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LEONTES: Make that thy question, and go rot! Dost think I am so muddy, so unsettled, To appoint myself in this vexation, sully The purity and whiteness of my sheets, Which to preserve is sleep, which being spotted Is goads, thorns, nettles, tails of wasps, Give scandal to the blood o' the prince my son, Who I do think ... |
CAMILLO: I must believe you, sir: I do; and will fetch off Bohemia for't; Provided that, when he's removed, your highness Will take again your queen as yours at first, Even for your son's sake; and thereby for sealing The injury of tongues in courts and kingdoms Known and allied to yours. |
LEONTES: Thou dost advise me Even so as I mine own course have set down: I'll give no blemish to her honour, none. |
CAMILLO: My lord, Go then; and with a countenance as clear As friendship wears at feasts, keep with Bohemia And with your queen. I am his cupbearer: If from me he have wholesome beverage, Account me not your servant. |
LEONTES: This is all: Do't and thou hast the one half of my heart; Do't not, thou split'st thine own. |
CAMILLO: I'll do't, my lord. |
LEONTES: I will seem friendly, as thou hast advised me. |
CAMILLO: O miserable lady! But, for me, What case stand I in? I must be the poisoner Of good Polixenes; and my ground to do't Is the obedience to a master, one Who in rebellion with himself will have All that are his so too. To do this deed, Promotion follows. If I could find example Of thousands that had struck anoint... |
POLIXENES: This is strange: methinks My favour here begins to warp. Not speak? Good day, Camillo. |
CAMILLO: Hail, most royal sir! |
POLIXENES: What is the news i' the court? |
CAMILLO: None rare, my lord. |
POLIXENES: The king hath on him such a countenance As he had lost some province and a region Loved as he loves himself: even now I met him With customary compliment; when he, Wafting his eyes to the contrary and falling A lip of much contempt, speeds from me and So leaves me to consider what is breeding That changeth t... |
CAMILLO: I dare not know, my lord. |
POLIXENES: How! dare not! do not. Do you know, and dare not? Be intelligent to me: 'tis thereabouts; For, to yourself, what you do know, you must. And cannot say, you dare not. Good Camillo, Your changed complexions are to me a mirror Which shows me mine changed too; for I must be A party in this alteration, finding My... |
CAMILLO: There is a sickness Which puts some of us in distemper, but I cannot name the disease; and it is caught Of you that yet are well. |
POLIXENES: How! caught of me! Make me not sighted like the basilisk: I have look'd on thousands, who have sped the better By my regard, but kill'd none so. Camillo,-- As you are certainly a gentleman, thereto Clerk-like experienced, which no less adorns Our gentry than our parents' noble names, In whose success we are ... |
CAMILLO: I may not answer. |
POLIXENES: A sickness caught of me, and yet I well! I must be answer'd. Dost thou hear, Camillo, I conjure thee, by all the parts of man Which honour does acknowledge, whereof the least Is not this suit of mine, that thou declare What incidency thou dost guess of harm Is creeping toward me; how far off, how near; Which... |
CAMILLO: Sir, I will tell you; Since I am charged in honour and by him That I think honourable: therefore mark my counsel, Which must be even as swiftly follow'd as I mean to utter it, or both yourself and me Cry lost, and so good night! |
POLIXENES: On, good Camillo. |
CAMILLO: I am appointed him to murder you. |
POLIXENES: By whom, Camillo? |
CAMILLO: By the king. |
POLIXENES: For what? |
CAMILLO: He thinks, nay, with all confidence he swears, As he had seen't or been an instrument To vice you to't, that you have touch'd his queen Forbiddenly. |
POLIXENES: O, then my best blood turn To an infected jelly and my name Be yoked with his that did betray the Best! Turn then my freshest reputation to A savour that may strike the dullest nostril Where I arrive, and my approach be shunn'd, Nay, hated too, worse than the great'st infection That e'er was heard or read! |
CAMILLO: Swear his thought over By each particular star in heaven and By all their influences, you may as well Forbid the sea for to obey the moon As or by oath remove or counsel shake The fabric of his folly, whose foundation Is piled upon his faith and will continue The standing of his body. |
POLIXENES: How should this grow? |
CAMILLO: I know not: but I am sure 'tis safer to Avoid what's grown than question how 'tis born. If therefore you dare trust my honesty, That lies enclosed in this trunk which you Shall bear along impawn'd, away to-night! Your followers I will whisper to the business, And will by twos and threes at several posterns Cle... |
POLIXENES: I do believe thee: I saw his heart in 's face. Give me thy hand: Be pilot to me and thy places shall Still neighbour mine. My ships are ready and My people did expect my hence departure Two days ago. This jealousy Is for a precious creature: as she's rare, Must it be great, and as his person's mighty, Must i... |
CAMILLO: It is in mine authority to command The keys of all the posterns: please your highness To take the urgent hour. Come, sir, away. |
HERMIONE: Take the boy to you: he so troubles me, 'Tis past enduring. |
First Lady: Come, my gracious lord, Shall I be your playfellow? |
MAMILLIUS: No, I'll none of you. |
First Lady: Why, my sweet lord? |
MAMILLIUS: You'll kiss me hard and speak to me as if I were a baby still. I love you better. |
Second Lady: And why so, my lord? |
MAMILLIUS: Not for because Your brows are blacker; yet black brows, they say, Become some women best, so that there be not Too much hair there, but in a semicircle Or a half-moon made with a pen. |
Second Lady: Who taught you this? |
MAMILLIUS: I learnt it out of women's faces. Pray now What colour are your eyebrows? |
First Lady: Blue, my lord. |
MAMILLIUS: Nay, that's a mock: I have seen a lady's nose That has been blue, but not her eyebrows. |
First Lady: Hark ye; The queen your mother rounds apace: we shall Present our services to a fine new prince One of these days; and then you'ld wanton with us, If we would have you. |
Second Lady: She is spread of late Into a goodly bulk: good time encounter her! |
HERMIONE: What wisdom stirs amongst you? Come, sir, now I am for you again: pray you, sit by us, And tell 's a tale. |
MAMILLIUS: Merry or sad shall't be? |
HERMIONE: As merry as you will. |
MAMILLIUS: A sad tale's best for winter: I have one Of sprites and goblins. |
HERMIONE: Let's have that, good sir. Come on, sit down: come on, and do your best To fright me with your sprites; you're powerful at it. |
MAMILLIUS: There was a man-- |
HERMIONE: Nay, come, sit down; then on. |
MAMILLIUS: Dwelt by a churchyard: I will tell it softly; Yond crickets shall not hear it. |
HERMIONE: Come on, then, And give't me in mine ear. |
LEONTES: Was he met there? his train? Camillo with him? |
First Lord: Behind the tuft of pines I met them; never Saw I men scour so on their way: I eyed them Even to their ships. |
LEONTES: How blest am I In my just censure, in my true opinion! Alack, for lesser knowledge! how accursed In being so blest! There may be in the cup A spider steep'd, and one may drink, depart, And yet partake no venom, for his knowledge Is not infected: but if one present The abhorr'd ingredient to his eye, make known... |
First Lord: By his great authority; Which often hath no less prevail'd than so On your command. |
LEONTES: I know't too well. Give me the boy: I am glad you did not nurse him: Though he does bear some signs of me, yet you Have too much blood in him. |
HERMIONE: What is this? sport? |
LEONTES: Bear the boy hence; he shall not come about her; Away with him! and let her sport herself With that she's big with; for 'tis Polixenes Has made thee swell thus. |
HERMIONE: But I'ld say he had not, And I'll be sworn you would believe my saying, Howe'er you lean to the nayward. |
LEONTES: You, my lords, Look on her, mark her well; be but about To say 'she is a goodly lady,' and The justice of your bearts will thereto add 'Tis pity she's not honest, honourable:' Praise her but for this her without-door form, Which on my faith deserves high speech, and straight The shrug, the hum or ha, these pet... |
HERMIONE: Should a villain say so, The most replenish'd villain in the world, He were as much more villain: you, my lord, Do but mistake. |
LEONTES: You have mistook, my lady, Polixenes for Leontes: O thou thing! Which I'll not call a creature of thy place, Lest barbarism, making me the precedent, Should a like language use to all degrees And mannerly distinguishment leave out Betwixt the prince and beggar: I have said She's an adulteress; I have said with... |
HERMIONE: No, by my life. Privy to none of this. How will this grieve you, When you shall come to clearer knowledge, that You thus have publish'd me! Gentle my lord, You scarce can right me throughly then to say You did mistake. |
LEONTES: No; if I mistake In those foundations which I build upon, The centre is not big enough to bear A school-boy's top. Away with her! to prison! He who shall speak for her is afar off guilty But that he speaks. |
HERMIONE: There's some ill planet reigns: I must be patient till the heavens look With an aspect more favourable. Good my lords, I am not prone to weeping, as our sex Commonly are; the want of which vain dew Perchance shall dry your pities: but I have That honourable grief lodged here which burns Worse than tears drown... |
LEONTES: Shall I be heard? |
HERMIONE: Who is't that goes with me? Beseech your highness, My women may be with me; for you see My plight requires it. Do not weep, good fools; There is no cause: when you shall know your mistress Has deserved prison, then abound in tears As I come out: this action I now go on Is for my better grace. Adieu, my lord: ... |
LEONTES: Go, do our bidding; hence! |
First Lord: Beseech your highness, call the queen again. |
ANTIGONUS: Be certain what you do, sir, lest your justice Prove violence; in the which three great ones suffer, Yourself, your queen, your son. |
First Lord: For her, my lord, I dare my life lay down and will do't, sir, Please you to accept it, that the queen is spotless I' the eyes of heaven and to you; I mean, In this which you accuse her. |
ANTIGONUS: If it prove She's otherwise, I'll keep my stables where I lodge my wife; I'll go in couples with her; Than when I feel and see her no farther trust her; For every inch of woman in the world, Ay, every dram of woman's flesh is false, If she be. |
LEONTES: Hold your peaces. |
First Lord: Good my lord,-- |
ANTIGONUS: It is for you we speak, not for ourselves: You are abused and by some putter-on That will be damn'd for't; would I knew the villain, I would land-damn him. Be she honour-flaw'd, I have three daughters; the eldest is eleven The second and the third, nine, and some five; If this prove true, they'll pay for't: ... |
LEONTES: Cease; no more. You smell this business with a sense as cold As is a dead man's nose: but I do see't and feel't As you feel doing thus; and see withal The instruments that feel. |
ANTIGONUS: If it be so, We need no grave to bury honesty: There's not a grain of it the face to sweeten Of the whole dungy earth. |
LEONTES: What! lack I credit? |
First Lord: I had rather you did lack than I, my lord, Upon this ground; and more it would content me To have her honour true than your suspicion, Be blamed for't how you might. |
LEONTES: Why, what need we Commune with you of this, but rather follow Our forceful instigation? Our prerogative Calls not your counsels, but our natural goodness Imparts this; which if you, or stupefied Or seeming so in skill, cannot or will not Relish a truth like us, inform yourselves We need no more of your advice:... |
ANTIGONUS: And I wish, my liege, You had only in your silent judgment tried it, Without more overture. |
LEONTES: How could that be? Either thou art most ignorant by age, Or thou wert born a fool. Camillo's flight, Added to their familiarity, Which was as gross as ever touch'd conjecture, That lack'd sight only, nought for approbation But only seeing, all other circumstances Made up to the deed, doth push on this proceedi... |
First Lord: Well done, my lord. |
LEONTES: Though I am satisfied and need no more Than what I know, yet shall the oracle Give rest to the minds of others, such as he Whose ignorant credulity will not Come up to the truth. So have we thought it good From our free person she should be confined, Lest that the treachery of the two fled hence Be left her to... |
ANTIGONUS: |
PAULINA: The keeper of the prison, call to him; let him have knowledge who I am. Good lady, No court in Europe is too good for thee; What dost thou then in prison? Now, good sir, You know me, do you not? |
Gaoler: For a worthy lady And one whom much I honour. |
PAULINA: Pray you then, Conduct me to the queen. |
Gaoler: I may not, madam: To the contrary I have express commandment. |
PAULINA: Here's ado, To lock up honesty and honour from The access of gentle visitors! Is't lawful, pray you, To see her women? any of them? Emilia? |
Gaoler: So please you, madam, To put apart these your attendants, I Shall bring Emilia forth. |
PAULINA: I pray now, call her. Withdraw yourselves. |
Gaoler: And, madam, I must be present at your conference. |
PAULINA: Well, be't so, prithee. Here's such ado to make no stain a stain As passes colouring. Dear gentlewoman, How fares our gracious lady? |
EMILIA: As well as one so great and so forlorn May hold together: on her frights and griefs, Which never tender lady hath born greater, She is something before her time deliver'd. |
PAULINA: A boy? |
EMILIA: A daughter, and a goodly babe, Lusty and like to live: the queen receives Much comfort in't; says 'My poor prisoner, I am innocent as you.' |
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