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SCENE I.

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ACT I.

- Sicilia. An Antichamber in Leontes' such an affection, which cannot choose but branch 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 fredom of my knowledge: we cannot with such magnificencein 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

now. Since their more mature dignities, and royal necessities, made separation of their society, their encounters, though not personal, have been royally attornied', 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.

him: it is a gallant child; one that, indeed, phyCam. I very well agree with you in the hopes of sicks the subject 3, makes old hearts fresh: they, that went on crutches ere he was born, desire yet their life, to see him a man.

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.

!Supplied by substitution of embassies. 2 Wide waste of country.

3 Affords a cordial to the state.

SCENE II.

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.
And pay them when you part.
Pol.

Stay your thanks awhile;

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.

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I'll no gain-saying.

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 say so, and he shall not stay,

We'll thwack him hence with distaffs.

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Hermione, my dearest, thou never spok'st

Yet of your royal presence [To POLIXENES.] I'll To better purpose.

adventure

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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,
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!

7 A diminutive of lords,

;

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.

It is Grace, indeed.

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,

Why, lo you now, I have spoke to the purpose twice: Lest it should bite its master, and so prove,
The one for ever earn'd a royal husband;
The other, for some while a friend.

[Giving her hand to POLIXENES.
Leon.
Too hot, too hot: [Aside.
To mingle friendship far, is mingling bloods.
I have tremor cordis 8 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: it may, I grant:
But, as now they are, making practis'd smiles,
As in a looking-glass;—and then to sigh, as 'twere
The mort o' the deer 9; O, that is entertainment
My bosom likes not, nor my brows. Mamillius,
Art thou my boy?

Ay, my good lord.

Mam.

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I'fecks?
What, hast smutch'd

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Upon his palm?
Art thou my calf?

Mam.

Yes, if you will, my lord.
Leon. Thou want'st a rough pash, and the shoots
that I have 3,

To be full like me : - - yet, they say we are
Almost as like as eggs; women say so,
That will say any thing: but were they false
As o'er-died 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 center:
Thou dost make possible, things not so held,
Communicat'st with dreams ;

be?)

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? 7

Mam. No, my lord, I'll fight.

Leon. You will? why, happy man be his dole! 8
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,
Hermione,
And leave you to your graver steps.
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 9 to my heart.

Her.

If you would seek us,
We are your's i' the garden: Shall's attend you

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(How can this 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's false: Should all despair,
That have revolted wives, the tenth of mankind
Would hang themselves; but many a thousand of us
Have the disease, and feel't not. How now, boy?
Mam. I am like you, they say.
Leon.

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(For, to a vision so apparent, rumour

Cannot be mute,) or thought, (for cogitation
Resides not in that man, that does not think it,)
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 woman that deserves a name
Too rank to mention: say it, and justify it.

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? stopping the career
Of laughter with a sigh? (a note infallible
Of breaking honesty :) 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't, is 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 cured
Of this diseas'd opinion, and betimes;
For 'tis most dangerous.

Leon.

Cam. No, no, my lord. Leon.

Say, it be; 'tis true.

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.

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About his neck, Bohemia: Who - if I Had servants true about me, that bare eyes

That seest a game play'd home, the rich stake To see alike mine honour as their profits, 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, Amongst 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 affects 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.

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Their own particular thrifts, they would do that
Which should undo more doing: Ay, and thou,
His cupbearer, - whom I from meaner form
Have bench'd, and rear'd to worship; who may'st

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