Sicilia. A Room in the Palace.
 Enter HERMIONE, MAMILLIUS, and 1st and 2nd LADY.

Hermione	Take the boy to you; he so troubles me,
	'Tis past enduring.

1st Lady							Come, my gracious lord,
	Shall I be your playfellow?

Mamillius	No, I'll none of you.

1st Lady	Why, my sweet lord?

Mamillius	You'll kiss me hard, and speak to me as if
	I were a baby still. I love you better.

2nd Lady	And why so, my lord?

Mamillius								Not for because
	Your brows are blacker; yet black brows, they say,
	Become some women best, so that there be not
	Too much hair there, but in a semicircle,
	Or a half-moon, made with a pen.

2nd Lady											Who taught' this?

Mamillius	I learned it out of women's faces. Pray now,
	What colour are your eyebrows?

1st Lady										Blue, my lord.

Mamillius	Nay, that's a mock. I have seen a lady's nose
	That has been blue, but not her eyebrows.

1st Lady											Hark ye,
	The queen your mother rounds apace. We shall
	Present our services to a fine new prince
	One of these days, and then you'd wanton with us,
	If we would have you.

2nd Lady							She is spread of late
	Into a goodly bulk. Good time encounter her!

Hermione	What wisdom stirs amongst you? Come, sir, now
	I am for you again. Pray you, sit by us,
	And tell's a tale.

Mamillius						Merry or sad, shall't be?

Hermione	As merry as you will.

Mamillius	A sad tale's best for winter. I have one
	Of sprites and goblins.

Hermione								Let's have that, good sir.
	Come on, sit down. Come on, and do your best
	To fright me with your sprites; you're powerful at it.

Mamillius	There was a man-

Hermione						Nay, come sit down, then on.

Mamillius	Dwelt by a churchyard. I will tell it softly,
	Yond crickets shall not hear it.

Hermione										Come on then,
	And give't me in mine ear.

                   Enter LEONTES, ANTIGONUS, and LORDS.

Leontes	Was he met there? His train? Camillo with him?

1st Lord	Behind the tuft of pines I met them; never
	Saw I men scour so on their way. I eyed them
	Even to their ships.

Leontes							How blest am I
	In my just censure, in my true opinion!
	Alack, for lesser knowledge! How accursed
	In being so blest! There may be in the cup
	A spider steeped, and one may drink, depart,
	And yet partake no venom, for his knowledge
	Is not infected; but if one present
	Th' abhorred ingredient to his eye, make known
	How he hath drunk, he cracks his gorge, his sides,
	With violent hefts. I have drunk, and seen the spider.
	Camillo was his help in this, his pandar.
	There is a plot against my life, my crown.
	All's true that is mistrusted. That false villain
	Whom I employed was pre-employed by him.
	He has discovered my design, and I
	Remain a pinched thing, yea, a very trick
	For them to play at will. How came the posterns
	So easily open?

1st Lord						By his great authority,
	Which often hath no less prevailed than so
	On your command.

Leontes					I know't too well.
	[To HERMIONE.]
	Give me the boy. I am glad you did not nurse him:
	Though he does bear some signs of me, yet you
	Have too much blood in him.

Hermione									What is this? Sport?

Leontes	Bear the boy hence; he shall not come about her.
	Away with him, and let her sport herself
	With that she's big with; for 'tis Polixenes
	Has made thee swell thus.
										[Exit ATTENDANT with MAMILLIUS.

Hermione								But I'd say he had not;
	And I'll be sworn you would believe my saying,
	How e'er you lean to the nay-ward.

Leontes											You, my lords,
	Look on her, mark her well; be but about
	To say "she is a goodly lady", and
	The justice of your hearts will thereto add
	"'Tis pity she's not honest, honourable".
	Praise her but for this her without-door form,
	- Which, on my faith deserves high speech - and straight
	The shrug, the hum or ha, these petty brands
	That calumny doth use - O, I am out!-
	That mercy does, for calumny will sear
	Virtue itself - these shrugs, these hum's and ha's,
	When you have said she's goodly, come between,
	Ere you can say "she's honest". But be't known,
	From him that has most cause to grieve it should be,
	She's an adultress.

Hermione							Should a villain say so,
	The most replenished villain in the world,
	He were as much more villain. You, my lord,
	Do but mistake.

Leontes						You have mistook, my lady,
	Polixenes for Leontes. O thou thing!
	Which I'll not call a creature of thy place,
	Lest barbarism, making me the precedent,
	Should a like language use to all degrees,
	And mannerly distinguishment leave out
	Betwixt the prince and beggar. I have said
	She's an adultress - I have said with whom-
	More, she's a traitor, and Camillo is
	A federary with her, and one that knows
	What she should shame to know herself
	But with her most vile principal, that she's
	A bed-swerver, even as bad as those
	That vulgars give bold'st titles; ay, and privy
	To this their late escape.

Hermione									No, by my life,
	Privy to none of this. How will this grieve you
	When you shall come to clearer knowledge, that
	You thus have published me! Gentle my lord,
	You scarce can right me throughly, then, to say
	You did mistake.

Leontes						No; if I mistake
	In those foundations which I build upon,
	The centre is not big enough to bear
	A schoolboy's top. Away with her to prison!
	He who shall speak for her is afar off guilty
	But that he speaks.

Hermione							There's some ill planet reigns.
	I must be patient till the heavens look
	With an aspect more favourable. Good my lords,
	I am not prone to weeping, as our sex
	Commonly are - the want of which vain dew
	Perchance shall dry your pities - but I have
	That honourable grief lodged here which burns
	Worse than tears drown. Beseech you all, my lords,
	With thoughts so qualified as your charities
	Shall best instruct you, measure me; and so
	The king's will be performed.

Leontes										Shall I be heard?

Hermione	Who is't that goes with me? Beseech your highness
	My women may be with me, for you see
	My plight requires it. Do not weep, good fools,
	There is no cause. When you shall know your mistress
	Has deserved prison, then abound in tears
	As I come out. This action I now go on
	Is for my better grace. Adieu, my lord;
	I never wished to see you sorry; now
	I trust I shall. My women, come; you have leave.

Leontes	Go, do our bidding. Hence!
								 [Exit HERMIONE, guarded, and LADIES.

1st Lord	Beseech your highness call the queen again.

Antigonus	Be certain what you do, sir, lest your justice
	Prove violence, in the which three great ones suffer,
	Yourself, your queen, your son.

1st Lord											For her, my lord,
	I dare my life lay down, and will do't, sir,
	Please you t' accept it, that the queen is spotless
	I'th' eyes of heaven and to you - I mean
	In this which you accuse her.

Antigonus											If it prove
	She's otherwise, I'll keep my stables where
	I lodge my wife, I'll go in couples with her;
	Than when I feel and see her no further trust her;
	For every inch of woman in the world,
	Ay, every dram of woman's flesh is false,
	If she be.

Leontes			Hold your peaces.

1st Lord										Good my lord-

Antigonus	It is for you we speak, not for ourselves.
	You are abused, and by some putter-on
	That will be damned for't. Would I knew the villain!
	I would land-damn him. Be she honour-flawed,
	I have three daughters - the eldest is eleven,
	The second and the third, nine and some five-
	If this prove true, they'll pay for't. By mine honour,
	I'll geld 'em all; fourteen they shall not see
	To bring false generations. They are co-heirs,
	And I had rather glib myself than they
	Should not produce fair issue.

Leontes											Cease, no more;
	You smell this business with a sense as cold
	As is a dead man's nose; but I do see't and feel't,
	As you feel doing thus; and see withal
	The instruments that feel.

Antigonus									If it be so,
	We need no grave to bury honesty;
	There's not a grain of it the face to sweeten
	Of the whole dungy earth.

Leontes									What, lack I credit?

1st Lord	I had rather you did lack than I, my lord,
	Upon this ground; and more it would content me
	To have her honour true than your suspicion,
	Be blamed for't how you might.

Leontes										Why, what need we
	Commune with you of this, but rather follow
	Our forceful instigation? Our prerogative
	Calls not your counsels, but our natural goodness
	Imparts this; which if you, or stupefied,
	Or seeming so in skill, cannot or will not
	Relish a truth, like us, inform yourselves
	We need no more of your advice. The matter,
	The loss, the gain, the ord'ring on't, is all
	Properly ours.

Antigonus					And I wish, my liege,
	You had only in your silent judgement tried it,
	Without more overture.

Leontes								How could that be?
	Either thou art most ignorant by age,
	Or thou wert born a fool. Camillo's flight,
	Added to their familiarity,
	Which was as gross as ever touched conjecture,
	That lacked sight only, nought for approbation
	But only seeing, all other circumstances
	Made up to th' deed, doth push on this proceeding.
	Yet, for a greater confirmation-
	For in an act of this importance 'twere
	Most piteous to be wild - I have dispatched in post
	To sacred Delphos, to Apollo's temple,
	Cleomenes and Dion, whom you know
	Of stuffed sufficiency. Now, from the oracle
	They will bring all; whose spiritual counsel had,
	Shall stop or spur me. Have I done well?

1st Lord	Well done, my lord.

Leontes	Though I am satisfied, and need no more
	Than what I know, yet shall the oracle
	Give rest to th' minds of others; such as he
	Whose ignorant credulity will not
	Come up to th' truth. So have we thought it good
	From our free person she should be confined,
	Lest that the treachery of the two fled hence
	Be left her to perform. Come, follow us;
	We are to speak in public, for this business
	Will raise us all.

Antigonus				[Aside.]	To laughter, as I take it,
	If the good truth were known.
													[Exeunt.
