To me the difference forges dread, your greatness
Hath not been us'd to fear. Even now I tremble
To think, your father, by some accident,

Should pass this way, as you did. O, the fates!
How would he look, to see his work, so noble,
Vilely bound up? What would he say? Or how
Should I, in these my borrow'd flaunts, behold
The sternness of his presence?

Flo.

Apprehend
Nothing but jollity. The gods themselves,
Humbling their deities to love, have taken
The shapes of beasts upon them: Jupiter
Became a bull, and bellow'd; the green Neptune
A ram, and bleated; and the fire-rob'd god,
Golden Apollo, a poor humble swain,
As I seem now. Their transformations
Were never for a piece of beauty rarer,
Nor in a way so chaste; since my desires
Run not before mine honour, nor my lusts
Burn hotter than my faith.

Your resolution cannot hold, when 'tis

Oppos'd, as it must be, by the power of the king.

One of these two must be necessities,

Which then will speak-that you must change this purpose,

Or I my life.

With these forc'd thoughts, I pr'ythee, darken not

The mirth o' the feast: or I'll be thine, my fair,

Or not my father's; for I cannot be

Mine own, or any thing to any, if

I be not thine: to this I am most constant,
Though destiny say, no. Be merry, girl';
Strangle such thoughts as these with any thing
That you behold the while. Your guests are coming :
Lift up your countenance, as it were the day

Of celebration of that nuptial, which

We two have sworn shall come.

Per.

Stand you auspicious!

O lady fortune,

Enter Shepherd, with POLIXENES and CAMILLO, disguised;

Flo.

Clown, MOPSA, DORCAS, and others.

See, your guests approach:

Address yourself to entertain them sprightly,
And let's be red with mirth.

Shep. Fie, daughter! when my old wife liv'd, upon
This day she was both pantler, butler, cook;
Both dame and servant; welcom'd all; serv'd all;
Would sing her song, and dance her turn; now here,
At upper end o' the table, now, i' the middle;
On his shoulder, and his; her face o' fire
With labour, and the thing she took to quench it,
She would to each one sip. You are retir'd,
As if you were a feasted one, and not
The hostess of the meeting: pray you, bid
These unknown friends to 's welcome; for it is
A way to make us better friends, more known.
Come; quench your blushes, and present yourself
That which you are, mistress o' the feast: come on,
And bid us welcome to your sheep-shearing,

As your good flock shall prosper.

Per.

[TO POL.] Sir, welcome.

It is my father's will, I should take on me

The hostess-ship o' the day :- [To CAM.] You're welcome,

sir.

Give me those flowers there, Dorcas. -Reverend sirs,

For you there's rosemary, and rue; these keep

Seeming and savour all the winter long:

Grace and remembrance be to you both,

And welcome to our shearing!

Pol.

Shepherdess,

(A fair one are you) well you fit our ages

With flowers of winter.

Per.

Sir, the year growing ancient, —

Not yet on summer's death, nor on the birth

Of trembling winter, -the fairest flowers o' the season

Are our carnations, and streak'd gilliflowers',

1

- and streak'd GILLIFLOWERS,] Pronounced of old gillyvors, and so spelt in the folios, both here, when the word is spoken by Perdita, and afterwards by Polixenes. The Rev. Mr. Dyce has a note ("Remarks," p. 83) in which he em. phatically calls upon editors of Shakespeare to reprint the exploded form of "gillyflowers," viz. gillyvors. He must excuse us for saying that this is the very Which some call nature's bastards: of that kind

Our rustic garden's barren, and I care not

To get slips of them.
Pol.

Do you neglect them?

Per.

Wherefore, gentle maiden,

For I heard it said, There is an art which, in their piedness, shares

With great creating nature *.

Pol.

Say, there be;

Yet nature is made better by no mean,

But nature makes that mean: so, o'er that art,

Which, you say, adds to nature, is an art

That nature makes. You see, sweet maid, we marry

A gentler scion to the wildest stock,

And make conceive a bark of baser kind

By bud of nobler race: this is an art

Which does mend nature, change it rather; but

Pol. Then make your garden rich in gilliflowers,

And do not call them bastards.

Per.

I'll not put

The dibble in earth to set one slip of them;
No more than, were I painted, I would wish

This youth should say, 'twere well, and only therefore

Desire to breed by me. - Here's flowers for you ;
Hot lavender, mints, savory, marjoram ;
The marigold, that goes to bed wi' the sun,
And with him rises weeping: these are flowers
Of middle summer, and, I think, they are given
To men of middle age. You are very welcome.

Cam. I should leave grazing, were I of your flock,

And only live by gazing.

Per.

Out, alas! You'd be so lean, that blasts of January

Would blow you through and through.-Now, my fair'st

friend,

I would, I had some flowers o'the spring, that might
Become your time of day; and your's, and your's,
That wear upon your virgin branches yet
Your maidenheads growing. - Proserpina!
For the flowers now, that, frighted, thou let'st fall
From Dis's waggon! daffodils,

That come before the swallow dares, and take
The winds of March with beauty; violets dim,
But sweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes,
Or Cytherea's breath; pale primroses,
That die unmarried ere they can behold
Bright Phœbus in his strength, a malady
Most incident to maids; bold oxlips, and
The crown-imperial; lilies of all kinds,
The flower-de-luce being one. O! these I lack,
To make you garlands of, and, my sweet friend,
To strew him o'er and o'er.

Flo.

What! like a corse?

Per. No, like a bank, for love to lie and play on,

Not like a corse; or if, -not to be buried,

But quick, and in mine arms. Come, take your flowers.

Methinks, I play as I have seen them do

In Whitsun-pastorals: sure, this robe of mine

Does change my disposition.

3

that, frighted, thou let'st fall

From Dis's waggon!] See Ovid, Metam. lib. v. The Rev. Mr. Dyce, in his "Few Notes," p. 70, here furnishes one which shows that another poet (B. Barnes) had spoken of "the waggon of black Dis." It would be easy to cite other instances, but we do not see how they illustrate Shakespeare, nor why it was necessary to explain that by "Dis's waggon," in the text, our poet meant "Dis's chariot:" we are not at all aware that any body ever disputed what was so palpable. We have not space for such matters.

Flo.

What you do

Still betters what is done. When you speak, sweet,

I'd have you do it ever: when you sing,

I'd have you buy and sell so; so give alms;
Pray so; and, for the ordering your affairs,
To sing them too. When you do dance, I wish you
A wave o' the sea, that you might ever do
Nothing but that; move still, still so,

And own no other function: each your doing,
So singular in each particular,
Crowns what you are doing in the present deeds,

That all your acts are queens.

Per.

O Doricles!

Your praises are too large: but that your youth,
And the true blood, which peeps so fairly through it',

Do plainly give you out an unstain'd shepherd,

With wisdom I might fear, my Doricles,

You woo'd me the false way.

Flo.

I think, you have

As little skill to fear', as I have purpose

To put you to't. But, come; our dance, I pray.

Your hand, my Perdita: so turtles pair,

That never mean to part.

Per.

I'll swear for 'em.

Pol. This is the prettiest low-born lass, that ever Ran on the green-sward: nothing she does, or says, But smacks of something greater than herself;

Too noble for this place.

4

Cam.

He tells her something,

which peeps so fairly through it,] "So" is from the corr. fo. 1632, is necessary to the measure, and had probably dropped out.

5 As little skill to fear,] When the Rev. Mr. Dyce here adds a note (see his "Remarks," p. 83) to show that "skill" means reason, he ought to have said that I never for a moment questioned it: he might find various proofs of it in Richardson's Dict., without taking the trouble to search in Warner. I was so confident that the passage would be well understood, that I did not think any information of the kind necessary. Some notes are written to illustrate an author, others to illustrate a commentator: the latter may usually be omitted.

6

nothing she does, or SAYS,] It is "nothing she does or seems" in the old copies; but the corrector of the fo. 1632 tells us to read "says" for seems, and we readily believe him. When, in a previous part of the line, Mr. Dyce insists ("Few Notes," p. 80) that we ought to print "sward," sword or sord, we would readily comply, if "sward" were not the present mode of spelling the word in all our best dictionaries, and nearer to the etymology. Such discussions savour a little too much of Shenstone's old heroine.