitated. 2 The folio reads I'd not have show'd it.' In the late edition of Malone's Shakspeare it stands, I'll not have show'd it.' But surely this is erroneous. 3 The sentence if completed would probably have been, but that, methinks, already I converse with the dead.'-His passion made him break off. What!-Look11 upon, my brother :--both your pardons, 8 Thus in Lodge's Rosalynde, 1592: A turtle sat upon a leavelesse tree, 9 Whose relates to Camillo, though Paulina is the immediate antecedent. I have observed, in the loose construction of ancient phraseology, whose often used 4 i. e. Though her eye be fixed, it seems to have mo-in this manner, where his would be more proper. tion in it. 10 It is erroneously printed for is here in the late Vari. orum Shakspeare. 11 Look upon for look on. Part III. Act ii. Sc. 3: Thus in King Henry V And look upon, as if the tragedy,' &c. |