Clo. Go you the next way with your findings; I'll ga see if the bear be gone from the gentleman, and how much he hath eaten they are never curst, but when they are hungry: if there be any of him left, I'll bury it.

Shep. That's a good deed: If thou may'st discern by that which is left of him, what he is, fetch me to the sight of him.

Clo. Marry, will I; and you shall help to put him i'the ground.

Shep. 'Tis a lucky day, boy; and we'll do good deeds on't.

[Exeunt.

Time. I,— that please some, try all; both joy, and terror,

Of good and bad; that make, and unfold error,
Now take upon me, in the name of Time,
To use my wings. Impute it not a crime,
To me, or my swift passage, that I slide
O'er sixteen years, and leave the growth untried
Of that wide gap; since it is in my power
To o'erthrow law, and in one self-born hour
To plant and o'erwhelm custom: Let me pass
The same I am, ere ancient'st order was,
Or what is now received: I witness to
The times that brought them in; so shall I do
To the freshest things now reigning; and make stale
The glistering of this present, as my tale
Now seems to it. Your patience this allowing,
I turn my glass; and give my scene such growing,

As you had slept between. Leontes leaving
The effects of his fond jealousies; so grieving,
That he shuts up himself; imagine me,
Gentle spectators, that I now may be

In fair Bohemia; and remember well,
I mentioned a son o'the king's, which Florizel
I now name to you; and with speed so pace
To speak of Perdita, now grown in grace
Equal with wond'ring: What of her ensues,
I list not prophecy; but let Time's news
Be known, when 'tis brought forth:

daughter,

a shepherd's

And what to her adheres, which follows after,
Is the argument 3 of time: Of this allow,
If ever you have spent time worse ere now;
If never yet, that Time himself doth say,
He wishes earnestly, you never may.

[Exit.

SCENE I.

Bohemia. A Room in the Palace of Polixenes.

Enter POLIXENES and CAMILLO.

Pol. I pray thee, good Camillo, be no more importunate: 'tis a sickness, denying thee any thing; a death, to grant this.

Cam. It is fifteen years, since I saw my country: though I have, for the most part, been aired abroad, I desire to lay my bones there. Besides, the penitent king, my master, hath sent for me: to whose feeling sorrows I might be some allay, or I o'erween + to think so; which is another spur to my departure.

Pol. As thou lovest me, Camillo, wipe not out the rest of thy services, by leaving me now: the

3 Subject.

+ Think too highly of myself.

need I have of thee, thine own goodness hath made; better not to have had thee, than thus to want thee: thou, having made me businesses, which none, without thee can sufficiently manage, must either stay to execute them thyself, or take away with thee the very services thou hast done: which if I have not enough considered, (as too much I cannot,) to be more thankful to thee, shall be my study; and my ' profit therein, the heaping friendships. Of that fatal country, Sicilia, pr'ythee speak no more: whose very naming punishes me with the remembrance of that penitent, as thou call'st him, and reconciled king, my brother; whose loss of his most precious queen, and children, are even now to be afresh lamented. Say to me, when saw'st thou the prince Florizel my son? Kings are no less unhappy, their issue not being gracious, than they are in losing them, when they have approved their virtues.

Cam. Sir, it is three days, since I saw the prince: What his happier affairs may be, are to me unknown but I have, missingly, noted; he is of late much retired from court; and is less frequent to his princely exercises, than formerly he hath appeared.

Pol. I have considered so much, Camillo; and with some care; so far, that I have eyes under my service, which look upon his removedness from whom I have this intelligence; That he is seldom from the house of a most homely shepherd; a man, they say, that from very nothing, and beyond the imagination of his neighbours, is grown into an unspeakable estate.

Cam. I have heard, sir, of such a man, who hath a daughter of most rare note: the report of her is extended more, than can be thought to begin from such a cottage.

Pol. That's likewise part of my intelligence. But, I fear the angle that plucks our son thither. Thou

5.Observed at intervals.

shalt accompany us to the place: where we will, not appearing what we are, have some question with the shepherd; from whose simplicity, I think it not uneasy to get the cause of my son's resort thither. Pr'ythee, be my present partner in this business, and lay aside the thoughts of Sicilia.

Cam. I willingly obey your command.

Pol. My best Camillo ! - We must disguise ourselves. [Exeunt.

SCENE II.

A Road near the Shepherd's Cottage.

Enter AUTOLYCUS.

Aut. I have served prince Florizel, and, in my time, wore three-pile; but now I am out of service:

But shall I go mourn for that, my dear? [Sings.
The pale moon shines by night:

And when I wander here and there,
I then do most go right.

If tinkers may have leave to live,
And bear the sow-skin budget;
Then my account I well may give,

And in the stocks avouch it.

My father named me, Autolycus; who, being, as I am, littered under Mercury, was likewise a snapper-up of unconsidered trifles: With die, and drab, I purchased this caparison; and my revenue is the silly cheat"; Gallows, and knock, are too powerful on the highway: beating, and hanging, are terrors to me; for the life to come, I sleep out the thought of it. A prize! a prize!

6 Rich velvet.

7 Picking pockets.

Enter Clown.

Clo. Let me see:

Every 'leven wether

tods:

every tod yields-pound and odd shilling: fifteen hundred shorn, What comes the wool to?

Aut. If the springe hold, the cock's mine. [Aside. Clo. I cannot do't without counters. Let me see; what I am to buy for our sheep-shearing feast? Three pound of sugar; five pound of currants; rice What will this sister of mine do with rice? But my father hath made her mistress of the feast, and she lays it on. She hath made me four-and-twenty nosegays for the shearers: three-man song-men all, and very good ones; but they are most of them means 9 and bases. I must have saffron, to colour the warden pies!; mace, that's out of my note: nutmegs, seven; a race, or two, of ginger; but that I may beg;-four pound of prunes, and as many of raisins o'the sun.

dates,

Aut. O, that ever I was born!

none;

[Grovelling on the ground.

Clo. I'the name of me, Aut. O help me, help me! pluck but off these rags; and then, death, death!

Clo. Alack, poor soul! thou hast need of more rags to lay on thee, rather than have these off.

Aut. O, sir, the loathsomeness of them offends me more than the stripes I have received; which are mighty ones and millions.

Clo. Alas, poor man! a million of beating may come to a great matter.

Aut. I am robbed, sir, and beaten; my money and apparel talen from me, and these detestable things put upon me.

Clo. What, by a horse-man, or a foot-man?
Aut. A foot-man, sweet sir, a foot-man,

8 Singers of catches in three parts.

Pies made of a species of

9 Tenors.

pears.