| ACT IV SCENE IV | The Shepherd's cottage. | |
| [Enter FLORIZEL and PERDITA] |
| FLORIZEL | These your unusual weeds to each part of you |
| Do give a life: no shepherdess, but Flora |
| Peering in April's front. This your sheep-shearing |
| Is as a meeting of the petty gods, |
| And you the queen on't. | 5 |
| PERDITA | Sir, my gracious lord, |
| To chide at your extremes it not becomes me: |
| O, pardon, that I name them! Your high self, |
| The gracious mark o' the land, you have obscured |
| With a swain's wearing, and me, poor lowly maid, | 10 |
| Most goddess-like prank'd up: but that our feasts |
| In every mess have folly and the feeders |
| Digest it with a custom, I should blush |
| To see you so attired, sworn, I think, |
| To show myself a glass. | 15 |
| FLORIZEL | I bless the time |
| When my good falcon made her flight across |
| Thy father's ground. |
| PERDITA | Now Jove afford you cause! |
| To me the difference forges dread; your greatness | 20 |
| Hath not been used to fear. Even now I tremble |
| To think your father, by some accident, |
| Should pass this way as you did: O, the Fates! |
| How would he look, to see his work so noble |
| Vilely bound up? What would he say? Or how | 25 |
| Should I, in these my borrow'd flaunts, behold |
| The sternness of his presence? |
| FLORIZEL | Apprehend |
| Nothing but jollity. The gods themselves, |
| Humbling their deities to love, have taken | 30 |
| The shapes of beasts upon them: Jupiter |
| Became a bull, and bellow'd; the green Neptune |
| A ram, and bleated; and the fire-robed god, |
| Golden Apollo, a poor humble swain, |
| As I seem now. Their transformations | 35 |
| Were never for a piece of beauty rarer, |
| Nor in a way so chaste, since my desires |
| Run not before mine honour, nor my lusts |
| Burn hotter than my faith. |
| PERDITA | O, but, sir, | 40 |
| Your resolution cannot hold, when 'tis |
| Opposed, as it must be, by the power of the king: |
| One of these two must be necessities, |
| Which then will speak, that you must |
| change this purpose, | 45 |
| Or I my life. |
| FLORIZEL | Thou dearest Perdita, |
| With these forced thoughts, I prithee, darken not |
| The mirth o' the feast. Or I'll be thine, my fair, |
| Or not my father's. For I cannot be | 50 |
| Mine own, nor any thing to any, if |
| I be not thine. To this I am most constant, |
| Though destiny say no. Be merry, gentle; |
| Strangle such thoughts as these with any thing |
| That you behold the while. Your guests are coming: | 55 |
| Lift up your countenance, as it were the day |
| Of celebration of that nuptial which |
| We two have sworn shall come. |
| PERDITA | O lady Fortune, |
| Stand you auspicious! | 60 |
| FLORIZEL | See, your guests approach: |
| Address yourself to entertain them sprightly, |
| And let's be red with mirth. |
| [
Enter Shepherd, Clown, MOPSA, DORCAS, and
others, with POLIXENES and CAMILLO disguised
] |
| Shepherd | Fie, daughter! when my old wife lived, upon |
| This day she was both pantler, butler, cook, | 65 |
| Both dame and servant; welcomed all, served all; |
| Would sing her song and dance her turn; now here, |
| At upper end o' the table, now i' the middle; |
| On his shoulder, and his; her face o' fire |
| With labour and the thing she took to quench it, | 70 |
| She would to each one sip. You are retired, |
| As if you were a feasted one and not |
| The hostess of the meeting: pray you, bid |
| These unknown friends to's welcome; for it is |
| A way to make us better friends, more known. | 75 |
| Come, quench your blushes and present yourself |
| That which you are, mistress o' the feast: come on, |
| And bid us welcome to your sheep-shearing, |
| As your good flock shall prosper. |
| PERDITA | [To POLIXENES] Sir, welcome:
| 80 |
| It is my father's will I should take on me |
| The hostess-ship o' the day. |
[To CAMILLO] |
| You're welcome, sir. |
| Give me those flowers there, Dorcas. Reverend sirs, |
| For you there's rosemary and rue; these keep | 85 |
| Seeming and savour all the winter long: |
| Grace and remembrance be to you both, |
| And welcome to our shearing!
|
| POLIXENES | Shepherdess, |
| A fair one are you--well you fit our ages | 90 |
| With flowers of winter. |
| PERDITA | Sir, the year growing ancient, |
| Not yet on summer's death, nor on the birth |
| Of trembling winter, the fairest |
| flowers o' the season | 95 |
| Are our carnations and streak'd gillyvors, |
| Which some call nature's bastards: of that kind |
| Our rustic garden's barren; and I care not |
| To get slips of them. |
| POLIXENES | Wherefore, gentle maiden, | 100 |
| Do you neglect them? |
| PERDITA | For I have heard it said |
| There is an art which in their piedness shares |
| With great creating nature. |
| POLIXENES | Say there be; | 105 |
| Yet nature is made better by no mean |
| But nature makes that mean: so, over that art |
| Which you say adds to nature, is an art |
| That nature makes. You see, sweet maid, we marry |
| A gentler scion to the wildest stock, | 110 |
| And make conceive a bark of baser kind |
| By bud of nobler race: this is an art |
| Which does mend nature, change it rather, but |
| The art itself is nature. |
| PERDITA | So it is. | 115 |
| POLIXENES | Then make your garden rich in gillyvors, |
| And do not call them bastards. |
| PERDITA | I'll not put |
| The dibble in earth to set one slip of them; |
| No more than were I painted I would wish | 120 |
| This youth should say 'twere well and only therefore |
| Desire to breed by me. Here's flowers for you; |
| Hot lavender, mints, savoury, marjoram; |
| The marigold, that goes to bed wi' the sun |
| And with him rises weeping: these are flowers | 125 |
| Of middle summer, and I think they are given |
| To men of middle age. You're very welcome. |
| CAMILLO | I should leave grazing, were I of your flock, |
| And only live by gazing. |
| PERDITA | Out, alas! | 130 |
| You'd be so lean, that blasts of January |
| Would blow you through and through. |
| Now, my fair'st friend, |
| I would I had some flowers o' the spring that might |
| Become your time of day; and yours, and yours, | 135 |
| That wear upon your virgin branches yet |
| Your maidenheads growing: O Proserpina, |
| For the flowers now, that frighted thou let'st fall |
| From Dis's waggon! daffodils, |
| That come before the swallow dares, and take | 140 |
| The winds of March with beauty; violets dim, |
| But sweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes |
| Or Cytherea's breath; pale primroses |
| That die unmarried, ere they can behold |
| Bight Phoebus in his strength--a malady | 145 |
| Most incident to maids; bold oxlips and |
| The crown imperial; lilies of all kinds, |
| The flower-de-luce being one! O, these I lack, |
| To make you garlands of, and my sweet friend, |
| To strew him o'er and o'er! | 150 |
| FLORIZEL | What, like a corse? |
| PERDITA | No, like a bank for love to lie and play on; |
| Not like a corse; or if, not to be buried, |
| But quick and in mine arms. Come, take your flowers: |
| Methinks I play as I have seen them do | 155 |
| In Whitsun pastorals: sure this robe of mine |
| Does change my disposition. |
| FLORIZEL | What you do |
| Still betters what is done. When you speak, sweet. |
| I'ld have you do it ever: when you sing, | 160 |
| I'ld have you buy and sell so, so give alms, |
| Pray so; and, for the ordering your affairs, |
| To sing them too: when you do dance, I wish you |
| A wave o' the sea, that you might ever do |
| Nothing but that; move still, still so, | 165 |
| And own no other function: each your doing, |
| So singular in each particular, |
| Crowns what you are doing in the present deed, |
| That all your acts are queens. |
| PERDITA | O Doricles, | 170 |
| Your praises are too large: but that your youth, |
| And the true blood which peepeth fairly through't, |
| Do plainly give you out an unstain'd shepherd, |
| With wisdom I might fear, my Doricles, |
| You woo'd me the false way. | 175 |
| FLORIZEL | I think you have |
| As little skill to fear as I have purpose |
| To put you to't. But come; our dance, I pray: |
| Your hand, my Perdita: so turtles pair, |
| That never mean to part. | 180 |
| PERDITA | I'll swear for 'em. |
| POLIXENES | This is the prettiest low-born lass that ever |
| Ran on the green-sward: nothing she does or seems |
| But smacks of something greater than herself, |
| Too noble for this place. | 185 |
| CAMILLO | He tells her something |
| That makes her blood look out: good sooth, she is |
| The queen of curds and cream. |
| Clown | Come on, strike up! |
| DORCAS | Mopsa must be your mistress: marry, garlic, | 190 |
| To mend her kissing with! |
| MOPSA | Now, in good time! |
| Clown | Not a word, a word; we stand upon our manners. |
| Come, strike up! |
| [
Music. Here a dance of Shepherds and
Shepherdesses
] |
| POLIXENES | Pray, good shepherd, what fair swain is this | 195 |
| Which dances with your daughter? |
| Shepherd | They call him Doricles; and boasts himself |
| To have a worthy feeding: but I have it |
| Upon his own report and I believe it; |
| He looks like sooth. He says he loves my daughter: | 200 |
| I think so too; for never gazed the moon |
| Upon the water as he'll stand and read |
| As 'twere my daughter's eyes: and, to be plain. |
| I think there is not half a kiss to choose |
| Who loves another best. | 205 |
| POLIXENES | She dances featly. |
| Shepherd | So she does any thing; though I report it, |
| That should be silent: if young Doricles |
| Do light upon her, she shall bring him that |
| Which he not dreams of. | 210 |
| [Enter Servant] |
| Servant | O master, if you did but hear the pedlar at the |
| door, you would never dance again after a tabour and |
| pipe; no, the bagpipe could not move you: he sings |
| several tunes faster than you'll tell money; he |
| utters them as he had eaten ballads and all men's | 215 |
| ears grew to his tunes. |
| Clown | He could never come better; he shall come in. I |
| love a ballad but even too well, if it be doleful |
| matter merrily set down, or a very pleasant thing |
| indeed and sung lamentably. | 220 |
| Servant | He hath songs for man or woman, of all sizes; no |
| milliner can so fit his customers with gloves: he |
| has the prettiest love-songs for maids; so without |
| bawdry, which is strange; with such delicate |
| burthens of dildos and fadings, 'jump her and thump | 225 |
| her;' and where some stretch-mouthed rascal would, |
| as it were, mean mischief and break a foul gap into |
| the matter, he makes the maid to answer 'Whoop, do me |
| no harm, good man;' puts him off, slights him, with |
| 'Whoop, do me no harm, good man.' | 230 |
| POLIXENES | This is a brave fellow. |
| Clown | Believe me, thou talkest of an admirable conceited |
| fellow. Has he any unbraided wares? |
| Servant | He hath ribbons of an the colours i' the rainbow; |
| points more than all the lawyers in Bohemia can | 235 |
| learnedly handle, though they come to him by the |
| gross: inkles, caddisses, cambrics, lawns: why, he |
| sings 'em over as they were gods or goddesses; you |
| would think a smock were a she-angel, he so chants |
| to the sleeve-hand and the work about the square on't. | 240 |
| Clown | Prithee bring him in; and let him approach singing. |
| PERDITA | Forewarn him that he use no scurrilous words in 's tunes. |
| [Exit Servant] |
| Clown | You have of these pedlars, that have more in them |
| than you'ld think, sister. |
| PERDITA | Ay, good brother, or go about to think. | 245 |
| [Enter AUTOLYCUS, singing] |
| AUTOLYCUS | Lawn as white as driven snow; |
| Cyprus black as e'er was crow; |
| Gloves as sweet as damask roses; |
| Masks for faces and for noses; |
| Bugle bracelet, necklace amber, | 250 |
| Perfume for a lady's chamber; |
| Golden quoifs and stomachers, |
| For my lads to give their dears: |
| Pins and poking-sticks of steel, |
| What maids lack from head to heel: | 255 |
| Come buy of me, come; come buy, come buy; |
| Buy lads, or else your lasses cry: Come buy. |
| Clown | If I were not in love with Mopsa, thou shouldst take |
| no money of me; but being enthralled as I am, it |
| will also be the bondage of certain ribbons and gloves. | 260 |
| MOPSA | I was promised them against the feast; but they come |
| not too late now. |
| DORCAS | He hath promised you more than that, or there be liars. |
| MOPSA | He hath paid you all he promised you; may be, he has |
| paid you more, which will shame you to give him again. | 265 |
| Clown | Is there no manners left among maids? will they |
| wear their plackets where they should bear their |
| faces? Is there not milking-time, when you are |
| going to bed, or kiln-hole, to whistle off these |
| secrets, but you must be tittle-tattling before all | 270 |
| our guests? 'tis well they are whispering: clamour |
| your tongues, and not a word more. |
| MOPSA | I have done. Come, you promised me a tawdry-lace |
| and a pair of sweet gloves. |
| Clown | Have I not told thee how I was cozened by the way | 275 |
| and lost all my money? |
| AUTOLYCUS | And indeed, sir, there are cozeners abroad; |
| therefore it behoves men to be wary. |
| Clown | Fear not thou, man, thou shalt lose nothing here. |
| AUTOLYCUS | I hope so, sir; for I have about me many parcels of charge. | 280 |
| Clown | What hast here? ballads? |
| MOPSA | Pray now, buy some: I love a ballad in print o' |
| life, for then we are sure they are true. |
| AUTOLYCUS | Here's one to a very doleful tune, how a usurer's |
| wife was brought to bed of twenty money-bags at a | 285 |
| burthen and how she longed to eat adders' heads and |
| toads carbonadoed. |
| MOPSA | Is it true, think you? |
| AUTOLYCUS | Very true, and but a month old. |
| DORCAS | Bless me from marrying a usurer! | 290 |
| AUTOLYCUS | Here's the midwife's name to't, one Mistress |
| Tale-porter, and five or six honest wives that were |
| present. Why should I carry lies abroad? |
| MOPSA | Pray you now, buy it. |
| Clown | Come on, lay it by: and let's first see moe | 295 |
| ballads; we'll buy the other things anon. |
| AUTOLYCUS | Here's another ballad of a fish, that appeared upon |
| the coast on Wednesday the four-score of April, |
| forty thousand fathom above water, and sung this |
| ballad against the hard hearts of maids: it was | 300 |
| thought she was a woman and was turned into a cold |
| fish for she would not exchange flesh with one that |
| loved her: the ballad is very pitiful and as true. |
| DORCAS | Is it true too, think you? |
| AUTOLYCUS | Five justices' hands at it, and witnesses more than | 305 |
| my pack will hold. |
| Clown | Lay it by too: another. |
| AUTOLYCUS | This is a merry ballad, but a very pretty one. |
| MOPSA | Let's have some merry ones. |
| AUTOLYCUS | Why, this is a passing merry one and goes to | 310 |
| the tune of 'Two maids wooing a man:' there's |
| scarce a maid westward but she sings it; 'tis in |
| request, I can tell you. |
| MOPSA | We can both sing it: if thou'lt bear a part, thou |
| shalt hear; 'tis in three parts. | 315 |
| DORCAS | We had the tune on't a month ago. |
| AUTOLYCUS | I can bear my part; you must know 'tis my |
| occupation; have at it with you. |
| [SONG] |
| AUTOLYCUS | Get you hence, for I must go |
| Where it fits not you to know. | 320 |
| DORCAS | Whither? |
| MOPSA | O, whither? |
| DORCAS | Whither? |
| MOPSA | It becomes thy oath full well, |
| Thou to me thy secrets tell. | 325 |
| DORCAS | Me too, let me go thither. |
| MOPSA | Or thou goest to the orange or mill. |
| DORCAS | If to either, thou dost ill. |
| AUTOLYCUS | Neither. |
| DORCAS | What, neither? | 330 |
| AUTOLYCUS | Neither. |
| DORCAS | Thou hast sworn my love to be. |
| MOPSA | Thou hast sworn it more to me: |
| Then whither goest? say, whither? |
| Clown | We'll have this song out anon by ourselves: my | 335 |
| father and the gentlemen are in sad talk, and we'll |
| not trouble them. Come, bring away thy pack after |
| me. Wenches, I'll buy for you both. Pedlar, let's |
| have the first choice. Follow me, girls. |
| [Exit with DORCAS and MOPSA] |
| AUTOLYCUS | And you shall pay well for 'em. | 340 |
[Follows singing] |
| Will you buy any tape, |
| Or lace for your cape, |
| My dainty duck, my dear-a? |
| Any silk, any thread, |
| Any toys for your head, | 345 |
| Of the new'st and finest, finest wear-a? |
| Come to the pedlar; |
| Money's a medler. |
| That doth utter all men's ware-a. |
| [Exit] |
| [Re-enter Servant] |
| Servant | Master, there is three carters, three shepherds, | 350 |
| three neat-herds, three swine-herds, that have made |
| themselves all men of hair, they call themselves |
| Saltiers, and they have a dance which the wenches |
| say is a gallimaufry of gambols, because they are |
| not in't; but they themselves are o' the mind, if it | 355 |
| be not too rough for some that know little but |
| bowling, it will please plentifully. |
| Shepherd | Away! we'll none on 't: here has been too much |
| homely foolery already. I know, sir, we weary you. |
| POLIXENES | You weary those that refresh us: pray, let's see | 360 |
| these four threes of herdsmen. |
| Servant | One three of them, by their own report, sir, hath |
| danced before the king; and not the worst of the |
| three but jumps twelve foot and a half by the squier. |
| Shepherd | Leave your prating: since these good men are | 365 |
| pleased, let them come in; but quickly now. |
| Servant | Why, they stay at door, sir. |
| [Exit] |
| [Here a dance of twelve Satyrs] |
| POLIXENES | O, father, you'll know more of that hereafter. |
[To CAMILLO] |
| Is it not too far gone? 'Tis time to part them. |
| He's simple and tells much. | 370 |
[To FLORIZEL] |
| How now, fair shepherd! |
| Your heart is full of something that does take |
| Your mind from feasting. Sooth, when I was young |
| And handed love as you do, I was wont |
| To load my she with knacks: I would have ransack'd | 375 |
| The pedlar's silken treasury and have pour'd it |
| To her acceptance; you have let him go |
| And nothing marted with him. If your lass |
| Interpretation should abuse and call this |
| Your lack of love or bounty, you were straited | 380 |
| For a reply, at least if you make a care |
| Of happy holding her. |
| FLORIZEL | Old sir, I know |
| She prizes not such trifles as these are: |
| The gifts she looks from me are pack'd and lock'd | 385 |
| Up in my heart; which I have given already, |
| But not deliver'd. O, hear me breathe my life |
| Before this ancient sir, who, it should seem, |
| Hath sometime loved! I take thy hand, this hand, |
| As soft as dove's down and as white as it, | 390 |
| Or Ethiopian's tooth, or the fann'd |
| snow that's bolted |
| By the northern blasts twice o'er. |
| POLIXENES | What follows this? |
| How prettily the young swain seems to wash | 395 |
| The hand was fair before! I have put you out: |
| But to your protestation; let me hear |
| What you profess. |
| FLORIZEL | Do, and be witness to 't. |
| POLIXENES | And this my neighbour too? | 400 |
| FLORIZEL | And he, and more |
| Than he, and men, the earth, the heavens, and all: |
| That, were I crown'd the most imperial monarch, |
| Thereof most worthy, were I the fairest youth |
| That ever made eye swerve, had force and knowledge | 405 |
| More than was ever man's, I would not prize them |
| Without her love; for her employ them all; |
| Commend them and condemn them to her service |
| Or to their own perdition. |
| POLIXENES | Fairly offer'd. | 410 |
| CAMILLO | This shows a sound affection. |
| Shepherd | But, my daughter, |
| Say you the like to him? |
| PERDITA | I cannot speak |
| So well, nothing so well; no, nor mean better: | 415 |
| By the pattern of mine own thoughts I cut out |
| The purity of his. |
| Shepherd | Take hands, a bargain! |
| And, friends unknown, you shall bear witness to 't: |
| I give my daughter to him, and will make | 420 |
| Her portion equal his. |
| FLORIZEL | O, that must be |
| I' the virtue of your daughter: one being dead, |
| I shall have more than you can dream of yet; |
| Enough then for your wonder. But, come on, | 425 |
| Contract us 'fore these witnesses. |
| Shepherd | Come, your hand; |
| And, daughter, yours. |
| POLIXENES | Soft, swain, awhile, beseech you; |
| Have you a father? | 430 |
| FLORIZEL | I have: but what of him? |
| POLIXENES | Knows he of this? |
| FLORIZEL | He neither does nor shall. |
| POLIXENES | Methinks a father |
| Is at the nuptial of his son a guest | 435 |
| That best becomes the table. Pray you once more, |
| Is not your father grown incapable |
| Of reasonable affairs? is he not stupid |
| With age and altering rheums? can he speak? hear? |
| Know man from man? dispute his own estate? | 440 |
| Lies he not bed-rid? and again does nothing |
| But what he did being childish? |
| FLORIZEL | No, good sir; |
| He has his health and ampler strength indeed |
| Than most have of his age. | 445 |
| POLIXENES | By my white beard, |
| You offer him, if this be so, a wrong |
| Something unfilial: reason my son |
| Should choose himself a wife, but as good reason |
| The father, all whose joy is nothing else | 450 |
| But fair posterity, should hold some counsel |
| In such a business. |
| FLORIZEL | I yield all this; |
| But for some other reasons, my grave sir, |
| Which 'tis not fit you know, I not acquaint | 455 |
| My father of this business. |
| POLIXENES | Let him know't. |
| FLORIZEL | He shall not. |
| POLIXENES | Prithee, let him. |
| FLORIZEL | No, he must not. | 460 |
| Shepherd | Let him, my son: he shall not need to grieve |
| At knowing of thy choice. |
| FLORIZEL | Come, come, he must not. |
| Mark our contract. |
| POLIXENES | Mark your divorce, young sir, | 465 |
[Discovering himself] |
| Whom son I dare not call; thou art too base |
| To be acknowledged: thou a sceptre's heir, |
| That thus affect'st a sheep-hook! Thou old traitor, |
| I am sorry that by hanging thee I can |
| But shorten thy life one week. And thou, fresh piece | 470 |
| Of excellent witchcraft, who of force must know |
| The royal fool thou copest with,-- |
| Shepherd | O, my heart! |
| POLIXENES | I'll have thy beauty scratch'd with briers, and made |
| More homely than thy state. For thee, fond boy, | 475 |
| If I may ever know thou dost but sigh |
| That thou no more shalt see this knack, as never |
| I mean thou shalt, we'll bar thee from succession; |
| Not hold thee of our blood, no, not our kin, |
| Far than Deucalion off: mark thou my words: | 480 |
| Follow us to the court. Thou churl, for this time, |
| Though full of our displeasure, yet we free thee |
| From the dead blow of it. And you, enchantment.-- |
| Worthy enough a herdsman: yea, him too, |
| That makes himself, but for our honour therein, | 485 |
| Unworthy thee,--if ever henceforth thou |
| These rural latches to his entrance open, |
| Or hoop his body more with thy embraces, |
| I will devise a death as cruel for thee |
| As thou art tender to't. | 490 |
| [Exit] |
| PERDITA | Even here undone! |
| I was not much afeard; for once or twice |
| I was about to speak and tell him plainly, |
| The selfsame sun that shines upon his court |
| Hides not his visage from our cottage but | 495 |
| Looks on alike. Will't please you, sir, be gone? |
| I told you what would come of this: beseech you, |
| Of your own state take care: this dream of mine,-- |
| Being now awake, I'll queen it no inch farther, |
| But milk my ewes and weep. | 500 |
| CAMILLO | Why, how now, father! |
| Speak ere thou diest. |
| Shepherd | I cannot speak, nor think |
| Nor dare to know that which I know. O sir! |
| You have undone a man of fourscore three, | 505 |
| That thought to fill his grave in quiet, yea, |
| To die upon the bed my father died, |
| To lie close by his honest bones: but now |
| Some hangman must put on my shroud and lay me |
| Where no priest shovels in dust. O cursed wretch, | 510 |
| That knew'st this was the prince, |
| and wouldst adventure |
| To mingle faith with him! Undone! undone! |
| If I might die within this hour, I have lived |
| To die when I desire. | 515 |
| [Exit] |
| FLORIZEL | Why look you so upon me? |
| I am but sorry, not afeard; delay'd, |
| But nothing alter'd: what I was, I am; |
| More straining on for plucking back, not following |
| My leash unwillingly. | 520 |
| CAMILLO | Gracious my lord, |
| You know your father's temper: at this time |
| He will allow no speech, which I do guess |
| You do not purpose to him; and as hardly |
| Will he endure your sight as yet, I fear: | 525 |
| Then, till the fury of his highness settle, |
| Come not before him. |
| FLORIZEL | I not purpose it. |
| I think, Camillo? |
| CAMILLO | Even he, my lord. | 530 |
| PERDITA | How often have I told you 'twould be thus! |
| How often said, my dignity would last |
| But till 'twere known! |
| FLORIZEL | It cannot fail but by |
| The violation of my faith; and then | 535 |
| Let nature crush the sides o' the earth together |
| And mar the seeds within! Lift up thy looks: |
| From my succession wipe me, father; I |
| Am heir to my affection. |
| CAMILLO | Be advised. | 540 |
| FLORIZEL | I am, and by my fancy: if my reason |
| Will thereto be obedient, I have reason; |
| If not, my senses, better pleased with madness, |
| Do bid it welcome. |
| CAMILLO | This is desperate, sir. | 545 |
| FLORIZEL | So call it: but it does fulfil my vow; |
| I needs must think it honesty. Camillo, |
| Not for Bohemia, nor the pomp that may |
| Be thereat glean'd, for all the sun sees or |
| The close earth wombs or the profound sea hides | 550 |
| In unknown fathoms, will I break my oath |
| To this my fair beloved: therefore, I pray you, |
| As you have ever been my father's honour'd friend, |
| When he shall miss me,--as, in faith, I mean not |
| To see him any more,--cast your good counsels | 555 |
| Upon his passion; let myself and fortune |
| Tug for the time to come. This you may know |
| And so deliver, I am put to sea |
| With her whom here I cannot hold on shore; |
| And most opportune to our need I have | 560 |
| A vessel rides fast by, but not prepared |
| For this design. What course I mean to hold |
| Shall nothing benefit your knowledge, nor |
| Concern me the reporting. |
| CAMILLO | O my lord! | 565 |
| I would your spirit were easier for advice, |
| Or stronger for your need. |
| FLORIZEL | Hark, Perdita |
[Drawing her aside] |
| I'll hear you by and by. |
| CAMILLO | He's irremoveable, | 570 |
| Resolved for flight. Now were I happy, if |
| His going I could frame to serve my turn, |
| Save him from danger, do him love and honour, |
| Purchase the sight again of dear Sicilia |
| And that unhappy king, my master, whom | 575 |
| I so much thirst to see. |
| FLORIZEL | Now, good Camillo; |
| I am so fraught with curious business that |
| I leave out ceremony. |
| CAMILLO | Sir, I think | 580 |
| You have heard of my poor services, i' the love |
| That I have borne your father? |
| FLORIZEL | Very nobly |
| Have you deserved: it is my father's music |
| To speak your deeds, not little of his care | 585 |
| To have them recompensed as thought on. |
| CAMILLO | Well, my lord, |
| If you may please to think I love the king |
| And through him what is nearest to him, which is |
| Your gracious self, embrace but my direction: | 590 |
| If your more ponderous and settled project |
| May suffer alteration, on mine honour, |
| I'll point you where you shall have such receiving |
| As shall become your highness; where you may |
| Enjoy your mistress, from the whom, I see, | 595 |
| There's no disjunction to be made, but by-- |
| As heavens forefend!--your ruin; marry her, |
| And, with my best endeavours in your absence, |
| Your discontenting father strive to qualify |
| And bring him up to liking. | 600 |
| FLORIZEL | How, Camillo, |
| May this, almost a miracle, be done? |
| That I may call thee something more than man |
| And after that trust to thee. |
| CAMILLO | Have you thought on | 605 |
| A place whereto you'll go? |
| FLORIZEL | Not any yet: |
| But as the unthought-on accident is guilty |
| To what we wildly do, so we profess |
| Ourselves to be the slaves of chance and flies | 610 |
| Of every wind that blows. |
| CAMILLO | Then list to me: |
| This follows, if you will not change your purpose |
| But undergo this flight, make for Sicilia, |
| And there present yourself and your fair princess, | 615 |
| For so I see she must be, 'fore Leontes: |
| She shall be habited as it becomes |
| The partner of your bed. Methinks I see |
| Leontes opening his free arms and weeping |
| His welcomes forth; asks thee the son forgiveness, | 620 |
| As 'twere i' the father's person; kisses the hands |
| Of your fresh princess; o'er and o'er divides him |
| 'Twixt his unkindness and his kindness; the one |
| He chides to hell and bids the other grow |
| Faster than thought or time. | 625 |
| FLORIZEL | Worthy Camillo, |
| What colour for my visitation shall I |
| Hold up before him? |
| CAMILLO | Sent by the king your father |
| To greet him and to give him comforts. Sir, | 630 |
| The manner of your bearing towards him, with |
| What you as from your father shall deliver, |
| Things known betwixt us three, I'll write you down: |
| The which shall point you forth at every sitting |
| What you must say; that he shall not perceive | 635 |
| But that you have your father's bosom there |
| And speak his very heart. |
| FLORIZEL | I am bound to you: |
| There is some sap in this. |
| CAMILLO | A cause more promising | 640 |
| Than a wild dedication of yourselves |
| To unpath'd waters, undream'd shores, most certain |
| To miseries enough; no hope to help you, |
| But as you shake off one to take another; |
| Nothing so certain as your anchors, who | 645 |
| Do their best office, if they can but stay you |
| Where you'll be loath to be: besides you know |
| Prosperity's the very bond of love, |
| Whose fresh complexion and whose heart together |
| Affliction alters. | 650 |
| PERDITA | One of these is true: |
| I think affliction may subdue the cheek, |
| But not take in the mind. |
| CAMILLO | Yea, say you so? |
| There shall not at your father's house these | 655 |
| seven years |
| Be born another such. |
| FLORIZEL | My good Camillo, |
| She is as forward of her breeding as |
| She is i' the rear our birth. | 660 |
| CAMILLO | I cannot say 'tis pity |
| She lacks instructions, for she seems a mistress |
| To most that teach. |
| PERDITA | Your pardon, sir; for this |
| I'll blush you thanks. | 665 |
| FLORIZEL | My prettiest Perdita! |
| But O, the thorns we stand upon! Camillo, |
| Preserver of my father, now of me, |
| The medicine of our house, how shall we do? |
| We are not furnish'd like Bohemia's son, | 670 |
| Nor shall appear in Sicilia. |
| CAMILLO | My lord, |
| Fear none of this: I think you know my fortunes |
| Do all lie there: it shall be so my care |
| To have you royally appointed as if | 675 |
| The scene you play were mine. For instance, sir, |
| That you may know you shall not want, one word. |
| [They talk aside] |
| [Re-enter AUTOLYCUS] |
| AUTOLYCUS | Ha, ha! what a fool Honesty is! and Trust, his |
| sworn brother, a very simple gentleman! I have sold |
| all my trumpery; not a counterfeit stone, not a | 680 |
| ribbon, glass, pomander, brooch, table-book, ballad, |
| knife, tape, glove, shoe-tie, bracelet, horn-ring, |
| to keep my pack from fasting: they throng who |
| should buy first, as if my trinkets had been |
| hallowed and brought a benediction to the buyer: | 685 |
| by which means I saw whose purse was best in |
| picture; and what I saw, to my good use I |
| remembered. My clown, who wants but something to |
| be a reasonable man, grew so in love with the |
| wenches' song, that he would not stir his pettitoes | 690 |
| till he had both tune and words; which so drew the |
| rest of the herd to me that all their other senses |
| stuck in ears: you might have pinched a placket, it |
| was senseless; 'twas nothing to geld a codpiece of a |
| purse; I could have filed keys off that hung in | 695 |
| chains: no hearing, no feeling, but my sir's song, |
| and admiring the nothing of it. So that in this |
| time of lethargy I picked and cut most of their |
| festival purses; and had not the old man come in |
| with a whoo-bub against his daughter and the king's | 700 |
| son and scared my choughs from the chaff, I had not |
| left a purse alive in the whole army. |
| [CAMILLO, FLORIZEL, and PERDITA come forward] |
| CAMILLO | Nay, but my letters, by this means being there |
| So soon as you arrive, shall clear that doubt. |
| FLORIZEL | And those that you'll procure from King Leontes-- | 705 |
| CAMILLO | Shall satisfy your father. |
| PERDITA | Happy be you! |
| All that you speak shows fair. |
| CAMILLO | Who have we here? |
[Seeing AUTOLYCUS] |
| We'll make an instrument of this, omit | 710 |
| Nothing may give us aid. |
| AUTOLYCUS | If they have overheard me now, why, hanging. |
| CAMILLO | How now, good fellow! why shakest thou so? Fear |
| not, man; here's no harm intended to thee. |
| AUTOLYCUS | I am a poor fellow, sir. | 715 |
| CAMILLO | Why, be so still; here's nobody will steal that from |
| thee: yet for the outside of thy poverty we must |
| make an exchange; therefore discase thee instantly, |
| --thou must think there's a necessity in't,--and |
| change garments with this gentleman: though the | 720 |
| pennyworth on his side be the worst, yet hold thee, |
| there's some boot. |
| AUTOLYCUS | I am a poor fellow, sir. |
[Aside] |
| I know ye well enough. |
| CAMILLO | Nay, prithee, dispatch: the gentleman is half | 725 |
| flayed already. |
| AUTOLYCUS | Are you in earnest, sir? |
[Aside] |
| I smell the trick on't. |
| FLORIZEL | Dispatch, I prithee. |
| AUTOLYCUS | Indeed, I have had earnest: but I cannot with | 730 |
| conscience take it. |
| CAMILLO | Unbuckle, unbuckle. |
[FLORIZEL and AUTOLYCUS exchange garments] |
| Fortunate mistress,--let my prophecy |
| Come home to ye!--you must retire yourself |
| Into some covert: take your sweetheart's hat | 735 |
| And pluck it o'er your brows, muffle your face, |
| Dismantle you, and, as you can, disliken |
| The truth of your own seeming; that you may-- |
| For I do fear eyes over--to shipboard |
| Get undescried. | 740 |
| PERDITA | I see the play so lies |
| That I must bear a part. |
| CAMILLO | No remedy. |
| Have you done there? |
| FLORIZEL | Should I now meet my father, | 745 |
| He would not call me son. |
| CAMILLO | Nay, you shall have no hat. |
[Giving it to PERDITA] |
| Come, lady, come. Farewell, my friend. |
| AUTOLYCUS | Adieu, sir. |
| FLORIZEL | O Perdita, what have we twain forgot! | 750 |
| Pray you, a word. |
| CAMILLO | [Aside] What I do next, shall be to tell the king
|
| Of this escape and whither they are bound; |
| Wherein my hope is I shall so prevail |
| To force him after: in whose company | 755 |
| I shall review Sicilia, for whose sight |
| I have a woman's longing. |
| FLORIZEL | Fortune speed us! |
| Thus we set on, Camillo, to the sea-side. |
| CAMILLO | The swifter speed the better. | 760 |
| [Exeunt FLORIZEL, PERDITA, and CAMILLO] |
| AUTOLYCUS | I understand the business, I hear it: to have an |
| open ear, a quick eye, and a nimble hand, is |
| necessary for a cut-purse; a good nose is requisite |
| also, to smell out work for the other senses. I see |
| this is the time that the unjust man doth thrive. | 765 |
| What an exchange had this been without boot! What |
| a boot is here with this exchange! Sure the gods do |
| this year connive at us, and we may do any thing |
| extempore. The prince himself is about a piece of |
| iniquity, stealing away from his father with his | 770 |
| clog at his heels: if I thought it were a piece of |
| honesty to acquaint the king withal, I would not |
| do't: I hold it the more knavery to conceal it; |
| and therein am I constant to my profession. |
[Re-enter Clown and Shepherd] |
| Aside, aside; here is more matter for a hot brain: | 775 |
| every lane's end, every shop, church, session, |
| hanging, yields a careful man work. |
| Clown | See, see; what a man you are now! |
| There is no other way but to tell the king |
| she's a changeling and none of your flesh and blood. | 780 |
| Shepherd | Nay, but hear me. |
| Clown | Nay, but hear me. |
| Shepherd | Go to, then. |
| Clown | She being none of your flesh and blood, your flesh |
| and blood has not offended the king; and so your | 785 |
| flesh and blood is not to be punished by him. Show |
| those things you found about her, those secret |
| things, all but what she has with her: this being |
| done, let the law go whistle: I warrant you. |
| Shepherd | I will tell the king all, every word, yea, and his | 790 |
| son's pranks too; who, I may say, is no honest man, |
| neither to his father nor to me, to go about to make |
| me the king's brother-in-law. |
| Clown | Indeed, brother-in-law was the farthest off you |
| could have been to him and then your blood had been | 795 |
| the dearer by I know how much an ounce. |
| AUTOLYCUS | [Aside] Very wisely, puppies!
|
| Shepherd | Well, let us to the king: there is that in this |
| fardel will make him scratch his beard. |
| AUTOLYCUS | [Aside] I know not what impediment this complaint
| 800 |
| may be to the flight of my master. |
| Clown | Pray heartily he be at palace. |
| AUTOLYCUS | [Aside] Though I am not naturally honest, I am so
|
| sometimes by chance: let me pocket up my pedlar's excrement. |
[Takes off his false beard] |
| How now, rustics! whither are you bound? | 805 |
| Shepherd | To the palace, an it like your worship. |
| AUTOLYCUS | Your affairs there, what, with whom, the condition |
| of that fardel, the place of your dwelling, your |
| names, your ages, of what having, breeding, and any |
| thing that is fitting to be known, discover. | 810 |
| Clown | We are but plain fellows, sir. |
| AUTOLYCUS | A lie; you are rough and hairy. Let me have no |
| lying: it becomes none but tradesmen, and they |
| often give us soldiers the lie: but we pay them for |
| it with stamped coin, not stabbing steel; therefore | 815 |
| they do not give us the lie. |
| Clown | Your worship had like to have given us one, if you |
| had not taken yourself with the manner. |
| Shepherd | Are you a courtier, an't like you, sir? |
| AUTOLYCUS | Whether it like me or no, I am a courtier. Seest | 820 |
| thou not the air of the court in these enfoldings? |
| hath not my gait in it the measure of the court? |
| receives not thy nose court-odor from me? reflect I |
| not on thy baseness court-contempt? Thinkest thou, |
| for that I insinuate, or toaze from thee thy | 825 |
| business, I am therefore no courtier? I am courtier |
| cap-a-pe; and one that will either push on or pluck |
| back thy business there: whereupon I command thee to |
| open thy affair. |
| Shepherd | My business, sir, is to the king. | 830 |
| AUTOLYCUS | What advocate hast thou to him? |
| Shepherd | I know not, an't like you. |
| Clown | Advocate's the court-word for a pheasant: say you |
| have none. |
| Shepherd | None, sir; I have no pheasant, cock nor hen. | 835 |
| AUTOLYCUS | How blessed are we that are not simple men! |
| Yet nature might have made me as these are, |
| Therefore I will not disdain. |
| Clown | This cannot be but a great courtier. |
| Shepherd | His garments are rich, but he wears | 840 |
| them not handsomely. |
| Clown | He seems to be the more noble in being fantastical: |
| a great man, I'll warrant; I know by the picking |
| on's teeth. |
| AUTOLYCUS | The fardel there? what's i' the fardel? | 845 |
| Wherefore that box? |
| Shepherd | Sir, there lies such secrets in this fardel and box, |
| which none must know but the king; and which he |
| shall know within this hour, if I may come to the |
| speech of him. | 850 |
| AUTOLYCUS | Age, thou hast lost thy labour. |
| Shepherd | Why, sir? |
| AUTOLYCUS | The king is not at the palace; he is gone aboard a |
| new ship to purge melancholy and air himself: for, |
| if thou beest capable of things serious, thou must | 855 |
| know the king is full of grief. |
| Shepard | So 'tis said, sir; about his son, that should have |
| married a shepherd's daughter. |
| AUTOLYCUS | If that shepherd be not in hand-fast, let him fly: |
| the curses he shall have, the tortures he shall | 860 |
| feel, will break the back of man, the heart of monster. |
| Clown | Think you so, sir? |
| AUTOLYCUS | Not he alone shall suffer what wit can make heavy |
| and vengeance bitter; but those that are germane to |
| him, though removed fifty times, shall all come | 865 |
| under the hangman: which though it be great pity, |
| yet it is necessary. An old sheep-whistling rogue a |
| ram-tender, to offer to have his daughter come into |
| grace! Some say he shall be stoned; but that death |
| is too soft for him, say I draw our throne into a | 870 |
| sheep-cote! all deaths are too few, the sharpest too easy. |
| Clown | Has the old man e'er a son, sir, do you hear. an't |
| like you, sir? |
| AUTOLYCUS | He has a son, who shall be flayed alive; then |
| 'nointed over with honey, set on the head of a | 875 |
| wasp's nest; then stand till he be three quarters |
| and a dram dead; then recovered again with |
| aqua-vitae or some other hot infusion; then, raw as |
| he is, and in the hottest day prognostication |
| proclaims, shall be be set against a brick-wall, the | 880 |
| sun looking with a southward eye upon him, where he |
| is to behold him with flies blown to death. But 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 | 885 |
| 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 | 890 |
| shall do it. |
| Clown | He seems to be of great authority: close with him, |
| give him gold; and though authority be 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, | 895 |
| and no more ado. Remember 'stoned,' and 'flayed alive.' |
| Shepherd | 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. |
| AUTOLYCUS | After I have done what I promised? | 900 |
| Shepherd | Ay, sir. |
| AUTOLYCUS | Well, give me the moiety. Are you a party in this business? |
| Clown | In some sort, sir: but though my case be a pitiful |
| one, I hope I shall not be flayed out of it. |
| AUTOLYCUS | O, that's the case of the shepherd's son: hang him, | 905 |
| he'll be made an example. |
| Clown | Comfort, good comfort! We must to the king and show |
| our strange sights: he must know 'tis 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 | 910 |
| business is performed, and remain, as he says, your |
| pawn till it be brought you. |
| AUTOLYCUS | 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. | 915 |
| Clown | We are blest in this man, as I may say, even blest. |
| Shepherd | Let's before as he bids us: he was provided to do us good. |
| [Exeunt Shepherd and Clown] |
| AUTOLYCUS | 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 | 920 |
| 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 | 925 |
| 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 will I present |
| them: there may be matter in it. |
| [Exit] |
The Winter's Tale: Plot Summary