The Winter's Tale · William Shakespeare
SCENE III. The same. A Road near the Shepherd’s cottage.
Enter Autolycus, singing. AUTOLYCUS. _When daffodils begin to peer, With, hey! the doxy over the dale, Why, then comes in the sweet o’ the year, For the red blood reigns in the winter’s pale._ _The white sheet bleaching on the hedge, With, hey! the sweet birds, O, how they sing! Doth set my pugging tooth on edge; For a quart of ale is a dish for a king._ _The lark, that tirra-lirra chants, With, hey! with, hey! the thrush and the jay, Are summer songs for me and my aunts, While we lie tumbling in the hay._ 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? 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 traffic is sheets; when the kite builds, look to lesser linen. My father named me Autolycus; who being, I as 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!
Enter Clown. CLOWN. Let me see: every ’leven wether tods; every tod yields pound and odd shilling; fifteen hundred shorn, what comes the wool to? AUTOLYCUS. [_Aside._] If the springe hold, the cock’s mine. CLOWN. I cannot do’t without counters. Let me see; what am I 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 and basses, but one puritan amongst them, and he sings psalms to hornpipes. I must have saffron to colour the warden pies; “mace; dates”, none, 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’ th’ sun.” AUTOLYCUS. [_Grovelling on the ground._] O that ever I was born! CLOWN. I’ th’ name of me! AUTOLYCUS. O, help me, help me! Pluck but off these rags; and then, death, death! CLOWN. Alack, poor soul! thou hast need of more rags to lay on thee, rather than have these off. AUTOLYCUS. O sir, the loathsomeness of them offends me more than the stripes I have received, which are mighty ones and millions.
CLOWN. Alas, poor man! a million of beating may come to a great matter. AUTOLYCUS. I am robbed, sir, and beaten; my money and apparel ta’en from me, and these detestable things put upon me. CLOWN. What, by a horseman or a footman? AUTOLYCUS. A footman, sweet sir, a footman. CLOWN. Indeed, he should be a footman by the garments he has left with thee: if this be a horseman’s coat, it hath seen very hot service. Lend me thy hand, I’ll help thee: come, lend me thy hand. [_Helping him up._] AUTOLYCUS. O, good sir, tenderly, O! CLOWN. Alas, poor soul! AUTOLYCUS. O, good sir, softly, good sir. I fear, sir, my shoulder blade is out. CLOWN. How now! canst stand? AUTOLYCUS. Softly, dear sir! [_Picks his pocket._] good sir, softly. You ha’ done me a charitable office. CLOWN. Dost lack any money? I have a little money for thee. AUTOLYCUS. No, good sweet sir; no, I beseech you, sir: I have a kinsman not past three-quarters of a mile hence, unto whom I was going. I shall there have money or anything I want. Offer me no money, I pray you; that kills my heart. CLOWN. What manner of fellow was he that robbed you? AUTOLYCUS. A fellow, sir, that I have known to go about with troll-my-dames. I knew him once a servant of the prince; I cannot tell, good sir, for which of his virtues it was, but he was certainly whipped out of the court.
Text from Project Gutenberg, public domain in the United States.