Nor is't directly laid to thee, the death
Of the young prince; whose honourable thoughts
(Thoughts high for one so tender,) cleft the heart
That could conceive, a gross and foolish sire
Blemish'd his gracious dam: this is not, no,
Laid to thy answer: But the last,-O, lords,
When I have said, cry, woe!--the queen, the queen,
The sweetest, dearest, creature's dead; and ven-
geance for't

Not dropp'd down yet.

1 Lord.

The higher powers forbid! Paul. I say, she's dead; I'll swear't: if word, nor oath,

Prevail not, go and see if you can bring
Tincture, or lustre, in her lip, her eye,
Heat outwardly, or breath within, I'll serve you
As I would do the gods.-But, O thou tyrant!
Do not repent these things; for they are heavier
Than all thy woes can stir: therefore betake thee
To nothing but despair. A thousand knees,
Ten thousand years together, naked, fasting,
Upon a barren mountain, and still winter
In storm perpetual, could not move the gods
To look that way thou wert.

Leon.
Go on, go on :
Thou canst not speak too much; I have deserv'd
All tongues to talk their bitterest.

1 Lord.

Say no more; Howe'er the business goes, you have made fault I' the boldness of your speech. Paul.

I am sorry for't;
All faults I make, when I shall come to know them,
I do repent: Alas, I have show'd too much
The rashness of a woman: he is touch'd
To the noble heart.-What's gone, and what's past
help,

Should be past grief: Do not receive affliction,
At my petition, I beseech you; rather
Let me be punish'd, that have minded you

Of what you should forget. Now, good my liege,
Sir, royal sir, forgive a foolish woman:
The love I bore your queen,-lo, fool again!—
I'll speak of her no more, nor of your children;
I'll not remember you of my own lord,

Who is lost too: Take your patience,to you,
And I'll say nothing.

Leon.
Thou didst speak but well,
When most the truth; which I receive much better
Than to be pitied of thee. Pr'ythee, bring me
To the dead bodies of my queen, and son:
One grave shall be for both: upon them shall
The causes of their death appear, unto
Our shame perpetual: Once a day I'll visit
The chapel where they lie; and tears, shed there,
Shall be my recreation: So long as
Nature will bear up with this exercise,
So long I daily vow to use it. Come,
And lead me to these sorrows.

[Exeunt.

SCENE III.-Bohemia. A desert Country near the Sea.

Mar.

Enter ANTIGONUS, with the Child; and a Mariner.
Ant. Thou art perfect then, our ship hath touch'd
The deserts of Bohemia?
[upon
Ay, my lord; and fear
We have landed in ill time; the skies look grimly,
And threaten present blusters. In my conscience,
The heavens with that we have in hand are angry,
And frown upon us.
[aboard;
Ant. Their sacred wills be done!-Go, get
Look to thy bark; I'll not be long, before
I call upon thee.

Mar. Make your best haste; and go not
Too far i' the land; 'tis like to be loud weather;
Besides, this place is famous for the creatures
Of prey, that keep upon't.

Ant.

I'll follow instantly.

Go thou away;

May walk again if such thing be, thy mother
Appear'd to me last night; for ne'er was dream
So like a waking. To me comes a creature,
Sometimes her head on one side, some another;
I never saw a vessel of like sorrow,
So fill'd, and so becoming in pure white robes,
Like very sanctity, she did approach
My cabin, where I lay: thrice bow'd before me;
And, gasping to begin some speech, her eyes
Became two spouts: the fury spent, anon
Did this break from her: Good Antigonus,
Since fate, against thy better disposition,
Hath made thy person for the thrower-out
Of my poor babe, according to thine oath,-
Places remote enough are in Bohemia,
There weep, and leave it crying; and, for the babe
Is counted lost for ever, Perdita,

I pr'ythee, call't: for this ungentle business,
Put on thee by my lord, thou ne'er shalt see
Thy wife Paulina more:-and so, with shrieks,
She melted into air. Affrighted much,

I did in time collect myself; and thought
This was so, and no slumber. Dreams are toys:
Yet, for this once, yea, superstitiously,
I will be squar'd by this. I do believe,
Hermione hath suffer'd death; and that
Apollo would, this being indeed the issue
Of King Polixenes, it should here be laid,
Either for life, or death, upon the earth
Of its right father.-Blossom, speed thee well!
(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,
[wretch,
And still rest thine.The storm begins:-Poor
That, for thy mother's fault, art thus expos'd
To loss, and what may follow :-Weep I cannot,
But
my
heart bleeds and most accurs'd am I,
To be by oath enjoin'd to this.-Farewell!
The day frowns more and more; thou art like to have
A lullaby too rough: I never saw
The heavens so dim by day. A savage clamour?—
Well may I get aboard!- -This is the chace;
I am gone for ever. [Exit, pursued by a bear.
Enter an old Shepherd.

Shep. I would, there were no age between ten and three-and-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 sea-side, browzing on 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 waiting-gentlewoman 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!

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 me and my aunts,

While we lie tumbling in the hay.

I have served prince Florizel, and, in my time, wore three-pile; but now I am out of service:

But shall I go mourn for that, my dear?
The pale moon shines by night:
And, when I wander here and there,
I then do most go right.

If tinkers may have leave to live,
And bear the sow-skin budget;
Then my account I well may give,
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 am, littered under Mercury, was likewise a snapper-up of unconsidered trifles: With die, and drab, I purchased this caparison; and my revenue is the silly cheat: Gallows, and knock, are too powerful on the highway: beating, and hanging, are terrors to me; for the life to come, I sleep out the thought of it.-A prize! a prize!

Enter Clown.

Clo. Let me see :-Every 'leven wether-tods; every tod yields-pound and odd shilling: fifteen hundred shorn,-What comes the wool to?

Aut. If the springe hold, the cock's mine. (A side.) Clo. I cannot do't without counters.-Let me see; what am I to buy for our sheep-shearing feast? Three pound of sugar; five pound of currants: rice,What will this sister of mine do with rice? But my father hath made her mistress of the feast, and she lays it on. She hath made me four-and twenty nosegays for the shearers: three-man song-men all, and very good ones; but they are most of them means and bases: but one Puritan amongst them, and he sings psalms to hornpipes. I must have saffron, to colour the warden pies; mace,-dates, none; that's out of my note: nutmegs, seven; a race, or two, of ginger; but that I may beg;-four pound of prunes, and as many of raisins o' the sun. Aut. O, that ever I was born!

(Grovelling on the ground.) Clo. I' the name of me,Aut. O, help me, help me! pluck but off these rags; and then, death, death!

Clo. Alack, poor soul! thou hast need of more rags to lay on thee, rather than have these off.

Aut. O, sir, the loathsomeness of them offends me more than the stripes I have received, which are mighty ones, and millions.

Clo. Alas, poor man! a million of beating may come to a great matter.

Aut. I am robbed, sir, and beaten; my money and apparel ta'en from me, and these detestable things put upon me.

Clo. What, by a horse-man, or a foot-man? Aut. A foot-man, sweet sir, a foot-man. Clo. Indeed, he should be a foot-man, by the garments he hath left with thee: if this be a horse-man's coat, it hath seen very hot service. Lend me thy hand, I'll help thee: come, lend me thy hand.

(Helping him up.)

Aut. O! good sir, tenderly, oh!

Clo. Alas, poor soul.

Aut. O! good sir, softly, good sir: I fear, sir, my shoulder-blade is out.

Clo. How now? canst stand?

Aut. Softly, dear sir; (picks his pocket.) good sir, softly; you ha' done me a charitable office. Clo. Dost lack any money? 1have a little money for thee.

Aut. No, good sweet sir; no, I beseech you, sir: I have a kinsman not past three quarters of a mile hence, unto whom I was going; I shall there have money, or any thing I want. Offer me no money, I pray you; that kills my heart. [you?

Clo. What manner of fellow was he that robbed Aut. A fellow, sir, that I have known to go about with trol-my-dames: I knew him once a servant of the prince; I cannot tell, good sir, for which of his virtues it was, but he was certainly whipped out of the court.

Clo. His vices, you would say; there's no virtue whipped out of court: they cherish it, to make it stay there; and yet it will no more but abide.

Aut. Vices I would say, sir. I know this man well he hath been since an ape-bearer; then a process-server, a bailiff; then he compassed a motion of the prodigal son, and married a tinker's wife having flown over many knavish professions, he within a mile where my land and living lies; and, settled only in rogue: some call him Autolycus.

haunts wakes, fairs, and bear-baitings. Clo. Out upon him! Prig, for my life, prig: he

Aut. Very true, sir; he, sir, he; that's the rogue that put me into this apparel.

if you had but looked big, and spit at him, he'd have Clo. Not a more cowardly rogue in all Bohemia ;

run.

Aut. I must confess to you, sir, I am no fighter: I am false of heart, that way; and that he knew, I warrant him.

Clo. How do you now?

When my good falcon made her flight across
Thy father's ground.
Per.
Now Jove afford you cause!
To me,
the difference forges dread; your greatness
Hath not been us'd to fear. Even now I tremble
To think, your father, by some accident,
Should pass this way, as you did: O, the fates!
How would he look, to see his work, so noble,
Vilely bound up? What would he say? Or how
Should I, in these my borrow'd flaunts, behold
The sternness of his presence?

Flo.

Apprehend Nothing but jollity. The gods themselves, Humbling their deities to love, have taken The shapes of beasts upon them: Jupiter Became a bull, and bellow'd; the green Neptune A ram, and bleated; and the fire-rob'd god, Golden Apollo, a poor humble swain, As I seem now: Their transformations Were never for a piece of beauty rarer; Nor in a way so chaste: since my desires Run not before mine honour; nor my lusts Burn hotter than my faith.

Per.

O but, dear sir, Your resolution cannot hold, when 'tis Oppos'd, as it must be, by the power o' the king: One of these two must be necessities,

Which then will speak; that you must change this purpose,

Or I my life.

Flo.

Thou dearest Perdita,

With these forc'd thoughts, I pr'ythee, darken not
The mirth o' the feast: Or I'll be thine, my fair,
Or not my father's; for I cannot be
Mine own, nor any thing to any, if

I be not thine: to this I am most constant,
Though destiny say, no. Be merry, gentle;
Strangle such thoughts as these, with any thing
That you behold the while. Your guests are coming:
Lift up your countenance; as it were the day
Of celebration of that nuptial, which
We two have sworn shall come.
Per.

Stand you auspicious!

O lady fortune,

Enter Shepherd, with POLIXENES and CAMILLO,
disguised; Clown, MOPSA, DORCAS, and others.
Flo.
See, your guests approach:
Address yourself to entertain them sprightly,
And let's be red with mirth.
[upon
Shep. Fy, daughter! when my old wife liv'd,
This day, she was both pantler, butler, cook;
Both dame and servant: welcom'd all; serv'd all:
Would sing her song, and dance her turn: now
here,

At upper end o' the table, now, i' the middle;
On his shoulder, and his; her face o' fire
With labour; and the thing, she took to quench it,
She would to each one sip: You are retir'd,
As if you were a feasted one, and not
The hostess of the meeting: Pray you, bid
These unknown friends to us welcome: for it is
A way to make us better friends, more known.
Come, quench your blushes; and present yourself
That, which you are, mistress o' the feast: Come on,
And bid us welcome to your sheep-shearing,
As your good flock shall prosper.

Per. Welcome, sir! (To Polixenes) It is my father's will, I should take on me The hostess-ship o' the day :-You're welcome, sir! (To Camillo.) Give me those flowers there, Dorcas.-Reverend sirs,

For you there's rosemary, and rue: these keep
Seeming, and savour, all the winter long:
Grace, and remembrance, be to you both,
And welcome to our shearing!

Desire to breed by me.-Here's flowers for you;
Hot lavender, mints, savory, marjoram ;
The marigold, that goes to bed with the sun,
And with him rises weeping; these are flowers
Of middle summer, and, I think, they are given
To men of middle age: You are very welcome.
Cam. I should leave grazing, were I of your flock,
And only live by gazing.

Per.
Out, alas!
You'd be so lean, that blasts of January
Would blow you through and through.-Now, my
fairest friend,

I would I had some flowers o' the spring, that might
Become your time of day; and yours, and yours;
That wear upon your virgin branches yet
Your maidenheads growing-0 Proserpina,
For the flowers now, that, frighted, thou let'st fall
From Dis's waggon! daffodils,

That come before the swallow dares, and take
The winds of March with beauty; violets, dim,
But sweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes,
Or Cytherea's breath; pale primroses,
That die unmarried, ere they can behold
Bright Phoebus in his strength, a malady
Most incident to maids; bold oxlips, and
The crown-imperial; lilies of all kinds,
The flower-de-luce being one! O, these I lack,
To make you garlands of; and, my sweet friend,
To strew him o'er and o'er.
Flo.
What? like a corse?
Per. No, like a bank, for love to lie and play on;
Not like a corse or if,-not to be buried,
But quick, and in mine arms. Come, take your
flowers:

Methinks, I play as I have seen them do
In Whitsun' pastorals: sure, this robe of mine
Does change my disposition.
Flo.
What you do,
Still betters what is done. When you speak, sweet,
I'd have you do it ever when you sing,
I'd have you buy and sell so; so give alms;
Pray so; and, for the ordering your affairs,
To sing them too: When you do dance, I wish you
A wave o' the sea, that you might ever do

Here a dance of Shepherds and Shepherdesses. Pol. Pray, good shepherd, what

Fair swain is this, which dances with your daughter? Shep. They call him Doricles; and he boasts himself

To have a worthy feeding: but I have it
Upon his own report, and I believe it;
He looks like sooth: He says, he loves my daughter;
I think so too; for never gaz'd the moon
Upon the water, as he'll stand, and read,
As 'twere, my daughter's eyes: and, to be plain,
I think, there is not half a kiss to choose,
Who loves another best.

Pol.

She dances featly.

rainbow; points, more than all the lawyers in Bohemia can learnedly handle, though they come to him by the gross; inkles, caddisses, cambrics, lawns: why, he sings them over, 'as they were gods or goddesses; you would think, a smock were a she-angel; he so chants to the sleeve-hand, and the work about the square on't.

Clo. Pr'ythee, bring him in; and let him approach singing.

Per. Forewarn him, that he use no scurrilous words in his tunes.

Clo. You have of these pedlers, that have more in 'em than you'd think, sister.

Per. Ay, good brother, or go about to think.

Enter AUTOLYCUS, singing.

Lawn, as white as driven snow;
Cyprus, black as e'er was crow;
Gloves, as sweet as damask roses;
Masks for faces, and for noses;
Bugle bracelet, necklace-amber,
Perfume for a lady's chamber:
Golden quoifs, and stomachers,
For my lads to give their dears;
Pins, and poking-sticks of steel,
What maids lack from head to heel:

Come, buy of me, come: come buy, come buy;
Buy lads, or else your lasses cry:
Come, buy, &c.

Clo. If I were not in love with Mopsa, thou should'st take no money of me; but being enthrall'd as I am, it will also be the bondage of certain ribands and gloves.

Mop. I was promised them against the feast; but they come not too late now.

Dor. He hath promised you more than that, or there be liars.

Mop. He hath paid you all he promised you; may be, he has paid you more; which will shame you to give him again.

Clo. Is there no manners left among maids? will they wear their plackets, where they should bear their faces? Is there not milking-time, when you are going to bed, or kiln-hole, to whistle off these

Do light upon her, she shall bring him that, Which he not dreams of.

Enter a Servant.

Serv. O master, if you did but hear the pedler at the door, you would never dance again after a tabor and pipe; no, the bagpipe could not move you: he sings several tunes, faster than you'll tell money; he utters them as he had eaten ballads, and all men's ears grew to his tunes.

Clo. He could never come better; he shall come in: I love a ballad but even too well; if it be doleful matter, merrily set down, or a very pleasant thing indeed, and sung lamentably.

Serv. He hath songs, for man, or woman, of all sizes; no milliner can so fit his customers with gloves he has the prettiest love-songs for maids; so without bawdry, which is strange; with such delicate bardens of dildos and fadings: jump her and thump her; and where some stretch-mouth'd rascal would, as it were, mean mischief, and break a foul gap into the matter, he makes the maid to answer, Whoop, do me no harm, good man; puts him off, slights him, with Whoop, do me no harm, good man.

Pol. This is a brave fellow.

Clo. Believe me, thou talkest of an admirableconceited fellow. Has he any unbraided wares? Serv. He hath ribands of all the colours i'the

our guests? "Tis well they are whispering: Clamour your tongues, and not a word more.

Mop. I have done. Come, you promised me a tawdry lace, and a pair of sweet gloves.

Clo. Have I not told thee, how I was cozened by the way, and lost all my money?

Aut. And, indeed, sir, there are cozeners abroad; therefore it behoves men to be wary.

Clo. Fear not thou, man, thou shalt lose nothing

here.

Aut. I hope so, sir; for I have about me many parcels of charge.

Clo. What hast here? ballads?

Mop. Pray now, buy some: I love a ballad in print, a'-life; for then we are sure they are true.

Aut. Here's one to a very doleful tune, How a usurer's wife was brought to bed of twenty moneybags at a burden; and how she longed to eat adders' heads, and toads carbonadoed." Mop. Is it true, think you?

Aut. Very true; and but a month old.
Dor. Bless me from marrying a usurer!

Aut. Here's the midwife's name to't, one mistress Taleporter; and five or six honest wives' that were present: Why should I carry lies abroad? Mop. 'Pray you now, buy it.

Clo. Come on, lay it by: And let's first see more ballads; we'll buy the other things anon.

Aut. Here's another ballad, Of a fish that appeared upon the coast, on Wednesday the fourscore of April, forty thousand fathom above water,