Complete Plays, The Read online

  Re-enter Clown and Shepherd

  Aside, aside; here is more matter for a hot brain: 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.

  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 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 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 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 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?

  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.

  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 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 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 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.

  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.

  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 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?

  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.

  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 know the king is full of grief.

  Shepherd

  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 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 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 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 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 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 men, what you have to the king: being something gently considered, I’ll bring you where he is aboard, tender your persons to his presence, whisper him in your behalfs; and if it be in man besides the king to effect your suits, here is man shall do it.

  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, 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?

  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, 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 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.

  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 co
urted now with a double occasion, gold and a means to do the prince my master good; which who knows how that may turn back to my advancement? I will bring these two moles, these blind ones, aboard him: if he think it fit to shore them again and that the complaint they have to the king concerns him nothing, let him call me rogue for being so far officious; for I am proof against that title and what shame else belongs to’t. To him will I present them: there may be matter in it.

  Exit

  ACT V

  SCENE I. A ROOM IN LEONTES’ PALACE.

  Enter Leontes, Cleomenes, Dion, Paulina, and Servants

  Cleomenes

  Sir, you have done enough, and have perform’d

  A saint-like sorrow: no fault could you make,

  Which you have not redeem’d; indeed, paid down

  More penitence than done trespass: at the last,

  Do as the heavens have done, forget your evil;

  With them forgive yourself.

  Leontes

  Whilst I remember

  Her and her virtues, I cannot forget

  My blemishes in them, and so still think of

  The wrong I did myself; which was so much,

  That heirless it hath made my kingdom and

  Destroy’d the sweet’st companion that e’er man

  Bred his hopes out of.

  Paulina

  True, too true, my lord:

  If, one by one, you wedded all the world,

  Or from the all that are took something good,

  To make a perfect woman, she you kill’d

  Would be unparallel’d.

  Leontes

  I think so. Kill’d!

  She I kill’d! I did so: but thou strikest me

  Sorely, to say I did; it is as bitter

  Upon thy tongue as in my thought: now, good now,

  Say so but seldom.

  Cleomenes

  Not at all, good lady:

  You might have spoken a thousand things that would

  Have done the time more benefit and graced

  Your kindness better.

  Paulina

  You are one of those

  Would have him wed again.

  Dion

  If you would not so,

  You pity not the state, nor the remembrance

  Of his most sovereign name; consider little

  What dangers, by his highness’ fail of issue,

  May drop upon his kingdom and devour

  Incertain lookers on. What were more holy

  Than to rejoice the former queen is well?

  What holier than, for royalty’s repair,

  For present comfort and for future good,

  To bless the bed of majesty again

  With a sweet fellow to’t?

  Paulina

  There is none worthy,

  Respecting her that’s gone. Besides, the gods

  Will have fulfill’d their secret purposes;

  For has not the divine Apollo said,

  Is’t not the tenor of his oracle,

  That King Leontes shall not have an heir

  Till his lost child be found? which that it shall,

  Is all as monstrous to our human reason

  As my Antigonus to break his grave

  And come again to me; who, on my life,

  Did perish with the infant. ’Tis your counsel

  My lord should to the heavens be contrary,

  Oppose against their wills.

  To Leontes

  Care not for issue;

  The crown will find an heir: great Alexander

  Left his to the worthiest; so his successor

  Was like to be the best.

  Leontes

  Good Paulina,

  Who hast the memory of Hermione,

  I know, in honour, O, that ever I

  Had squared me to thy counsel! then, even now,

  I might have look’d upon my queen’s full eyes,

  Have taken treasure from her lips —

  Paulina

  And left them

  More rich for what they yielded.

  Leontes

  Thou speak’st truth.

  No more such wives; therefore, no wife: one worse,

  And better used, would make her sainted spirit

  Again possess her corpse, and on this stage,

  Where we’re offenders now, appear soul-vex’d,

  And begin, ‘Why to me?’

  Paulina

  Had she such power,

  She had just cause.

  Leontes

  She had; and would incense me

  To murder her I married.

  Paulina

  I should so.

  Were I the ghost that walk’d, I’ld bid you mark

  Her eye, and tell me for what dull part in’t

  You chose her; then I’ld shriek, that even your ears

  Should rift to hear me; and the words that follow’d

  Should be ‘Remember mine.’

  Leontes

  Stars, stars,

  And all eyes else dead coals! Fear thou no wife;

  I’ll have no wife, Paulina.

  Paulina

  Will you swear

  Never to marry but by my free leave?

  Leontes

  Never, Paulina; so be blest my spirit!

  Paulina

  Then, good my lords, bear witness to his oath.

  Cleomenes

  You tempt him over-much.

  Paulina

  Unless another,

  As like Hermione as is her picture,

  Affront his eye.

  Cleomenes

  Good madam,—

  Paulina

  I have done.

  Yet, if my lord will marry,— if you will, sir,

  No remedy, but you will,— give me the office

  To choose you a queen: she shall not be so young

  As was your former; but she shall be such

  As, walk’d your first queen’s ghost, it should take joy

  To see her in your arms.

  Leontes

  My true Paulina,

  We shall not marry till thou bid’st us.

  Paulina

  That

  Shall be when your first queen’s again in breath;

  Never till then.

  Enter a Gentleman

  Gentleman

  One that gives out himself Prince Florizel,

  Son of Polixenes, with his princess, she

  The fairest I have yet beheld, desires access

  To your high presence.

  Leontes

  What with him? he comes not

  Like to his father’s greatness: his approach,

  So out of circumstance and sudden, tells us

  ’Tis not a visitation framed, but forced

  By need and accident. What train?

  Gentleman

  But few,

  And those but mean.

  Leontes

  His princess, say you, with him?

  Gentleman

  Ay, the most peerless piece of earth, I think,

  That e’er the sun shone bright on.

  Paulina

  O Hermione,

  As every present time doth boast itself

  Above a better gone, so must thy grave

  Give way to what’s seen now! Sir, you yourself

  Have said and writ so, but your writing now

  Is colder than that theme, ‘she had not been,

  Nor was not to be equall’d;’— thus your verse

  Flow’d with her beauty once: ’tis shrewdly ebb’d,

  To say you have seen a better.

  Gentleman

  Pardon, madam:

  The one I have almost forgot,— your pardon,—

  The other, when she has obtain’d your eye,

  Will have your tongue too. This is a creature,

  Would she begin a sect, might quench the zeal

  Of all professors else, make proselytes

&nbs
p; Of who she but bid follow.

  Paulina

  How! not women?

  Gentleman

  Women will love her, that she is a woman

  More worth than any man; men, that she is

  The rarest of all women.

  Leontes

  Go, Cleomenes;

  Yourself, assisted with your honour’d friends,

  Bring them to our embracement. Still, ’tis strange

  Exeunt Cleomenes and others

  He thus should steal upon us.

  Paulina

  Had our prince,

  Jewel of children, seen this hour, he had pair’d

  Well with this lord: there was not full a month

  Between their births.

  Leontes

  Prithee, no more; cease; thou know’st

  He dies to me again when talk’d of: sure,

  When I shall see this gentleman, thy speeches

  Will bring me to consider that which may

  Unfurnish me of reason. They are come.

  Re-enter Cleomenes and others, with Florizel and Perdita

  Your mother was most true to wedlock, prince;

  For she did print your royal father off,

  Conceiving you: were I but twenty-one,

  Your father’s image is so hit in you,

  His very air, that I should call you brother,

  As I did him, and speak of something wildly

  By us perform’d before. Most dearly welcome!

  And your fair princess,— goddess!— O, alas!

  I lost a couple, that ’twixt heaven and earth

  Might thus have stood begetting wonder as

  You, gracious couple, do: and then I lost —

  All mine own folly — the society,

  Amity too, of your brave father, whom,

  Though bearing misery, I desire my life

  Once more to look on him.

  Florizel

  By his command

  Have I here touch’d Sicilia and from him

  Give you all greetings that a king, at friend,

  Can send his brother: and, but infirmity

  Which waits upon worn times hath something seized

  His wish’d ability, he had himself

  The lands and waters ’twixt your throne and his

  Measured to look upon you; whom he loves —

  He bade me say so — more than all the sceptres

  And those that bear them living.

  Leontes

  O my brother,

  Good gentleman! the wrongs I have done thee stir

  Afresh within me, and these thy offices,

  So rarely kind, are as interpreters

  Of my behind-hand slackness. Welcome hither,

  As is the spring to the earth. And hath he too

  Exposed this paragon to the fearful usage,