Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

William Shakespeare (1564–1616). The Oxford Shakespeare. 1914.

The Winter’s Tale

Pol.Nine changes of the watery star have been

The shepherd’s note since we have left our throne

Without a burden: time as long again

Would be fill’d 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.

Leon.Stay your thanks awhile,

And pay them when you part.

Pol.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.

Leon.We are tougher, brother,

Than you can put us to ’t.

Pol.No longer stay.

Leon.One seven-night longer.

Pol.Very sooth, to-morrow.

Leon.We’ll part the time between’s then; and in that

I’ll no gainsaying.

Pol.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.

Leon.Tongue-tied, our queen? speak you.

Her.I had thought, sir, to have held my peace until

You had 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.

Leon.Well said, Hermione.

Her.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.

[To POLIXENES.]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?

Pol.No, madam.

Her.Nay, but you will?

Pol.I may not, verily.

Her.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.

Pol.Your guest, then, madam:

To be your prisoner should import offending;

Which is for me less easy to commit

Than you to punish.

Her.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.

Pol.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.

Her.Was not my lord the verier wag o’ the two?

Pol.We were as twinn’d lambs that did frisk i’ the sun,

And bleat the one at the other: what we chang’d

Was innocence for innocence; we knew not

The doctrine of ill-doing, no nor dream’d

That any did. Had we pursu’d 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.

Her.By this we gather

You have tripp’d since.

Pol.O! my most sacred lady,

Temptations have since then been born to’s; for

In those unfledg’d days was my wife a girl;

Your precious self had then not cross’d the eyes

Of my young playfellow.

Her.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.

Leon.Is he won yet?

Her.He’ll stay, my lord.

Leon.At my request he would not.

Hermione, my dearest, thou never spok’st

To better purpose.

Her.Never?

Leon.Never, but once.

Her.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 heat 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.

Leon.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.’

Her.’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.[Giving her hand to POLIXENES.

Leon.[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 practis’d 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,

Art thou my boy?

Mam.Ay, my good lord.

Leon.I’ fecks?

Why, that’s my bawcock. What! hast smutch’d thy nose?

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!

Art thou my calf?

Mam.Yes, if you will, my lord.

Leon.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,

That will say anything: but were they false

As o’er-dy’d 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,

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,

Communicat’st with dreams;—how can this be?—

With what’s unreal thou co-active 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

And hardening of my brows.

Pol.What means Sicilia?

Her.He something seems unsettled.

Pol.How, my lord!

What cheer? how is ’t with you, best brother?

Her.You look

As if you held a brow of much distraction:

Are you mov’d, my lord?

Leon.No, in good earnest.

How sometimes nature will betray its folly,

Its tenderness, and make itself a pastime

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,

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?

Mam.No, my lord, I’ll fight.

Leon.You will? why, happy man be his dole! My brother,

Are you so fond of your young prince as we

Do seem to be of ours?

Pol.If at home, sir,

He’s all my exercise, my mirth, my matter,

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.

Leon.So stands this squire

Offic’d with me. We two will walk, my lord,

And leave you to your graver steps. Hermione,

How thou lov’st us, show in our brother’s welcome:

Let what is dear in Sicily be cheap:

Next to thyself and my young rover, he’s

Apparent to my heart.

Her.If you would seek us,

We are yours i’ the garden: shall’s attend you there?

Leon.To your own bents dispose you: you’ll be found,

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!

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!

Go play, boy, play; thy mother plays, and I

Play too, but so disgrac’d a part, whose issue

Will hiss me to my grave: contempt and clamour

Will be my knell. Go play, boy, play. There have been,

Or I am much deceiv’d, 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 sluic’d in ’s absence,

And his pond fish’d by his next neighbour, by

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;

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

With bag and baggage. Many a thousand on ’s

Have the disease, and feel ’t not. How now, boy!

Mam.I am like you, they say.

Leon.Why, that’s some comfort.

What! Camillo there?

Cam.Ay, my good lord.

Leon.Go play, Mamillius; thou ’rt an honest man.[Exit MAMILLIUS.

Camillo, this great sir will yet stay longer.

Cam.You had much ado to make his anchor hold:

When you cast out, it still came home.

Leon.Didst note it?

Cam.He would not stay at your petitions; made

His business more material.

Leon.Didst perceive it?

[Aside.]They’re here with me already, whispering, rounding

‘Sicilia is a so-forth.’ ’Tis far gone,

When I shall gust it last. How came ’t, Camillo,

That he did stay?

Cam.At the good queen’s entreaty.

Leon.At the queen’s, be ’t: ‘good’ should be pertinent;

But so it is, it is not. Was this taken

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

Perchance are to this business purblind? say.

Cam.Business, my lord! I think most understand

Bohemia stays here longer.

Leon.Ha!

Cam.Stays here longer.

Leon.Ay, but why?

Cam.To satisfy your highness and the entreaties

Of our most gracious mistress.

Leon.Satisfy!

The entreaties of your mistress! satisfy!

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 cleans’d my bosom: I from thee departed

Thy penitent reform’d; but we have been

Deceiv’d in thy integrity, deceiv’d

In that which seems so.

Cam.Be it forbid, my lord!

Leon.To bide upon ’t, thou art not honest; or,

If thou inclin’st that way, thou art a coward,

Which hoxes honesty behind, restraining

From course requir’d; 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,

And tak’st it all for jest.

Cam.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,

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,

Not weighing well the end; if ever fearful

To do a thing, where I the issue doubted,

Whereof the execution did cry out

Against the non-performance, ’twas a fear

Which oft infects the wisest: these, my lord,

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.

Leon.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

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

As rank as any flax-wench that puts to

Before her troth-plight: say ’t and justify ’t.

Cam.I would not be a stander-by, to hear

My sovereign mistress clouded so, without

My present vengeance taken: ’shrew my heart,

You never spoke what did become you less

Than this; which to reiterate were sin

As deep as that, though true.

Leon.Is whispering nothing?

Is leaning cheek to cheek? is meeting noses?

Kissing with inside lip? stopping the career

Of laughter 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

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 ’tis nothing;

The covering sky is nothing; Bohemia nothing;

My wife is nothing; nor nothing have these nothings,

If this be nothing.

Cam.Good my lord, be cur’d

Of this diseas’d opinion, and betimes;

For ’tis most dangerous.

Leon.Say it be, ’tis true.

Cam.No, no, my lord.

Leon.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

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.

Cam.Who does infect her?

Leon.Why, he that wears her like her 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

Which should undo more doing: ay, and thou,

His cup-bearer,—whom I from meaner form

Have bench’d and rear’d to worship, who mayst see

Plainly, as heaven sees earth, and earth sees heaven,

How I am galled,—mightst bespice a cup,

To give mine enemy a lasting wink;

Which draught to me were cordial.

Cam.Sir, my lord,

I could do this, and that with no rash potion,

But with a lingering dram that should not work

Maliciously like poison: but I cannot

Believe this crack to be in my dread mistress,

So sovereignly being honourable.

I have lov’d thee,—

Leon.Make that thy question, and go rot!

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?

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?

Cam.I must believe you, sir:

I do; and will fetch off Bohemia for ’t;

Provided that when he’s remov’d, 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

Known and allied to yours.

Leon.Thou dost advise me

Even so as I mine own course have set down:

I’ll give no blemish to her honour, none.

Cam.My lord,

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.

Leon.This is all:

Do ’t, and thou hast the one half of my heart;

Do ’t not, thou split’st thine own.

Cam.I’ll do ’t, my lord.

Leon.I will seem friendly, as thou hast advis’d me.[Exit.

Cam.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

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’d not do ’t; but since

Nor brass nor stone nor parchment bears not one,

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.