ACT I.

SCENE I.-Sicilia. An Antechamber in Leontes' Palace.

Enter CAMILLO and ARCHIDAMUS.

ARCH. 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.

CAM. I think, this coming summer, the king of Sicilia means to pay Bohemia the visitation which he justly owes him.

ARCH. Wherein our entertainment shall shame us, we will be justified in our loves; for, indeed,

CAM. Beseech you,

ARCH. 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. CAM. You pay a great deal too dear for what 's given freely.

ARCH. Believe me, I speak as my understanding instructs me, and as mine honesty puts it to utterance.

CAM. 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!

ARCH. 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.

CAM. 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.

- shook hands, as over a vast;] So the first folio: that of 1632 reads, "over a vast sea." The earlier lection is no doubt the true one; in "The Tempest," Act I. So. 2, we have, "vast of night;" and in "Pericles," Act III. Sc. 1,—

"The God of this great vast, rebuke these surges."

b -one that, indeed, physics the subject,-] "Subject," in this place, may import the people generally, as it is usually interpreted; yet from the words which immediately follow," makes old hearts fresh," it has perhaps a more particular meaning:-The sight and hopes of the princely boy were cordial to the afflicted, and invigorating to the old.

ARCH. Would they else be content to die?

CAM. Yes; if there were no other excuse why they should desire to live.

ARCH. If the king had no son they would desire to live on crutches till he had one.

[Exeunt.

SCENE II.-The same. A Room of State in the Palace.

Enter LEONTES, POLIXENES, HERMIONE, MAMILLIUS, CAMILLO, and Attendants.

POL. Nine changes of the wat'ry 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 more
That go before it.

LEON.

Stay your thanks awhile,

Sir, that's to-morrow.

And pay them when you part.

POL.

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,

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

'T were needful I denied it. My affairs

Hanmer reads,—

And Capell,

that may blow

No sneaping winds at home, to make us say,
This is put forth too truly!]

"This is put forth too early."

"This is put forth too tardily."

The sense appears to be,-Oh that no misfortune may occur at home to justify my apprehensions, and make me say, "I predicted too truly:" but Mr. Dyce and Mr. Collier suspect, with reason, that the passage is corrupt.

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.

Yet of your royal presence [To POLIXENES.] 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.

HER. Nay, but you will?

POL.

HER. Verily!

No, madam.

I may not, 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;

To let-] To stay.

- behind the gest-] A "gest" was the name of the scroll containing the route and resting-places of royalty during a progress;" and Hermione's meaning may be,when he visits Bohemia he shall have my licence to prolong his sojourn a month beyond the time prescribed for his departure. But gest, or jest, also signified a show or revelry, and it is not impossible that the sense intended was, he shall have my permission to remain a month after the farewell entertainment.

What lady-she her lord.-] Mr. Collier's annotator suggests, prosaically enough, "What lady should her lord." The difficulty in the expression arises, we apprehend, solely from the omission of the hyphen in "lady-she;" that restored, the sense is unmistakeable,-I love thee not a tick of the clock behind whatever high-born woman does her husband. So in Massinger's play of "The Bondman," Act I. Sc. 3,

"I'll kiss him for the honour of my country,

With any she in Corinth."

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 th' other: what we chang'd

Was innocence for innocence; we knew not

The doctrine of ill-doing, 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.a

HER.

By this we gather,

You have tripp'd since.

POL.

O, my most sacred lady,
Temptations have since then been born to us! for
In those unfledg'd days was my wife a girl;
Your precious self had then not cross'd the eyes
Of my young play-fellow.

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 dear'st, thou never spok'st

To better purpose.

HER.

LEON.

Never?

Never, but once.

HER. What! have I twice said well? when was 't before?

I pr'ythee, tell me. Cram us with praise, and make us
As fat as tame things: one good deed dying tongueless,
Slaughters a thousand waiting upon that.

Our praises are our wages: you may ride us

the imposition clear'd,

Hereditary ours.]

That is, were the penalty remitted which we inherit from the transgression of our first parents.

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,

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,b
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 't were
The mort o' the deer; O, that is entertainment
My bosom likes not, nor my brows!-Mamillius,
Art thou my boy?

MAM.

LEON.

Ay, my good lord.

I' fecks? d

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

[Observing POLIXENES and HERMIONE.

Upon his palm? (1)—How now, you wanton calf?

Art thou my calf?

ΜΑΜ.

Yes, if you will, my lord.

With spur we heat an acre. But to the goal; -]Mr. Collier's annotator substitutes,—

b

"With spur we clear an acre. But to the good."

- bounty, fertile bosom,-] Hanmer and Mr. Collier's annotator read,

The mort o' the deer;] The mort or mote of the deer was a particular strain blown by the huntsmen when the deer was killed. There is perhaps, also, a latent play on the word "deer," akin to that in the ensuing speech on neat."

d I' fecks?] A popular corruption of "in faith," it is supposed.