The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works

by William Shakespeare

  Th’entreaties of your mistress? satisfy?

  Let that suffice. I have trusted thee, Camillo,

  235

  With all the nearest things to my heart, as well

  My chamber-counsels, wherein, priest-like, thou

  Hast cleans’d my bosom: I from thee departed

  Thy penitent reform’d. But we have been

  Deceiv’d in thy integrity, deceiv’d

  240

  In that which seems so.

  CAMILLO Be it forbid, my lord!

  LEONTES To bide upon’t: thou art not honest: or,

  If thou inclin’st that way, thou art a coward,

  Which hoxes honesty behind, restraining

  From course requir’d: or else thou must be counted

  245

  A servant grafted in my serious trust,

  And therein negligent; or else a fool,

  That seest a game play’d home, the rich stake drawn,

  And tak’st it all for jest.

  CAMILLO My gracious lord,

  I may be negligent, foolish, and fearful;

  250

  In every one of these no man is free,

  But that his negligence, his folly, fear,

  Among the infinite doings of the world,

  Sometime puts forth. In your affairs, my lord,

  If ever I were wilful-negligent,

  255

  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

  260

  Against the non-performance, ’twas a fear

  Which oft infects 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

  265

  By its own visage: if I then deny it,

  ’Tis none of mine.

  LEONTES Ha’ not you seen, Camillo?

  (But that’s past doubt: you have, or your eye-glass

  Is thicker than a cuckold’s horn) or heard?

  (For to a vision so apparent rumour

  270

  Cannot be mute) or thought? (for cogitation

  Resides not in that man that does not think)

  My wife is slippery? If thou wilt confess,

  Or else be impudently negative,

  To have nor eyes, nor ears, nor thought, then say

  275

  My wife’s a hobby-horse, deserves a name

  As rank as any flax-wench that puts to

  Before her troth-plight: say’t and justify’t!

  CAMILLO I would not be a stander-by, to hear

  My sovereign mistress clouded so, without

  280

  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.

  LEONTES Is whispering nothing?

  Is leaning cheek to cheek? is meeting noses?

  285

  Kissing with inside lip? stopping the career

  Of laughter with a sigh (a note infallible

  Of breaking honesty)? horsing foot on foot?

  Skulking in corners? wishing clocks more swift?

  Hours, minutes? noon, midnight? and all eyes

  290

  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,

  295

  If this be nothing.

  CAMILLO Good my lord, be cur’d

  Of this diseas’d opinion, and betimes,

  For ’tis most dangerous.

  LEONTES Say it be, ’tis true.

  CAMILLO No, no, my lord.

  LEONTES It is: you lie, you lie:

  I say thou liest, Camillo, and I hate thee,

  300

  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

  305

  The running of one glass.

  CAMILLO Who does infect her?

  LEONTES

  Why, he that wears her like her medal, hanging

  About his neck, Bohemia; who, if I

  Had servants true about me, that bare eyes

  To see alike mine honour as their profits,

  310

  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 see

  Plainly as heaven sees earth and earth sees heaven,

  315

  How I am gall’d, – might’st bespice a cup,

  To give mine enemy a lasting wink;

  Which draught to me were cordial.

  CAMILLO Sir, my lord,

  I could do this, and that with no rash potion,

  But with a ling’ring dram, that should not work

  320

  Maliciously, like poison: but I cannot

  Believe this crack to be in my dread mistress

  (So sovereignly being honourable).

  I have lov’d thee, –

  LEONTES Make that thy question, and go rot!

  Dost think I am so muddy, so unsettled,

  325

  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’th’ prince, my son,

  330

  (Who I do think is mine and love as mine)

  Without ripe moving to’t? Would I do this?

  Could man so blench?

  CAMILLO I must believe you, sir:

  I do; and will fetch off Bohemia for’t;

  Provided, that when he’s removed, your highness

  335

  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:

  340

  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:

  345

  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 splitt’st thine own.

  CAMILLO I’ll do’t, my lord.

  LEONTES I will seem friendly, as thou hast advis’d me.

  350

  Exit.

  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

  355

  All that are his, so too. To do this deed,

  Promotion follows. If I could find example

  Of thousands that had struck anointed kings

  And flourish’d aft
er, I’d not do’t: but since

  Nor brass, nor stone, nor parchment bears not one,

  360

  Let villainy itself forswear’t. I must

  Forsake the court: to do’t, or no, is certain

  To me a break-neck. Happy star reign now!

  Here comes Bohemia.

  Enter POLIXENES.

  POLIXENES This is strange: methinks

  My favour here begins to warp. Not speak?

  365

  Good day, Camillo.

  CAMILLO Hail, most royal sir!

  POLIXENES What is the news i’th’ court?

  CAMILLO None rare, my lord.

  POLIXENES The king hath on him such a countenance

  As he had lost some province, and a region

  Lov’d as he loves himself: even now I met him

  370

  With customary compliment, when he,

  Wafting his eyes to th’ contrary, and falling

  A lip of much contempt, speeds from me, and

  So leaves me, to consider what is breeding

  That changes thus his manners.

  375

  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,

  380

  Your chang’d complexions are to me a mirror

  Which shows me mine chang’d too; for I must be

  A party in this alteration, finding

  Myself thus alter’d with’t.

  CAMILLO There is a sickness

  Which puts some of us in distemper, but

  385

  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, –

  390

  As you are certainly a gentleman, thereto

  Clerk-like experienc’d, which no less adorns

  Our gentry than our parents’ noble names,

  In whose success we are gentle, – I beseech you,

  If you know aught which does behove my knowledge

  395

  Thereof to be inform’d, imprison’t not

  In ignorant concealment.

  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

  400

  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 way to be prevented, if to be:

  405

  If not, how best to bear it.

  CAMILLO Sir, I will tell you;

  Since I am charg’d in honour, and by him

  That I think honourable. Therefore mark my counsel,

  Which must be ev’n as swiftly follow’d as

  I mean to utter it, or both yourself and me

  410

  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

  415

  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 yok’d with his that did betray the Best!

  Turn then my freshest reputation to

  420

  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

  425

  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 pil’d upon his faith, and will continue

  430

  The standing of his body.