Put on thee by my lord, thou ne'er shalt see I did in time collect myself; and thought [Laying down the Child. There lie; and there thy character: there these; [Laying down a bundle. Which may, if fortune please, both breed thee, pretty, And still rest thine.- The storm begins.-Poor wretch, That, for thy mother's fault, art thus exposed To loss, and what may follow!-Weep I cannot, But my heart bleeds; and most accursed am I, To be by oath enjoined to this.-Farewell! The day frowns more and more; thou art like to have The heavens so dim by day. A savage clamor!- I am gone forever. [Exit, pursued by a bear. Enter an old Shepherd. Shep. I would there were no age between ten and threeand-twenty; or that youth would sleep out the rest; for there is nothing in the between but getting wenches with child, wronging the ancientry, stealing, fighting.-Hark you now!-Would any but these boiled brains of nineteen and two-and-twenty, hunt this weather? They have scared away two of my best sheep; which, I fear, the wolf will sooner find than the master; if anywhere I have them, 'tis by the seaside, browzing of ivy. Good luck, an't be thy will! what have we here? [Taking up the Child.] Mercy on's, a barne; a very pretty barne! A boy, or a child, I wonder? A pretty one; a very pretty one. Sure, some scape: though I am not bookish, yet I can read waitinggentlewoman in the scape. This has been some stair-work, some trunk-work. some behind-door work. They were warmer that got this, than the poor thing is here. I'll take it up for pity: yet I'll tarry till my son come; he hollaed but even now. Whoa, ho, hoa! Enter Clown. Clo. Hilloa, loa! Shep. What, art so near? on when thou art dead and ail'st thou, man? If thou'lt see a thing to talk rotten, come hither. What Clo. I have seen two such sights, by sea, and by land; -but I am not to say, it is a sea, for it is now the sky; betwixt the firmament and it, you cannot thrust a bodkin's point. Shep. Why, boy, how is it? Clo. I would you did but see how it chafes, how it rages, how it takes up the shore! But that's not to the point. O, the most piteous cry of the poor souls! Sometimes to see 'em, and not to see 'em: now the ship boring the moon with her main-mast; and anon swallowed with yest and froth, as you'd thrust a cork into a hogshead. And then for the land. service, To see how the bear tore out his shoulder-bone! how he cried to me for help, and said, his name was Antigonus, a nobleman.- But to make an end of the ship,-To see how the sea flap-dragoned it:-but, first, how the poor souls roared, and the sea mocked them; and how the poor gentleman roared, and the bear mocked him, both roaring louder than the sea, or weather. Shep. 'Name of mercy, when was this, boy? Clo. Now, now; I have not winked since I saw these sights. The men are not yet cold under water, nor the bear half dined on the gentleman; he's at it now. Shep. 'Would I had been by, to have helped the old man! Clo. I would you had been by the ship side, to have helped her; there your charity would have lacked footing. [Aside. Shep. Heavy matters! heavy matters! but look thee here, boy. Now bless thyself; thou met'st with things dying, I with things new born. Here's a sight for thee; look thee, a bearing-cloth for a squire's child! Look thee here: take up, take up, boy; open't. So, let's see. It was told me, I should be rich, by the fairies: this is some changeling. Open't. What's within, boy? Clo. You're a made old man; if the sins of your youth are forgiven you, you're well to live. Gold! All gold! Shep. This is fairy gold, boy, and 'twill prove so: up with it, keep it close; home, home, the next way. We are lucky, boy; and to be so still, requires nothing but secrecy. -Let my sheep go.- Come, good boy, the next way home. Clo. Go the next you way with your findings; I'll go see if the bear be gone from the gentleman, and how much he hath eaten they are never curst, but when they are hungry: if there be any of him left, I'll bury it. Shep. That's a good deed. If thou mayst discern by that which is left of him, what he is, fetch me to the sight of him. Clo. Marry, will I: and you shall help to put him i̇' the ground. Shep. 'Tis a lucky day, boy; and we'll do good deeds on't. [Exeunt. ACT IV. Enter Time, as Chorus. Time. I,-that please some, try all; both joy and terror, Of good and bad; that make, and unfold error,— Now take upon me, in the name of Time, To use my wings. Impute it not a crime, To me, or my swift passage, that I slide O'er sixteen years, and leave the growth untried Of that wide gap; since it is in my power To o'erthrow law, and in one self-born hour To plant and o'erwhelm custom. Let me pass The same I am, ere ancient'st order was, Or what is now received. I witness to The times that brought them in; so shall I do To the freshest things now reigning; and make stale The glistering of this present, as my tale Now seems to it. Your patience this allowing, I turn my glass; and give my scene such growing, As you had slept between. Leontes leaving The effects of his fond jealousies; so grieving, That he shuts up himself; imagine me, Gentle spectators, that I now may be In fair Bohemia; and remember well, I mentioned a son o'the king's, which Florizel I now name to you; and with speed so pace To speak of Perdita, now grown in grace Equal with wondering. What of her ensues, I list not prophesy; but let Time's news Be known, when 'tis brought forth:-a shepherd's daughter, And what to her adheres, which follows after, Is the argument of Time. Of this allow, If ever you have spent time worse ere now; [Exit. SCENE I. The same. A Room in the Palace of Polixenes. Enter POLIXENES and CAMILLO. Pol. I pray thee, good Camillo, be no more importunate. 'Tis a sickness, denying thee any thing; a death, to grant this. Cam. It is fifteen years since I saw my country: though I have, for the most part, been aired abroad, I desire to lay my bones there. Besides, the penitent king, my master, hath sent for me; to whose feeling sorrows I might be some allay, or I o'erween to think so; which is another spur to my departure. Pol. As thou lovest me, Camillo, wipe not out the rest of thy services, by leaving me now. The need I have of thee, thine own goodness hath made; better not to have had thee, than thus to want thee. Thou, having made me businesses which none without thee can sufficiently manage, must either stay to execute them thyself, or take away with thee the very services thou hast done; which if I have not enough considered, (as too much I cannot,) to be more thankful to thee, shall be my study; and my profit therein, the heaping friendships. Of that fatal country, Sicilia, pr'ythee speak no more; whose very naming punishes me with the remembrance of that penitent, as thou call'st him, and reconciled king, my brother; whose loss of his most precious queen and children, are even now to be fresh lamented. Say to me, when saw'st thou the prince Florizel, my son? Kings are no less unhappy, their issue not being gracious, than they are in losing them, when they have approved their virtues. Cam. Sir, it is three days since I saw the prince. What his happier affairs may be, are to me unknown: but I have missingly noted, he is of late much retired from court; and is less frequent to his princely exercises, than formerly he hath appeared. Pol. I have considered so much, Camillo; and with some care; so far, that I have eyes under my service, which look upon this removedness, from whom I have this intelligence; that he is seldom from the house of a most homely shepherd; a man, they say, that from very nothing, and beyond the imagination of his neighbors, is grown into an unspeakable estate. Cam. I have heard, sir, of such a man, who hath a daughter of most rare note; the report of her is extended more than can be thought to begin from such a cottage. Pol. That's likewise part of my intelligence. But I fear the angle that plucks our son thither. Thou shalt accompany us to the place; where we will, not appearing what we are, have some question with the shepherd; from whose simplicity I think it not uneasy to get the cause of my son's resort thither. Pr'ythee, be my present partner in this business, and lay aside the thoughts of Sicilia. Cam. I willingly obey your command. Pol. My best Camillo !-We must disguise ourselves. [Exeunt. SCENE II. The same. A Road near the Shepherd's Cottage. Enter AUTOLYCUS, singing. When daffodils begin to peer, With heigh! the doxy over the dale, Why, then comes in the sweet o'the year; For the red blood reigns in the winter's pale. The white sheet bleaching on the hedge, With, hey! the sweet birds, O how they sing!— Doth set my pugging tooth on edge; For a quart of ale is a dish for a king. The lark, that tirra-lirra chants, With, hey! with, hey! the thrush and the jay,— Are summer songs for my aunts, While we lie tumbling in the hay. I have served prince Florizel, and, in my time, wore threepile; but now I am out of service. But shall I go mourn for that, my dear? And when I wander here and there, I then do most go right. If tinkers may have leave to live, And in the stocks avouch it. My traffic is sheets; when the kite builds, look to lesser linen. My father named me Autolycus; who, being, as I |