| ACT I SCENE II | A room of state in the same. | |
| [
Enter LEONTES, HERMIONE, MAMILLIUS,
POLIXENES, CAMILLO, and Attendants
] |
| POLIXENES | Nine changes of the watery star hath been |
| The shepherd's note since we have left our throne |
| Without a burthen: time as long again |
| Would be find up, my brother, with our thanks; |
| And yet we should, for perpetuity, | 5 |
| Go hence in debt: and therefore, like a cipher, |
| Yet standing in rich place, I multiply |
| With one 'We thank you' many thousands moe |
| That go before it. |
| LEONTES | Stay your thanks a while; | 10 |
| And pay them when you part. |
| POLIXENES | 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 | 15 |
| 'This is put forth too truly:' besides, I have stay'd |
| To tire your royalty. |
| LEONTES | We are tougher, brother, |
| Than you can put us to't. |
| POLIXENES | No longer stay. | 20 |
| LEONTES | One seven-night longer. |
| POLIXENES | Very sooth, to-morrow. |
| LEONTES | We'll part the time between's then; and in that |
| I'll no gainsaying. |
| POLIXENES | Press me not, beseech you, so. | 25 |
| There is no tongue that moves, none, none i' the world, |
| So soon as yours could win me: so it should now, |
| Were there necessity in your request, although |
| 'Twere needful I denied it. My affairs |
| Do even drag me homeward: which to hinder | 30 |
| Were in your love a whip to me; my stay |
| To you a charge and trouble: to save both, |
| Farewell, our brother. |
| LEONTES | Tongue-tied, our queen? |
| speak you. | 35 |
| HERMIONE | I had thought, sir, to have held my peace until |
| You have drawn oaths from him not to stay. You, sir, |
| Charge him too coldly. Tell him, you are sure |
| All in Bohemia's well; this satisfaction |
| The by-gone day proclaim'd: say this to him, | 40 |
| He's beat from his best ward. |
| LEONTES | Well said, Hermione. |
| HERMIONE | To tell, he longs to see his son, were strong: |
| But let him say so then, and let him go; |
| But let him swear so, and he shall not stay, | 45 |
| We'll thwack him hence with distaffs. |
| Yet of your royal presence I'll adventure |
| The borrow of a week. When at Bohemia |
| You take my lord, I'll give him my commission |
| To let him there a month behind the gest | 50 |
| Prefix'd for's parting: yet, good deed, Leontes, |
| I love thee not a jar o' the clock behind |
| What lady-she her lord. You'll stay? |
| POLIXENES | No, madam. |
| HERMIONE | Nay, but you will? | 55 |
| POLIXENES | I may not, verily. |
| HERMIONE | Verily! |
| You put me off with limber vows; but I, |
| Though you would seek to unsphere the |
| stars with oaths, | 60 |
| Should yet say 'Sir, no going.' Verily, |
| You shall not go: a lady's 'Verily' 's |
| As potent as a lord's. Will you go yet? |
| Force me to keep you as a prisoner, |
| Not like a guest; so you shall pay your fees | 65 |
| When you depart, and save your thanks. How say you? |
| My prisoner? or my guest? by your dread 'Verily,' |
| One of them you shall be. |
| POLIXENES | Your guest, then, madam: |
| To be your prisoner should import offending; | 70 |
| Which is for me less easy to commit |
| Than you to punish. |
| HERMIONE | Not your gaoler, then, |
| But your kind hostess. Come, I'll question you |
| Of my lord's tricks and yours when you were boys: | 75 |
| You were pretty lordings then? |
| POLIXENES | We were, fair queen, |
| Two lads that thought there was no more behind |
| But such a day to-morrow as to-day, |
| And to be boy eternal. | 80 |
| HERMIONE | Was not my lord |
| The verier wag o' the two? |
| POLIXENES | We were as twinn'd lambs that did frisk i' the sun, |
| And bleat the one at the other: what we changed
|
| Was innocence for innocence; we knew not | 85 |
| The doctrine of ill-doing, nor dream'd |
| That any did. Had we pursued that life, |
| And our weak spirits ne'er been higher rear'd |
| With stronger blood, we should have answer'd heaven |
| Boldly 'not guilty;' the imposition clear'd | 90 |
| Hereditary ours. |
| HERMIONE | By this we gather |
| You have tripp'd since. |
| POLIXENES | O my most sacred lady! |
| Temptations have since then been born to's; for | 95 |
| In those unfledged days was my wife a girl; |
| Your precious self had then not cross'd the eyes |
| Of my young play-fellow. |
| HERMIONE | Grace to boot! |
| Of this make no conclusion, lest you say | 100 |
| Your queen and I are devils: yet go on; |
| The offences we have made you do we'll answer, |
| If you first sinn'd with us and that with us |
| You did continue fault and that you slipp'd not |
| With any but with us. | 105 |
| LEONTES | Is he won yet? |
| HERMIONE | He'll stay my lord. |
| LEONTES | At my request he would not. |
| Hermione, my dearest, thou never spokest |
| To better purpose. | 110 |
| HERMIONE | Never? |
| LEONTES | Never, but once. |
| HERMIONE | What! have I twice said well? when was't before? |
| I prithee tell me; cram's with praise, and make's |
| As fat as tame things: one good deed dying tongueless | 115 |
| Slaughters a thousand waiting upon that. |
| Our praises are our wages: you may ride's |
| With one soft kiss a thousand furlongs ere |
| With spur we beat an acre. But to the goal: |
| My last good deed was to entreat his stay: | 120 |
| What was my first? it has an elder sister, |
| Or I mistake you: O, would her name were Grace! |
| But once before I spoke to the purpose: when? |
| Nay, let me have't; I long. |
| LEONTES | Why, that was when | 125 |
| Three crabbed months had sour'd themselves to death, |
| Ere I could make thee open thy white hand |
| And clap thyself my love: then didst thou utter |
| 'I am yours for ever.' |
| HERMIONE | 'Tis grace indeed. | 130 |
| Why, lo you now, I have spoke to the purpose twice: |
| The one for ever earn'd a royal husband; |
| The other for some while a friend. |
| LEONTES | [Aside] Too hot, too hot!
|
| To mingle friendship far is mingling bloods. | 135 |
| I have tremor cordis on me: my heart dances; |
| But not for joy; not joy. This entertainment |
| May a free face put on, derive a liberty |
| From heartiness, from bounty, fertile bosom, |
| And well become the agent; 't may, I grant; | 140 |
| But to be paddling palms and pinching fingers, |
| As now they are, and making practised smiles, |
| As in a looking-glass, and then to sigh, as 'twere |
| The mort o' the deer; O, that is entertainment |
| My bosom likes not, nor my brows! Mamillius, | 145 |
| Art thou my boy? |
| MAMILLIUS | Ay, my good lord. |
| LEONTES | I' fecks! |
| Why, that's my bawcock. What, hast |
| smutch'd thy nose? | 150 |
| They say it is a copy out of mine. Come, captain, |
| We must be neat; not neat, but cleanly, captain: |
| And yet the steer, the heifer and the calf |
| Are all call'd neat.--Still virginalling |
| Upon his palm!--How now, you wanton calf! | 155 |
| Art thou my calf? |
| MAMILLIUS | Yes, if you will, my lord. |
| LEONTES | Thou want'st a rough pash and the shoots that I have, |
| To be full like me: yet they say we are |
| Almost as like as eggs; women say so, | 160 |
| That will say anything but were they false |
| As o'er-dyed blacks, as wind, as waters, false |
| As dice are to be wish'd by one that fixes |
| No bourn 'twixt his and mine, yet were it true |
| To say this boy were like me. Come, sir page, | 165 |
| Look on me with your welkin eye: sweet villain! |
| Most dear'st! my collop! Can thy dam?--may't be?-- |
| Affection! thy intention stabs the centre: |
| Thou dost make possible things not so held, |
| Communicatest with dreams;--how can this be?-- | 170 |
| With what's unreal thou coactive art, |
| And fellow'st nothing: then 'tis very credent |
| Thou mayst co-join with something; and thou dost, |
| And that beyond commission, and I find it, |
| And that to the infection of my brains | 175 |
| And hardening of my brows. |
| POLIXENES | What means Sicilia? |
| HERMIONE | He something seems unsettled. |
| POLIXENES | How, my lord! |
| What cheer? how is't with you, best brother? | 180 |
| HERMIONE | You look as if you held a brow of much distraction |
| Are you moved, my lord? |
| LEONTES | No, in good earnest. |
| How sometimes nature will betray its folly, |
| Its tenderness, and make itself a pastime | 185 |
| To harder bosoms! Looking on the lines |
| Of my boy's face, methoughts I did recoil |
| Twenty-three years, and saw myself unbreech'd, |
| In my green velvet coat, my dagger muzzled, |
| Lest it should bite its master, and so prove, | 190 |
| As ornaments oft do, too dangerous: |
| How like, methought, I then was to this kernel, |
| This squash, this gentleman. Mine honest friend, |
| Will you take eggs for money? |
| MAMILLIUS | No, my lord, I'll fight. | 195 |
| LEONTES | You will! why, happy man be's dole! My brother, |
| Are you so fond of your young prince as we |
| Do seem to be of ours? |
| POLIXENES | If at home, sir, |
| He's all my exercise, my mirth, my matter, | 200 |
| Now my sworn friend and then mine enemy, |
| My parasite, my soldier, statesman, all: |
| He makes a July's day short as December, |
| And with his varying childness cures in me |
| Thoughts that would thick my blood. | 205 |
| LEONTES | So stands this squire |
| Officed with me: we two will walk, my lord, |
| And leave you to your graver steps. Hermione, |
| How thou lovest us, show in our brother's welcome; |
| Let what is dear in Sicily be cheap: | 210 |
| Next to thyself and my young rover, he's |
| Apparent to my heart. |
| HERMIONE | If you would seek us, |
| We are yours i' the garden: shall's attend you there? |
| LEONTES | To your own bents dispose you: you'll be found, | 215 |
| Be you beneath the sky. |
[Aside] |
| I am angling now, |
| Though you perceive me not how I give line. |
| Go to, go to! |
| How she holds up the neb, the bill to him! | 220 |
| And arms her with the boldness of a wife |
| To her allowing husband! |
[Exeunt POLIXENES, HERMIONE, and Attendants] |
| Gone already! |
| Inch-thick, knee-deep, o'er head and |
| ears a fork'd one! | 225 |
| Go, play, boy, play: thy mother plays, and I |
| Play too, but so disgraced a part, whose issue |
| Will hiss me to my grave: contempt and clamour |
| Will be my knell. Go, play, boy, play. |
| There have been, | 230 |
| Or I am much deceived, cuckolds ere now; |
| And many a man there is, even at this present, |
| Now while I speak this, holds his wife by the arm, |
| That little thinks she has been sluiced in's absence |
| And his pond fish'd by his next neighbour, by | 235 |
| Sir Smile, his neighbour: nay, there's comfort in't |
| Whiles other men have gates and those gates open'd, |
| As mine, against their will. Should all despair |
| That have revolted wives, the tenth of mankind |
| Would hang themselves. Physic for't there is none; | 240 |
| It is a bawdy planet, that will strike |
| Where 'tis predominant; and 'tis powerful, think it, |
| From east, west, north and south: be it concluded, |
| No barricado for a belly; know't; |
| It will let in and out the enemy | 245 |
| With bag and baggage: many thousand on's |
| Have the disease, and feel't not. How now, boy! |
| MAMILLIUS | I am like you, they say. |
| LEONTES | Why that's some comfort. What, Camillo there? |
| CAMILLO | Ay, my good lord. | 250 |
| LEONTES | Go play, Mamillius; thou'rt an honest man. |
[Exit MAMILLIUS] |
| Camillo, this great sir will yet stay longer. |
| CAMILLO | You had much ado to make his anchor hold: |
| When you cast out, it still came home. |
| LEONTES | Didst note it? | 255 |
| CAMILLO | He would not stay at your petitions: made |
| His business more material. |
| LEONTES | Didst perceive it? |
[Aside] |
| They're here with me already, whispering, rounding |
| 'Sicilia is a so-forth:' 'tis far gone, | 260 |
| When I shall gust it last. How came't, Camillo, |
| That he did stay? |
| CAMILLO | At the good queen's entreaty. |
| LEONTES | At the queen's be't: 'good' should be pertinent |
| But, so it is, it is not. Was this taken | 265 |
| By any understanding pate but thine? |
| For thy conceit is soaking, will draw in |
| More than the common blocks: not noted, is't, |
| But of the finer natures? by some severals |
| Of head-piece extraordinary? lower messes | 270 |
| Perchance are to this business purblind? say. |
| CAMILLO | Business, my lord! I think most understand |
| Bohemia stays here longer. |
| LEONTES | Ha! |
| CAMILLO | Stays here longer. | 275 |
| LEONTES | Ay, but why? |
| CAMILLO | To satisfy your highness and the entreaties |
| Of our most gracious mistress. |
| LEONTES | Satisfy! |
| The entreaties of your mistress! satisfy! | 280 |
| Let that suffice. I have trusted thee, Camillo, |
| With all the nearest things to my heart, as well |
| My chamber-councils, wherein, priest-like, thou |
| Hast cleansed my bosom, I from thee departed |
| Thy penitent reform'd: but we have been | 285 |
| Deceived in thy integrity, deceived |
| In that which seems so. |
| CAMILLO | Be it forbid, my lord! |
| LEONTES | To bide upon't, thou art not honest, or, |
| If thou inclinest that way, thou art a coward, | 290 |
| Which hoxes honesty behind, restraining |
| From course required; or else thou must be counted |
| A servant grafted in my serious trust |
| And therein negligent; or else a fool |
| That seest a game play'd home, the rich stake drawn, | 295 |
| And takest it all for jest. |
| CAMILLO | My gracious lord, |
| I may be negligent, foolish and fearful; |
| In every one of these no man is free, |
| But that his negligence, his folly, fear, | 300 |
| Among the infinite doings of the world, |
| Sometime puts forth. In your affairs, my lord, |
| If ever I were wilful-negligent, |
| It was my folly; if industriously |
| I play'd the fool, it was my negligence, | 305 |
| Not weighing well the end; if ever fearful |
| To do a thing, where I the issue doubted, |
| Where of the execution did cry out |
| Against the non-performance, 'twas a fear |
| Which oft infects the wisest: these, my lord, | 310 |
| Are such allow'd infirmities that honesty |
| Is never free of. But, beseech your grace, |
| Be plainer with me; let me know my trespass |
| By its own visage: if I then deny it, |
| 'Tis none of mine. | 315 |
| LEONTES | Ha' not you seen, Camillo,-- |
| But that's past doubt, you have, or your eye-glass |
| Is thicker than a cuckold's horn,--or heard,-- |
| For to a vision so apparent rumour |
| Cannot be mute,--or thought,--for cogitation | 320 |
| Resides not in that man that does not think,-- |
| My wife is slippery? If thou wilt confess, |
| Or else be impudently negative, |
| To have nor eyes nor ears nor thought, then say |
| My wife's a hobby-horse, deserves a name | 325 |
| As rank as any flax-wench that puts to |
| Before her troth-plight: say't and justify't. |
| CAMILLO | I would not be a stander-by to hear |
| My sovereign mistress clouded so, without |
| My present vengeance taken: 'shrew my heart, | 330 |
| You never spoke what did become you less |
| Than this; which to reiterate were sin |
| As deep as that, though true. |
| LEONTES | Is whispering nothing? |
| Is leaning cheek to cheek? is meeting noses? | 335 |
| Kissing with inside lip? stopping the career |
| Of laughing with a sigh?--a note infallible |
| Of breaking honesty--horsing foot on foot? |
| Skulking in corners? wishing clocks more swift? |
| Hours, minutes? noon, midnight? and all eyes | 340 |
| Blind with the pin and web but theirs, theirs only, |
| That would unseen be wicked? is this nothing? |
| Why, then the world and all that's in't is nothing; |
| The covering sky is nothing; Bohemia nothing; |
| My wife is nothing; nor nothing have these nothings, | 345 |
| If this be nothing. |
| CAMILLO | Good my lord, be cured |
| Of this diseased opinion, and betimes; |
| For 'tis most dangerous. |
| LEONTES | Say it be, 'tis true. | 350 |
| CAMILLO | No, no, my lord. |
| LEONTES | It is; you lie, you lie: |
| I say thou liest, Camillo, and I hate thee, |
| Pronounce thee a gross lout, a mindless slave, |
| Or else a hovering temporizer, that | 355 |
| Canst with thine eyes at once see good and evil, |
| Inclining to them both: were my wife's liver |
| Infected as her life, she would not live |
| The running of one glass. |
| CAMILLO | Who does infect her? | 360 |
| LEONTES | Why, he that wears her like a medal, hanging |
| About his neck, Bohemia: who, if I |
| Had servants true about me, that bare eyes |
| To see alike mine honour as their profits, |
| Their own particular thrifts, they would do that | 365 |
| Which should undo more doing: ay, and thou, |
| His cupbearer,--whom I from meaner form |
| Have benched and reared to worship, who mayst see |
| Plainly as heaven sees earth and earth sees heaven, |
| How I am galled,--mightst bespice a cup, | 370 |
| To give mine enemy a lasting wink; |
| Which draught to me were cordial. |
| CAMILLO | Sir, my lord, |
| I could do this, and that with no rash potion, |
| But with a lingering dram that should not work | 375 |
| Maliciously like poison: but I cannot |
| Believe this crack to be in my dread mistress, |
| So sovereignly being honourable. |
| I have loved thee,-- |
| LEONTES | Make that thy question, and go rot! | 380 |
| Dost think I am so muddy, so unsettled, |
| To appoint myself in this vexation, sully |
| The purity and whiteness of my sheets, |
| Which to preserve is sleep, which being spotted |
| Is goads, thorns, nettles, tails of wasps, | 385 |
| Give scandal to the blood o' the prince my son, |
| Who I do think is mine and love as mine, |
| Without ripe moving to't? Would I do this? |
| Could man so blench? |
| CAMILLO | I must believe you, sir: | 390 |
| I do; and will fetch off Bohemia for't; |
| Provided that, when he's removed, your highness |
| Will take again your queen as yours at first, |
| Even for your son's sake; and thereby for sealing |
| The injury of tongues in courts and kingdoms | 395 |
| Known and allied to yours. |
| LEONTES | Thou dost advise me |
| Even so as I mine own course have set down: |
| I'll give no blemish to her honour, none. |
| CAMILLO | My lord, | 400 |
| Go then; and with a countenance as clear |
| As friendship wears at feasts, keep with Bohemia |
| And with your queen. I am his cupbearer: |
| If from me he have wholesome beverage, |
| Account me not your servant. | 405 |
| LEONTES | This is all: |
| Do't and thou hast the one half of my heart; |
| Do't not, thou split'st thine own. |
| CAMILLO | I'll do't, my lord. |
| LEONTES | I will seem friendly, as thou hast advised me. | 410 |
| [Exit] |
| CAMILLO | O miserable lady! But, for me, |
| What case stand I in? I must be the poisoner |
| Of good Polixenes; and my ground to do't |
| Is the obedience to a master, one |
| Who in rebellion with himself will have | 415 |
| All that are his so too. To do this deed, |
| Promotion follows. If I could find example |
| Of thousands that had struck anointed kings |
| And flourish'd after, I'ld not do't; but since |
| Nor brass nor stone nor parchment bears not one, | 420 |
| Let villany itself forswear't. I must |
| Forsake the court: to do't, or no, is certain |
| To me a break-neck. Happy star, reign now! |
| Here comes Bohemia. |
| [Re-enter POLIXENES] |
| POLIXENES | This is strange: methinks | 425 |
| My favour here begins to warp. Not speak? |
| Good day, Camillo. |
| CAMILLO | Hail, most royal sir! |
| POLIXENES | What is the news i' the court? |
| CAMILLO | None rare, my lord. | 430 |
| POLIXENES | The king hath on him such a countenance |
| As he had lost some province and a region |
| Loved as he loves himself: even now I met him |
| With customary compliment; when he, |
| Wafting his eyes to the contrary and falling | 435 |
| A lip of much contempt, speeds from me and |
| So leaves me to consider what is breeding |
| That changeth thus his manners. |
| CAMILLO | I dare not know, my lord. |
| POLIXENES | How! dare not! do not. Do you know, and dare not? | 440 |
| Be intelligent to me: 'tis thereabouts; |
| For, to yourself, what you do know, you must. |
| And cannot say, you dare not. Good Camillo, |
| Your changed complexions are to me a mirror |
| Which shows me mine changed too; for I must be | 445 |
| A party in this alteration, finding |
| Myself thus alter'd with 't. |
| CAMILLO | There is a sickness |
| Which puts some of us in distemper, but |
| I cannot name the disease; and it is caught | 450 |
| Of you that yet are well. |
| POLIXENES | How! caught of me! |
| Make me not sighted like the basilisk: |
| I have look'd on thousands, who have sped the better |
| By my regard, but kill'd none so. Camillo,-- | 455 |
| As you are certainly a gentleman, thereto |
| Clerk-like experienced, which no less adorns |
| Our gentry than our parents' noble names, |
| In whose success we are gentle,--I beseech you, |
| If you know aught which does behove my knowledge | 460 |
| Thereof to be inform'd, imprison't not |
| In ignorant concealment. |
| CAMILLO | I may not answer. |
| POLIXENES | A sickness caught of me, and yet I well! |
| I must be answer'd. Dost thou hear, Camillo, | 465 |
| I conjure thee, by all the parts of man |
| Which honour does acknowledge, whereof the least |
| Is not this suit of mine, that thou declare |
| What incidency thou dost guess of harm |
| Is creeping toward me; how far off, how near; | 470 |
| Which way to be prevented, if to be; |
| If not, how best to bear it. |
| CAMILLO | Sir, I will tell you; |
| Since I am charged in honour and by him |
| That I think honourable: therefore mark my counsel, | 475 |
| Which must be even as swiftly follow'd as |
| I mean to utter it, or both yourself and me |
| Cry lost, and so good night! |
| POLIXENES | On, good Camillo. |
| CAMILLO | I am appointed him to murder you. | 480 |
| POLIXENES | By whom, Camillo? |
| CAMILLO | By the king. |
| POLIXENES | For what? |
| CAMILLO | He thinks, nay, with all confidence he swears, |
| As he had seen't or been an instrument | 485 |
| To vice you to't, that you have touch'd his queen |
| Forbiddenly. |
| POLIXENES | O, then my best blood turn |
| To an infected jelly and my name |
| Be yoked with his that did betray the Best! | 490 |
| Turn then my freshest reputation to |
| A savour that may strike the dullest nostril |
| Where I arrive, and my approach be shunn'd, |
| Nay, hated too, worse than the great'st infection |
| That e'er was heard or read! | 495 |
| CAMILLO | Swear his thought over |
| By each particular star in heaven and |
| By all their influences, you may as well |
| Forbid the sea for to obey the moon |
| As or by oath remove or counsel shake | 500 |
| The fabric of his folly, whose foundation |
| Is piled upon his faith and will continue |
| The standing of his body. |
| POLIXENES | How should this grow? |
| CAMILLO | I know not: but I am sure 'tis safer to | 505 |
| Avoid what's grown than question how 'tis born. |
| If therefore you dare trust my honesty, |
| That lies enclosed in this trunk which you |
| Shall bear along impawn'd, away to-night! |
| Your followers I will whisper to the business, | 510 |
| And will by twos and threes at several posterns |
| Clear them o' the city. For myself, I'll put |
| My fortunes to your service, which are here |
| By this discovery lost. Be not uncertain; |
| For, by the honour of my parents, I | 515 |
| Have utter'd truth: which if you seek to prove, |
| I dare not stand by; nor shall you be safer |
| Than one condemn'd by the king's own mouth, thereon |
| His execution sworn. |
| POLIXENES | I do believe thee: | 520 |
| I saw his heart in 's face. Give me thy hand: |
| Be pilot to me and thy places shall |
| Still neighbour mine. My ships are ready and |
| My people did expect my hence departure |
| Two days ago. This jealousy | 525 |
| Is for a precious creature: as she's rare, |
| Must it be great, and as his person's mighty, |
| Must it be violent, and as he does conceive |
| He is dishonour'd by a man which ever |
| Profess'd to him, why, his revenges must | 530 |
| In that be made more bitter. Fear o'ershades me: |
| Good expedition be my friend, and comfort |
| The gracious queen, part of his theme, but nothing |
| Of his ill-ta'en suspicion! Come, Camillo; |
| I will respect thee as a father if | 535 |
| Thou bear'st my life off hence: let us avoid. |
| CAMILLO | It is in mine authority to command |
| The keys of all the posterns: please your highness |
| To take the urgent hour. Come, sir, away. |
| [Exeunt] |
The Winter's Tale: Plot Summary