Vin. Thy father? O villain! he is a sailmaker in Bergamo. Bap. You mistake, sir; you mistake, sir. Pray, what do you think is his name? Vin. His name? as if I knew not his name! I have brought him up ever since he was three years old, and his name is Tranio. Ped. Away, away, mad ass! His name is Lucentio; and he is mine only son, and heir to the lands of me, Signior Vincentio. Vin. Lucentio! O, he hath murder'd his master! lay hold on him, I charge you, in the duke's name: O, my son, my son! tell me, thou villain, where is my son, Lucentio. Tra. Call forth an officer: [Enter one with an Officer.] Carry this mad knave to the gaol Father Baptista, I charge you see that he be forthcoming. Vin. Carry me to the gaol! Gre. Stay, officer; he shall not go to prison. Bap. Talk not, Signior Gremio. I say he shall go to prison. Gre. Take heed, Signior Baptista, lest you be conycatched in this business. I dare swear this is the right Vincentio. Ped. Swear, if thou dar'st. Gre. Nay, I dare not swear it. [Lucentio. Tra. Then thou wert best say that I am not Gre. Yes, I know thee to be Signior Lucentio. Bap. Away with the dotard: to the gaol with nim. Vin. Thus strangers may be haled and abus'd. O monstrous villain! Re-enter BIONDELLO,with LUCENTIO and BIANCA. Bion. O, we are spoil'd, and-yonder he is; deny him, forswear him, or else we are all undone. Luc. Pardon, sweet father. [Kneeling. Vin. Lives my sweetest son? [BION., TRA., and Ped. run out. Bian. Pardon, dear father. [Kneeling. Bap. How hast thou offended? Where is Lucentio? Luc. Here's Lucentio, Right son to the right Vincentio, That have by marriage made thy daughter mine, While counterfeit supposes blear'd thine eyne.+ Gre. Here's packing‡ with a witness, to deceive us all! Vin. Where is that villain, Tranio, That fac'd and brav'd me in this matter so? Bap. Why, tell me, is not this my Cambio ? Bian. Cambio is chang'd into Lucentio. Luc. Love wrought these miracles. Bianca's love Made me exchange my state with Tranio, Bap. But do you hear, sir? [To Luc.] Have you married my daughter without asking my good-will? Vin. Fear not, Baptista; we will content you: go to: But I will in, to be reveng'd for this villainy. [Exit. Bap. And I, to sound the depth of this knavery. [Exit. Luc. Look not pale, Bianca; thy father will not frown. [Exeunt Luc. and BIAN. * Cheated. + Deceived thine eyes. + Tricking, underhand contrivances. [kiss. Pet. First kiss me, Kate, and we will. Kath. Nay, I will give thee a kiss: now pray thee, love, stay. Pet. Is not this well?-Come, my sweet Kate; Better once than never, for never too late. [Exeunt. SCENE II.-A Room in LUCENTIO's House. A banquet set out. Enter BAPTISTA, VINCENtio, GREMIO, the Pedant, LUCENTIO, BIANCA, PeTRUCIO, KATHARINA, HORTENSIO, and Widow. TRANIO, BIONDELLO, GRUMIO, and others, attending. Luc. At last, though long, our jarring notes agree; And time it is, when raging war is done, [They sit at table. Pet. Nothing but sit and sit, and eat and eat. Bap. Padua affords this kindness, son Petrucio. Pet. Padua affords nothing but what is kind. Hor. For both our sakes, I would that word were true. [widow. Pet. Now, for my life, Hortensio fears his I mean, Hortensio is afeard of you. [round. Kath. He that is giddy thinks the world turns round: I pray you, tell me what you mean by that. Measures my husband's sorrow by his woe: Wid. Kath. And I am mean, indeed, respecting you. [down. Pet. A hundred marks, my Kate does put her Bap. How likes Gremio these quick-witted folks? Gre. Believe me, sir, they butt together well. Bian. Head, and butt? an hasty-witted body Would say your head and butt were head and horn. [you? Vin. Ay, mistress bride, hath that awaken'd Bian. Ay, but not frighted me; therefore I'll sleep again. ? A proverbial expression, repeated after a disappointment. R Pet. Nay, that you shall not; since you have begun, Have at you for a bitter jest or two! [bush, Bian. Am I your bird? I mean to shift my And then pursue me as you draw your bow: You are welcome all. [Exit BIAN., KATH., and Wid. Pet. She hath prevented me.-Here, Signior Tranio, Enter KATHARINA. Bap. Now, by my holidame, here comes Katharina! Kath. What is your will, sir, that you send for me? Pet. Where is your sister, and Hortensio's wife? Kath. They sit conferring by the parlour fire. Pet. Go, fetch them hither; if they deny to This bird you aim'd at, though you hit her not: come, [bands: Therefore, a health to all that shot and miss'd. Swinge me them soundly forth unto their husTra. O, sir, Lucentio slipp'd me like his grey-Away, I say, and bring them hither straight. hound, Which runs himself, and catches for his master. Pet. A good swift simile, but something currish. [self; Tra. 'Tis well, sir, that you hunted for your'Tis thought your deer does hold you at a bay. Bap. O ho, Petrucio, Tranio hits you now. Luc. I thank thee for that gird,* good Tranio. Hor. Confess, confess, hath he not hit you here? Pet. 'A has a little gall'd me, I confess; And, as the jest did glance away from me, 'Tis ten to one it maim'd you two outright. Bap. Now, in good sadness, son Petrucio, I think thou hast the veriest shrew of all. Pet. Well, I say-no: and, therefore, for asLet's each one send unto his wife; And he, whose wife is most obedient To come at first, when he doth send for her, Shall win the wager which we will propose. Hor. Content: What's the wager? Luc. Twenty crowns. Pet. Twenty crowns! [surance, I'li venture so much on my hawk, or hound, But twenty times so much upon my wife. Luc. A hundred then. Bion. Pet. Now, where's my wife? [in hand; Bion. She says, you have some goodly jest She will not conie; she bids you come to her. Pet. Worse and worse; she will not come! O Intolerable, not to be endur'd! [vile, Sirrah Grumio, go to your mistress; Say I command her come to me. [Exit GRU. Hor. I know her answer. [Exit KATH. Luc. Here is a wonder, if you talk of a wonder. Hor. And so it is; I wonder what it bodes. Pet. Marry, peace it bodes, and love, and quiet life, An awful rule, and right supremacy; And, to be short, what not, that's sweet and happy. Bap. Now fair befall thee, good Petrucio! The wager thou hast won; and I will add Unto their losses twenty thousand crowns! Another dowry to another daughter, For she is chang'd, as she had never been. Pet. Nay, I will win my wager better yet, And show more sign of her obedience, Her new-built virtue and obedience. Re-enter KATHARINA, with BIANCA and Widow. See, where she comes; and brings your froward wives As prisoners to her womanly persuasion. Katharine, that cap of yours becomes you not; Off with that bauble, throw it under foot. [KATH. pulls off her cap, and throws it down. Wid. Well! let me never have a cause to sigh, Till I be brought to such a silly pass! Bian. Fie! what a foolish duty call you this? Luc. I would your duty were as foolish too: The wisdom of your duty, fair Bianca, Hath cost me an hundred crowns since suppertime. [duty. Bian. The more fool you, for laying on my Pet. Katharine, I charge thee, tell these headstrong women What duty they do owe their lords and husbands. Wid. Come, come, you're mocking; we will have no telling. Pet. Come on, I say; and first begin with her. Wid. She shall not. [her. Pet. I say she shall;-and first begin with Kath. Fie, fie! unknit that threat'ning, un kind brow; And dart not scornful glances from those eyes, And in no sense is meet or amiable. A woman mov'd is like a fountain troubled, And not obedient to his honest will, And place your hands below your husbands' foot: Pet. Why, there's a wench!-Come on, and Luc. Well, go thy ways, old lad; for thou Vin. 'Tis a good hearing, when children are Luc. But a harsh hearing, when women are We three are married, but you two are sped. Luc. 'Tis a wonder, by your leave, she will INTRODUCTION TO THE WINTER'S TALE. THE Winter's Tale was founded on an old novel | by Robert Greene, which was published in 1588, under the following quaint title,-"Pandosto, the Triumph of Time, wherein is discovered by a pleasant Historie, that, although by the meanes of sinister fortune, Truth may be concealed, yet by Time, in spight of fortune, it is most manifestly revealed: Pleasant for age to avoyde drowsie thoughtes, profitable for youth to eschue other wanton Pastimes, and bringing to both a desired content." A copy of this most rare edition is in the British Museum, and the tale continued a favourite with the public for upwards of two centuries, under the title of "Dorastus and Fawnia." It emerged finally into the form of the popular chap-book; and within the last few years, a penny might have purchased of a north-country pedlar a copy of the original story of the Winter's Tale, sold to a public ignorant of the dignified use to which it had been applied. It is singular that, in framing the play on the groundwork of the novel, Shakespeare should have reversed the circumstances and actions attributed in the latter to the kings of Bohemia and Sicily. It was this mode of dealing with the subject, which led the poet into the absurdity of giving a sea-shore to Bohemia; which is thus noticed in Ben Jonson's Conversations with William Drummond,:-" :-"Sheakspear, in a play, brought in a number of men saying they had suffered shipwrack in Bohemia, wher ther is no sea neer by some one hundred miles." There was nothing spiteful in this remark, which has been noticed by some of the editors as a proof of Jonson's malignity towards Shakespeare. It was one of those palpable blunders which would have been detected by most readers of the play, and is most readily to be accounted for by the reason above alluded to, independently of the circumstance that Bohemia is also mentioned in Pandosto as a maritime country. The date of the Winter's Tale can be safely assigned to the year 1610, or very early in 1611; a memorandum in Sir H. Herbert's Diary declaring it was licensed by Sir George Buc, who was named Master of the Revels in October, 1610, and Dr. Forman having recorded an account of it as seen by him at the Globe Theatre on May 15th, 1611. The latter is contained in the doctor's original manuscript preserved in the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford; and as it is most curious, and has not been given by former editors in its original form, I take the opportunity of adding a precise copy of it, carefully taken by myself from the MS. "In the Winters Talle at the Glob, 1611, the 15 of Maye, Wednesday. "Observe ther howe Lyontes the Kinge of Cicillia was overcom with jelosy of his wife with the Kinge of Bohemia, his frind, that came to see him, and howe he contrived his death, and wold have had his cup-berer to have poisoned [him] who gave the King of Bohemia warning threof and fled with him to Bohemia. "Remember also howe he sent to the orakell of Apollo, and the aunswer of Apollo that she was giltles, and that the king was jelouse, &c., and howe, except the child was found again that was loste, the kinge should die without yssue; for the child was carried into Bohemia, and there laid in a forrest, and brought up by a sheppard, and the Kinge of Bohemia his sonn married that wentch; and howe they fled into Cicillia to Leontes, and the sheppard having showed the letter of the nobleman, by whom Leontes sent, it was that child, and [by] the jewells found about her, she was knowen to be Leontes daughter, and was then 16. yers old. "Remember also the rog that cam in all tottered like roll pixci, and howe he fayned him sicke and to have him robbed of all that he had, and howe_he_cosoned the por man of all his money, and after cam to the shop ther with a pedlers packe, and ther cosened them again of all their money; and how he changed apparell with the Kinge of Bomia, his sonn, and then how he turned courtier, &c. Beware of trustinge feined beggars or fawninge fellouse." In the Winter's Tale, the poet has intentionally violated all dramatic rules; and it may be questioned whether he did not himself intend it rather as a romance slightly woven into dramatic action than as a regular drama. It is heresy to say so; but it appears to me the romance of the tale overwhelms the play and the author's dramatic art. There is no ground-idea; for the jealousy of Leontes, which has been so considered, is introduced to us in its perfect developement, and may almost be regarded as the effect of a distempered mind. It is not a leading idea philosophically delineated, and is chiefly necessary to the progress of the tale. Neither has the character of Perdita, fascinating as the poet has imagined it, a title to be considered the prominent feature in the drama. There are others, for example Autolycus, fully as deserving attention; and perhaps the reader is more impressed with either than with the dignity and eloquence of Hermione. THE PLOT.-The scene opens in the palace of Leontes, King of Sicilia; from whence Polixenes, King of Bohemia, the early companion and friend of Leontes, is about to depart. At the instance of Leontes, Hermione, the Queen of Sicilia, persuades Polixenes to prolong his stay, and his acquiescence excites the jealousy of Leontes; who, in the height of his resentment, engages Camillo, one of his pages, to poison his friend. Camillo betrays the designs of Leontes,-undertakes to conduct Polixenes from Sicilia, and actually accompanies him in his hasty retreat from the kingdom of the jealous Leontes. Their flight being discovered, the enraged Leontes accuses his queen of adultery, and commands her to be conducted to prison, where she is delivered of a princess. Paulina, a lady of the court, undertakes to present the infant to the enraged monarch, in order to soften his resentment; he, however, refuses to hearken, and commands Antigonus, one of his lords, and the husband of Paulina, to seize the child and bear it from his presence to some desert place, and leave it to perish. At this time, Dion and Cleomenes, two lords of his court, whom he had dispatched to Delphos, to consult the oracle whether the queen was innocent or guilty, return with the answer; and Leontes, having summoned the queen before a court of justice, charges her with the crime of adultery, which she, with becoming dignity, denies. Dion and Cleomenes, being called in, are sworn to the validity of the sacred | packet they deliver;- the seal is broken, and the queen is pronounced, by the oracle, to be both innocent and chaste. At this instant, a gentleman of the court rushes into his presence, and announces to the king the death of Mamillius, the young prince, his son, who died for grief at the imprisonment of the queen, his mother. Hermione swoons on hearing the intelligence; and Leontes, overcome by his feelings, declares his belief in the innocence of his queen, and his sorrow for having doubted the honour of his friend Polixenes. In the interim, Antigonus bears the infant princess away, lands in Bohemia, and, agreeably to the command of Leontes, leaves it in a desert place, where it is found by an old shepherd, whose son witnesses the destruction of Antigonus, and the vessel in which he arrives; he being torn in pieces by a bear, and the vessel wrecked on the coast. A sum of money is left by Antigonus, with some evidence of the infant's real birth, and directions that it should be named Perdita; which the old shepherd complies with. and rears the princess as his own daughter. The young prince, Florizel, son of the King of Bohemia, becomes enamoured with Perdita, whom he supposes to be the shepherd's daughter. The frequency of his visits raises the suspicions of the king, who, being confirmed by witnessing the conduct of his son, forbids him to entertain the passion, and threatens the shepherd for allowing the intercourse. The shepherd, in order to appease the monarch, discovers the manner in which he found Perdita, and the vouchers left by Antigonus. In the interim, Florizel, accompanied by Perdita and Camillo, flies to Sicilia, and entreats the protection of Leontes. Polixenes follows to demand his son, but is appeased on discovering that Perdita is the daughter of his friend; and the whole concludes with the joyful discovery that Hermione, who had been mourned as deceased for sixteen years, is still living. Winter's Tale. Persons Represented. An Attendant on the young Prince Mamillius. Officers of a Court of Judicature. POLIXENES, King of Bohemia. FLORIZEL, his Son. ARCHIDAMUS, a Bohemian Lord. Gaoler. Lords, Ladies, and Attendants; Satyrs, for a SCENE. Sometimes in Sicilia; sometimes in Bohemia. Sicilia. An Antechamber in LEONTES' Palace. vices are now on foot, you shall see, as I have said, great difference betwixt our Bohemia and your Sicilia. Cam. I think, this coming summer, the king of Sicilia means to pay Bohemia the visitation which he justly owes him. Arch. Wherein our entertainment shall shame us we will be justified in our loves: for, indeed,— Cam. 'Beseech you, Arch. Verily, I speak it in the freedom of my knowledge: we cannot with such magnificencein so rare-I know not what to say. We will give you sleepy drinks, that your senses, unintelligent of our insufficience, may, though they cannot praise us, as little accuse us. Cam. You pay a great deal too dear for what's given freely. Arch. Believe me, I speak as my understanding instructs me, and as mine honesty puts it to utterance. Cam. Sicilia cannot show himself over-kind to Bohemia. They were train'd together in their childhoods; and there rooted betwixt them then such an affection which cannot choose but branch now. Since their more mature dignities, and royal necessities, made separation of their society, their encounters, though not personal, have been royally attorneyed, with interchange of gifts, letters, loving embassies; that they have seem'd to be together, though absent; shook hands, as over a vast ;+ and embrac'd, as it were, from the ends of opposed winds. The Heavens continue their loves! Arch. I think there is not in the world either malice or matter to alter it. You have an unspeakable comfort of your young prince Mamillíus; it is a gentleman of the greatest promise that ever came into my note. Cam. I very well agree with you in the hopes of him: It is a gallant child; one that, indeed, physics the subject,+ makes old hearts fresh; they that went on crutches ere he was born, desire yet their life to see him a man. Arch. Would they else be content to die? Cam. Yes; if there were no other excuse why they should desire to live. Arch. If the king had no son, they would desire to live on crutches till he had one. [Exeunt. SCENE II. A Room of State in the Palace. Enter LEONTES, POLIXENES, HERMIONE, MAMILLIUS, CAMILLO, and Attendants." Pol. Nine changes of the wat'ry star have been The shepherd's note, since we have left our throne Without a burthen: time as long again Go hence in debt: And therefore, like a cipher With one we-thank-you, many thousands more Stay your thanks a while; Sir, that's to-morrow. I am question'd by my fears, of what may chance, Or breed upon our absence: That may blow No sneaping winds at home, to make us say, "This is put forth too truly!" Besides, I have stay'd To tire your royalty. Leon. We are tougher, brother, Pol. So soon as yours, could win me: so it should now, Leon. Tongue-tied, our queen? speak you. The borrow of a week. When at Bohemia Her. Verily! I may not, 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, How My prisoner? or my guest? by your dread verily, |