SCENE II. THE SAME. A ROOM OF STATE IN THE PALACE.

[Enter LEONTES, POLIXENES, HERMIONE, MAMILLIUS, CAMILLO, and Attendants.]

POLIXENES

Nine changes of the watery star hath been

The shepherd’s note since we have left our throne

Without a burden: time as long again

Would be fill’d up, my brother, with our thanks;

And yet we should, for perpetuity,

Go hence in debt: and therefore, like a cipher,

Yet standing in rich place, I multiply

With one we-thank-you many thousands more

That go before it.

LEONTES

Stay your thanks a while,

And pay them when you part.

POLIXENES

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.

LEONTES

We are tougher, brother,

Than you can put us to’t.

POLIXENES

No longer stay.

LEONTES

One seven-night longer.

POLIXENES

Very sooth, to-morrow.

LEONTES

We’ll part the time between ‘s then: and in that

I’ll no gainsaying.

POLIXENES

Press me not, beseech you, so,

There is no tongue that moves, none, none i’ the world,

So soon as yours, could win me: so it should now,

Were there necessity in your request, although

‘Twere needful I denied it. My affairs

Do even drag me homeward: which to hinder,

Were, in your love a whip to me; my stay

To you a charge and trouble: to save both,

Farewell, our brother.

LEONTES

Tongue-tied, our queen? Speak you.

HERMIONE

I had thought, sir, to have held my peace until

You had drawn oaths from him not to stay. You, sir,

Charge him too coldly. Tell him you are sure

All in Bohemia’s well: this satisfaction

The by-gone day proclaimed: say this to him,

He’s beat from his best ward.

LEONTES

Well said, Hermione.

HERMIONE

To tell he longs to see his son were strong:

But let him say so then, and let him go;

But let him swear so, and he shall not stay,

We’ll thwack him hence with distaffs.—

[To POLIXENES]

Yet of your royal presence I’ll adventure

The borrow of a week. When at Bohemia

You take my lord, I’ll give him my commission

To let him there a month behind the gest

Prefix’d for’s parting:—yet, good deed, Leontes,

I love thee not a jar of the clock behind

What lady she her lord.—You’ll stay?

POLIXENES

No, madam.

HERMIONE

Nay, but you will?

POLIXENES

I may not, verily.

HERMIONE

Verily!

You put me off with limber vows; but I,

Though you would seek to unsphere the stars with oaths,

Should yet say ‘Sir, no going.’ Verily,

You shall not go; a lady’s verily is

As potent as a lord’s. Will go yet?

Force me to keep you as a prisoner,

Not like a guest: so you shall pay your fees

When you depart, and save your thanks. How say you?

My prisoner or my guest? by your dread ‘verily,’

One of them you shall be.

POLIXENES

Your guest, then, madam:

To be your prisoner should import offending;

Which is for me less easy to commit

Than you to punish.

HERMIONE

Not your gaoler then,

But your kind hostess. Come, I’ll question you

Of my lord’s tricks and yours when you were boys.

You were pretty lordings then.

POLIXENES

We were, fair queen,

Two lads that thought there was no more behind

But such a day to-morrow as to-day,

And to be boy eternal.

HERMIONE

Was not my lord the verier wag o’ the two?

POLIXENES

We were as twinn’d lambs that did frisk i’ the sun

And bleat the one at th’ other. What we chang’d

Was innocence for innocence; we knew not

The doctrine of ill-doing, nor dream’d

That any did. Had we pursu’d that life,

And our weak spirits ne’er been higher rear’d

With stronger blood, we should have answer’d heaven

Boldly ‘Not guilty,’ the imposition clear’d

Hereditary ours.

HERMIONE

By this we gather

You have tripp’d since.

POLIXENES

O my most sacred lady,

Temptations have since then been born to ‘s! for

In those unfledg’d days was my wife a girl;

Your precious self had then not cross’d the eyes

Of my young play-fellow.

HERMIONE

Grace to boot!

Of this make no conclusion, lest you say

Your queen and I are devils: yet, go on;

The offences we have made you do we’ll answer;

If you first sinn’d with us, and that with us

You did continue fault, and that you slipp’d not

With any but with us.

LEONTES

Is he won yet?

HERMIONE

He’ll stay, my lord.

LEONTES

At my request he would not.

Hermione, my dearest, thou never spok’st

To better purpose.

HERMIONE

Never?

LEONTES

Never but once.

HERMIONE

What! have I twice said well? when was’t before?

I pr’ythee tell me; cram ‘s with praise, and make ‘s

As fat as tame things: one good deed dying tongueless

Slaughters a thousand waiting upon that.

Our praises are our wages; you may ride ‘s

With one soft kiss a thousand furlongs ere

With spur we heat an acre. But to the goal:—

My last good deed was to entreat his stay;

What was my first? it has an elder sister,

Or I mistake you: O, would her name were Grace!

But once before I spoke to the purpose—when?

Nay, let me have’t; I long.

LEONTES

Why, that was when

Three crabbèd months had sour’d themselves to death,

Ere I could make thee open thy white hand

And clap thyself my love; then didst thou utter

‘I am yours for ever.’

HERMIONE

It is Grace indeed.

Why, lo you now, I have spoke to the purpose twice;

The one for ever earn’d a royal husband;

Th’ other for some while a friend.

[Giving her hand to POLIXENES.]

LEONTES

[Aside.] Too hot, too hot!

To mingle friendship far is mingling bloods.

I have tremor cordis on me;—my heart dances;

But not for joy,—not joy.—This entertainment

May a free face put on; derive a liberty

From heartiness, from bounty, fertile bosom,

And well become the agent: ‘t may, I grant:

But to be paddling palms and pinching fingers,

As now they are; and making practis’d smiles

As in a looking-glass; and then to sigh, as ‘twere

The mort o’ the deer: O, that is entertainment

My bosom likes not, nor my brows,—Mamillius,

Art thou my boy?

MAMILLIUS

Ay, my good lord.

LEONTES

I’ fecks!

Why, that’s my bawcock. What! hast smutch’d thy nose?—

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