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But here she checks herself. The name of villain must not be coupled with his,—her husband, and a king, and with a voice softened, but resolute, she adds, 'You, my lord, do but mistake." Unmoved Unmoved by her gentleness, Leontes reiterates his accusations with redoubled vehemence. The blood is sent back upon her heart, speaking as these do of the overthrow of the love of years in the inexplicable delusion by which he is possessed. Humiliating as her position is, thus to be reviled by her husband and before the Court, she never loses for a moment her queenly dignity and self-command. Even in the midst of her anguish, her paramount thought is for him, to whom, as he had so lately reminded her, she had vowed herself "for ever." We seem to hear the sad, calm, solemn tones of her voice as she speaks.

"How will this grieve you, When you shall come to clearer knowledge, that

You have thus publish'd me! Gentle my lord,

You scarce can right me truly then, to

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"There's some ill planet reigns: I must be patient, till the heavens look

With an aspect more favourable."

As she is about to leave, she sees the lords regarding her with mournful faces. They cannot surely believe her guilty; yet men look for women's tears in hours of trial. She has none to give; her heart is too "sorely charged" for that. But from her dry eyes they must draw no false conclusions. "Good my lords," she says,

"I am not prone to weeping, as our

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all, my lords,

With thoughts so qualified as your charities

Shall best instruct you, measure me; and so

The king's will be perform'd." No one stirs; and Leontes, made more and more angry and excited by her presence, says roughly, "Shall I be heard?" Upon this Hermione, suddenly reminded by a painful throb of her impending trial, is affrighted by the thought that jailers are to be her sole attendants?" Who can read with out emotion what follows?—

"Beseech your highness,

My women may be with me; for, you

see,

My plight requires it. Do not weep, good fools;

"Adieu, my lord:

I never wished to see you sorry; now
I trust I shall."

What a parting, what a prophecy ! And in our common life to how many a sad heart does the infinite pathos of these words strike home!

No sooner has the queen withdrawn with her ladies than the lords, who have been restrained by her presence, break forth into passionate remonstrances with

Leontes, heedless of his words, "He who shall speak for her is afar off guilty,

But that he speaks."

"Beseech your highness," says one, "call the queen again!" and Antigonus, who is afterwards to play a material part in the story, speaks with a solemn voice of warning

"Be certain what you do, sir; lest your justice

Prove violence; in the which three great ones suffer, Yourself, your queen, your son." Later on, he points out to the king how far more seemly it would have been for him to have tested his suspicions silently before blazoning them to all the world. So absolute is the belief of all the lords in the queen's innocence, that they are not deterred by the angry resistance of Leontes from loudly protesting that he is under a delusion. It is some saving grace in him that he argues the matter with them, instead of order

There is no cause; when you shall ing them to prison for their bold

know your mistress

Has deserved prison, then abound in

tears,

ness, and tells them, that, while himself assured of the queen's guilt,

As I come out: this action I now go "Yet, for a greater confirmation,

on

Is for my better grace."

Then, bending with a low reverence to the king, she continues

For, in an act of this importance, 'twere

Most piteous to be wild,"

he has despatched two of the

leading members of his Court to obtain the opinion of the Oracle at Delphi, "whose spiritual counsel had shall stop or spur him." He has done this obviously not for his own satisfaction but to "give rest to the minds of others." Neither Antigonus nor any of the lords have any misgivings as to the issue. The oracle will surely show their monarch's folly, "if the good truth were known."

The next scene introduces us to Paulina, the wife of Antigonus, a lady of high position, who henceforth fills a most important part in the drama, and who should be impersonated in any adequate representation of the play by an actress of the first order. She is

a woman of no ordinary sagacity, with a warm heart, a vigorous brain, and an ardent temper. Her love for Hermione has its roots in admiration and reverence for all the good and gracious qualities of which the queen's daily life has given witness. She has been much about her royal mistress, and much esteemed and trusted by her. Leontes, knowing this, obviously anticipates that she will not remain quiet when she hears of the charge he has brought against the queen, and that he has thrust her into prison. Accordingly, he has given express orders that Paulina is not to be admitted to the prison, and this fresh act of cruelty she learns from the governor only when she arrives there in hopes to be of some comfort to her much-wronged mistress. "Good lady," she exclaims, to herself,

"No court in Europe is too good for thee; What dost thou, then, in prison ?"

The privilege of access to the queen is resolutely denied to her. She prevails, however, on the governor to permit her to see the

queen's chief woman, Emilia, and from her she learns, that " 'on her frights and griefs," Hermione has been prematurely delivered of a daughter, "a goodly babe, lusty and like to live."

"The queen receives Much comfort in't; says 'My poor prisoner,

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I am innocent as you.' How Paulina's heart must have been stirred as these words brought before her the image of the forlorn mother and her child! In hot

anger she exclaims, "I dare be sworn!" and in the words that follow shows the clear commonsense and fearless courage, of which she gives remarkable proofs at a later stage. From first to last she regards the conduct of Leontes as simple madness.

"These dangerous lunes i' the king, beshrew them!

He must be told on't, and he shall: the office

Becomes a woman best. I take't upon

me.

If I prove honey-mouthed, let my tongue blister,

And never to my red-looked anger be The trumpet any more."

But here a plea that may soften the king's heart flashes upon her. If the queen will trust her with the babe, she will show it to the king, "and undertake to be her advocate to the loud'st."

"We do not know, How he may soften at the sight o' the The silence often of pure innocence child; Persuades, when speaking fails."

The idea of such an appeal, Emilia says, had occurred to the queen herself;

"Who, but to-day, hammered of this design,

But durst not trust a minister of honour,'

Lest she should be denied.”

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"There is no lady living," Emilia adds, so meet for this great errand." She anticipates "a thriving issue" for it. Presently we find that Hermione parts with her child, in the hope that the sight of its sweet face, the touch of the baby fingers, its likeness to himself

"Although the print be little, the whole matter

And copy of the father"

may turn his heart, and break the frightful spell by which he is mysteriously bound.

Under that spell Leontes is kept upon the rack. "Nor night nor day, no rest!" are his first words when next we see him. His thoughts are all of vengeance. "The harlot king," he says, "is quite beyond mine arm;" but she, his queen, is in his grasp.

"Say, that she were gone, "Given to the fire, a moiety of my rest Might come to me again."

But he has still another bitter grief, one for which he can take vengeance upon no one, neither thrust aside, a grief which will haunt him to his grave. His boy, his darling Mamillius, is sick. "How does the boy?" he asks eagerly of an attendant whom he has summoned, who answers—

"He took good rest to-night; 'Tis hoped his sickness is discharged. Leon. To see his nobleness ! Conceiving the dishonour of his mother, He straight declined, droop'd, took it deeply;

Fastened and fixed the shame on't in himself;

Threw off his spirit, his appetite, his

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vengeance. In these he becomes absorbed, until his attention is aroused by the voice of Paulina in loud talk with his attendants, who are trying to keep her from making her way to him with Hermione's baby in her arms. Of all the ladies of the Court she is the one he has most feared to see. "I charged thee," he says to her husband, Antigonus, "that she should not come about me. I knew she would." But neither Antigonus nor the king can shake her determination to speak her "I say, I come

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The good queen, For she is good, hath brought you forth a daughter;

Here 'tis; commends it to your blessing. [Laying down the child."

In a paroxysm of rage, Leontes calls her by names the most opprobrious, orders her "out o' door," and commands Antigonus to "take " and the bastard up give it to his " crone." "For ever," she exclaims to her husband,

"Unvenerable be thy hands, if thou Tak'st up the princess, by that forced baseness

Which he has put upon't."

Maddened still further by her indifference to his anger, Leontes exclaims

"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!

(To Paulina) I'll have thee burn'd.
Paul.
I care not:

It is an heretic that makes the fire,

Not she which burns in't. I'll not To save this bastard's life; for 'tis a call you tyrant;

bastard

But this most cruel usage of your So sure as this beard's grey,-what

queen

Not able to produce more accusation Than your own weak-hinged fancy— something savours

Of tyranny, and will ignoble make

you,

Yea, scandalous to the world."

"Out of the chamber with her!" cries the king. Paulina, seeing that further remonstrance is impossible, retires; but not without some further words of warning. "Look to your babe, my lord; 'tis yours. Jove send her a better guiding spirit!" How dangerous, how unsafe the king's frenzy has become, is seen in the way he turns upon Antigonus.

"Thou, traitor, hast set on thy wife to this.

My child! Away with't! Even thou, that hast

A heart so tender o'er it, take it hence,

And see it instantly consumed with fire; Even thou, and none but thou. Take

it up straight; Within this hour bring me word 'tis done,

And by good testimony, or I'll seize thy life,

And what thou else call'st thine. thou refuse,

If

And wilt encounter with my wrath,

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will you adventure

To save this brat's life?

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