The Works of William Shakespeare [Cambridge Edition] [Vol. 3 of 9]

Enter Time, the Chorus.

Time. I, that please some, try all, both joy and terror

Of good and bad, that makes and unfolds error,

Now take upon me, in the name of Time,

To use my wings. Impute it not a crime

To me or my swift passage, that I slide

O'er sixteen years and leave the growth untried

Of that wide gap, since it is in my power

To o'erthrow law and in one self-born hour

To plant and o'erwhelm custom. Let me pass

The same I am, ere ancient'st order was

Or what is now received: I witness to

The times that brought them in; so shall I do

To the freshest things now reigning and make stale

The glistering of this present, as my tale

Now seems to it. Your patience this allowing,

I turn my glass and give my scene such growing

As you had slept between: Leontes leaving,

The effects of his fond jealousies so grieving

That he shuts up himself, imagine me,

Gentle spectators, that I now may be

In fair Bohemia; and remember well,

I mentioned a son o' the king's, which Florizel

I now name to you; and with speed so pace

To speak of Perdita, now grown in grace

Equal with wondering: what of her ensues

I list not prophesy; but let Time's news

Be known when 'tis brought forth. A shepherd's daughter,

And what to her adheres, which follows after,

Is the argument of Time. Of this allow,

If ever you have spent time worse ere now;

If never, yet that Time himself doth say

He wishes earnestly you never may. [Exit.

Enter Polixenes and Camillo.

Pol. I pray thee, good Camillo, be no more importunate:

'tis a sickness denying thee any thing; a death to grant this.

Cam. It is fifteen years since I saw my country:

though I have for the most part been aired abroad, I desire

to lay my bones there. Besides, the penitent king, my

master, hath sent for me; to whose feeling sorrows I might

be some allay, or I o'erween to think so, which is another

spur to my departure.

Pol. As thou lovest me, Camillo, wipe not out the rest

of thy services by leaving me now: the need I have of thee,

thine own goodness hath made; better not to have had thee

than thus to want thee: thou, having made me businesses,

which none without thee can sufficiently manage, must

either stay to execute them thyself, or take away with thee

the very services thou hast done; which if I have not enough

considered, as too much I cannot, to be more thankful to

thee shall be my study; and my profit therein, the heaping

friendships. Of that fatal country, Sicilia, prithee speak no

more; whose very naming punishes me with the remembrance

of that penitent, as thou callest him, and reconciled

king, my brother; whose loss of his most precious queen and

children are even now to be afresh lamented. Say to me,

when sawest thou the Prince Florizel, my son? Kings are

no less unhappy, their issue not being gracious, than they

are in losing them when they have approved their virtues.

Cam. Sir, it is three days since I saw the prince. What

his happier affairs may be, are to me unknown: but I have

missingly noted, he is of late much retired from court and

is less frequent to his princely exercises than formerly he

hath appeared.

Pol. I have considered so much, Camillo, and with some

care; so far, that I have eyes under my service which look

upon his removedness; from whom I have this intelligence,

that he is seldom from the house of a most homely shepherd;

a man, they say, that from very nothing, and beyond

the imagination of his neighbours, is grown into an unspeakable

estate.

Cam. I have heard, sir, of such a man, who hath a

daughter of most rare note: the report of her is extended

more than can be thought to begin from such a cottage.

Pol. That's likewise part of my intelligence; but, I

fear, the angle that plucks our son thither. Thou shalt accompany

us to the place; where we will, not appearing

what we are, have some question with the shepherd; from

whose simplicity I think it not uneasy to get the cause of

my son's resort thither. Prithee, be my present partner in

this business, and lay aside the thoughts of Sicilia.

Cam. I willingly obey your command.

Pol. My best Camillo! We must disguise ourselves. [Exeunt.

Enter Autolycus, singing.

When daffodils begin to peer,

With heigh! the doxy over the dale,

Why, then comes in the sweet o' the year;

For the red blood reigns in the winter's pale.

The white sheet bleaching on the hedge,

With heigh! the sweet birds, O, how they sing!

Doth set my pugging tooth on edge;

For a quart of ale is a dish for a king.

The lark, that tirra-lyra chants,

With heigh! with heigh! the thrush and the jay,

Are summer songs for me and my aunts,

While we lie tumbling in the hay.

I have served Prince Florizel and in my time wore three-pile;

but now I am out of service:

But shall I go mourn for that, my dear?

The pale moon shines by night:

And when I wander here and there,

I then do most go right.

If tinkers may have leave to live,

And bear the sow-skin budget,

Then my account I well may give,

And in the stocks avouch it.

My traffic is sheets; when the kite builds, look to lesser

linen. My father named me Autolycus; who being, as I

am, littered under Mercury, was likewise a snapper-up of

unconsidered trifles. With die and drab I purchased this

caparison, and my revenue is the silly cheat. Gallows and

knock are too powerful on the highway: beating and hanging

are terrors to me: for the life to come, I sleep out the

thought of it. A prize! a prize!

Enter Clown.

Clo. Let me see: every 'leven wether tods; every tod

yields pound and odd shilling; fifteen hundred shorn, what

comes the wool to?

Ant. [Aside] If the springe hold, the cock's mine.

Clo. I cannot do't without counters. Let me see; what

am I to buy for our sheep-shearing feast? Three pound of

sugar; five pound of currants; rice—what will this sister

of mine do with rice? But my father hath made her mistress

of the feast, and she lays it on. She hath made me

four and twenty nosegays for the shearers, three-man song-men

all, and very good ones; but they are most of them

means and bases; but one puritan amongst them, and he

sings psalms to hornpipes. I must have saffron to colour

the warden pies; mace; dates, none, that's out of my note;

nutmegs, seven; a race or two of ginger, but that I may

beg; four pound of prunes, and as many of raisins o' the sun.

Ant. O that ever I was born! [Grovelling on the ground.

Clo. I' the name of me—

Ant. O, help me, help me! pluck but off these rags;

and then, death, death!

Clo. Alack, poor soul! thou hast need of more rags to

lay on thee, rather than have these off.

Ant. O sir, the loathsomeness of them offends me more

than the stripes I have received, which are mighty ones and

millions.

Clo. Alas, poor man! a million of beating may come

to a great matter.

Ant. I am robbed, sir, and beaten; my money and apparel

ta'en from me, and these detestable things put upon me.

Clo. What, by a horseman, or a footman?

Ant. A footman, sweet sir, a footman.

Clo. Indeed, he should be a footman by the garments

he has left with thee: if this be a horseman's coat, it hath

seen very hot service. Lend me thy hand, I'll help thee:

come, lend me thy hand.

Ant. O, good sir, tenderly, O!

Clo. Alas, poor soul!

Ant. O, good sir, softly, good sir! I fear, sir, my

shoulder-blade is out.

Clo. How now! canst stand?

Ant. Softly, dear sir [picks his pocket]; good sir, softly.

You ha' done me a charitable office.

Clo. Dost lack any money? I have a little money for

thee.

Ant. No, good sweet sir; no, I beseech you, sir: I have

a kinsman not past three quarters of a mile hence, unto

whom I was going; I shall there have money, or any thing I

want: offer me no money, I pray you; that kills my heart.

Clo. What manner of fellow was he that robbed you?

Ant. A fellow, sir, that I have known to go about with

troll-my-dames: I knew him once a servant of the prince:

I cannot tell, good sir, for which of his virtues it was, but

he was certainly whipped out of the court.

Clo. His vices, you would say; there's no virtue whipped

out of the court: they cherish it to make it stay there;

and yet it will no more but abide.

Aut. Vices I would say, sir. I know this man well:

he hath been since an ape-bearer; then a process-server,

a bailiff; then he compassed a motion of the Prodigal Son,

and married a tinker's wife within a mile where my land

and living lies; and, having flown over many knavish professions,

he settled only in rogue: some call him Autolycus.

Clo. Out upon him! prig, for my life, prig: he haunts

wakes, fairs and bear-baitings.

Aut. Very true, sir; he, sir, he; that's the rogue that

put me into this apparel.

Clo. Not a more cowardly rogue in all Bohemia: if

you had but looked big and spit at him, he'ld have run.

Aut. I must confess to you, sir, I am no fighter: I am

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false of heart that way; and that he knew, I warrant him.

Clo. How do you now?

Aut. Sweet sir, much better than I was; I can stand

and walk: I will even take my leave of you, and pace softly

towards my kinsman's.

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Clo. Shall I bring thee on the way?

Aut. No, good-faced sir; no, sweet sir.

Clo. Then fare thee well: I must go buy spices for our

sheep-shearing.

Aut. Prosper you, sweet sir! [Exit Clown.] Your purse

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is not hot enough to purchase your spice. I'll be with you

at your sheep-shearing too: if I make not this cheat bring

out another and the shearers prove sheep, let me be unrolled

and my name put in the book of virtue!

Song. Jog on, jog on, the foot-path way,

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And merrily hent the stile-a:

A merry heart goes all the day,

Your sad tires in a mile-a. [Exit.

Scene II. Bohemia. The palace of Polixenes.

Scene III. A road near the Shepherd's cottage.

Scene IV. The Shepherd's cottage.