Given to the fire, a moiety of my rest

Might come to me again. Who’s there?

Enter a Servant

SERVANT

My lord.

LEONTES

How does the boy?

SERVANT

He took good rest tonight.

’Tis hoped his sickness is discharged.

LEONTES To see his nobleness!

Conceiving the dishonour of his mother

He straight declined, drooped, took it deeply,

Fastened and fixed the shame on’t in himself;

Threw off his spirit, his appetite, his sleep,

And downright languished. Leave me solely. Go,

See how he fares.

Exit Servant

Fie, fie, no thought of him.

The very thought of my revenges that way

Recoil upon me. In himself too mighty,

And in his parties, his alliance. Let him be

Until a time may serve. For present vengeance,

Take it on her. Camillo and Polixenes

Laugh at me, make their pastime at my sorrow.

They should not laugh if I could reach them, nor

Shall she, within my power.

Enter Paulina, carrying a babe, with Antigonus,

Lords, and the Servant, trying to restrain her

A LORD

You must not enter.

PAULINA

Nay rather, good my lords, be second to me.

Fear you his tyrannous passion more, alas,

Than the Queen’s life?—a gracious, innocent soul,

More free than he is jealous.

ANTIGONUS

That’s enough.

SERVANT

Madam, he hath not slept tonight, commanded

None should come at him.

PAULINA

Not so hot, good sir.

I come to bring him sleep. ’Tis such as you,

That creep like shadows by him, and do sigh

At each his needless heavings, such as you

Nourish the cause of his awaking. I

Do come with words as medicinal as true,

Honest as either, to purge him of that humour

That presses him from sleep.

LEONTES

What noise there, ho?

PAULINA

No noise, my lord, but needful conference

About some gossips for your highness.

LEONTES

How?

Away with that audacious lady! Antigonus,

I charged thee that she should not come about me.

I knew she would.

ANTIGONUS

I told her so, my lord,

On your displeasure’s peril and on mine,

She should not visit you.

LEONTES

What, canst not rule her?

PAULINA

From all dishonesty he can. In this,

Unless he take the course that you have done—

Commit me for committing honour—trust it,

He shall not rule me.

ANTIGONUS

La you now, you hear.

When she will take the rein I let her run,

But she’ll not stumble.

PAULINA (to Leontes) Good my liege, I come—

And I beseech you hear me, who professes

Myself your loyal servant, your physician,

Your most obedient counsellor; yet that dares

Less appear so in comforting your evils

Than such as most seem yours—I say, I come

From your good queen.

LEONTES Good queen?

PAULINA

Good queen, my lord, good queen, I say good queen,

And would by combat make her good, so were I

A man, the worst about you.

LEONTES (to Lords)

Force her hence.

PAULINA

Let him that makes but trifles of his eyes

First hand me. On mine own accord, I’ll off.

But first I’ll do my errand. The good Queen—

For she is good—hath brought you forth a daughter—

Here ’tis—commends it to your blessing.

She lays down the babe

LEONTES Out!

A mankind witch! Hence with her, out o’door—

A most intelligencing bawd.

PAULINA

Not so.

I am as ignorant in that as you

In so entitling me, and no less honest

Than you are mad, which is enough, I’ll warrant,

As this world goes, to pass for honest.

LEONTES (to Lords)

Traitors,

Will you not push her out?

(To Antigonus)

Give her the bastard.

Thou dotard, thou art woman-tired, unroosted

By thy Dame Partlet here. Take up the bastard,

Take’t up, I say. Give’t to thy crone.

PAULINA (to Antigonus)

For ever

Unvenerable be thy hands if thou

Tak’st up the princess by that forced baseness

Which he has put upon’t.

LEONTES

He dreads his wife.

PAULINA

So I would you did. Then ’twere past all doubt

You’d call your children yours.

LEONTES

A nest of traitors.

ANTIGONUS

I am none, by this good light.

PAULINA

Nor I, nor any

But one that’s here, and that’s himself, for he

The sacred honour of himself, his queen’s,

His hopeful son’s, his babe‘s, betrays to slander,

Whose sting is sharper than the sword’s; and will

not—

For as the case now stands, it is a curse

He cannot be compelled to’t—once remove

The root of his opinion, which is rotten

As ever oak or stone was sound.

LEONTES (to Lords)

A callat

Of boundless tongue, who late hath beat her husband,

And now baits me! This brat is none of mine.

It is the issue of Polixenes.

Hence with it, and together with the dam

Commit them to the fire.

PAULINA

It is yours,

And might we lay th‘old proverb to your charge,

So like you ’tis the worse. Behold, my lords,

Although the print be little, the whole matter

And copy of the father: eye, nose, lip,

The trick of’s frown, his forehead, nay, the valley,