When the old shepherd heard how much notice the king had taken of Perdita, and that he had lost a daughter, who was exposed in infancy, he fell to comparing the time when he found the little Perdita with the manner of its exposure, the jewels and other tokens of its high birth; from all which it was impossible for him not to conclude, that Perdita and the king’s lost daughter were the same.

Florizel and Perdita, Camillo and the faithful Paulina, were present when the old shepherd related to the king the manner in which he had found the child, and also the circumstance of Antigonus’s death, he having seen the bear seize upon him.  He shewed the rich mantle in which Paulina remembered Hermione had wrapped the child; and he produced a jewel which she remembered Hermione had tied about Perdita’s neck, and he gave up the paper which Paulina knew to be the writing of her husband; it could not be doubted that Perdita was Leontes’ own daughter:  but oh! the noble struggles of Paulina, between sorrow for her husband’s death, and joy that the oracle was fulfilled, in the king’s heir, his long-lost daughter, being found.  When Leontes heard that Perdita was his daughter, the great sorrow that he felt that Hermione was not living to behold her child, made him that he could say nothing for a long time, but “O thy mother, thy mother!”

Paulina interrupted this joyful yet distressful scene, with saying to Leontes, that she had a statue, newly finished by that rare Italian master, Julio Romano, which was such a perfect resemblance of the queen, that would his majesty be pleased to go to her house and look upon it, he would be almost ready to think it was Hermione herself.  Thither then they all went; the king anxious to see the semblance of his Hermione, and Perdita longing to behold what the mother she never saw did look like.

When Paulina drew back the curtain which concealed this famous statue, so perfectly did it resemble Hermione, that all the king’s sorrow was renewed at the sight:  for a long time he had no power to speak or move.

“I like your silence, my liege,” said Paulina; “it the more shews your wonder.  Is not this statue very like your queen?” At length the king said, “O, thus she stood, even with such majesty, when I first wooed her.  But yet, Paulina, Hermione was not so aged as this statue looks.”  Paulina replied, “So much the more the carver’s excellence, who has made the statue as Hermione would have looked had she been living now.  But let me draw the curtain, sire, lest presently you think it moves.”

The king then said, “Do not draw the curtain!  Would I were dead!  See, Camillo, would you not think it breathed?  Her eye seems to have motion in it.”  “I must draw the curtain, my liege,” said Paulina.  “You are so transported, you will persuade yourself the statue lives.”  “O, sweet Paulina,” said Leontes, “make me think so twenty years together!  Still methinks there is an air comes from her.  What fine chisel could ever yet cut breath?  Let no man mock me, for I will kiss her.”  “Good, my lord, forbear!” said Paulina.  “The ruddiness upon her lip is wet; you will stain your own with oily painting.  Shall I draw the curtain?” “No, not these twenty years,” said Leontes.