TPTT The Winter's Tale: ACT IV
Introduction
ACT I
ACT II
ACT III
ACT IV
SCENE I
SCENE II. Bohemia. The palace of POLIXENES.
SCENE III. A road near the Shepherd's cottage.
SCENE IV. The Shepherd's cottage.
ACT V
About the Play
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SCENE IV. The Shepherd's cottage.
Enter FLORIZEL and PERDITA
FLORIZEL
      These your unusual weeds to each part of you
      Do give a life: no shepherdess, but Flora
      Peering in April's front. This your sheep-shearing
      Is as a meeting of the petty gods,
5     And you the queen on't.
PERDITA
      Sir, my gracious lord,
      To chide at your extremes it not becomes me:
      O, pardon, that I name them! Your high self,
      The gracious mark o' the land, you have obscured
10    With a swain's wearing, and me, poor lowly maid,
      Most goddess-like prank'd up: but that our feasts
      In every mess have folly and the feeders
      Digest it with a custom, I should blush
      To see you so attired, sworn, I think,
15    To show myself a glass.
FLORIZEL
      I bless the time
      When my good falcon made her flight across
      Thy father's ground.
PERDITA
      Now Jove afford you cause!
20    To me the difference forges dread; your greatness
      Hath not been used to fear. Even now I tremble
      To think your father, by some accident,
      Should pass this way as you did: O, the Fates!
      How would he look, to see his work so noble
25    Vilely bound up? What would he say? Or how
      Should I, in these my borrow'd flaunts, behold
      The sternness of his presence?
FLORIZEL
      Apprehend
      Nothing but jollity. The gods themselves,
30    Humbling their deities to love, have taken
      The shapes of beasts upon them: Jupiter
      Became a bull, and bellow'd; the green Neptune
      A ram, and bleated; and the fire-robed god,
      Golden Apollo, a poor humble swain,
35    As I seem now. Their transformations
      Were never for a piece of beauty rarer,
      Nor in a way so chaste, since my desires
      Run not before mine honour, nor my lusts
      Burn hotter than my faith.
PERDITA
40    O, but, sir,
      Your resolution cannot hold, when 'tis
      Opposed, as it must be, by the power of the king:
      One of these two must be necessities,
      Which then will speak, that you must
45    change this purpose,
      Or I my life.
FLORIZEL
      Thou dearest Perdita,
      With these forced thoughts, I prithee, darken not
      The mirth o' the feast. Or I'll be thine, my fair,
50    Or not my father's. For I cannot be
      Mine own, nor any thing to any, if
      I be not thine. To this I am most constant,
      Though destiny say no. Be merry, gentle;
      Strangle such thoughts as these with any thing
55    That you behold the while. Your guests are coming:
      Lift up your countenance, as it were the day
      Of celebration of that nuptial which
      We two have sworn shall come.
PERDITA
      O lady Fortune,
60    Stand you auspicious!
FLORIZEL
      See, your guests approach:
      Address yourself to entertain them sprightly,
      And let's be red with mirth.
Enter Shepherd, Clown, MOPSA, DORCAS, and others, with POLIXENES and CAMILLO disguised
Shepherd
      Fie, daughter! when my old wife lived, upon
65    This day she was both pantler, butler, cook,
      Both dame and servant; welcomed all, served all;
      Would sing her song and dance her turn; now here,
      At upper end o' the table, now i' the middle;
      On his shoulder, and his; her face o' fire
70    With labour and the thing she took to quench it,
      She would to each one sip. You are retired,
      As if you were a feasted one and not
      The hostess of the meeting: pray you, bid
      These unknown friends to's welcome; for it is
75    A way to make us better friends, more known.
      Come, quench your blushes and present yourself
      That which you are, mistress o' the feast: come on,
      And bid us welcome to your sheep-shearing,
      As your good flock shall prosper.
PERDITA
80    (To POLIXENES) Sir, welcome:
      It is my father's will I should take on me
      The hostess-ship o' the day.

To CAMILLO

      You're welcome, sir.
      Give me those flowers there, Dorcas. Reverend sirs,
85    For you there's rosemary and rue; these keep
      Seeming and savour all the winter long:
      Grace and remembrance be to you both,
      And welcome to our shearing!
POLIXENES
      Shepherdess,
90    A fair one are you--well you fit our ages
      With flowers of winter.
PERDITA
      Sir, the year growing ancient,
      Not yet on summer's death, nor on the birth
      Of trembling winter, the fairest
95    flowers o' the season
      Are our carnations and streak'd gillyvors,
      Which some call nature's bastards: of that kind
      Our rustic garden's barren; and I care not
      To get slips of them.
POLIXENES
100   Wherefore, gentle maiden,
      Do you neglect them?
PERDITA
      For I have heard it said
      There is an art which in their piedness shares
      With great creating nature.
POLIXENES
105   Say there be;
      Yet nature is made better by no mean
      But nature makes that mean: so, over that art
      Which you say adds to nature, is an art
      That nature makes. You see, sweet maid, we marry
110   A gentler scion to the wildest stock,
      And make conceive a bark of baser kind
      By bud of nobler race: this is an art
      Which does mend nature, change it rather, but
      The art itself is nature.
PERDITA
115   So it is.
POLIXENES
      Then make your garden rich in gillyvors,
      And do not call them bastards.
PERDITA
      I'll not put
      The dibble in earth to set one slip of them;
120   No more than were I painted I would wish
      This youth should say 'twere well and only therefore
      Desire to breed by me. Here's flowers for you;
      Hot lavender, mints, savoury, marjoram;
      The marigold, that goes to bed wi' the sun
125   And with him rises weeping: these are flowers
      Of middle summer, and I think they are given
      To men of middle age. You're very welcome.
CAMILLO
      I should leave grazing, were I of your flock,
      And only live by gazing.
PERDITA
130   Out, alas!
      You'd be so lean, that blasts of January
      Would blow you through and through.
      Now, my fair'st friend,
      I would I had some flowers o' the spring that might
135   Become your time of day; and yours, and yours,
      That wear upon your virgin branches yet
      Your maidenheads growing: O Proserpina,
      For the flowers now, that frighted thou let'st fall
      From Dis's waggon! daffodils,
140   That come before the swallow dares, and take
      The winds of March with beauty; violets dim,
      But sweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes
      Or Cytherea's breath; pale primroses
      That die unmarried, ere they can behold
145   Bight Phoebus in his strength--a malady
      Most incident to maids; bold oxlips and
      The crown imperial; lilies of all kinds,
      The flower-de-luce being one! O, these I lack,
      To make you garlands of, and my sweet friend,
150   To strew him o'er and o'er!
FLORIZEL
      What, like a corse?
PERDITA
      No, like a bank for love to lie and play on;
      Not like a corse; or if, not to be buried,
      But quick and in mine arms. Come, take your flowers:
155   Methinks I play as I have seen them do
      In Whitsun pastorals: sure this robe of mine
      Does change my disposition.
FLORIZEL
      What you do
      Still betters what is done. When you speak, sweet.
160   I'ld have you do it ever: when you sing,
      I'ld have you buy and sell so, so give alms,
      Pray so; and, for the ordering your affairs,
      To sing them too: when you do dance, I wish you
      A wave o' the sea, that you might ever do
165   Nothing but that; move still, still so,
      And own no other function: each your doing,
      So singular in each particular,
      Crowns what you are doing in the present deed,
      That all your acts are queens.
PERDITA
170   O Doricles,
      Your praises are too large: but that your youth,
      And the true blood which peepeth fairly through't,
      Do plainly give you out an unstain'd shepherd,
      With wisdom I might fear, my Doricles,
175   You woo'd me the false way.
FLORIZEL
      I think you have
      As little skill to fear as I have purpose
      To put you to't. But come; our dance, I pray:
      Your hand, my Perdita: so turtles pair,
180   That never mean to part.
PERDITA
      I'll swear for 'em.
POLIXENES
      This is the prettiest low-born lass that ever
      Ran on the green-sward: nothing she does or seems
      But smacks of something greater than herself,
185   Too noble for this place.
CAMILLO
      He tells her something
      That makes her blood look out: good sooth, she is
      The queen of curds and cream.
Clown
      Come on, strike up!
DORCAS
190   Mopsa must be your mistress: marry, garlic,
      To mend her kissing with!
MOPSA
      Now, in good time!
Clown
      Not a word, a word; we stand upon our manners.
      Come, strike up!
Music. Here a dance of Shepherds and Shepherdesses
POLIXENES
195   Pray, good shepherd, what fair swain is this
      Which dances with your daughter?
Shepherd
      They call him Doricles; and boasts himself
      To have a worthy feeding: but I have it
      Upon his own report and I believe it;
200   He looks like sooth. He says he loves my daughter:
      I think so too; for never gazed the moon
      Upon the water as he'll stand and read
      As 'twere my daughter's eyes: and, to be plain.
      I think there is not half a kiss to choose
205   Who loves another best.
POLIXENES
      She dances featly.
Shepherd
      So she does any thing; though I report it,
      That should be silent: if young Doricles
      Do light upon her, she shall bring him that
210   Which he not dreams of.
Enter Servant
Servant
      O master, if you did but hear the pedlar at the
      door, you would never dance again after a tabour and
      pipe; no, the bagpipe could not move you: he sings
      several tunes faster than you'll tell money; he
215   utters them as he had eaten ballads and all men's
      ears grew to his tunes.
Clown
      He could never come better; he shall come in. I
      love a ballad but even too well, if it be doleful
      matter merrily set down, or a very pleasant thing
220   indeed and sung lamentably.
Servant
      He hath songs for man or woman, of all sizes; no
      milliner can so fit his customers with gloves: he
      has the prettiest love-songs for maids; so without
      bawdry, which is strange; with such delicate
225   burthens of dildos and fadings, 'jump her and thump
      her;' and where some stretch-mouthed rascal would,
      as it were, mean mischief and break a foul gap into
      the matter, he makes the maid to answer 'Whoop, do me
      no harm, good man;' puts him off, slights him, with
230   'Whoop, do me no harm, good man.'
POLIXENES
      This is a brave fellow.
Clown
      Believe me, thou talkest of an admirable conceited
      fellow. Has he any unbraided wares?
Servant
      He hath ribbons of an the colours i' the rainbow;
235   points more than all the lawyers in Bohemia can
      learnedly handle, though they come to him by the
      gross: inkles, caddisses, cambrics, lawns: why, he
      sings 'em over as they were gods or goddesses; you
      would think a smock were a she-angel, he so chants
240   to the sleeve-hand and the work about the square on't.
Clown
      Prithee bring him in; and let him approach singing.
PERDITA
      Forewarn him that he use no scurrilous words in 's tunes.
Exit Servant
Clown
      You have of these pedlars, that have more in them
      than you'ld think, sister.
PERDITA
245   Ay, good brother, or go about to think.
Enter AUTOLYCUS, singing
AUTOLYCUS
      Lawn as white as driven snow;
      Cyprus black as e'er was crow;
      Gloves as sweet as damask roses;
      Masks for faces and for noses;
250   Bugle bracelet, necklace amber,
      Perfume for a lady's chamber;
      Golden quoifs and stomachers,
      For my lads to give their dears:
      Pins and poking-sticks of steel,
255   What maids lack from head to heel:
      Come buy of me, come; come buy, come buy;
      Buy lads, or else your lasses cry: Come buy.
Clown
      If I were not in love with Mopsa, thou shouldst take
      no money of me; but being enthralled as I am, it
260   will also be the bondage of certain ribbons and gloves.
MOPSA
      I was promised them against the feast; but they come
      not too late now.
DORCAS
      He hath promised you more than that, or there be liars.
MOPSA
      He hath paid you all he promised you; may be, he has
265   paid you more, which will shame you to give him again.
Clown
      Is there no manners left among maids? will they
      wear their plackets where they should bear their
      faces? Is there not milking-time, when you are
      going to bed, or kiln-hole, to whistle off these
270   secrets, but you must be tittle-tattling before all
      our guests? 'tis well they are whispering: clamour
      your tongues, and not a word more.
MOPSA
      I have done. Come, you promised me a tawdry-lace
      and a pair of sweet gloves.
Clown
275   Have I not told thee how I was cozened by the way
      and lost all my money?
AUTOLYCUS
      And indeed, sir, there are cozeners abroad;
      therefore it behoves men to be wary.
Clown
      Fear not thou, man, thou shalt lose nothing here.
AUTOLYCUS
280   I hope so, sir; for I have about me many parcels of charge.
Clown
      What hast here? ballads?
MOPSA
      Pray now, buy some: I love a ballad in print o'
      life, for then we are sure they are true.
AUTOLYCUS
      Here's one to a very doleful tune, how a usurer's
285   wife was brought to bed of twenty money-bags at a
      burthen and how she longed to eat adders' heads and
      toads carbonadoed.
MOPSA
      Is it true, think you?
AUTOLYCUS
      Very true, and but a month old.
DORCAS
290   Bless me from marrying a usurer!
AUTOLYCUS
      Here's the midwife's name to't, one Mistress
      Tale-porter, and five or six honest wives that were
      present. Why should I carry lies abroad?
MOPSA
      Pray you now, buy it.
Clown
295   Come on, lay it by: and let's first see moe
      ballads; we'll buy the other things anon.
AUTOLYCUS
      Here's another ballad of a fish, that appeared upon
      the coast on Wednesday the four-score of April,
      forty thousand fathom above water, and sung this
300   ballad against the hard hearts of maids: it was
      thought she was a woman and was turned into a cold
      fish for she would not exchange flesh with one that
      loved her: the ballad is very pitiful and as true.
DORCAS
      Is it true too, think you?
AUTOLYCUS
305   Five justices' hands at it, and witnesses more than
      my pack will hold.
Clown
      Lay it by too: another.
AUTOLYCUS
      This is a merry ballad, but a very pretty one.
MOPSA
      Let's have some merry ones.
AUTOLYCUS
310   Why, this is a passing merry one and goes to
      the tune of 'Two maids wooing a man:' there's
      scarce a maid westward but she sings it; 'tis in
      request, I can tell you.
MOPSA
      We can both sing it: if thou'lt bear a part, thou
315   shalt hear; 'tis in three parts.
DORCAS
      We had the tune on't a month ago.
AUTOLYCUS
      I can bear my part; you must know 'tis my
      occupation; have at it with you.
SONG
AUTOLYCUS
      Get you hence, for I must go
320   Where it fits not you to know.
DORCAS
      Whither?
MOPSA
      O, whither?
DORCAS
      Whither?
MOPSA
      It becomes thy oath full well,
325   Thou to me thy secrets tell.
DORCAS
      Me too, let me go thither.
MOPSA
      Or thou goest to the orange or mill.
DORCAS
      If to either, thou dost ill.
AUTOLYCUS
      Neither.
DORCAS
330   What, neither?
AUTOLYCUS
      Neither.
DORCAS
      Thou hast sworn my love to be.
MOPSA
      Thou hast sworn it more to me:
      Then whither goest? say, whither?
Clown
335   We'll have this song out anon by ourselves: my
      father and the gentlemen are in sad talk, and we'll
      not trouble them. Come, bring away thy pack after
      me. Wenches, I'll buy for you both. Pedlar, let's
      have the first choice. Follow me, girls.
Exit with DORCAS and MOPSA
AUTOLYCUS
340   And you shall pay well for 'em.

Follows singing

      Will you buy any tape,
      Or lace for your cape,
      My dainty duck, my dear-a?
      Any silk, any thread,
345   Any toys for your head,
      Of the new'st and finest, finest wear-a?
      Come to the pedlar;
      Money's a medler.
      That doth utter all men's ware-a.
Exit
Re-enter Servant
Servant
350   Master, there is three carters, three shepherds,
      three neat-herds, three swine-herds, that have made
      themselves all men of hair, they call themselves
      Saltiers, and they have a dance which the wenches
      say is a gallimaufry of gambols, because they are
355   not in't; but they themselves are o' the mind, if it
      be not too rough for some that know little but
      bowling, it will please plentifully.
Shepherd
      Away! we'll none on 't: here has been too much
      homely foolery already. I know, sir, we weary you.
POLIXENES
360   You weary those that refresh us: pray, let's see
      these four threes of herdsmen.
Servant
      One three of them, by their own report, sir, hath
      danced before the king; and not the worst of the
      three but jumps twelve foot and a half by the squier.
Shepherd
365   Leave your prating: since these good men are
      pleased, let them come in; but quickly now.
Servant
      Why, they stay at door, sir.
Exit
Here a dance of twelve Satyrs
POLIXENES
      O, father, you'll know more of that hereafter.

To CAMILLO

      Is it not too far gone? 'Tis time to part them.
370   He's simple and tells much.

To FLORIZEL

      How now, fair shepherd!
      Your heart is full of something that does take
      Your mind from feasting. Sooth, when I was young
      And handed love as you do, I was wont
375   To load my she with knacks: I would have ransack'd
      The pedlar's silken treasury and have pour'd it
      To her acceptance; you have let him go
      And nothing marted with him. If your lass
      Interpretation should abuse and call this
380   Your lack of love or bounty, you were straited
      For a reply, at least if you make a care
      Of happy holding her.
FLORIZEL
      Old sir, I know
      She prizes not such trifles as these are:
385   The gifts she looks from me are pack'd and lock'd
      Up in my heart; which I have given already,
      But not deliver'd. O, hear me breathe my life
      Before this ancient sir, who, it should seem,
      Hath sometime loved! I take thy hand, this hand,
390   As soft as dove's down and as white as it,
      Or Ethiopian's tooth, or the fann'd
      snow that's bolted
      By the northern blasts twice o'er.
POLIXENES
      What follows this?
395   How prettily the young swain seems to wash
      The hand was fair before! I have put you out:
      But to your protestation; let me hear
      What you profess.
FLORIZEL
      Do, and be witness to 't.
POLIXENES
400   And this my neighbour too?
FLORIZEL
      And he, and more
      Than he, and men, the earth, the heavens, and all:
      That, were I crown'd the most imperial monarch,
      Thereof most worthy, were I the fairest youth
405   That ever made eye swerve, had force and knowledge
      More than was ever man's, I would not prize them
      Without her love; for her employ them all;
      Commend them and condemn them to her service
      Or to their own perdition.
POLIXENES
410   Fairly offer'd.
CAMILLO
      This shows a sound affection.
Shepherd
      But, my daughter,
      Say you the like to him?
PERDITA
      I cannot speak
415   So well, nothing so well; no, nor mean better:
      By the pattern of mine own thoughts I cut out
      The purity of his.
Shepherd
      Take hands, a bargain!
      And, friends unknown, you shall bear witness to 't:
420   I give my daughter to him, and will make
      Her portion equal his.
FLORIZEL
      O, that must be
      I' the virtue of your daughter: one being dead,
      I shall have more than you can dream of yet;
425   Enough then for your wonder. But, come on,
      Contract us 'fore these witnesses.
Shepherd
      Come, your hand;
      And, daughter, yours.
POLIXENES
      Soft, swain, awhile, beseech you;
430   Have you a father?
FLORIZEL
      I have: but what of him?
POLIXENES
      Knows he of this?
FLORIZEL
      He neither does nor shall.
POLIXENES
      Methinks a father
435   Is at the nuptial of his son a guest
      That best becomes the table. Pray you once more,
      Is not your father grown incapable
      Of reasonable affairs? is he not stupid
      With age and altering rheums? can he speak? hear?
440   Know man from man? dispute his own estate?
      Lies he not bed-rid? and again does nothing
      But what he did being childish?
FLORIZEL
      No, good sir;
      He has his health and ampler strength indeed
445   Than most have of his age.
POLIXENES
      By my white beard,
      You offer him, if this be so, a wrong
      Something unfilial: reason my son
      Should choose himself a wife, but as good reason
450   The father, all whose joy is nothing else
      But fair posterity, should hold some counsel
      In such a business.
FLORIZEL
      I yield all this;
      But for some other reasons, my grave sir,
455   Which 'tis not fit you know, I not acquaint
      My father of this business.
POLIXENES
      Let him know't.
FLORIZEL
      He shall not.
POLIXENES
      Prithee, let him.
FLORIZEL
460   No, he must not.
Shepherd
      Let him, my son: he shall not need to grieve
      At knowing of thy choice.
FLORIZEL
      Come, come, he must not.
      Mark our contract.
POLIXENES
465   Mark your divorce, young sir,

Discovering himself

      Whom son I dare not call; thou art too base
      To be acknowledged: thou a sceptre's heir,
      That thus affect'st a sheep-hook! Thou old traitor,
      I am sorry that by hanging thee I can
470   But shorten thy life one week. And thou, fresh piece
      Of excellent witchcraft, who of force must know
      The royal fool thou copest with,--
Shepherd
      O, my heart!
POLIXENES
      I'll have thy beauty scratch'd with briers, and made
475   More homely than thy state. For thee, fond boy,
      If I may ever know thou dost but sigh
      That thou no more shalt see this knack, as never
      I mean thou shalt, we'll bar thee from succession;
      Not hold thee of our blood, no, not our kin,
480   Far than Deucalion off: mark thou my words:
      Follow us to the court. Thou churl, for this time,
      Though full of our displeasure, yet we free thee
      From the dead blow of it. And you, enchantment.--
      Worthy enough a herdsman: yea, him too,
485   That makes himself, but for our honour therein,
      Unworthy thee,--if ever henceforth thou
      These rural latches to his entrance open,
      Or hoop his body more with thy embraces,
      I will devise a death as cruel for thee
490   As thou art tender to't.
Exit
PERDITA
      Even here undone!
      I was not much afeard; for once or twice
      I was about to speak and tell him plainly,
      The selfsame sun that shines upon his court