Ay, and a kind one too:

Is that an answer?

Gre.

Pray heaven, sir, your wife send you not a worse.
Pet. I hope, better.

Hor. Sirrah, Biondello, go and entreat my wife
To come to me forthwith.

Pet.

[Exit Biondello.

O, ho! entreat her !

I am afraid, sir,

Nay, then she must needs come.

Hor.

Do what you can, yours will not be entreated.

Re-enter Biondello.

Now, where's my wife?

Bap. She says, you have some goodly jest in hand; She will not come; she bids you come to her.

Pet. Worse, and worse; she will not come! O vile, Intolerable, not to be endur'd!

Sirrah, Grumio, go to your mistress;

Say, I command her come to me.

Hor. I know her answer.

Pet.

Hor.

[Exit Grumio.

What?

She will not come.

Pet. The fouler fortune mine, and there an end.

Enter Katharina.

Bap. Now, by my holidame, here comes Katharina!
Kath. What is your will, sir, that you send for me?
Pet. Where is your sister, and Hortensio's wife?
Kath. They sit conferring by the parlour fire.
Pet. Go fetch them hither; if they deny to come,
Swinge1 me them soundly forth unto their husbands:

Away, I say, and bring them hither straight. [Exit Katharina.
Luc. Here is a wonder, if you talk of a wonder.

Hor. And so it is; I wonder what it bodes.

Pet. Marry, peace it bodes, and love and quiet life,

An awful rule, and right supremacy;

And, to be short, what not, that's sweet and happy.
Bap. Now fair befal thee, good Petruchio!
The wager thou hast won; and I will add
Unto their losses twenty thousand crowns;
Another dowry to another daughter,

For she is chang'd, as she had never been.
Pet. Nay, I will win my wager better yet;

And show inore sign of her obedience,

Her new-built virtue and obedience.

Re-enter Katharina, with Bianca and Widow. See, where she comes; and brings your froward wives As prisoners to her womanly persuasion.

Katharine, that cap of yours becomes

you not:

Off with that bauble, throw it under foot.

[Kath. pulls off her cap, and throws it down.

Wid. Well! let me never have a cause to sigh,

1 Sway.

Till I be brought to such a silly pass!

Bian. Fie! what a foolish duty call you this?
Luc. I would, your duty were as foolish too:
The wisdom of your duty, fair Bianca,

Hath cost me an hundred crowns since supper-time.
Bian. The more fool you, for laying on my duty.

Pet. Katharine, I charge thee, tell these head-strong women What duty they do owe their lords and husbands.

Wid. Come, come, you're mocking; we will have no telling. Pet. Come on, I say; and first begin with her.

Wid. She shall not.

Pet. I say, she shall;-and first begin with her.

Kath. Fie, fie! unknit that threat'ning unkind brow ;
And dart not scornful glances from those eyes,

To wound thy lord, thy king, thy governor;
It blots thy beauty, as frosts bite the meads;
Confounds thy fame, as whirlwinds shake fair buds,
And in no sense is meet, or amiable.

A woman mov'd, is like a fountain troubled,
Muddy, ill-seeming, thick, bereft of beauty;
And, while it is so, none so dry or thirsty
Will deign to sip, or touch one drop of it.
Thy husband is thy lord, thy life, thy keeper,
Thy head, thy sovereign; one that cares for thee,
And for thy maintenance: commits his body
To painful labour, both by sea and land;
To watch the night in storms, the day in cold,
While thou liest warm at home, secure and safe;
And craves no other tribute at thy hands,
But love, fair looks, and true obedience ;-
Too little payment for so great a debt.
Such duty as the subject owes the prince,
Even such, a woman oweth to her husband:
And when she's froward, peevish, sullen, sour,
And not obedient to his honest will,
What is she, but a foul contending rebel,
And graceless traitor to her loving lord?
I am asham'd, that women are so simple
To offer war, where they should kneel for peace:
Or seek for rule, supremacy, and sway,
When they are bound to serve, love, and obey.
Why are our bodies soft, and weak, and smooth,
Unapt to toil and trouble in the world;
But that our soft conditions' and our hearts,
Should well agree with our external parts?
Come, come, you froward and unable worms!
My mind hath been as big as one of yours,
My heart as great; my reason, haply more
To bandy word for word, and frown for frown:
But now, I see our lances are but straws;
Our strength as weak, our weakness past compare,-
That seeming to be most, which we least are.
Then vail your stomachs, for it is no boot;

1 Dispositions.

2

2 Abate your spirits.

And place your hands below your husband's foot:
In token of which duty, if he please,

My hand is ready, may it do him ease.

Pet. Why, there's a wench!-Come on, and kiss me, Kate.
Luc. Well, go thy ways, old lad; for thou shalt ha't.
Vin. 'Tis a good hearing, when children are toward.
Luc. But a harsh hearing, when women are froward.
Pet. Come, Kate, we'll to bed :—

We three are married, but you two are sped.

[To Lucentio.] 'Twas I won the wager, though you hit the white : And, being a winner, God give you good night!

[Exeunt Petruchio and Kath.

Hor. Now go thy ways, thou hast tam'd a curst shrew.

Luc. "Tis a wonder, by your leave, she will be tam'd so. [Exeunt.

Gaoler.

An old Shepherd, reputed Father of
Perdita.

HERMIONE, Queen to Leontes.

PERDITA, Daughter to Leontes and
Hermione.

PAULINA, Wife to Antigonus.

EMILIA, a Lady,

Two other Ladies, S

MOPSA,

DORCAS,

attending the

Queen.

Shepherdesses.

Lords, Ladies, and Attendants;
Satyrs for a Dance; Shepherds,
Shepherdesses, Guards, &c.

SCENE.-Sometimes in Sicilia, sometimes in Bohemia.

Act First.

SCENE I. SICILIA. AN ANTECHAMBER IN LEONTES' PALACE.

Enter Camillo and Archidamus.

Arch. If you shall chance, Camillo, to visit Bohemia, on the like occasion whereon my services are now on foot, you shall see, as I have said, great difference betwixt our Bohemia and your Sicilia. Cam. I think, this coming summer, the king of Sicilia means to pay Bohemia the visitation which he justly owes him.

Arch. Wherein our entertainment shall shame us, we will be justified in our loves: for, indeed,—

Cam. 'Beseech you,

Arch. Verily, I speak it in the freedom of my knowledge: we cannot with such magnificence-in so rare-I know not what to say. -We will give you sleepy drinks that your senses, unintelligent of our insufficience, may, though they cannot praise us, as little accuse us.

Cam. You pay a great deal too dear, for what's given freely. Arch. Believe me, I speak as my understanding instructs nie, and as mine honesty puts it to utterance.

Cam. Sicilia cannot show himself over-kind to Bohemia. They were trained together in their childhoods; and there rooted be

twixt them then such an affection, which cannot choose but branch now. Since their more mature dignities, and royal necessities, made separation of their society, their encounters, though not personal, have been royally attornied,' with interchange of gifts, letters, loving embassies; that they have seemed to be together, though absent; shook hands, as over a vast2; and embraced, as it were, from the ends of opposed winds. The heavens continue their loves!

Arch. I think, there is not in the world either malice, or matter, to alter it. You have an unspeakable comfort of your young prince Mamillius; it is a gentleman of the greatest promise, that ever came into my note.

Cam. I very well agree with you in the hopes of him: it is a gallant child; one that, indeed, physicks the subject, makes old hearts fresh they, that went on crutches ere he was born, desire yet their life, to see him a man.

Arch. Would they else be content to die?

Cam. Yes if there were no other excuse why they should desire to live.

Arch. If the king had no son, they would desire to live on crutches till he had one.

[Exeunt.

SCENE II.-A ROOM OF STATE IN THE PALACE. Enter Leontes, Polixenes, Hermione, Mamillius, Camillo, and

Attendants.

Pol. Nine changes of the wat'ry star have been
The shepherd's note, since we have left our throne
Without a burden: time as long again

Would be fill'd up, my brother, with our thanks;
And yet we should for perpetuity,

Go hence in debt: And therefore, like a cipher,
Yet standing in rich place, I multiply,

With one we-thank-you, many thousands more
That go before it.

Leon.

Stay your thanks awhile;

And pay them when you part.

Pol.

Sir, that's to-morrow.

I am question'd by my fears, of what may chance,
Or breed upon our absence: That may blow
No sneaping winds at home, to make us say,
This is put forth too truly! Besides, I have stay'd
To tire your royalty.

Leon.

We are tougher, brother,

Leon. We'll part the time between's then: and in that I'll no gainsaying.

Pol.

Press me not, 'beseech you so:

There is no tongue that moves, none, none i' the world,