"Much love there was betwixt them both,
Till they contracted were by oath :
Which when his father came to know,
Then did begin the lover's woe;

For with extream outrageous words he begun

To bid him leave her, or he'd never own him as a son.

The Prince did vow his love he ne're would withdraw
Although he lost his father,

And the crown of Padua.

"But having got much treasure, he

Doth with his virgin put to sea.

After a while, there was report

They're in the Duke of Parma's court.

The Duke of Padua then, for fear they should wed,

Will follow if he finde it true,

His son shall lose his head :

But the old shepherd, fearing wrong should befall

His pretty witty daughter,

Doth resolve to finde them all.

"The Bride and Bridegroom now in state

Are going to the Temple-gate.

The Duke of Padua with his trains

Doth stop them, and forbids the banes.

And the Duke of Parma plainly sayes, that

His son did fly from him to marry with a shepherd's brat.
The Bride and Bridegroom, by both Dukes in a breath,

Commanded are to separate,

Or they shall meet in death.

"Both are content, and are led on

Unto their execution:

They were to suffer both alike.

The headsman's axe was up to strike.

'Hold!' quoth the shepherd, 'I bring strange news to town.'

The Dukes were both amazed

And the axe was straight laid down :

This lady sixteen years ago did I finde;
This paper and these jewels,

For the childe is none of mine.'

"The lord that bore the childe away,

Seeing the name, did boldly say
'Great Duke of Parma, this is she

Which you did send away by me.

'Tis your own daughter.' Then the Duke[s] full of tears
Embrace them both, and now another marriage day appears.

Bonfires and bells, the conduits all run with wine.

By this we see, there's nothing can

Prevent the Powers divine."

Much cannot be said in favour of the versification of this ballad, but not a few of its irregularities must have been introduced by

corruptions from time to time after its original publication, as we may suppose, in the shape of a broadside. When the theatres were closed by authority of the Parliament, and of the Puritans at the head of the state, such productions as the above were sung about the streets for public amusement; and there were no periods so prolific of ballads as those when playhouses were first erected, and were struggling for existence, and when, being entirely prohibited, the poets and ballad-makers endeavoured to find some substitute for the loss of dramatic representations. It is very clear, from various passages, that Jordan had in his mind not Greene's Novel of "Pandosto," but Shakespeare's play of "The Winter's Tale;" and the wonder is that, with such an exquisite original before him, a writer of admitted talents could make so little of his subject, and degrade it to so humble a level.

It deserves remark, as already hinted, that in Jordan's time the error of making Bohemia a sea-coast country had become so apparent, that he felt it necessary, even when addressing himself to the population of the thoroughfares of London, to make the change of Parma for Sicily, and of Padua for Bohemia. The close relationship established by James I. between England and Bohemia had called general attention to the geographical situation of the latter. In our own day, it has been thought necessary in this respect to restore what some may consider "dramatic propriety," and at the same time to smother the poetry and pathos of Shakespeare in the trumpery of tinsel, and the daubery of scene-painting. It is the greatest literary blessing that could have been conferred on our nation, that Shakespeare wrote at a period when the mechanical deficiencies of his art in a manner compelled him to gratify the ears rather than glut the eyes of his contemporaries. It cannot be too often stated, that from the period of the introduction of scenery we date the decline of English dramatic poetry.

HERMIONE, Queen to Leontes.

PERDITA, Daughter to Leontes and Hermione.

PAULINA, Wife to Antigonus.

EMILIA, a Lady attending the Queen.

Lords, Ladies, and Attendants; Satyrs, Shepherds, Shepherdesses,

Guards, &c.

SCENE, sometimes in Sicilia, sometimes in Bohemia.

1 An imperfect list of characters is appended to the play in the four folios under the title of "The Names of the Actors." Rowe completed it.

THE WINTER'S TALE.

ACT I. SCENE I.

Sicilia. An Antechamber in LEONTES' Palace.

Enter CAMILLO and ARCHIDAMUS.

Arch. If you shall chance, Camillo, to visit Bohemia, on the like occasion whereon my services are now on foot, you shall see, as I have said, great difference betwixt our Bohemia and your Sicilia.

Cam. I think, this coming summer, the king of Sicilia means to pay Bohemia the visitation which he justly owes him.

Arch. Wherein our entertainment shall shame us, we will be justified in our loves: for, indeed,—

Cam. Beseech you,

Arch. Verily, I speak it in the freedom of my knowledge: we cannot with such magnificence-in so rare-I know not what to say. We will give you sleepy drinks, that your senses, unintelligent of our insufficience, may, though they cannot praise us, as little accuse us.

Cam. You pay a great deal too dear for what's given freely.

Arch. Believe me, I speak as my understanding instructs me, and as mine honesty puts it to utterance.

Cam. Sicilia cannot show himself over-kind to Bohemia. They were trained together in their childhoods; and there rooted betwixt them then such an affection, which cannot choose but branch now. Since their more mature dignities, and royal necessities, made separation of their society, their encounters, though not personal, have been so royally

attorney'd', with interchange of gifts, letters, loving embassies, that they have seemed to be together, though absent, shook hands, as over a vast, and embraced, as it were, from the ends of opposed winds. The heavens continue their loves!

Arch. I think, there is not in the world either malice, or matter, to alter it. You have an unspeakable comfort of your young prince Mamillius: it is a gentleman of the greatest promise that ever came into my note.

Cam. I very well agree with you in the hopes of him. It is a gallant child; one that, indeed, physics the subject 3, makes old hearts fresh: they that went on crutches ere he was born desire yet their life to see him a man.

Arch. Would they else be content to die?

Cam. Yes; if there were no other excuse why they should desire to live.

Arch. If the king had no son, they would desire to live on crutches till he had one. [Exeunt.

SCENE II.

The Same. A Room of State in the Palace.

Enter LEONTES, POLIXENES, HERMIONE, MAMILLIUS, CAMILLO, and Attendants.

Pol. Nine changes of the watery star have been The shepherd's note, since we have left our throne

1- have been so royally attorney'd,] "So" is from the corr. fo. 1632, and is necessary to the sentence: it, no doubt, escaped in the press.

2 shook hands, as over a VAST,] This is the reading of the first folio: the second has it, "shook hands, as over a vast sea," which, being an unnecessary addition, is here rejected. "Vast" is employed substantively, and, as Steevens observed, Shakespeare uses it for the sea in "Pericles," A. iii. sc. 1:

"Thou God of this great vast, rebuke these surges."

In "The Tempest" also we have the expression of the "vast of night." This opportunity may be taken to mention, that the line in "Hamlet," A. i. sc. 2, which is printed in the folio, 1623,

"In the dead waste and middle of the night,"

is given in the earliest 4to. of 1603, in the possession of the Duke of Devonshire, "In the dead vast and middle of the night."

3 one that, indeed, PHYSICS the SUBJECT,] Here, as in "Measure for Measure," A. iii. sc. 2, (and perhaps A. ii. sc. 4,) the word " subject" is used in a plural sense for "subjects." The expression "physics the subject" means, gives the subjects of the king, or the state generally, health and vigour.