SCENE I. Antechamber in LEONTES' palace. Winter's Tale  Shakespeare homepage  |  Winter's Tale  | Act 1, Scene 1 

 Next scene  SCENE I. Antechamber in LEONTES' palace. 

 Enter CAMILLO 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. 

 CAMILLO  I think, this coming summer, the King of Sicilia 

 means to pay Bohemia the visitation which he justly owes him. 

 ARCHIDAMUS  Wherein our entertainment shall shame us we will be 

 justified in our loves; for indeed-- 

 CAMILLO  Beseech you,-- 

 ARCHIDAMUS  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. 

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

 ARCHIDAMUS  Believe me, I speak as my understanding instructs me 

 and as mine honesty puts it to utterance. 

 CAMILLO  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 royally attorneyed 

 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! 

 ARCHIDAMUS  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. 

 CAMILLO  I very well agree with you in the hopes of him: it 

 is a gallant child; one that indeed physics the 

 subject, makes old hearts fresh: they that went on 

 crutches ere he was born desire yet their life to 

 see him a man. 

 ARCHIDAMUS  Would they else be content to die? 

 CAMILLO  Yes; if there were no other excuse why they should 

 desire to live. 

 ARCHIDAMUS  If the king had no son, they would desire to live 

 on crutches till he had one. 



 Exeunt  Shakespeare homepage  |  Winter's Tale  | Act 1, Scene 1 

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