flies blown to death. But what talk we of these traitorly rascals, whose miseries are to be smiled at, their offences being so capital? Tell me (for you seem to be honest plain men) what you have to the king? being something gently considered 74, I'll bring you where he is aboard, tender your persons to his presence, whisper him in your behalfs; and, if it be in man, besides the king, to effect your suits, here is man shall do it.

Clo. He seems to be of great authority: close with him, give him gold; and though authority be a stubborn bear, yet he is oft led by the nose with gold: show the inside of your purse to the outside of his hand, and no more ado: Remember, stoned, and flayed alive!

Shep. An't please you, sir, to undertake the business for us, here is that gold I have: I'll make it as

much more; and leave this young man in pawn, till I bring it you.

Aut. After I have done what I promised?

Shep. Ay, sir.

Aut. Well, give me the moiety:-Are you a party in this business?

Clo. In some sort, sir: but though my case be a pitiful one, I hope I shall not be flayed out of it. Aut. O, that's the case of the shepherd's son :Hang him, he'll be made an example.

Clo. Comfort, good comfort! we must to the king, and show our strange sights; he must know, 'tis none of your daughter nor my sister; we are gone else. Sir, I will give you as much as this old man does, when the business is performed; and remain, as he says, your pawn, till it be brought you.

Aut. I will trust you. Walk before toward the sea-side; go on the right hand; I will but look upon the hedge, and follow you.

74 Being something gently considered, i. e. being handsomely bribed; to consider often signified to reward.

Clo. We are bless'd in this man, as I may say, even bless'd.

Shep. Let's before. as he bids us; he was provided to do us good. [Exeunt Shepherd and Clown. Aut. If I had a mind to be honest, I see, fortune would not suffer me; she drops booties in my mouth. I am courted now with a double occasion ;-gold, and a means to do the prince my master good; which, who knows how that may turn back to my advancement? I will bring these two moles, these blind ones, aboard him if he think it fit to shore them again, and that the complaint they have to the king concerns him nothing, let him call me rogue, for being so far officious: for I am proof against that title, and what shame else belongs to't: To him will I them, there may be matter in it.

present

[Exit.

ACT V.

SCENE I. Sicilia. A Room in the Palace of Leontes.

Enter LEONTES, CLEOMENES, DION, PAULINA,

and others.

Cleomenes.

IR, you have done enough, and have per

form'd

A saintlike sorrow: no fault could y you make, Which you have not redeem'd; indeed, paid down More penitence, than done trespass: at the last, Do, as the heavens have done; forget your evil : With them, forgive yourself.

Leon.

Whilst I remember

Her and her virtues, I cannot forget

My blemishes in them; and so still think of

The wrong I did myself: which was so much,
That heirless it hath made my kingdom; and
Destroy'd the sweet'st companion that e'er man
Bred his hopes out of: true―

Paul.

lord:

Too true, my
If, one by one, you wedded all the world,
Or, from the all that are, took something good,
To make a perfect woman; she, you kill'd,
Would be unparallel❜d.

Leon.

I think so.

Kill'd!

She I kill'd? I did so: but thou strik'st me

Sorely, to say

I did it is as bitter

:

Upon thy tongue, as in my thought: Now, good now, Say so but seldom.

Cleo.

Not at all, good lady:

You might have spoken a thousand things that would Have done the time more benefit, and grac'd

Your kindness better.

Paul.

Would have him wed again.

You are one of those,

If you would not so,

Dion.
You pity not the state, nor the remembrance
Of his most sovereign name; consider little,
What dangers, by his highness' fail of issue,
May drop upon his kingdom, and devour
Incertain lookers-on. What were more holy,
Than to rejoice, the former queen is well1?
What holier, than,-for royalty's repair,
For present comfort and for future good,—
To bless the bed of majesty again

With a sweet fellow to't?

Paul.

There is none worthy,

1 The former queen is well, i. e. at rest, dead. So in Antony and

Cleopatra:

"Mess. First, madam, he is well.

Cleop. Why, there's more gold; but, sirrah, mark,

We use to say the dead are well."

Respecting her that's gone. Besides, the gods
Will have fulfill'd their secret purposes:
For has not the divine Apollo said,
Is't not the tenour of his oracle,

That king Leontes shall not have an heir,
Till his lost child be found? which, that it shall,
Is all as monstrous to our human reason,
As my Antigonus to break his grave,
And come again to me; who, on my life,
Did perish with the infant. "Tis your counsel,
My lord should to the heavens be contrary,
Oppose against their wills. [To LEONTES.]-Care
not for issue:

The crown will find an heir: Great Alexander
Left his to the worthiest; so his successor

Was like to be the best.

Leon.

Good Paulina,

Who hast the memory of Hermione,

I know, in honour,-O, that ever I

Had squar'd me to thy counsel !—then, even now, I might have look'd upon my queen's full eyes; Have taken treasure from her lips,

Paul.

More rich, for what they yielded.

Leon.

And left them

Thou speak'st truth.

No more such wives; therefore, no wife: one worse, And better us'd, would make her sainted spirit

Again possess her corpse; and, on this stage

(Where we offenders now

Begin, And why to me??

Paul.

She had just cause3.

appear), soul-vex'd,

Had she such power,

2 The old copy reads, " And begin, why to me." The transposition of and was made by Steevens.

3 The first and second folios have," She had just such cause:" the correction was made in the third folio. The repetition of such was caught from the preceding line.

Leon.

She had; and would incense1 me

To murder her I married.

Paul.

I should so :

Were I the ghost that walk'd, I'd bid you mark
Her eye; and tell me, for what dull part in't
You chose her: then I'd shriek, that even your ears
Should rift to hear me; and the words that follow'd
Should be, Remember mine.

Leon.

Stars, stars,

And all eyes else dead coals!—fear thou no wife,
I'll have no wife, Paulina.

Paul.

Will you swear Never to marry, but by my free leave?

Leon. Never, Paulina; so be bless'd my spirit! Paul. Then, good my lords, bear witness to his oath. Cleo. You tempt him over-much.

Paul.

As like Hermione as is her picture,

Affront5 his eye.—

Cleo.

Paul.

Unless another,

Good madam.—

I have donea.

Yet, if my lord will marry,-if you will, sir,

A Incense, to instigate or stimulate, was the ancient sense of this word; it is rendered in the Latin dictionaries by dare stimulo. So in King Richard III.—

"Think you, my lord, this little prating York Was not incensed by his subtle mother?" 5 Affront his eye, ‚i. e. meet his eye, or encounter it. Shakespeare uses this word with the same meaning again in Hamlet, Act iii. Sc. 1

:

"That he, as 'twere by accident, may here
Affront Ophelia."

And in Cymbeline:-" Your preparation can affront no less than what you hear of." The word is used in the same sense by Ben Jonson, and even by Dryden. Lodge, in the Preface to his Translation of Seneca, says, "No soldier is counted valiant that affronteth not his enemie."

In the old copies "I have done" is given to Cleomenes. Steevens proposed the transfer. Paulina gives way to his expostulation, and has done with the point she was urging; she only continues speaking to hint a possible concession.