The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works
Page 575
LEONTES You are married?
FLORIZEL We are not, sir, nor are we like to be:
The stars, I see, will kiss the valleys first:
205
The odds for high and low’s alike.
LEONTES My lord.
Is this the daughter of a king?
FLORIZEL She is,
When once she is my wife.
LEONTES
That ‘once’, I see, by your good father’s speed,
Will come on very slowly. I am sorry,
210
Most sorry, you have broken from his liking,
Where you were tied in duty; and as sorry
Your choice is not so rich in worth as beauty,
That you might well enjoy her.
FLORIZEL Dear, look up:
Though Fortune, visible an enemy,
215
Should chase us, with my father, power no jot
Hath she to change our loves. Beseech you, sir,
Remember since you ow’d no more to time
Than I do now: with thought of such affections,
Step forth mine advocate: at your request,
220
My father will grant precious things as trifles.
LEONTES
Would he do so, I’d beg your precious mistress,
Which he counts but a trifle.
PAULINA Sir, my liege,
Your eye hath too much youth in ’t; not a month
’Fore your queen died, she was more worth such gazes
225
Than what you look on now.
LEONTES I thought of her,
Even as these looks I made.
[to Florizel] But your petition
Is yet unanswer’d. I will to your father:
Your honour not o’erthrown by your desires,
I am friend to them and you: upon which errand
230
I now go toward him; therefore follow me
And mark what way I make. Come, good my lord.
Exeunt.
5.2 Enter AUTOLYCUS and a Gentleman.
AUTOLYCUS Beseech you, sir, were you present at this
relation?
1GENTLEMAN I was by at the opening of the fardel,
heard the old shepherd deliver the manner how he
found it: whereupon, after a little amazedness, we
5
were all commanded out of the chamber; only this,
methought I heard the shepherd say he found the
child.
AUTOLYCUS I would most gladly know the issue of it.
1GENTLEMAN I make a broken delivery of the business;
10
but the changes I perceived in the king and Camillo
were very notes of admiration: they seemed almost,
with staring on one another, to tear the cases of their
eyes: there was speech in their dumbness, language in
their very gesture; they looked as they had heard of a
15
world ransomed, or one destroyed: a notable passion
of wonder appeared in them; but the wisest beholder,
that knew no more but seeing, could not say if th’
importance were joy or sorrow; but in the extremity of
the one it must needs be.
20
Enter another Gentleman.
Here comes a gentleman that haply knows more. The
news, Rogero?
2GENTLEMAN Nothing but bonfires: the Oracle is
fulfilled; the king’s daughter is found: such a deal of
wonder is broken out within this hour, that ballad-
25
makers cannot be able to express it.
Enter a third Gentleman.
Here comes the Lady Paulina’s steward: he can deliver
you more. How goes it now, sir? This news, which is
called true, is so like an old tale that the verity of it is
in strong suspicion. Has the king found his heir?
30
3GENTLEMAN Most true, if ever truth were pregnant
by circumstance: that which you hear you’ll swear you
see, there is such unity in the proofs. The mantle of
Queen Hermione’s, her jewel about the neck of it, the
letters of Antigonus found with it, which they know to
35
be his character; the majesty of the creature in
resemblance of the mother, the affection of nobleness
which nature shows above her breeding, and many
other evidences proclaim her, with all certainty, to be
the king’s daughter. Did you see the meeting of the
40
two kings?
2GENTLEMAN No.
3GENTLEMAN Then have you lost a sight which was to
be seen, cannot be spoken of. There might you have
beheld one joy crown another, so and in such manner
45
that it seemed sorrow wept to take leave of them, for
their joy waded in tears. There was casting up of eyes,
holding up of hands, with countenance of such
distraction, that they were to be known by garment,
not by favour. Our king, being ready to leap out of
50
himself for joy of his found daughter, as if that joy
were now become a loss, cries ‘O, thy mother, thy
mother!’ then asks Bohemia forgiveness; then
embraces his son-in-law; then again worries he his
DAUGHTER with clipping her; now he thanks the old
55
Shepherd, which stands by, like a weather-bitten
conduit of many kings’ reigns. I never heard of such
another encounter, which lames report to follow it,
and undoes description to do it.
2GENTLEMAN What, pray you, became of Antigonus,
60
that carried hence the child?
3GENTLEMAN Like an old tale still, which will have
matter to rehearse, though credit be asleep and not an
ear open. He was torn to pieces with a bear: this
avouches the shepherd’s son; who has not only his
65
innocence, which seems much, to justify him, but a
handkerchief and rings of his that Paulina knows.
1GENTLEMAN What became of his bark and his
followers?
3GENTLEMAN Wrecked the same instant of their
70
master’s death, and in the view of the shepherd: so
that all the instruments which aided to expose the
child were even then lost when it was found. But O,
the noble combat that ’twixt joy and sorrow was
fought in Paulina! She had one eye declined for the
75
loss of her husband, another elevated that the Oracle
was fulfilled: she lifted the princess from the earth,
and so locks her in embracing as if she would pin her
to her heart, that she might no more be in danger of
losing.
80
1GENTLEMAN The dignity of this act was worth the
audience of kings and princes; for by such was it acted.
3GENTLEMAN One of the prettiest touches of all, and
that which angled for mine eyes (caught the water
though not the fish) was, when at the relation of the
85
queen’s death (with the manner how she came to’t
bravely confessed and lamented by the king) how
attentiveness wounded his daughter; till, from one
sign of dolour to another, she did, with an ‘Alas,’ I
would fain say, bleed tears, for I am sure my heart wept
90
blood. Who was most marble, there changed colour;
some swooned, all sorrowed: if all the world could
have seen’t, the woe had been universal.
1GENTLEMAN Are they returned to the court?
3GENTLEMAN No: the princess hearing of her mother’s
95
statue, which is in the keeping of Paulina, – a piece
many years in doing and now newly performed by that
rare Italian master, Julio Romano, who, had he himself
eternity and could put breath into his work, would
beguile Nature of her custom, so perfectly he is her
100
ape: he so near to Hermione hath done Hermione,
that they say one would speak to her and stand in hope
of answer. Thither with all greediness of affection are
they gone, and there they intend to sup.
2 GENTLEMAN I thought she had some great matter
105
there in hand; for she hath privately twice or thrice a
day, ever since the death of Hermione, visited that
removed house. Shall we thither, and with our
company piece the rejoicing?
1GENTLEMAN Who would be thence that has the
110
benefit of access? Every wink of an eye, some new
grace will be born: our absence makes us unthrifty to
our knowledge. Let’s along. Exeunt Gentlemen.
AUTOLYCUS Now, had I not the dash of my former life
in me, would preferment drop on my head. I brought
115
the old man and his son aboard the prince; told him I
heard them talk of a fardel and I know not what: but
he at that time overfond of the shepherd’s daughter
(so he then took her to be), who began to be much sea-
sick, and himself little better, extremity of weather
120
continuing, this mystery remained undiscovered. But
’tis all one to me; for had I been the finder out of this
secret, it would not have relished among my other
discredits.
Enter Shepherd and Clown.
Here come those I have done good to against my
125
will, and already appearing in the blossoms of their
fortune.
SHEPHERD Come, boy; I am past moe children, but thy
sons and daughters will be all gentlemen born.
CLOWN You are well met, sir. You denied to fight with
130
me this other day, because I was no gentleman born.
See you these clothes? say you see them not and
think me still no gentleman born: you were best say
these robes are not gentleman born: give me the lie;
do; and try whether I am not now a gentleman born.
135
AUTOLYCUS I know you are now, sir, a gentleman born.
CLOWN Ay, and have been so any time these four hours.
SHEPHERD And so have I, boy.
CLOWN So you have: but I was a gentleman born before
my father; for the king’s son took me by the hand, and
140
called me brother; and then the two kings called my
father brother; and then the prince, my brother, and
the princess, my sister, called my father father; and so
we wept; and there was the first gentleman-like tears
that ever we shed.
145
SHEPHERD We may live, son, to shed many more.
CLOWN Ay; or else ’twere hard luck, being in so
preposterous estate as we are.
AUTOLYCUS I humbly beseech you, sir, to pardon me all
the faults I have committed to your worship, and to
150
give me your good report to the prince my master.
SHEPHERD Prithee, son, do; for we must be gentle, now
we are gentlemen.
CLOWN Thou wilt amend thy life?
AUTOLYCUS Ay, and it like your good worship.
155
CLOWN Give me thy hand: I will swear to the prince
thou art as honest a true fellow as any is in Bohemia.
SHEPHERD You may say it, but not swear it.
CLOWN Not swear it, now I am a gentleman? Let boors
and franklins say it, I’ll swear it.
160
SHEPHERD How if it be false, son?
CLOWN If it be ne’er so false, a true gentleman may
swear it in the behalf of his friend: and I’ll swear to the
prince thou art a tall fellow of thy hands and that
thou wilt not be drunk; but I know thou art no tall
165
fellow of thy hands and that thou wilt be drunk: but
I’ll swear it, and I would thou would’st be a tall
fellow of thy hands.
AUTOLYCUS I will prove so, sir, to my power.
CLOWN Ay, by any means prove a tall fellow: if I do not
170
wonder how thou dar’st venture to be drunk, not
being a tall fellow, trust me not. Hark! the kings and