The WINTER's TALE,

BY

WILL. SHAKSPERE:

Printed Complete from the TEXT of

SAM. JOHNSON and GEO. STEEVENS,
And revised from the last Editions.

When Learning's triumph o'er her barb'rous foes
First rear'd the Stage, immortal SHAKSPERE rose;
Each change of many-colour'd life he drew,
Exhausted worlds, and then imagin'd new:
Existence saw him spurn her bounded reign,
And panting Time toil'd after him in vain:
His pow'rful strokes presiding Truth confess'd,
And unresisted Passion storm'd the breast.

DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON.

LONDON:

Printed for, and under the direction of,

JOHN BELL, British Library, STRAND, Bookseller to his Royal Highness the PRINCE of WALES.

M DCC LXXXVI.

OBSERVATIONS

ON THE Fable AND Composition of

The WINTER'S TALE.

THIS play, throughout, is written in the very spirit of its author. And in telling this homely and simple, though agreeable, country tale,

Our sweetest Shakspere, fancy's child,

Warbles his native wood notes wild.

This was necessary to observe in mere justice to the play; as the meanness of the fable, and the extravagant conduct of it, had misled some of great name into a wrong judgment of its merit; which, as far as it regards sentiment and character, iş scarce inferior to any in the whole collection. WARBURTON, The story of this play is taken from the Pleasaunt History of Dorastus and Fawnia, written by Robert Greene.

JOHNSON Of this play no edition is known published before the folio of 1623.

This play, as Dr. Warburton justly observes, is, with all its absurdities, very entertaining. The character of Autolycus is very naturally conceived, and strongly represented. JOHNSON.

Aij

Dramatis Personae.

MEN.

LEONTES, King of Sicilia.

POLIXENES, King of Bohemia,

MAMILLIUS, young Prince of Sicilia.

FLORIZEL, Prince of Bohemia.

CAMILLO,

ANTIGONUS,

CLEOMENES,

DION,

Sicilian Lords.

Another Sicilian Lord.

ARCHIDAMUS, a Bohemian Lord.
ROGERO, a Sicilian Gentleman.

An Attendant on the young Prince Mamillius.
Officers of a Court of Judicature.

Old Shepherd, reputed Father of Perdita,
Clown, bis Son,

A Mariner.

Gaoler.

Servant to the old Shepherd.

AUTOLICUS, a Rogue.
TIME, as Chorus.

WOMEN.

HERMIONE, Queen to Leontes.

PERDITA, Daughter to Leontes and Hermione.

PAULINA, Wife to Antigonus.

EMILIA, a Lady.

Two other Ladies.

Satyrs for a Dance, Shepherds, Shepherdesses, Guards, and

Attendants.

SCENE, sometimes in Sicilia; sometimes in Bohemia,

The WINTER'S TALE.

ACT 1. SCENE 1.

An Anti-Chamber in LEONTES's Palace. Enter CAMIL LO, and ARCHIDAMUS.

Archidamus.

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

10

Arch. Verily, I speak it in the freedom of my knowledge: we cannot with such magnificence-in sơ rare-I know not what to say.-We will give you

sleepy