I have too much believ'd mine own suspicion: [Exeunt Paulina and Ladies, with Her. My great profaneness 'gainst thine oracle!I'll reconcile me to Polixenes; New woo my queen; recall the good Camillo ; My friend Polixenes; which had been done, Paul. Re-enter Paulina. Wo the while! O, cut my lace; lest my heart, cracking it, Break too! 1 Lord. What fit is this, good lady? Paul. What studied torments, tyrant, hast for me? What wheels? racks? fires? What flaying? boiling, In leads, or oils? what old, or newer torture Must I receive; whose every word deserves To taste of thy most worst? Thy tyranny Together working with thy jealousies,Fancies too weak for boys, too green and idle For girls of nine !-O, think, what they have done, And then run mad, indeed; stark mad! for all Thy by-gone fooleries were but spices of it. That thou betray'dst Polixenes, 'twas nothing; That did but show thee, of a fool, inconstant, And damnable ungrateful: nor was't much, Thou would'st have poison'd good Camillo's honour, To have him kill a king; poor trespasses, More monstrous standing by: whereof I reckon The casting forth to crows thy baby daughter, To be or none, or little; though a devil Would have shed water out of fire, ere done't: Nor is't directly laid to thee, the death Of the young prince; whose honourable thoughts (Thoughts high for one so tender,) cleft the heart That could conceive, a gross and foolish sire Blemish'd his gracious dam: this is not, no, Laid to thy answer: But the last,-0, lords, When I have said, cry, wo!-the queen, the queen, The sweetest, dearest, creature's dead; and vengeance for't Not dropp'd down yet. 1 Lord. The higher powers forbid ! Paul. I say, she's dead; I'll swear't: if word, nor oath, Prevail not, go and see: if you can bring Should be past grief: Do not receive affliction Leon. [Exeunt. SCENE III.-Bohemia. A desert country near Enter Antigonus, with the child; and the sea. a Mariner. Ant. Thou art perfect then, our ship hath touch'd upon The deserts of Bohemia ? Mar. Ay, my lord: and fear We have landed in ill time; the skies look grimly, And threaten present blusters. In my conscience, The heavens with that we have in hand are angry, And frown upon us. Ant. Their sacred wills be done!-Go, get aboard; Look to thy bark; I'll not be long, before I I'll follow instantly. Mar. I am glad at heart To be so rid o'the business. Ant. Come, poor babe : [Exit. I have heard (but not believ'd,) the spirits of the dead My cabin where I lay: thrice bow'd before me; (3) Well-assured. Did this break from her: Good Antigonus, the sky; betwixt the firmament and it, you cannot thrust a bodkin's point. Shep. Why, boy, how is it? Clo. I would, you did but see how it chafes, how it rages, how it takes up the shore! but that's not There weep, and leave it crying; and, for the babe to the point: O, the most piteous cry of the poor Is counted lost for ever, Perdita, I pr'ythee, callit; for this ungentle business, And still rest thine. -The storm begins :-Poor - wretch, That, for thy mother's fault, art thus expos'd To loss, and what may follow!-Weep I cannot, But my heart bleeds: and most accurs'd am I, To be by oath enjoin'd to this.-Farewell! The day frowns more and more; thou art like to have A lullaby too rough: I never saw souls! sometimes to see 'em, and not to see 'em : now the ship boring the moon with her main-mast; and anon swallowed with yest and froth, as you'd thrust a cork into a hogshead. And then for the land service,-To see how the bear tore out his shoulder-bone; how he cried to me for help, and said, his name was Antigonus, a nobleman:-But to make an end of the ship:-to see how the sea flap-dragon'd it :-but, first, how the poor souls roared, and the sea mocked them ;-and how the poor gentleman roar'd, and the bear mocked him, both roaring louder than the sea, or weather. Shep. 'Name of mercy, when was this, boy? Clo. Now, now; I have not winked since I saw these sights: the men are not yet cold under water, nor the bear half dined on the gentleman; he's at it now. Shep. Would I had been by, to have helped the old man! Clo. I would you had been by the ship-side, to have helped her; there your charity would have lacked footing. [Aside. Shep. Heavy matters! heavy matters! but look thee here, boy. Now bless thyself; thou met'st with things dying, I with things new born. Here's a sight for thee; look thee, a bearing-cloths for a squire's child! Look thee here; take up, take up, boy; open't. So, let's see; It was told me, ling:-open't: "What's within, boy? The heavens so dim by day.-A savage clamour?-should be rich by the fairies: this is some change- Enter an old Shepherd. Clo. You're a made old man; if the sins of your youth are forgiven you, you're well to live. Gold! all gold! Shep. I would, there were no age between ten Shep. This is fairy gold, boy, and 'twill prove so: and three-and-twenty; or that youth would sleep up with it, keep it close; home, home, the next out the rest: for there is nothing in the between way. We are lucky, boy; and to be so still rebut getting wenches with child, wronging the an-quires nothing but secrecy.-Let my sheep go:cientry, stealing, fighting.Hark you now!-Come, good boy, the next way home. Would any but these boiled brains of nineteen, and Clo. Go you the next way with your findings; two-and-twenty, hunt this weather? They have I'll go see if the bear be gone from the gentleman, scared away two of my best sheep; which, I fear, and how much he hath eaten : they are never curst, the wolf will sooner find, than the master: if any but when they are hungry: if there be any of him where I have them, 'tis by the sea-side, browzing left, I'll bury it. on ivy. Good luck, an't be thy will! what have we Shep. That's a good deed: If thou may'st dishere [Taking up the child.] Mercy on's, a cern by that which is left of him, what he is, fetch barne; a very pretty barne! A boy, or a child, I me to the sight of him. Shep. 'Tis a lucky day, boy; and we'll do good deeds 'on't. [Exeunt. wonder? A pretty one; a very pretty one: Sure, Clo. Marry, will I; and you shall help to put some scape: though I am not bookish, yet I can him i'the ground. read waiting-gentlewoman in the scape. This has been some stair-work, some trunkwork, some behind-door-work: they were warmer that got this, than the poor thing is here. I'll take it up for pity: yet I'll tarry till my son come; he hollaed but ren now. Whoa, ho hoa! Enter Clown. Clo. Hilloa, loa! Shep. What, art so near? If thou'lt see a thing to talk on when thou art dead and rotten, come hither. What ailest thou, man? ACT IV. Enter Time, as Chorus. Time. I,-that please some, try all; both joy, and terror, Of good and bad; that make, and unfold error,— Clo. I have seen two such sights, by sea, and by Now take upon me, in the name of Time, land;-but I am not to say, it is a sea, for it is now To use my wings. Impute it not a crime, To me, or my swift passage, that I slide (1) The writing afterward discovered with Per-O'er sixteen years, and leave the growth untried dita. (2) Child. (3) Female infant. (4) Swallowed. (6) Some child left behind by the fairies, in the (5) The mantle in which a child was carried to room of one which they had stolen. he baptized. (7) Nearest. (8) Mischievous. Of that wide gap; since it is in my power And what to her adheres, which follows after, [Exit. Polixenes. Enter Polixenes and Camillo. Pol. I pray thee, good Camillo, be no more importunate; 'tis a sickness, denying thee any thing; a death, to grant this. Cam. It is fifteen years, since I saw my country; though I have, for the most part, been aired abroad, with some care; so far, that I have eyes under my service, which look upon his removedness: from whom I have this intelligence; That he is seldom from the house of a most homely shepherd; a man, they say, that from very nothing, and beyond the imagination of his neighbours, is grown into an unspeakable estate. Cam. have heard, sir, of such a man, who hath a daughter of most rare note: the report of her is extended more, than can be thought to begin from such a cottage. Pol. That's likewise part of my intelligence. With, heigh! the doxy over the dale,- The lark, that tirra-lirra chaunts,— With, hey! with, hey! the thrush and the jay : While we lie tumbling in the hay. I desire to lay my bones there. Besides, the peni-Are summer-songs for me and my aunts,11 have served prince Florizel, and, in my time, wore three-pile; 12 but now I am out of service: But shall I go mourn for that, my dear? Pol. As thou lovest me, Camillo, wipe not out the rest of thy services, by leaving me now: the need I have of thee, thine own goodness hath made; better not to have had thee, than thus to want thee: thou, having made me businesses, which none without thee can sufficiently manage, must either stay to execute them thyself, or take away with thee the very services thou hast done: which if I have not enough considered, (as too much I cannot,) to be more thankful to thee, shall be my My traffic is sheets; when the kite builds, look to study; and my profit therein, the heaping friend- lesser linen. My father named me, Autolycus; ships. Of that fatal country, Sicilia, pr'ythee speak who, being, as I am, littered under Mercury, was no more: whose very naming punishes me with the likewise a snapper-up of unconsidered trifles: With remembrance of that penitent, as thou call'st him, die, and drab, I purchased this caparison; and my and reconciled king, my brother; whose loss of his revenue is the silly cheat:13 Gallows, and knock, most precious queen, and children, are even now are too powerful on the highway: beating, and to be afresh lamented. Say to me, when saw'st hanging, are terrors to me; for the life to come, I thou the prince Florizel my son? Kings are no less sleep out the thought of it.-A prize! a prize unhappy, their issue not being gracious, than they are in losing them, when they have approved their virtues. Enter Clown. Clo. Let me see :-Every 'leven wether-tods; 14 Cam. Sir, it is three days since I saw the prince: every tod yields-pound and odd shilling: fifteen What his happier affairs may be, are to me un-hundred shorn,-What comes the wool to? known: but I have, missingly, noted," he is of late much retired from court; and is less frequent to his princely exercises, than formerly he hath appeared. Po!. I have considered so much, Camillo; and (1) i. e. Leave unexamined the progress of the intermediate time which filled up the gap in Perdita's story. (2) Imagine for me. (3) Subject. (4) Approve. Aut. If the springe hold, the cock's mine. [Aside. (9) i. e. The spring blood reigns over the parts lately under the dominion of winter. (10) Thievish. (11) Doxies. (12) Rich velvet. (13) Picking pockets. (14) Every eleven sheep will produce a tod or twenty-eight pounds of wool. (15) Circular pieces of base metal, anciently used by the illiterate, to adjust their reckonings. I Aut. Very true, sir; he, sir, he; that's the rogue, that put me into this apparel. Clo. Not a more cowardly rogue in all Bohemia ; if you had but looked big, and spit at him, he'd see; what I am to buy for our sheep-shearing feast? Aut. O, that ever I was born! [Grovelling on the ground. Clo. I' the name of me,Aut. O, help me, help me! pluck but off these rags; and then, death, death! Clo. Alack, poor soul! thou hast need of more rags to lay on thee, rather than have these off. Aut. O, sir, the loathsomeness of them offends me more than the stripes I have received; which are mighty ones and millions. Clo. Alas, poor man! a million of beating may come to a great matter. Aut. I am robbed, sir, and beaten; my money and apparel ta'en from me, and these detestable things put upon me. Clo. What, by a horse-man, or a foot-man? Aut. I must confess to you, sir, I am no fighter: am false of heart that way; and that he knew, I warrant him. Clo. How do you now? Aut. Sweet sir, much better than I was; I can stand, and walk: I will even take my leave of you, and pace softly towards my kinsman's. Clo. Shall I bring thee on the way? Aut. Prosper you, sweet sir!--[Exit Clown.] Your purse is not hot enough to purchase your spice. I'll be with you at your sheep-shearing too: If I make not this cheat bring out another, and the shearers prove sheep, let me be unrolled, and my name put in the book of virtue! Jog on, jog on, the foot-path way, [Exit. SCENE III.-The same. A shepherd's cottage. Flo. These your unusual weeds to each part of you Clo. Indeed, he should be a foot-man, by the Do give a life: no shepherdess; but Flora, garments he has left with thee; if this be a horse- Peering in April's front. This your sheep-shearin man's coat, it hath seen very hot service. Lend me Is as a meeting of the petty gods, thy hand, I'll help thee: come, lend me thy hand. And you the queen on't. [Helping him up. Per. Sir, my gracious lord, To chide at your extremes, it not becomes me; O, pardon, that I name them: your high self, Aut. O! good sir, tenderly, oh! Aut. O, good sir, softly, good sir: I fear, sir, The gracious mark1o o' the land, you have obscur'd my shoulder-blade is out. Clo. How now! canst stand? Aut. Softly, dear sir: [Picks his pocket.] good sir, softly: you ha' done me a charitable office. Clo. Dost lack any money? I have a little money for thee. Aui. No, good sweet sir; no, I beseech you, sir: I have a kinsman not past three-quarters of a mile hence, unto whom I was going; I shall there have money, or any thing I want: Offer me no money, I pray you; that kills my heart. Clo. What manner of fellow was he that robbed you? Aut. A fellow, sir, that I have known to go about with trol-my-dames: I knew him once a servant of the prince; I cannot tell, good sir, for which of his virtues it was, but he was certainly whipped out of the court. With a swain's wearing; and me, poor lowly maid, Flo. Clo. His vices, you would say; there's no virtue Apprehend whipped out of the court: they cherish it, to make Nothing but jollity. The gods themselves, it stay there; and yet it will no more but abide. Humbling their deities to love, have taken Aut. Vices I would say, sir. I know this man The shapes of beasts upon them: Jupiter well: he hath been since an ape-bearer; then a Became a bull, and bellow'd; the green Neptune process-server, a bailiff; then he compassed a mo- A ram, and bleated; and the fire-rob'd god, tions of the prodigal son, and married a tinker's Golden Apollo, a poor humble swain, wife within a mile where my land and living lies; As I seem now: Their transformations and, having flown over many knavish professions, Were never for a piece of beauty rarer; he settled only in rogue: some call him Autolycus. Nor in a way so chaste: since my desires Clo. Out upon him! Prig," for my life, prig: he Run not before mine honour; nor my lusts haunts wakes, fairs, and bear-baitings. Burn hotter than my faith. (1) Singers of catches in three parts. (2) Tenors. (3) A species of pears. (7) Thief. (5) Sojourn. (6) Puppet-show. (8) Take hold of. (9) Excesses. (4) The machine used in the game of pigeon-(10) Object of all men's notice. 11) Dressed with ostentation. (12) i. e. Of station. boles. With these forc'd' thoughts, I pr'ythee, darken not Mine own, nor any thing to any, if I be not thine: to this I am most constant, coming: Lift up your countenance; as it were the day Per. Stand you auspicious! Say, there be; Pol. Per. Per. I'll not put Desire to breed by me.-Here's flowers for you! O lady fortune, The marigold, that goes to bed with the sun, Enter Shepherd, with Polixenes, and Camillo, dis- Shep. Fie, daughter! when my old wife liv'd, This day, she was both pantler, butler, cook; Per. Out, alas! I would I had some flowers o'the spring, that might With labour; and the thing she took to quench it, From Dis's wagon! daffodils, She would to each one sip: You are retir'd, Welcome, sir! [To Pol. 2 For you there's rosemary, and rue; these keep Pol. Shepherdess, (A fair one are vou,) well you fit our ages With flowers of winter. Per. Not yet on summer's death, nor on the birth season Are our carnations, and streak'd gillyflowers, That come before the swallow dares, and take Flo. What? like a corse? Methinks, I play as I have seen them do Flo. Sir, the year growing ancient,—I'd have you buy and sell so; so give alms; Wherefore, gentle maiden, For I have heard it said, There is an art, which, in their piedness, shares With great creating nature. (1) Far-fetched. 75) Because that, (2) Likeness and smell. (5) Pluto's. |