Shall I live on, to see this bastard kneel
And call me father? Better burn it now,
Than curse it then. But, be it; let it live:
It shall not neither.-You, sir, come you hither;
You, that have been so tenderly officious

With lady Margery, your midwife, there,

[To ANT.

To save this bastard's life :-for 'tis a bastard,

So sure as this beard's grey,6-what will you adventure To save this brat's life?

Ant. Any thing, my lord,

That my ability may undergo,

And nobleness impose: at least, thus much;

I'll pawn the little blood which I have left,

To save the innocent: any thing possible.

Leo. It shall be possible: Swear by this sword,7 Thou wilt perform my bidding.

Ant. I will, my lord.

Leo. Mark, and perform it; (seest thou?) for the fail Of any point in't shall not only be

Death to thyself, but to thy lewd-tongu'd wife;

Whom, for this time, we pardon. We enjoin thee,
As thou art liege-man to us, that thou carry
This female bastard hence; and that thou bear it
To some remote and desert place, quite out
Of our dominions; and that there thou leave it,
Without more mercy, to its own protection,
And favour of the climate.

As by strange fortune
It came to us, I do in justice charge thee,-
On thy soul's peril, and thy body's torture,-
That thou commend it strangely to some place,
Where chance may nurse, or end it: Take it up.

Ant. I swear to do this, though a present death
Had been more merciful.-Come on, poor babe :
Some powerful spirit instruct the kites and ravens,
To be thy nurses! Wolves, and bears, they say,
Casting their savageness aside, have done

[6] The King must mean the beard of Antigonus, which perhaps both here and on the former occasion, (See p. 24, 11. 2,) it was intended, he should lay hold of. Leontes has himself told us that twenty-three years ago he was unbreech'd, in his green velvet coat, his dagger muzzled; and of course his age at the opening of this play must be under thirty. He cannot therefore mean his own beard. MALONE.

[7] It was anciently the custom to swear by the cross that was on the handle of a sword. STEEV.

I remember to have seen the name of Jesus engraved upon the pummel of the sword of a Crusader in the Church at Winchelsea. DOUGE,

Like offices of pity.-Sir, be prosperous

In more than this deed doth require ! and blessing,
Against this cruelty, fight on thy side.

-Poor thing, condemn'd to loss! [Exit with the child.
Leo. No, I'll not rear

Another's issue.

1 Atten. Please your highness, posts,

From those you sent to the oracle, are come

An hour since: Cleomenes and Dion,

Being well arriv'd from Delphos, are both landed,
Hasting to the court.

1 Lord. So please you, sir, their speed

Hath been beyond account.

Leo. Twenty-three days

They have been absent: 'Tis good speed; foretels,
The great Apollo suddenly will have

The truth of this appear. Prepare you, lords;
Summon a session, that we may arraign
Our most disloyal lady: for, as she hath
Been publicly accus'd, so shall she have
A just and open trial. While she lives,
My heart will be a burden to me.
And think upon my bidding.

ACT III.

Leave me;

[Exeunt.

SCENE I-The same. A Street in some Town. Enter CLEOMENES and DION.

Cleomenes.

THE climate's delicate; the air most sweet;
Fertile the isle; the temple much surpassing
The common praise it bears.

Dion. I shall report,

For most it caught me, the celestial habits,

(Methinks, I so should term them,) and the reverence Of the grave wearers. O, the sacrifice!

How ceremonious, solemn, and unearthly

It was i' the offering!

Cleo. But, of all, the burst

And the ear-deafening voice o' the oracle,

Kin to Jove's thunder, so surpris'd my sense,

That I was nothing:

Dio. If the event o' the journey Prove as successful to the queen,

-O, be't so !

As it hath been to us, rare, pleasant, speedy,
The time is worth the use on't.

Cleo. Great Apollo,

Turn all to the best! These proclamations,
So forcing faults upon Hermione,

I little like.

Dion. The violent carriage of it

Will clear, or end, the business: When the oracle, (Thus by Apollo's great divine seal'd up,)

Shall the contents discover, something rare,

Even then will rush to knowledge.-Go,-fresh horses; -And gracious be the issue !

The same.

SCENE II.

[Exeunt.

A Court of Justice. LEONTES, Lords, and Officers, appear, properly seated.

Leo. This sessions (to our great grief, we pronounce)
Even pushes 'gainst our heart: The party tried,
The daughter of a king; our wife; and one
Of us too much belov'd.Let us be clear'd
Of being tyrannous, since we so openly

Proceed in justice; which shall have due course,
Even to the guilt, or the purgation.

-Produce the prisoner.

Offi. It is his highness' pleasure, that the queen Appear in person here in court.-Silence!

HERMIONE is brought in, guarded; PAULINA and Ladies, attending.

Leo. Read the indictment.

Offi. Hermione, queen to the worthy Leontes, king of Sicilia, thou art here accused and arraigned of high treason, in committing adultery with Polixenes, king of Bohemia; and conspiring with Camillo to take away the life of our sovereign lord the king, thy royal husband: the pretences whereof being by circumstances partly laid open, thou, Hermione, contrary to the faith and allegiance of a true subject, didst counsel and aid them, for their better safety, to fly away by night.

[8] Pretence-is, in this place, taken for a scheme laid, a plot formed. JOH.

Her. Since what I am to say, must be but that Which contradicts my accusation ; and

The testimony on my part, no other

But what comes from myself; it shall scarce boot me
To say, Not guilty: mine integrity,

Being counted falsehood, shall, as I express it,
Be so receiv'd. But thus,- -If powers divine
Behold our human actions, (as they do,)

I doubt not then, but innocence shall make
False accusation blush, and tyranny

Tremble at patience.-You, my lord, best know,
(Who least will seem to do so,) my past life
Hath been as continent, as chaste, as true,
As I am now unhappy; which is more
Than history can pattern, though devis'd,
And play'd, to take spectators: For behold me,-
A fellow of the royal bed, which owe

A moiety of the throne, a great king's daughter,
The mother to a hopeful prince,-here standing,
To prate and talk for life, and honour, 'fore

Who please to come and hear. For life, I prize it As I weigh grief, which I would spare for honour, 'Tis a derivative from me to mine, 2

And only that I stand for. I appeal

To your own conscience, sir, before Polixenes
Came to your court, how was I in your grace,
How merited to be so; since he came,
With what encounter so uncurrent I

Have strain'd, to appear thus :3 if one jot beyond
The bound of honour; or, in act, or will,
That way inclining; harden'd be the hearts
Of all that hear me, and my near'st of kin
Cry, Fye upon my grave!

Leo. I ne'er heard yet,

That any of these bolder vices wanted

[9] That is, my virtue being accounted wickedness, my assertion of it will pass but for a lie. Falsehood means both treachery and lie. JOHNS.

[1] Life is to me now only grief, and as such only is considered by me: I would therefore willingly dismiss it. JOHNS.

[2] This sentiment, which is probably borrowed from Eccl. iii. 11, cannot be too often impressed on the female mind: "The glory of a man is from the honour of his father; and a mother in dishonour, is a reproach unto her children." STEEV.

[3] The sense seems to be this :-"what sudden slip have I made, that I should catch a wrench in my character."-Mrs Ford talks of-some strain in her character. STEEV.

Less impudence to gainsay what they did,
Than to perform it first.3

Her. That's true enough;

Though 'tis a saying, sir, not due to me.

Leo. You will not own it.

Her. More than mistress of,

Which comes to me in name of fault, I must not
At all acknowledge. For Polixenes,
(With whom I am accus'd,) I do confess,
I lov'd him, as in honour he requir'd;
With such a kind of love, as might become
A lady like me; with a love, even such,
So, and no other, as yourself commanded:

Which not to have done, I think, had been in me
Both disobedience and ingratitude,

To you, and toward your friend; whose love had spoke,
Even since it could speak, from an infant, freely,
That it was yours. Now, for conspiracy,

I know not how it tastes; though it be disi'd
For me to try how all I know of it

Is, that Camillo was an honest man;

And, why he left your court, the gods themselves,
Wotting no more than I, are ignorant.

Leo. You knew of his departure, as you know
What you have underta'en to do in his absence.
Her. Sir,

You speak a language that I understand not :
My life stands in the level4 of your dreams,
Which I'll lay down.

Leo. Your actions are my dreams;

You had a bastard by Polixenes,

And I but dream'd it :-As you were past all shame, (Those of your facts are so), so past all truth: Which to deny, concerns more than avails :

For as

[3] It is apparent that according to the proper, at least according to the present, use of words, less should be more, or wanted should be had. But Shakspeare is very uncertain in his use of negatives. It may be necessary once to observe, that in our language, two negatives did not originally affirm, but strengthen the negation. This mode of speech was in time changed, but, as the change was made in opposition to long custom, it proceeded gradually, and uniformity was not obtained but through an intermediate confusion.

JOHNS.

[4] This metaphor, (as Mr. Douce has already observed,) is from gunnery. See. p. 30, n. 6. STEEV.

[5] I do not remember that fact is used any where absolutely for guilt, which must be its sense in this place. JOHNS.