I mean thou shalt), we 'll bar thee from succession; Shep. I cannot speak nor think, Nor dare to know that which I know.-O, sir, [TO FLORIZEL. You have undone a man of fourscore-three, That thought to fill his grave in quiet; yea, To die upon the bed my father died, To lie close by his honest bones: but now Some hangman must put on my shroud, and lay me Where no priest shovels-in dust.- O cursed wretch! [TO PERDITA. That knew'st this was the prince, and wouldst adventure To mingle faith with him.-Undone, undone! If I might die within this hour, I have lived To die when I desire. [Exit. Flo. I am, and by my fancy: if my reason Will thereto be obedient, I have reason; If not, my senses, better pleased with madness, Do bid it welcome. Flo. So call it: but it does fulfil my vow; I needs must think it honesty. Camillo, Not for Bohemia, nor the pomp that may Be thereat gleaned; for all the sun sees, or The close earth wombs, or the profound seas hide In unknown fathoms, will I break my oath To this my fair beloved. Therefore, I pray you, As you have ever been my father's honoured friend, With her whom here I cannot hold on shore: Have you deserved: it is my father's music If you may please to think I love the king, What colour for my visitation shall I Cam. Sent by the king your father The which shall point you forth at every sitting What you must say; that he shall not perceive But that you have your father's bosom there, And speak his very heart. Flo. I am bound to you: There is some sap in this. There shall not, at your father's house, these seven years, Be born another such. She is as forward of her breeding as I' the rear of our birth. She lacks instructions; for she seems a mistress To most that teach. Aut. Ha, ha! what a fool honesty is! and trust, his sworn brother, a very simple gentleman! I have sold all my trumpery; not a counterfeit stone, not a riband, glass, pomander, brooch, table-book, ballad, knife, tape, glove, shoetie, bracelet, horn ring, to keep my pack from fasting: they throng who should buy first; as if my trinkets had been hallowed, and brought a benediction to the buyer; by which means I saw whose purse was best in picture; and what I saw, to my good use I remembered. My clown (who wants but something to be a reasonable man) grew so in love with the wenches' song, that he would not stir his pettitoes till he had both tune and words; which so drew the rest of the herd to me, that all their other senses stuck in ears: you might have pinched a placket, it was senseless: 't was nothing to geld a codpiece of a purse; I would have filed keys off, that hung in chains: no hearing, no feeling, but my sir's song, and admiring the nothing of it. So that, in this time of lethargy, I picked and cut most of their festival purses: and had not the old man come in with a whoobub against his daughter and the king's son, and scared my choughs from the chaff, I had not left a purse alive in the whole army. [CAMILLO, FLORIZEL, and PERDITA, come forward. Cam. Nay, but my letters by this means being Aut. If they have overheard me now,-why hanging. [Aside. Cam. How now, good fellow? why shakest thou so? Fear not, man; here's no harm intended to thee. Aut. I am a poor fellow, sir. Cam. Why, be so still; here's nobody will steal that from thee: yet, for the outside of thy poverty, we must make an exchange: therefore, discase thee instantly (thou must think there's necessity in 't), and change garments with this gentleman. Though the pennyworth on his side be the worst, yet hold thee, there's some boot. Aut. I am a poor fellow, sir.—I know ye well enough. [Aside. Cam. Nay, pr'y thee despatch: the gentleman is half flayed already. Aut. Are you in earnest, sir?—I smell the trick on 't. [Aside. Flo. Despatch, I pr'y thee. Aut. Indeed I have had earnest; but I cannot with conscience take it. Cam. Unbuckle, unbuckle. [FLORIZEL and AUTOLYCUS exchange garments. Fortunate mistress,-let my prophecy Come home to you!—you must retire yourself Into some covert: take your sweetheart's hat, And pluck it o'er your brows; muffle your Dismantle you; and as you can, disliken The truth of your own seeming; that you may (For I do fear eyes over you) to shipboard Get undescried. He would not call me son. Cam. Nay, you shall have face; No hat.-Come, lady, come.-Farewell, my friend. Aut. Adieu, sir. Flo. O Perdita, what have we twain forgot? Pray you, a word. [They converse apart. Cam. What I do next shall be to tell the king [Aside. Of this escape, and whither they are bound; Thus we set on, Camillo, to the sea-side. [Exeunt FLORIZEL, PERDITA, and CAMILLO. Aut. I understand the business; I hear it: to have an open ear, a quick eye, and a nimble hand, is necessary for a cutpurse; a good nose is requi site also, to smell out work for the other senses. I see this is the time that the unjust man doth thrive. What an exchange had this been without boot?-what a boot is here with this exchange? Sure the gods do this year connive at us, and we may do anything extempore. The prince himself is about a piece of iniquity; stealing away from his father, with his clog at his heels. If I thought it were not a piece of honesty to acquaint the king withal, I would do 't: I hold it the more knavery to conceal it: and therein am I constant to my profession. Enter Clown and Shepherd. A side, aside: here is more matter for a hot brain. Every lane's-end, every shop, church, session, hanging, yields a careful man work. Clo. See, see, what a man you are now! There is no other way but to tell the king she's a changeling, and none of your flesh and blood. Shep. Nay, but hear me. Clo. Nay, but hear me. Clo. She being none of your flesh and blood, your flesh and blood has not offended the king; and so your flesh and blood is not to be punished by him. Shew those things you found about her; those secret things, all but what she has with her. This being done, let the law go whistle: I warrant you. Shep. I will tell the king all, every word, yea, and his son's pranks too; who, I may say, is no honest man neither to his father, nor to me, to go about to make me the king's brother-in-law. Clo. Indeed, brother-in-law was the farthest off you could have been to him; and then your blood had been the dearer by I know how much an ounce. Aut. Very wisely; puppies! [Aside. Shep. Well, let us to the king; there is that in this fardel will make him scratch his beard. Aut. I know not what impediment this complaint may be to the flight of my master. [Aside. Clo. 'Pray heartily he be at palace. Aut. Though I am not naturally honest, I am so sometimes by chance. Let me pocket up my pedler's excrement. [Takes off his false beard. —How now, rustics? whither are you bound? Shep. To the palace, an it like your worship. Aut. Your affairs there; what; with whom ; the condition of that fardel; the place of your dwelling; your names; your ages; of what having, breeding; and anything that is fitting to be known, -discover? Clo. We are but plain fellows, sir. Aut. A lie; you are rough and hairy. Let me have no lying; it becomes none but tradesmen, and they often give us soldiers the lie but we pay them for it with stamped coin, not stabbing steel therefore they do not "give" us the lie. if Clo. Your worship had like to have given us one, you had not taken yourself with the manner. Shep. Are you a courtier, an 't like you, sir? Aut. Whether it like me or no, I am a courtier. Seest thou not the air of the court in these enfoldings; hath not my gait in it the measure of the court; receives not thy nose court-odour from me; reflect I not on thy baseness courtcontempt? Think'st thou, for that I insinuate or toze from thee thy business, I am therefore no courtier? I am courtier cap-a-pie, and one that will either push on or pluck back thy business there whereupon I command thee to open thy affair. Shep. My business, sir, is to the king. Clo. Advocate's the court-word for a pheasant: say you have none. Shep. None, sir; I have no pheasant, cock nor hen. Aut. How blessed are we that are not simple men! Yet nature might have made me as these are; Therefore I'll not disdain. Clo. This cannot be but a great courtier. Shep. His garments are rich, but he wears them not handsomely. Clo. He seems to be the more noble in being fantastical: a great man, I'll warrant: I know by the picking on's teeth. Aut. The fardel there; what's i' the fardel? Wherefore that box? Shep. Sir, there lies such secrets in this fardel and box which none must know but the king; and which he shall know within this hour, if I may come to the speech of him. Aut. Age, thou hast lost thy labour. Aut. The king is not at the palace; he is gone aboard a new ship, to purge melancholy and air himself: for, if thou beest capable of things serious, thou must know the king is full of grief. Shep. So 'tis said, sir; about his son, that should have married a shepherd's daughter. shall be stoned; but that death is too soft for him, say I. Draw our throne into a sheep-cote ! all deaths are too few; the sharpest too easy. Clo. Has the old man e'er a son, sir, do you hear, an 't like sir? you, Aut. He has a son, who shall be flayed alive ; then, 'nointed over with honey, set on the head of a wasps'-nest; then stand till he be threequarters and a dram dead; then recovered again with aqua-vita, or some other hot infusion; then, raw as he is, and in the hottest day prognostication proclaims, shall he be set against a brickwall, the sun looking with a southward eye upon him; where he is to behold him with flies blown to death. But what talk we of these traitorly rascals, whose miseries are to be smiled at, their offences being so capital? Tell me (for you seem to be honest plain men) what have you to the king: being something gently considered, I'll bring you where he is aboard, tender your persons to his presence, whisper him in your behalfs; and if it be in man, besides the king, to effect your suits, here is man shall do it. Clo. He seems to be of great authority: close with him, give him gold; and though authority be a stubborn bear, yet he is oft led by the nose with gold: shew the inside of your purse to the outside of his hand, and no more ado. Remember, stoned and flayed alive! Shep. An't please you, sir, to undertake the business for us, here is that gold I have: I'll make it as much more, and leave this young pawn till I bring it you. man in Aut. After I have done what I promised? Shep. Ay, sir. Aut. Well, give me the moiety.-Are you a party in this business? Clo. In some sort, sir: but though my case be a pitiful one, I hope I shall not be flayed out of it. Aut. O, that's the case of the shepherd's son : -hang him, he'll be made an example. Clo. Comfort, good comfort: we must to the king, and shew our strange sights: he must know 't is none of your daughter nor my sister; we are gone else.-Sir, I will give you as much as this old man does, when the business is performed; and remain, as he says, your pawn, till it be brought you. Aut. I will trust you. Walk before toward the sea-side; go on the right hand; I will but look upon the hedge, and follow you. Clo. We are blessed in this man, as I may say, even blessed. Shep. Let's before, as he bids us: he was provided to do us good. [Exeunt Shepherd and Clown. Aut. If I had a mind to be honest, I see fortune would not suffer me; she drops booties in my mouth. I am courted now with a double occasion,-gold, and a means to do the prince my master good; which, who knows how that may turn back to my advancement? I will bring these two moles, these blind ones, aboard him: if he think it fit to shore them again, and that the complaint they have to the king concerns him nothing, let him call me rogue for being so far officious; for I am proof against that title, and what shame else belongs to 't. To him will I present them; there may be matter in it. [Exit. |