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 remole enough are in Bohemia,
There weep, and leave it crying; and, for the babe
Is counted lost for ever, Perdita,

I pr'ythee, callit; for this ungentle business,
Put on thee by my lord, thou ne'er shall 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,

And still rest thine.--The storm begins:-Poor
wretch,

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.

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: 0, 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-dragon'd it :-but, first, how the poor souls roared, and the sea mocked them;-and how the poor gentleman roar'd, 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, 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. I would, there were no age between ten Shep. This is fairy gold, boy, and 'twill prove so: and three-and-twenty; or that youth would sleep up with it, keep it close; home, home, the next" out the rest: for there is nothing in the between way. We are lucky, boy; and to be so still rebut getting wenches with child, wronging the an-quires nothing but secrecy.-Let my sheep go:--eientry, stealing, fighting.- -Hark you now!-Come, good boy, the next way home. Would any but these boiled brains of nineteen, and Clo. Go you the next way with your findings; two-and-twenty, hunt this weather? They have I'll go see if the bear be gone from the gentleman, scared away two of my best sheep; which, I fear, and how much he hath eaten they are never curst, the wolf will sooner find, than the master: if any but when they are hungry: if there be any of him where I have them, 'tis by the sea-side, browzing left, I'll bury it.

:

on ivy. Good luck, an't be thy will! what have we Shep. That's a good deed: If thou may'st dishere [Taking up the child.] Mercy on's, a cern by that which is left of him, what he is, fetch barne; a very pretty barne! A boy, or a child, I me to the sight of him.

wonder? A pretty one; a very pretty one: Sure, Clo. Marry, will I; and you shall help to put some scape: though I am not bookish, yet I can him i'the ground. read waiting-gentlewoman in the scape. This has

Shep. 'Tis a lucky day, boy; and we'll do good

been some stair-work, some trunk-work, some be-deeds 'on't.
hind-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? If thou'lt see a thing to talk on when thou art dead and rotten, come hither. What ailest thou, man?

Time.

ACT IV.

Enter Time, as Chorus.

[Exeunt.

I,—that please some, try all; both joy and terror,

Of good and bad; that make, and unfold error,-

Clo. I have seen two such sights, by sea, and by Now take upon me, in the name of Time, land; but I am not to say, it is a sea, for it is now To use my wings. Impute it not a crime, To me, or my swift passage, that I slide

(1) The writing afterward discovered with Per-O'er sixteen years, and leave the growth untried dita.

(2) Child. (3) Female infant. (4) Swallowed. (6) Some child left behind by the fairies, in the (5) The mantle in which a child was carried to room of one which they had stolen. be baptized. (7) Nearest. (8) Mischievous,

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 receiv'd: I witness to
The times that brought them in; so shall I do
To the freshest things now reigning; and make stale
The glistening 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,2
Gentle spectators, that I now may be
In fair Bohemia; and remember well,

I mention'd 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 wond'ring: 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;
If never yet, that Time himself doth say,
He wishes earnestly, you never may. [Exit.
SCENE 1.-The same. A room in the palace of

Polixenes. Enter Polixenes and Camillo.
Pol. I pray thee, good Camillo, be no more im-
portunate; 'tis a sickness, denying thee any thing;
a death, to grant this.

with some care; so far, that I have eyes under my service, which look upon his 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 neighbours, 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 our
selves.
[Exeunt
SCENE II.-The same. A road near the Shep
herd's cottage. Enter Autolycus, singing.
When daffodils begin to peer,-

With, heigh! the doxy over the dale,-
For the red blood reigns in the winter's pale.'
Why, then comes in the sweet o' the year;
The white sheet bleaching on the hedge,-
With, hey! the sweet birds, O, how they sing!-
Doth set my pugging tooth on edge;

The lark, that tirra-lirra chaunts,-
For a quart of ale is a dish for a king.

With, hey! with, hey! the thrush and the jay :

my aunts,

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 peni-Are summer-songs for me and tent king, my master, hath sent for me: to whose While we lie tumbling in the hay. feeling sorrows I might be some allay, or I o'er-} ween to think so; which is another spur to my three-pile; 12 but now I am out of service: have served prince Florizel, and, in my time, wore departure.

I

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.

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 i have not enough considered, (as too much I cannot,) to be more thankful to thee, shall be my My traffic is sheets; when the kite builds, look to study; and my profit therein, the heaping friend- lesser linen. My father named me, Autolycus; ships. Of that fatal country, Sicilia, pr'ythee speak who, being, as I am, littered under Mercury, was no more: whose very naming punishes me with the likewise a snapper-up of unconsidered trifles: With remembrance of that penitent, as thou call'st him, die, and drab, I purchased this caparison; and my and reconciled king, my brother; whose loss of his revenue is the silly cheat: 13 Gallows, and knock, most precious queen, and children, are even now are too powerful on the highway: beating, and to be afresh lamented. Say to me, when saw'st hanging, are terrors to me; for the life to come, I thou the prince Florizel my son? Kings are no less sleep out the thought of it.-A prize! a prize unhappy, their issue not being gracious, than they are in losing them, when they have approved their

virtues.

Enter Clown.

Clo. Let me see :-Every 'leven wether-tods; 14 Cam. Sir, it is three days since I saw the prince: every tod yields-pound and odd shilling: fifteen What his happier affairs may be, are to me un-hundred shorn,-What comes the wool to? known: 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

Aut. If the springe hold, the cock's mine. [Aside.
Clo. I cannot do't without counters. 1-Let me

(9) i. e. The spring blood reigns over the parts lately under the dominion of winter. (10) Thievish. (11) Doxies. (12) Rich velvet. (13) Picking pockets. (14) Every eleven sheep will produce a tod or twenty-eight pounds of wool.

(15) Circular pieces of base metal, anciently used by the illiterate, to adjust their reckonings.

see; what I am to buy for our sheep-shearing feast?

Aut. Very true, sir; he, sir, he; that's the rogue, Three pound of sugar; five pound of currants; that put me into this apparel. rice

What will this sister of mine do with rice ? Clo. Not a more cowardly rogue in all Bohemia ; But my father hath made her mistress of the feast, if you had but looked big, and spit at him, he'd and she lays it on. She hath made me four-and-have run.

Clo. How do you now?

twenty nosegays for the shearers: three man song- Aut. I must confess to you, sir, I am no fighter: men' all, and very good ones; but they are most I am false of heart that way; and that he knew, I of them means and bases: but one Puritan amongst warrant him. them, and he sings psalms to hornpipes. I must have saffron, to colour the warden3 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!

Aut. Sweet sir, much better than I was; I can stand, and walk: I will even take my leave of you, and pace softly towards my kinsman's.

Clo. Shall I bring thee on the way?
Aut. No, good-faced sir; no, sweet sir.
Clo. Then fare thee well; I'must go buy spices

[Grovelling on the ground. for our sheep-shearing.

Aut. Prosper you, sweet sir!-[Exit Clown.}

Clo. I' the name of me,Aut. O, help me, help me! pluck but off these Your purse is not hot enough to purchase your 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

spice. I'll be with you at your sheep-shearing too:
If I make not this cheat bring out another, and the
shearers prove sheep, let me be unrolled, and my
name put in the book of virtue!

Jog on, jog on, the foot-path way,
And merrily hent the stile-a:
A merry heart goes all the day,
Your sad tires in a mile-a.

[Exit.

and apparel ta'en from me, and these detestable SCENE III.-The same. A shepherd's cottage. things put upon me.

Clo. What, by a horse-man, or a foot-man?
Aut. A foot-man, sweet sir, a foot-man.

Enter Florizel and Perdita.

Flo. These your unusual weeds to each part of you
Do give a life: no shepherdess; but Flora,
Peering in April's front. This your sheep-shearing
Is as a meeting of the petty gods,
And you the queen on't.
Per.

Clo. Indeed, he should be a foot-man, by the
garments he has 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. |
Sir, my gracious lord,
To chide at your extremes, it not becomes me;
O, pardon, that I name them: your high self,

Aut. O! good sir, tenderly, oh!
Clo. Alas, poor soul.

Aut. O, good sir, softly, good sir: I fear, sir, The gracious mark1o o' the land, you have obscur'd my shoulder-blade is out."

Clo. How now! canst stand?

Aut. Softly, dear sir: [Picks his pocket.] good str, softly: you ha' done me a charitable office. Clo. Dost lack any money? I have 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.

Clo. What manner of fellow was he that robbed you?

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.

Flo.

With a swain's wearing; and me, poor lowly maid,
Most goddess-like prank'd up: But that our feast
In every mess have folly, and the feeders
Digest it with a custom, I should blush,
To see you so attired; sworn, I think,
To show myself a glass.
I bless the time,
When my good falcon made her flight across
Thy father's ground.
Per.
Now Jove afford you cause!
To me, the difference12 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

Clo. His vices, you would say; there's no virtue whipped out of the court: they cherish it, to make Nothing but jollity. The gods themselves, it stay there; and yet it will no more but abide. Humbling their deities to love, have taken Aut. Vices I would say, sir. I know this man The shapes of beasts upon them: Jupiter well: he hath been since an ape-bearer; then a Became a bull, and bellow'd; the green Neptune process-server, a bailiff; then he compassed a mo- A ram, and bleated; and the fire-rob'd god, tions of the prodigal son, and married a tinker's Golden Apollo, a poor humble swain, wife within a mile where my land and living lies; As I seem now: Their transformations and, having flown over many knavish professions, Were never for a piece of beauty rarer; he settled only in rogue: some call him Autolycus. Clo. Out upon him! Prig," for my life, prig: he haunts wakes, fairs, and bear-baitings.

(1) Singers of catches in three parts. (2) Tenors.

(3) A species of pears.

Nor in a way so chaste: since my desires
Run not before mine honour; nor my lusts
Burn hotter than my faith.

(5) Sojourn. (6) Puppet-show.
(8) Take hold of. (9) Excesses.

(4) The machine used in the game of pigeon-(10) Object of all men's notice.

boles.

(7) Thief.

(11) Dressed with ostentation. (12) i. e. Of station.

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!

Say, there be;

Pol.
Yet nature is made better by no mean,
But nature makes that mean: so, o'er that art,
Which, you say, adds to nature, is an art
That nature makes. You see, sweet maid, we marry
A gentler scion to the wildest stock;
And make conceive a bark of baser kind
By bud of nobler race; This is an art
Which does mend nature,-change it rather: but
The art itself is nature.
So it is.
Pol. Then make your garden rich in gillyflowers,
And do not call them bastards.
I'll not put

Per.

Per.

The dibble in earth to set one slip of them:
No more than, were I painted, I would wish
This youth should say, 'twere well; and only

therefore

Desire to breed by me.-Here's flowers for you!
Hot lavender, mints, savory, marjoram ;

O lady fortune, 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.

Enter Shepherd, with Polixenes, and Camillo, dis-
guised; Clown, Mopsa, Dorcas, and others.
Flo.
See, your guests approach:
Address yourself to entertain them sprightly,
And let's be red with mirth.

Shep. Fie, daughter! when my old wife liv'd,

upon

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

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:-O Proserpina,
For that flowers now, that, frighted, thou lett'st fall

With labour; and the thing she took to quench it, From Dis's wagon! daffodils,
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 Pol.
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!

Pol.

Shepherdess,

(A fair one are you,) well you fit our ages With flowers of winter.

Per.

Not yet on summer's death, nor on the birth
Of trembling winter,-the fairest flowers o'the

season

Are our carnations, and streak'd gillyflowers,
Which some call nature's bastards: of that kind
Our rustic garden's barren; and I care not
To get slips of them.
Pol.

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,

Sir, the year growing ancient,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
Nothing but that; move still, still so, and own
No other function: Each your doing,
So singular in each particular,
Crowns what you are doing in the present deeds,
That all your acts are queens.
→ Doricles,
Your praises are too large: but that your youth,
And the true blond, which fairly peeps through it,
Do plainly give you out an unstain'd shepherd:
With wisdom I might fear, my Doricles,

Do you neglect them?
Per.

Wherefore, gentle maiden,

For I have heard it said, There is an art, which, in their piedness, shares With great creating nature.

Clo. Believe me, thou talkest of an admirable conceited fellow. Has he any unbraided wares?

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

Shep. So she does any thing; though I report it, there be liars.
That should be silent: if young Doricles
Do light upon her, she shall bring him that
Which he not dreams of.