45
HERMIONE Verily!
You put me off with limber vows; but I,
Though you would seek t’unsphere the stars with oaths,
Should yet say ‘Sir, no going’. Verily,
You shall not go: a lady’s Verily’s
50
As potent as a lord’s. Will you go yet?
Force me to keep you as a prisoner,
Not like a guest: so you shall pay your fees
When you depart, and save your thanks? How say you?
My prisoner? or my guest? By your dread ‘Verily’,
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One of them you shall be.
POLIXENES Your guest then, madam:
To be your prisoner should import offending;
Which is for me less easy to commit
Than you to punish.
HERMIONE Not your gaoler then,
But your kind hostess. Come, I’ll question you
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Of my lord’s tricks, and yours, when you were boys.
You were pretty lordings then?
POLIXENES We were, fair queen,
Two lads that thought there was no more behind,
But such a day to-morrow as to-day,
And to be boy eternal.
HERMIONE Was not my lord
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The verier wag o’th’ two?
POLIXENES
We were as twinn’d lambs that did frisk i’th’ sun,
And bleat the one at th’other: what we chang’d
Was innocence for innocence: we knew not
The doctrine of ill-doing, nor dream’d
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That any did. Had we pursu’d that life,
And our weak spirits ne’er been higher rear’d
With stronger blood, we should have answer’d heaven
Boldly ‘not guilty’, the imposition clear’d
Hereditary ours.
HERMIONE By this we gather
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You have tripp’d since.
POLIXENES O my most sacred lady,
Temptations have since then been born to ’s: for
In those unfledg’d days was my wife a girl;
Your precious self had then not cross’d the eyes
Of my young play-fellow.
HERMIONE Grace to boot!
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Of this make no conclusion, lest you say
Your queen and I are devils. Yet go on;
Th’offences we have made you do, we’ll answer,
If you first sinn’d with us, and that with us
You did continue fault, and that you slipp’d not
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With any but with us.
LEONTES Is he won yet?
HERMIONE He’ll stay, my lord.
LEONTES At my request he would not.
HERMIONE, my dearest, thou never spok’st
To better purpose.
HERMIONE Never?
LEONTES Never but once.
HERMIONE
What! have I twice said well? when was’t before?
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I prithee tell me: cram’s with praise, and make’s
As fat as tame things: one good deed, dying tongueless,
Slaughters a thousand, waiting upon that.
Our praises are our wages. You may ride’s
With one soft kiss a thousand furlongs ere
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With spur we heat an acre. But to th’ 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!
But once before I spoke to th’ purpose? when?
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Nay, let me have’t: I long!
LEONTES 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.’
HERMIONE ’Tis Grace indeed.
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Why lo you now; I have spoke to th’ purpose twice:
The one, for ever earn’d a royal husband;
Th’other, for some while a friend.
[giving her hand to Polixenes]
LEONTES [aside] Too hot, too hot!
To mingle friendship far, is mingling bloods.
I have tremor cordis on me: my heart dances,
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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: ’t may, I grant:
But to be paddling palms, and pinching fingers,
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As now they are, and making practis’d smiles
As in a looking-glass; and then to sigh, as ’twere
The mort o’th’ deer – O, that is entertainment
My bosom likes not, nor my brows. Mamillius,
Art thou my boy?
MAMILLIUS Ay, my good lord.
LEONTES I’fecks:
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Why that’s my bawcock. What! hast smutch’d thy nose?
They say it is a copy out of mine. Come, captain,
We must be neat; not neat, but cleanly, captain:
And yet the steer, the heifer and the calf
Are all call’d neat. – Still virginalling
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Upon his palm! – How now, you wanton calf!
Art thou my calf?
MAMILLIUS Yes, if you will, my lord.
LEONTES
Thou want’st a rough pash and the shoots that I have
To be full like me: yet they say we are
Almost as like as eggs; women say so,
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(That will say any thing): but were they false
As o’er-dy’d 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,
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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 centre:
Thou dost make possible things not so held,
Communicat’st with dreams; – how can this be? –
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With what’s unreal thou coactive art,
And fellow’st nothing: then ’tis very credent
Thou may’st co-join with something; and thou dost,
(And that beyond commission) and I find it,
(And that to the infection of my brains
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And hard’ning of my brows).
POLIXENES What means Sicilia?
HERMIONE He something seems unsettled.
POLIXENES How, my lord?
What cheer? how is’t with you, best brother?
HERMIONE You look
As if you held a brow of much distraction:
Are you mov’d, my lord?
LEONTES No, in good earnest.
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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,
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In my green velvet coat; my dagger muzzl’d
Lest it should bite its master, and so prove,
As ornaments oft do, too dangerous:
How like, methought, I then was to this kernel,
This squash, this gentleman. Mine honest friend,
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Will you take eggs for money?
MAMILLIUS No, my lord, I’ll fight.
LEONTES
You will? Why, happy man be’s dole! My brother,
&n
bsp; Are you so fond of your young prince, as we
Do seem to be of ours?
POLIXENES If at home, sir,
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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
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Thoughts that would thick my blood.
LEONTES So stands this squire
Offic’d with me: we two will walk, my lord,
And leave you to your graver steps. Hermione,
How thou lov’st us, show in our brother’s welcome;
Let what is dear in Sicily be cheap:
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Next to thyself, and my young rover, he’s
Apparent to my heart.
HERMIONE If you would seek us,
We are yours i’th’ garden: shall’s attend you there?
LEONTES
To your own bents dispose you: you’ll be found,
Be you beneath the sky. [aside] I am angling now,
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Though you perceive me not how I give line.
Go to, go to!
How she holds up the neb, the bill to him!
And arms her with the boldness of a wife
To her allowing husband!
Exeunt Polixenes, Hermione and attendants.
Gone already!
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Inch-thick, knee-deep; o’er head and ears a fork’d one.
Go, play, boy, play: thy mother plays, and I
Play too; but so disgrac’d a part, whose issue
Will hiss me to my grave: contempt and clamour
Will be my knell. Go, play, boy, play. There havec been,
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(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 th’ arm,
That little thinks she has been sluic’d in’s absence
And his pond fish’d by his next neighbour, by
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Sir Smile, his neighbour: nay, there’s comfort in’t,
Whiles other men have gates, and those gates open’d,
As mine, against their will. Should all despair
That have revolted wives, the tenth of mankind
Would hang themselves. Physic for’t there’s none;
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It is a bawdy planet, that will strike
Where ’tis predominant; and ’tis powerful, think it,
From east, west, north, and south; be it concluded,
No barricado for a belly. Know’t,
It will let in and out the enemy,
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With bag and baggage: many thousand on’s
Have the disease, and feel’t not. How now, boy?
MAMILLIUS I am like you, they say.
LEONTES Why, that’s some comfort.
What, Camillo there?
CAMILLO Ay, my good lord.
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LEONTES Go play, Mamillius; thou’rt an honest man.
Exit Mamillius.
Camillo, this great Sir will yet stay longer.
CAMILLO You had much ado to make his anchor hold:
When you cast out, it still came home.
LEONTES Didst note it?
CAMILLO He would not stay at your petitions; made
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His business more material.
LEONTES Didst perceive it?
[aside] They’re here with me already; whisp’ring, rounding
‘Sicilia is a so-forth’: ’tis far gone,
When I shall gust it last. – How cam’t, Camillo,
That he did stay?
CAMILLO At the good queen’s entreaty.
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LEONTES
At the queen’s be’t: ‘good’ should be pertinent,
But so it is, it is not. Was this taken
By any understanding pate but thine?
For thy conceit is soaking, will draw in
More than the common blocks: not noted, is’t,
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But of the finer natures? by some severals
Of head-piece extraordinary? lower messes
Perchance are to this business purblind? say!
CAMILLO Business, my lord? I think most understand
Bohemia stays here longer.
LEONTES Ha?
CAMILLO Stays here longer.
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LEONTES Ay, but why?
CAMILLO To satisfy your highness, and the entreaties
Of our most gracious mistress.
LEONTES Satisfy?
The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works Page 562
