Part 213

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. 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, In my green velvet coat; my dagger muzzled 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, Will you take eggs for money?

MAMILLIUS. No, my lord, I’ll fight.

LEONTES. You will? Why, happy man be ’s dole! My brother, Are you so fond of your young prince as we Do seem to be of ours?

POLIXENES. If at home, sir, 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 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: Next to thyself and my young rover, he’s Apparent to my heart.

HERMIONE. If you would seek us, We are yours i’ the 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, 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! 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 have been, 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 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 hath revolted wives, the tenth of mankind Would hang themselves. Physic for’t there’s none; 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 With bag and baggage. Many thousand of us 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.

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 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 came’t, Camillo, That he did stay?

CAMILLO. At the good queen’s entreaty.

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, 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.

LEONTES. Ay, but why?

CAMILLO. To satisfy your highness, and the entreaties Of our most gracious mistress.

LEONTES. Satisfy? Th’ entreaties of your mistress? Satisfy? Let that suffice. I have trusted thee, Camillo, 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 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 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; 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, 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 Against the non-performance, ’twas a fear Which oft affects 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 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 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 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 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? 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 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, 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, 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 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, 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 mayst see Plainly as heaven sees earth and earth sees heaven, How I am galled,—mightst 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 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, 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, (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 remov’d, 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 splitt’st thine own.

CAMILLO. I’ll do’t, my lord.

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

[_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 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 after, I’d not do’t. But since Nor brass, nor stone, nor parchment, bears not one, 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? 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 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 changes thus his manners.

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 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 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, 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 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 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; 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 Cry lost, and so goodnight!

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 yok’d 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 pil’d 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 tonight. Your followers I will whisper to the business, And will by twos and threes, at several posterns, Clear them o’ th’ city. For myself, I’ll put My fortunes to your service, which are here By this discovery lost. Be not uncertain, For, by the honour of my parents, I Have utter’d truth: which if you seek to prove, I dare not stand by; nor shall you be safer Than one condemned by the king’s own mouth, Thereon his execution sworn.

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 it be violent; and as he does conceive He is dishonour’d by a man which ever Profess’d to him, why, his revenges must In that be made more bitter. Fear o’ershades me. Good expedition be my friend, and comfort The gracious queen, part of his theme, but nothing Of his ill-ta’en suspicion! Come, Camillo, I will respect thee as a father if Thou bear’st my life off hence. Let us avoid.

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.

[_Exeunt._]

ACT II

SCENE I. Sicilia. A Room in the Palace.

Enter Hermione, Mamillius and Ladies.

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 this?

MAMILLIUS. I learn’d 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’d 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.

Enter Leontes, Antigonus, Lords and Guards.

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 ey’d them Even to their ships.

LEONTES. How blest am I In my just censure, in my true opinion! Alack, for lesser knowledge! How accurs’d 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 Th’ abhorr’d ingredient to his eye, make known How he hath drunk, he cracks his gorge, his sides, With violent hefts. I have drunk, and seen the spider. Camillo was his help in this, his pander. There is a plot against my life, my crown; All’s true that is mistrusted. That false villain Whom I employ’d, was pre-employ’d by him. He has discover’d my design, and I Remain a pinch’d thing; yea, a very trick For them to play at will. How came the posterns So easily open?

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.

[_Exit Mamillius with some of the Guards._]

HERMIONE. But I’d say he had not, And I’ll be sworn you would believe my saying, Howe’er you learn th’ 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 hearts 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 petty brands That calumny doth use—O, I am out, That mercy does; for calumny will sear Virtue itself—these shrugs, these hum’s, and ha’s, When you have said “she’s goodly,” come between, Ere you can say “she’s honest”: but be it known, From him that has most cause to grieve it should be, She’s an adultress!

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 adultress; I have said with whom: More, she’s a traitor, and Camillo is A federary with her; and one that knows What she should shame to know herself But with her most vile principal, that she’s A bed-swerver, even as bad as those That vulgars give bold’st titles; ay, and privy To this their late escape.

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 lodg’d here which burns Worse than tears drown: beseech you all, my lords, With thoughts so qualified as your charities Shall best instruct you, measure me; and so The king’s will be perform’d.

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 deserv’d prison, then abound in tears As I come out: this action I now go on Is for my better grace. Adieu, my lord: I never wish’d to see you sorry; now I trust I shall. My women, come; you have leave.

LEONTES. Go, do our bidding. Hence!

[_Exeunt Queen and Ladies with Guards._]

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’ th’ 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 further 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 abus’d, 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. By mine honour, I’ll geld ’em all; fourteen they shall not see, To bring false generations: they are co-heirs, And I had rather glib myself than they Should not produce fair issue.

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 blam’d 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 stupified Or seeming so in skill, cannot or will not Relish a truth, like us, inform yourselves We need no more of your advice: the matter, The loss, the gain, the ord’ring on’t, is all Properly ours.

ANTIGONUS. And I wish, my liege, You had only in your silent judgement 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 th’ deed) doth push on this proceeding. Yet, for a greater confirmation (For in an act of this importance, ’twere Most piteous to be wild), I have dispatch’d in post To sacred Delphos, to Apollo’s temple, Cleomenes and Dion, whom you know Of stuff’d sufficiency: now from the oracle They will bring all, whose spiritual counsel had, Shall stop or spur me. Have I done well?

FIRST LORD. Well done, my lord.