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The Winter’s Tale: Act III, Scene 3

The Winter’s Tale
Act III, Scene 3

Bohemia. A desert country near the sea.

  1. Enter Antigonus and a Mariner with the babe.

Antigonus

1 - 2
  1. Thou art perfect then, our ship hath touch’d upon
  2. The deserts of Bohemia?

Mariner

3 - 7
  1.                         Ay, my lord, and fear
  2. We have landed in ill time: the skies look grimly,
  3. And threaten present blusters. In my conscience,
  4. The heavens with that we have in hand are angry,
  5. And frown upon ’s.

Antigonus

8 - 10
  1. Their sacred wills be done! Go get aboard;
  2. Look to thy bark, I’ll not be long before
  3. I call upon thee.

Mariner

11 - 14
  1. Make your best haste, and go not
  2. Too far i’ th’ land; ’tis like to be loud weather.
  3. Besides, this place is famous for the creatures
  4. Of prey that keep upon’t.

Antigonus

15 - 16
  1.                           Go thou away,
  2. I’ll follow instantly.

Mariner

17 - 18
  1.                        I am glad at heart
  2. To be so rid o’ th’ business.
  1. Exit.

Antigonus

19 - 63
  1.                               Come, poor babe.
  2. I have heard (but not believ’d) the spirits o’ th’ dead
  3. May walk again. If such thing be, thy mother
  4. Appear’d to me last night; for ne’er was dream
  5. So like a waking. To me comes a creature,
  6. Sometimes her head on one side, some another
  7. I never saw a vessel of like sorrow,
  8. So fill’d, and so becoming; in pure white robes,
  9. Like very sanctity, she did approach
  10. My cabin where I lay; thrice bow’d before me,
  11. And (gasping to begin some speech) her eyes
  12. Became two spouts; the fury spent, anon
  13. Did this break from her: Good Antigonus,
  14. Since fate (against thy better disposition)
  15. Hath made thy person for the thrower-out
  16. Of my poor babe, according to thine oath,
  17. Places remote enough are in Bohemia,
  18. There weep and leave it crying; and for the babe
  19. Is counted lost forever, Perdita
  20. I prithee call’t. For this ungentle business,
  21. Put on thee by my lord, thou ne’er shalt see
  22. Thy wife Paulina more.” And so, with shrieks,
  23. She melted into air. Affrighted much,
  24. I did in time collect myself and thought
  25. This was so, and no slumber. Dreams are toys,
  26. Yet for this once, yea, superstitiously,
  27. I will be squar’d by this. I do believe
  28. Hermione hath suffer’d death, and that
  29. Apollo would (this being indeed the issue
  30. Of King Polixenes) it should here be laid,
  31. Either for life or death, upon the earth
  32. Of its right father. Blossom, speed thee well!
  33. Laying down the child, with a scroll.
  34. There lie, and there thy character; there these,
  35. Placing a bundle beside it.
  36. Which may, if Fortune please, both breed thee, pretty,
  37. And still rest thine.
  38. Thunder.
  39.                       The storm begins. Poor wretch,
  40. That for thy mother’s fault art thus expos’d
  41. To loss, and what may follow! Weep I cannot,
  42. But my heart bleeds; and most accurs’d am I
  43. To be by oath enjoin’d to this. Farewell!
  44. The day frowns more and more; thou’rt like to have
  45. A lullaby too rough. I never saw
  46. The heavens so dim by day. A savage clamor!
  47. Well may I get aboard! This is the chase;
  48. I am gone forever.
  1. Exit pursued by a bear.
  1. Enter Shepherd.

Old Shepherd

64 - 80
  1. I would there were no age between ten and three-and-twenty,
  2. or that youth would sleep out the rest; for there is nothing
  3. in the between but getting wenches with child, wronging the
  4. ancientry, stealing, fighting
  5. Horns.
  6. Hark you now! Would any but these boil’d-brains of nineteen
  7. and two-and-twenty hunt this weather? They have scar’d away
  8. two of my best sheep, which I fear the wolf will sooner find
  9. than the master. If any where I have them, ’tis by the
  10. sea-side, browsing of ivy. Good luck, and’t be thy will!
  11. What have we here? Mercy on ’s, a barne? A very pretty
  12. barne! A boy, or a child, I wonder? A pretty one, a very
  13. pretty one: sure some scape. Though I am not bookish, yet I
  14. can read waiting-gentlewoman in the scape. This has been
  15. some stair-work, some trunk-work, some behind-door-work.
  16. They were warmer that got this than the poor thing is here.
  17. I’ll take it up for pity, yet I’ll tarry till my son come;
  18. he hallow’d but even now. Whoa-ho-hoa!
  1. Enter Clown.

Clown

81
  1. Hilloa, loa!

Old Shepherd

82 - 84
  1. What? Art so near? If thou’lt see a thing to talk on when
  2. thou art dead and rotten, come hither. What ail’st thou,
  3. man?

Clown

85 - 87
  1. I have seen two such sights, by sea and by land! But I am
  2. not to say it is a sea, for it is now the sky, betwixt the
  3. firmament and it you cannot thrust a bodkin’s point.

Old Shepherd

88
  1. Why, boy, how is it?

Clown

89 - 100
  1. I would you did but see how it chafes, how it rages, how it
  2. takes up the shore! But that’s not to the point. O, the most
  3. piteous cry of the poor souls! Sometimes to see ’em, and not
  4. to see ’em; now the ship boring the moon with her mainmast,
  5. and anon swallow’d with yeast and froth, as you’ld thrust a
  6. cork into a hogshead. And then for the land-service, to see
  7. how the bear tore out his shoulder-bone, how he cried to me
  8. for help, and said his name was Antigonus, a nobleman. But
  9. to make an end of the ship, to see how the sea flap-dragon’d
  10. it; but, first, how the poor souls roar’d, and the sea
  11. mock’d them; and how the poor gentleman roar’d, and the bear
  12. mock’d him, both roaring louder than the sea or weather.

Old Shepherd

101
  1. Name of mercy, when was this, boy?

Clown

102 - 104
  1. Now, now; I have not wink’d since I saw these sights. The
  2. men are not yet cold under water, nor the bear half din’d on
  3. the gentleman. He’s at it now.

Old Shepherd

105
  1. Would I had been by, to have help’d the old man!

Clown

106 - 107
  1. I would you had been by the ship side, to have help’d her;
  2. there your charity would have lack’d footing.

Old Shepherd

108 - 114
  1. Heavy matters, heavy matters! But look thee here, boy. Now
  2. bless thyself: thou met’st with things dying, I with things
  3. new-born. Here’s a sight for thee; look thee, a
  4. bearing-cloth for a squire’s child! Look thee here, take up,
  5. take up, boy; open’t. So, let’s seeit was told me I should
  6. be rich by the fairies. This is some changeling; open’t;
  7. what’s within, boy?

Clown

115 - 116
  1. You’re a made old man; if the sins of your youth are
  2. forgiven you, you’re well to live. Gold, all gold!

Old Shepherd

117 - 120
  1. This is fairy gold, boy, and ’twill prove so. Up with’t,
  2. keep it close. Home, home, the next way. We are lucky, boy,
  3. and to be so still requires nothing but secrecy. Let my
  4. sheep go. Come, good boy, the next way home.

Clown

121 - 124
  1. Go you the next way with your findings; I’ll go see if the
  2. bear be gone from the gentleman and how much he hath eaten.
  3. They are never curst but when they are hungry. If there be
  4. any of him left, I’ll bury it.

Old Shepherd

125 - 126
  1. That’s a good deed. If thou mayest discern by that which is
  2. left of him what he is, fetch me to th’ sight of him.

Clown

127
  1. Marry, will I; and you shall help to put him i’ th’ ground.

Old Shepherd

128
  1. ’Tis a lucky day, boy, and we’ll do good deeds on’t.
  1. Exeunt.
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