The Winter's Tale Part 7

CLOWN. Not a more cowardly rogue in all Bohemia; if you had but look'd big and spit at him, he'd have run.

AUTOLYCUS. I must confess to you, sir, I am no fighter; I am false of heart that way, and that he knew, I warrant him.

CLOWN. How do you now?

AUTOLYCUS. 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.

CLOWN. Shall I bring thee on the way?

AUTOLYCUS. No, good-fac'd sir; no, sweet sir.

CLOWN. Then fare thee well. I must go buy spices for our sheep-shearing.

AUTOLYCUS. Prosper you, sweet sir! Exit CLOWN Your purse 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 unroll'd, and my name put in the book of virtue!

[Sings]

Jog on, jog on, the footpath way, And merrily hent the stile-a; A merry heart goes all the day, Your sad tires in a mile-a. Exit

SCENE IV.

Bohemia. 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 G.o.ds, 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' th' land, you have obscur'd With a swain's wearing; and me, poor lowly maid, Most G.o.ddess-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 attir'd; swoon, I think, To show myself a gla.s.s.

FLORIZEL. I bless the time When my good falcon made her flight across Thy father's ground.

PERDITA. Now Jove afford you cause!

To me the difference forges dread; your greatness Hath not been us'd to fear. Even now I tremble To think your father, by some accident, Should pa.s.s this way, as you did. O, the Fates!

How would he look to see his work, so n.o.ble, Vilely bound up? What would he say? Or how Should I, in these my borrowed flaunts, behold The sternness of his presence?

FLORIZEL. Apprehend Nothing but jollity. The G.o.ds themselves, 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-rob'd G.o.d, Golden Apollo, a poor humble swain, 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 l.u.s.ts Burn hotter than my faith.

PERDITA. O, but, sir, Your resolution cannot hold when 'tis Oppos'd, as it must be, by th' pow'r of the King.

One of these two must be necessities, Which then will speak, that you must change this purpose, Or I my life.

FLORIZEL. Thou dearest Perdita, With these forc'd thoughts, I prithee, darken not The mirth o' th' feast. Or I'll be thine, my fair, Or not my father's; for I cannot be Mine own, nor anything 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 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, Stand you auspicious!

FLORIZEL. See, your guests approach.

Address yourself to entertain them sprightly, And let's be red with mirth.

Enter SHEPHERD, with POLIXENES and CAMILLO, disguised; CLOWN, MOPSA, DORCAS, with OTHERS

SHEPHERD. Fie, daughter! When my old wife liv'd, upon This day she was both pantler, butler, cook; Both dame and servant; welcom'd all; serv'd all; Would sing her song and dance her turn; now here At upper end o' th' table, now i' th' middle; On his shoulder, and his; her face o' fire 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 A way to make us better friends, more known.

Come, quench your blushes, and present yourself That which you are, Mistress o' th' Feast. Come on, And bid us welcome to your sheep-shearing, As your good flock shall prosper.

PERDITA. [To POLIXENES] Sir, welcome.

It is my father's will I should take on me The hostess-ship o' th' day. [To CAMILLO]

You're welcome, sir.

Give me those flow'rs there, Dorcas. Reverend sirs, 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- A fair one are you- well you fit our ages With flow'rs of winter.

PERDITA. Sir, the year growing ancient, Not yet on summer's death nor on the birth Of trembling winter, the fairest flow'rs o' th' season Are our carnations and streak'd gillyvors, Which some call nature's b.a.s.t.a.r.ds. Of that kind Our rustic garden's barren; and I care not To get slips of them.

POLIXENES. 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. 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 A gentler scion to the wildest stock, And make conceive a bark of baser kind By bud of n.o.bler race. This is an art Which does mend nature- change it rather; but The art itself is nature.

PERDITA. So it is.

POLIXENES. Then make your garden rich in gillyvors, And do not call them b.a.s.t.a.r.ds.

PERDITA. I'll not put The dibble in earth to set one slip of them; 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 flow'rs for you: Hot lavender, mints, savory, marjoram; The marigold, that goes to bed wi' th' sun, And with him rises weeping; these are flow'rs Of middle summer, and I think they are given To men of middle age. Y'are very welcome.

CAMILLO. I should leave grazing, were I of your flock, And only live by gazing.

PERDITA. 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 flow'rs o' th' spring that might Become your time of day- and yours, and yours, That wear upon your virgin branches yet Your maidenheads growing. O Proserpina, From the flowers now that, frighted, thou let'st fall From Dis's waggon!- daffodils, 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 Bright Phoebus in his strength- a malady Most incident to maids; bold oxlips, and The crown-imperial; lilies of all kinds, The flow'r-de-luce being one. O, these I lack To make you garlands of, and my sweet friend 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 flow'rs.

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, I'd have you do it ever. When you sing, I'd have you buy and sell so; so give alms; Pray so; and, for the ord'ring your affairs, To sing them too. When you do dance, I wish you A wave o' th' sea, that you might ever do 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 deeds, That all your acts are queens.

PERDITA. O Doricles, Your praises are too large. But that your youth, And the true blood which peeps fairly through't, Do plainly give you out an unstain'd shepherd, With wisdom I might fear, my Doricles, 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 That never mean to part.

PERDITA. I'll swear for 'em.

POLIXENES. This is the prettiest low-born la.s.s that ever Ran on the green-sward; nothing she does or seems But smacks of something greater than herself, Too n.o.ble 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. 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. 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: He looks like sooth. He says he loves my daughter; I think so too; for never gaz'd 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 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 Which he not dreams of.

Enter a SERVANT

SERVANT. O master, if you did but hear the pedlar at the door, you would never dance again after a tabor and pipe; no, the bagpipe could not move you. He sings several tunes faster than you'll tell money; he 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 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 burdens of d.i.l.d.os and fadings, 'jump her and thump her'; and where some stretch-mouth'd 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 '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 all the colours i' th' rainbow; points, more than all the lawyers in Bohemia can learnedly handle, though they come to him by th' gross; inkles, caddisses, cambrics, lawns. Why he sings 'em over as they were G.o.ds or G.o.ddesses; you would think a smock were she-angel, he so chants 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'd think, sister.

PERDITA. Ay, good brother, or go about to think.

Enter AUTOLYCUS, Singing

Lawn as white as driven snow; Cypress black as e'er was crow; Gloves as sweet as damask roses; Masks for faces and for noses; 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- What maids lack from head to heel.

Come, buy of me, come; come buy, come buy; Buy, lads, or else your la.s.ses cry.

Come, buy.

CLOWN. If I were not in love with Mopsa, thou shouldst take no money of me; but being enthrall'd as I am, it will also be the bondage of certain ribbons and gloves.