First lord. 
                    This your request
Is altogether just:  therefore, bring forth,
And in Apollo’s name, his oracle: 

[Exeunt certain Officers.]

Hermione. 
The Emperor of Russia was my father;
O that he were alive, and here beholding
His daughter’s trial! that he did but see
The flatness of my misery; yet with eyes
Of pity, not revenge!

[Re-enter officers, with Cleomenes and Dion.]

Officer. 
You here shall swear upon this sword of justice,
That you, Cleomenes and Dion, have
Been both at Delphos, and from thence have brought
This seal’d-up oracle, by the hand deliver’d
Of great Apollo’s priest; and that since then,
You have not dar’d to break the holy seal,
Nor read the secrets in’t.

Cleomenes, Dion. 
                           All this we swear.

Leontes. 
Break up the seals and read.

Officer. [Reads.] ’Hermione is chaste; Polixenes blameless; Camillo a true subject; Leontes a jealous tyrant; his innocent babe truly begotten; and the king shall live without an heir, if that which is lost be not found.’

Lords. 
Now blessed be the great Apollo!

Hermione. 
                                 Praised!

Leontes. 
Hast thou read truth?

Officer. 
                      Ay, my lord; even so
As it is here set down.

Leontes. 
There is no truth at all i’ the oracle: 
The sessions shall proceed:  this is mere falsehood!

[Enter a Servant hastily.]

Servant. 
My lord the king, the king!

Leontes. 
                            What is the business?

Servant. 
O sir, I shall be hated to report it: 
The prince your son, with mere conceit and fear
Of the queen’s speed, is gone.

Leontes. 
                               How! gone?

Servant. 
                                          Is dead.

Leontes. 
Apollo’s angry; and the heavens themselves
Do strike at my injustice.

[Hermione faints.]

How now there!

Paulina. 
This news is mortal to the queen:—­Look down
And see what death is doing.

Leontes. 
                             Take her hence: 
Her heart is but o’ercharg’d; she will recover.—­
I have too much believ’d mine own suspicion:—­
Beseech you tenderly apply to her
Some remedies for life.—­

[Exeunt Paulina and Ladies with Hermione.]