Dramatis Personae
LEONTES king of Sicilia.
MAMILLIUS young prince of Sicilia.
CAMILLO, ANTIGONUS, CLEOMENES, DION } Four Lords of Sicilia.
POLIXENES King of Bohemia.
FLORIZEL Prince of Bohemia.
ARCHIDAMUS a Lord of Bohemia.
Old Shepherd reputed father of Perdita.
Clown his son.
AUTOLYCUS a rogue.
A Mariner.
A Gaoler.
HERMIONE queen to Leontes.
PERDITA daughter to Leontes and Hermione.
PAULINA wife to Antigonus.
EMILIA a lady attending on Hermione,
MOPSA, DORCAS } Shepherdesses.
Other Lords and Gentlemen, Ladies, Officers, and Servants, Shepherds, and Shepherdesses.
Time as Chorus.
Scene: Sicilia, and Bohemia.
Act 1
Scene 1
Antechamber in LEONTES’ palace.
Enter CAMILLO and ARCHIDAMUS
ARCHIDAMUS If you shall chance, Camillo, to visit Bohemia, on
the like occasion whereon my services are now on
foot, you shall see, as I have said, great
difference betwixt our Bohemia and your Sicilia.
CAMILLO I think, this coming summer, the King of Sicilia
means to pay Bohemia the visitation which he justly owes him.
ARCHIDAMUS Wherein our entertainment shall shame us we will be
justified in our loves; for indeed–
CAMILLO Beseech you,–
ARCHIDAMUS Verily, I speak it in the freedom of my knowledge:
we cannot with such magnificence–in so rare–I know
not what to say. We will give you sleepy drinks,
that your senses, unintelligent of our insufficience,
may, though they cannot praise us, as little accuse
us.
CAMILLO You pay a great deal too dear for what’s given freely.
ARCHIDAMUS Believe me, I speak as my understanding instructs me
and as mine honesty puts it to utterance.
CAMILLO Sicilia cannot show himself over-kind to Bohemia.
They were trained together in their childhoods; and
there rooted betwixt them then such an affection,
which cannot choose but branch now. Since their
more mature dignities and royal necessities made
separation of their society, their encounters,
though not personal, have been royally attorneyed
with interchange of gifts, letters, loving
embassies; that they have seemed to be together,
though absent, shook hands, as over a vast, and
embraced, as it were, from the ends of opposed
winds. The heavens continue their loves!
ARCHIDAMUS I think there is not in the world either malice or
matter to alter it. You have an unspeakable
comfort of your young prince Mamillius: it is a
gentleman of the greatest promise that ever came
into my note.
CAMILLO I very well agree with you in the hopes of him: it
is a gallant child; one that indeed physics the
subject, makes old hearts fresh: they that went on
crutches ere he was born desire yet their life to
see him a man.
ARCHIDAMUS Would they else be content to die?
CAMILLO Yes; if there were no other excuse why they should
desire to live.
ARCHIDAMUS If the king had no son, they would desire to live
on crutches till he had one.
Exeunt
Scene 2
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,
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;
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
‘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.
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.
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
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.
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,
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,
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
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?
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,
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
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;
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:
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.
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
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
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
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
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.
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.
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
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:
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
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.
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.
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;
But to be paddling palms and pinching fingers,
As now they are, and making practised smiles,