Shakespeare Text: Hamlet

Hamlet

SCENE I. Elsinore. A platform before the castle.
FRANCISCO at his post. Enter to him BERNARDO
BERNARDO
Who's there?
FRANCISCO
Nay, answer me: stand, and unfold yourself.
BERNARDO
Long live the king!
FRANCISCO
Bernardo?
BERNARDO
He.
FRANCISCO
You come most carefully upon your hour.
BERNARDO
'Tis now struck twelve; get thee to bed, Francisco.
FRANCISCO
For this relief much thanks: 'tis bitter cold,And I am sick at heart.
BERNARDO
Have you had quiet guard?
FRANCISCO
Not a mouse stirring.
BERNARDO
Well, good night.If you do meet Horatio and Marcellus,The rivals of my watch, bid them make haste.
FRANCISCO
I think I hear them. Stand, ho! Who's there?
Enter HORATIO and MARCELLUS
HORATIO
Friends to this ground.
MARCELLUS
And liegemen to the Dane.
FRANCISCO
Give you good night.
MARCELLUS
O, farewell, honest soldier:Who hath relieved you?
FRANCISCO
Bernardo has my place.Give you good night.
Exit
MARCELLUS
Holla! Bernardo!
BERNARDO
Say,What, is Horatio there?
HORATIO
A piece of him.
BERNARDO
Welcome, Horatio: welcome, good Marcellus.
MARCELLUS
What, has this thing appear'd again to-night?
BERNARDO
I have seen nothing.
MARCELLUS
Horatio says 'tis but our fantasy,And will not let belief take hold of himTouching this dreaded sight, twice seen of us:Therefore I have entreated him alongWith us to watch the minutes of this night;That if again this apparition come,He may approve our eyes and speak to it.
HORATIO
Tush, tush, 'twill not appear.
BERNARDO
Sit down awhile;And let us once again assail your ears,That are so fortified against our storyWhat we have two nights seen.
HORATIO
Well, sit we down,And let us hear Bernardo speak of this.
BERNARDO
Last night of all,When yond same star that's westward from the poleHad made his course to illume that part of heavenWhere now it burns, Marcellus and myself,The bell then beating one,--
Enter Ghost
MARCELLUS
Peace, break thee off; look, where it comes again!
BERNARDO
In the same figure, like the king that's dead.
MARCELLUS
Thou art a scholar; speak to it, Horatio.
BERNARDO
Looks it not like the king? mark it, Horatio.
HORATIO
Most like: it harrows me with fear and wonder.
BERNARDO
It would be spoke to.
MARCELLUS
Question it, Horatio.
HORATIO
What art thou that usurp'st this time of night,Together with that fair and warlike formIn which the majesty of buried DenmarkDid sometimes march? by heaven I charge thee, speak!
MARCELLUS
It is offended.
BERNARDO
See, it stalks away!
HORATIO
Stay! speak, speak! I charge thee, speak!
Exit Ghost
MARCELLUS
'Tis gone, and will not answer.
BERNARDO
How now, Horatio! you tremble and look pale:Is not this something more than fantasy?What think you on't?
HORATIO
Before my God, I might not this believeWithout the sensible and true avouchOf mine own eyes.
MARCELLUS
Is it not like the king?
HORATIO
As thou art to thyself:Such was the very armour he had onWhen he the ambitious Norway combated;So frown'd he once, when, in an angry parle,He smote the sledded Polacks on the ice.'Tis strange.
MARCELLUS
Thus twice before, and jump at this dead hour,With martial stalk hath he gone by our watch.
HORATIO
In what particular thought to work I know not;But in the gross and scope of my opinion,This bodes some strange eruption to our state.
MARCELLUS
Good now, sit down, and tell me, he that knows,Why this same strict and most observant watchSo nightly toils the subject of the land,And why such daily cast of brazen cannon,And foreign mart for implements of war;Why such impress of shipwrights, whose sore taskDoes not divide the Sunday from the week;What might be toward, that this sweaty hasteDoth make the night joint-labourer with the day:Who is't that can inform me?
HORATIO
That can I;At least, the whisper goes so. Our last king,Whose image even but now appear'd to us,Was, as you know, by Fortinbras of Norway,Thereto prick'd on by a most emulate pride,Dared to the combat; in which our valiant Hamlet--For so this side of our known world esteem'd him--Did slay this Fortinbras; who by a seal'd compact,Well ratified by law and heraldry,Did forfeit, with his life, all those his landsWhich he stood seized of, to the conqueror:Against the which, a moiety competentWas gaged by our king; which had return'dTo the inheritance of Fortinbras,Had he been vanquisher; as, by the same covenant,And carriage of the article design'd,His fell to Hamlet. Now, sir, young Fortinbras,Of unimproved mettle hot and full,Hath in the skirts of Norway here and thereShark'd up a list of lawless resolutes,For food and diet, to some enterpriseThat hath a stomach in't; which is no other--As it doth well appear unto our state--But to recover of us, by strong handAnd terms compulsatory, those foresaid landsSo by his father lost: and this, I take it,Is the main motive of our preparations,The source of this our watch and the chief headOf this post-haste and romage in the land.
BERNARDO
I think it be no other but e'en so:Well may it sort that this portentous figureComes armed through our watch; so like the kingThat was and is the question of these wars.
HORATIO
A mote it is to trouble the mind's eye.In the most high and palmy state of Rome,A little ere the mightiest Julius fell,The graves stood tenantless and the sheeted deadDid squeak and gibber in the Roman streets:As stars with trains of fire and dews of blood,Disasters in the sun; and the moist starUpon whose influence Neptune's empire standsWas sick almost to doomsday with eclipse:And even the like precurse of fierce events,As harbingers preceding still the fatesAnd prologue to the omen coming on,Have heaven and earth together demonstratedUnto our climatures and countrymen.--But soft, behold! lo, where it comes again!
Re-enter Ghost
I'll cross it, though it blast me. Stay, illusion!If thou hast any sound, or use of voice,Speak to me:If there be any good thing to be done,That may to thee do ease and grace to me,Speak to me:
Cock crows
If thou art privy to thy country's fate,Which, happily, foreknowing may avoid, O, speak!Or if thou hast uphoarded in thy lifeExtorted treasure in the womb of earth,For which, they say, you spirits oft walk in death,Speak of it: stay, and speak! Stop it, Marcellus.
MARCELLUS
Shall I strike at it with my partisan?
HORATIO
Do, if it will not stand.
BERNARDO
'Tis here!
HORATIO
'Tis here!
MARCELLUS
'Tis gone!
Exit Ghost
We do it wrong, being so majestical,To offer it the show of violence;For it is, as the air, invulnerable,And our vain blows malicious mockery.
BERNARDO
It was about to speak, when the cock crew.
HORATIO
And then it started like a guilty thingUpon a fearful summons. I have heard,The cock, that is the trumpet to the morn,Doth with his lofty and shrill-sounding throatAwake the god of day; and, at his warning,Whether in sea or fire, in earth or air,The extravagant and erring spirit hiesTo his confine: and of the truth hereinThis present object made probation.
MARCELLUS
It faded on the crowing of the cock.Some say that ever 'gainst that season comesWherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated,The bird of dawning singeth all night long:And then, they say, no spirit dares stir abroad;The nights are wholesome; then no planets strike,No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm,So hallow'd and so gracious is the time.
HORATIO
So have I heard and do in part believe it.But, look, the morn, in russet mantle clad,Walks o'er the dew of yon high eastward hill:Break we our watch up; and by my advice,Let us impart what we have seen to-nightUnto young Hamlet; for, upon my life,This spirit, dumb to us, will speak to him.Do you consent we shall acquaint him with it,As needful in our loves, fitting our duty?
MARCELLUS
Let's do't, I pray; and I this morning knowWhere we shall find him most conveniently.
Exeunt
SCENE II. A room of state in the castle.
Enter KING CLAUDIUS, QUEEN GERTRUDE, HAMLET, POLONIUS, LAERTES, VOLTIMAND, CORNELIUS, Lords, and Attendants
KING CLAUDIUS
Though yet of Hamlet our dear brother's deathThe memory be green, and that it us befittedTo bear our hearts in grief and our whole kingdomTo be contracted in one brow of woe,Yet so far hath discretion fought with natureThat we with wisest sorrow think on him,Together with remembrance of ourselves.Therefore our sometime sister, now our queen,The imperial jointress to this warlike state,Have we, as 'twere with a defeated joy,--With an auspicious and a dropping eye,With mirth in funeral and with dirge in marriage,In equal scale weighing delight and dole,--Taken to wife: nor have we herein barr'dYour better wisdoms, which have freely goneWith this affair along. For all, our thanks.Now follows, that you know, young Fortinbras,Holding a weak supposal of our worth,Or thinking by our late dear brother's deathOur state to be disjoint and out of frame,Colleagued with the dream of his advantage,He hath not fail'd to pester us with message,Importing the surrender of those landsLost by his father, with all bonds of law,To our most valiant brother. So much for him.Now for ourself and for this time of meeting:Thus much the business is: we have here writTo Norway, uncle of young Fortinbras,--Who, impotent and bed-rid, scarcely hearsOf this his nephew's purpose,--to suppressHis further gait herein; in that the levies,The lists and full proportions, are all madeOut of his subject: and we here dispatchYou, good Cornelius, and you, Voltimand,For bearers of this greeting to old Norway;Giving to you no further personal powerTo business with the king, more than the scopeOf these delated articles allow.Farewell, and let your haste commend your duty.
CORNELIUS VOLTIMAND
In that and all things will we show our duty.
KING CLAUDIUS
We doubt it nothing: heartily farewell.
Exeunt VOLTIMAND and CORNELIUS
And now, Laertes, what's the news with you?You told us of some suit; what is't, Laertes?You cannot speak of reason to the Dane,And loose your voice: what wouldst thou beg, Laertes,That shall not be my offer, not thy asking?The head is not more native to the heart,The hand more instrumental to the mouth,Than is the throne of Denmark to thy father.What wouldst thou have, Laertes?
LAERTES
My dread lord,Your leave and favour to return to France;From whence though willingly I came to Denmark,To show my duty in your coronation,Yet now, I must confess, that duty done,My thoughts and wishes bend again toward FranceAnd bow them to your gracious leave and pardon.
KING CLAUDIUS
Have you your father's leave? What says Polonius?
LORD POLONIUS
He hath, my lord, wrung from me my slow leaveBy laboursome petition, and at lastUpon his will I seal'd my hard consent:I do beseech you, give him leave to go.
KING CLAUDIUS
Take thy fair hour, Laertes; time be thine,And thy best graces spend it at thy will!But now, my cousin Hamlet, and my son,--
HAMLET
[Aside] A little more than kin, and less than kind.
KING CLAUDIUS
How is it that the clouds still hang on you?
HAMLET
Not so, my lord; I am too much i' the sun.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Good Hamlet, cast thy nighted colour off,And let thine eye look like a friend on Denmark.Do not for ever with thy vailed lidsSeek for thy noble father in the dust:Thou know'st 'tis common; all that lives must die,Passing through nature to eternity.
HAMLET
Ay, madam, it is common.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
If it be,Why seems it so particular with thee?
HAMLET
Seems, madam! nay it is; I know not 'seems.''Tis not alone my inky cloak, good mother,Nor customary suits of solemn black,Nor windy suspiration of forced breath,No, nor the fruitful river in the eye,Nor the dejected 'havior of the visage,Together with all forms, moods, shapes of grief,That can denote me truly: these indeed seem,For they are actions that a man might play:But I have that within which passeth show;These but the trappings and the suits of woe.
KING CLAUDIUS
'Tis sweet and commendable in your nature, Hamlet,To give these mourning duties to your father:But, you must know, your father lost a father;That father lost, lost his, and the survivor boundIn filial obligation for some termTo do obsequious sorrow: but to perseverIn obstinate condolement is a courseOf impious stubbornness; 'tis unmanly grief;It shows a will most incorrect to heaven,A heart unfortified, a mind impatient,An understanding simple and unschool'd:For what we know must be and is as commonAs any the most vulgar thing to sense,Why should we in our peevish oppositionTake it to heart? Fie! 'tis a fault to heaven,A fault against the dead, a fault to nature,To reason most absurd: whose common themeIs death of fathers, and who still hath cried,From the first corse till he that died to-day,'This must be so.' We pray you, throw to earthThis unprevailing woe, and think of usAs of a father: for let the world take note,You are the most immediate to our throne;And with no less nobility of loveThan that which dearest father bears his son,Do I impart toward you. For your intentIn going back to school in Wittenberg,It is most retrograde to our desire:And we beseech you, bend you to remainHere, in the cheer and comfort of our eye,Our chiefest courtier, cousin, and our son.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Let not thy mother lose her prayers, Hamlet:I pray thee, stay with us; go not to Wittenberg.
HAMLET
I shall in all my best obey you, madam.
KING CLAUDIUS
Why, 'tis a loving and a fair reply:Be as ourself in Denmark. Madam, come;This gentle and unforced accord of HamletSits smiling to my heart: in grace whereof,No jocund health that Denmark drinks to-day,But the great cannon to the clouds shall tell,And the king's rouse the heavens all bruit again,Re-speaking earthly thunder. Come away.
Exeunt all but HAMLET
HAMLET
O, that this too too solid flesh would meltThaw and resolve itself into a dew!Or that the Everlasting had not fix'dHis canon 'gainst self-slaughter! O God! God!How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable,Seem to me all the uses of this world!Fie on't! ah fie! 'tis an unweeded garden,That grows to seed; things rank and gross in naturePossess it merely. That it should come to this!But two months dead: nay, not so much, not two:So excellent a king; that was, to this,Hyperion to a satyr; so loving to my motherThat he might not beteem the winds of heavenVisit her face too roughly. Heaven and earth!Must I remember? why, she would hang on him,As if increase of appetite had grownBy what it fed on: and yet, within a month--Let me not think on't--Frailty, thy name is woman!--A little month, or ere those shoes were oldWith which she follow'd my poor father's body,Like Niobe, all tears:--why she, even she--O, God! a beast, that wants discourse of reason,Would have mourn'd longer--married with my uncle,My father's brother, but no more like my fatherThan I to Hercules: within a month:Ere yet the salt of most unrighteous tearsHad left the flushing in her galled eyes,She married. O, most wicked speed, to postWith such dexterity to incestuous sheets!It is not nor it cannot come to good:But break, my heart; for I must hold my tongue.
Enter HORATIO, MARCELLUS, and BERNARDO
HORATIO
Hail to your lordship!
HAMLET
I am glad to see you well:Horatio,--or I do forget myself.
HORATIO
The same, my lord, and your poor servant ever.
HAMLET
Sir, my good friend; I'll change that name with you:And what make you from Wittenberg, Horatio? Marcellus?
MARCELLUS
My good lord--
HAMLET
I am very glad to see you. Good even, sir.But what, in faith, make you from Wittenberg?
HORATIO
A truant disposition, good my lord.
HAMLET
I would not hear your enemy say so,Nor shall you do mine ear that violence,To make it truster of your own reportAgainst yourself: I know you are no truant.But what is your affair in Elsinore?We'll teach you to drink deep ere you depart.
HORATIO
My lord, I came to see your father's funeral.
HAMLET
I pray thee, do not mock me, fellow-student;I think it was to see my mother's wedding.
HORATIO
Indeed, my lord, it follow'd hard upon.
HAMLET
Thrift, thrift, Horatio! the funeral baked meatsDid coldly furnish forth the marriage tables.Would I had met my dearest foe in heavenOr ever I had seen that day, Horatio!My father!--methinks I see my father.
HORATIO
Where, my lord?
HAMLET
In my mind's eye, Horatio.
HORATIO
I saw him once; he was a goodly king.
HAMLET
He was a man, take him for all in all,I shall not look upon his like again.
HORATIO
My lord, I think I saw him yesternight.
HAMLET
Saw? who?
HORATIO
My lord, the king your father.
HAMLET
The king my father!
HORATIO
Season your admiration for awhileWith an attent ear, till I may deliver,Upon the witness of these gentlemen,This marvel to you.
HAMLET
For God's love, let me hear.
HORATIO
Two nights together had these gentlemen,Marcellus and Bernardo, on their watch,In the dead vast and middle of the night,Been thus encounter'd. A figure like your father,Armed at point exactly, cap-a-pe,Appears before them, and with solemn marchGoes slow and stately by them: thrice he walk'dBy their oppress'd and fear-surprised eyes,Within his truncheon's length; whilst they, distilledAlmost to jelly with the act of fear,Stand dumb and speak not to him. This to meIn dreadful secrecy impart they did;And I with them the third night kept the watch;Where, as they had deliver'd, both in time,Form of the thing, each word made true and good,The apparition comes: I knew your father;These hands are not more like.
HAMLET
But where was this?
MARCELLUS
My lord, upon the platform where we watch'd.
HAMLET
Did you not speak to it?
HORATIO
My lord, I did;But answer made it none: yet once methoughtIt lifted up its head and did addressItself to motion, like as it would speak;But even then the morning cock crew loud,And at the sound it shrunk in haste away,And vanish'd from our sight.
HAMLET
'Tis very strange.
HORATIO
As I do live, my honour'd lord, 'tis true;And we did think it writ down in our dutyTo let you know of it.
HAMLET
Indeed, indeed, sirs, but this troubles me.Hold you the watch to-night?
MARCELLUS BERNARDO
We do, my lord.
HAMLET
Arm'd, say you?
MARCELLUS BERNARDO
Arm'd, my lord.
HAMLET
From top to toe?
MARCELLUS BERNARDO
My lord, from head to foot.
HAMLET
Then saw you not his face?
HORATIO
O, yes, my lord; he wore his beaver up.
HAMLET
What, look'd he frowningly?
HORATIO
A countenance more in sorrow than in anger.
HAMLET
Pale or red?
HORATIO
Nay, very pale.
HAMLET
And fix'd his eyes upon you?
HORATIO
Most constantly.
HAMLET
I would I had been there.
HORATIO
It would have much amazed you.
HAMLET
Very like, very like. Stay'd it long?
HORATIO
While one with moderate haste might tell a hundred.
MARCELLUS BERNARDO
Longer, longer.
HORATIO
Not when I saw't.
HAMLET
His beard was grizzled--no?
HORATIO
It was, as I have seen it in his life,A sable silver'd.
HAMLET
I will watch to-night;Perchance 'twill walk again.
HORATIO
I warrant it will.
HAMLET
If it assume my noble father's person,I'll speak to it, though hell itself should gapeAnd bid me hold my peace. I pray you all,If you have hitherto conceal'd this sight,Let it be tenable in your silence still;And whatsoever else shall hap to-night,Give it an understanding, but no tongue:I will requite your loves. So, fare you well:Upon the platform, 'twixt eleven and twelve,I'll visit you.
All
Our duty to your honour.
HAMLET
Your loves, as mine to you: farewell.
Exeunt all but HAMLET
My father's spirit in arms! all is not well;I doubt some foul play: would the night were come!Till then sit still, my soul: foul deeds will rise,Though all the earth o'erwhelm them, to men's eyes.
Exit
SCENE III. A room in Polonius' house.
Enter LAERTES and OPHELIA
LAERTES
My necessaries are embark'd: farewell:And, sister, as the winds give benefitAnd convoy is assistant, do not sleep,But let me hear from you.
OPHELIA
Do you doubt that?
LAERTES
For Hamlet and the trifling of his favour,Hold it a fashion and a toy in blood,A violet in the youth of primy nature,Forward, not permanent, sweet, not lasting,The perfume and suppliance of a minute; No more.
OPHELIA
No more but so?
LAERTES
Think it no more;For nature, crescent, does not grow aloneIn thews and bulk, but, as this temple waxes,The inward service of the mind and soulGrows wide withal. Perhaps he loves you now,And now no soil nor cautel doth besmirchThe virtue of his will: but you must fear,His greatness weigh'd, his will is not his own;For he himself is subject to his birth:He may not, as unvalued persons do,Carve for himself; for on his choice dependsThe safety and health of this whole state;And therefore must his choice be circumscribedUnto the voice and yielding of that bodyWhereof he is the head. Then if he says he loves you,It fits your wisdom so far to believe itAs he in his particular act and placeMay give his saying deed; which is no furtherThan the main voice of Denmark goes withal.Then weigh what loss your honour may sustain,If with too credent ear you list his songs,Or lose your heart, or your chaste treasure openTo his unmaster'd importunity.Fear it, Ophelia, fear it, my dear sister,And keep you in the rear of your affection,Out of the shot and danger of desire.The chariest maid is prodigal enough,If she unmask her beauty to the moon:Virtue itself 'scapes not calumnious strokes:The canker galls the infants of the spring,Too oft before their buttons be disclosed,And in the morn and liquid dew of youthContagious blastments are most imminent.Be wary then; best safety lies in fear:Youth to itself rebels, though none else near.
OPHELIA
I shall the effect of this good lesson keep,As watchman to my heart. But, good my brother,Do not, as some ungracious pastors do,Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven;Whiles, like a puff'd and reckless libertine,Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads,And recks not his own rede.
LAERTES
O, fear me not.I stay too long: but here my father comes.
Enter POLONIUS
A double blessing is a double grace,Occasion smiles upon a second leave.
LORD POLONIUS
Yet here, Laertes! aboard, aboard, for shame!The wind sits in the shoulder of your sail,And you are stay'd for. There; my blessing with thee!And these few precepts in thy memorySee thou character. Give thy thoughts no tongue,Nor any unproportioned thought his act.Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar.Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried,Grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel;But do not dull thy palm with entertainmentOf each new-hatch'd, unfledged comrade. BewareOf entrance to a quarrel, but being in,Bear't that the opposed may beware of thee.Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice;Take each man's censure, but reserve thy judgment.Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy,But not express'd in fancy; rich, not gaudy;For the apparel oft proclaims the man,And they in France of the best rank and stationAre of a most select and generous chief in that.Neither a borrower nor a lender be;For loan oft loses both itself and friend,And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.This above all: to thine ownself be true,And it must follow, as the night the day,Thou canst not then be false to any man.Farewell: my blessing season this in thee!
LAERTES
Most humbly do I take my leave, my lord.
LORD POLONIUS
The time invites you; go; your servants tend.
LAERTES
Farewell, Ophelia; and remember wellWhat I have said to you.
OPHELIA
'Tis in my memory lock'd,And you yourself shall keep the key of it.
LAERTES
Farewell.
Exit
LORD POLONIUS
What is't, Ophelia, be hath said to you?
OPHELIA
So please you, something touching the Lord Hamlet.
LORD POLONIUS
Marry, well bethought:'Tis told me, he hath very oft of lateGiven private time to you; and you yourselfHave of your audience been most free and bounteous:If it be so, as so 'tis put on me,And that in way of caution, I must tell you,You do not understand yourself so clearlyAs it behoves my daughter and your honour.What is between you? give me up the truth.
OPHELIA
He hath, my lord, of late made many tendersOf his affection to me.
LORD POLONIUS
Affection! pooh! you speak like a green girl,Unsifted in such perilous circumstance.Do you believe his tenders, as you call them?
OPHELIA
I do not know, my lord, what I should think.
LORD POLONIUS
Marry, I'll teach you: think yourself a baby;That you have ta'en these tenders for true pay,Which are not sterling. Tender yourself more dearly;Or--not to crack the wind of the poor phrase,Running it thus--you'll tender me a fool.
OPHELIA
My lord, he hath importuned me with loveIn honourable fashion.
LORD POLONIUS
Ay, fashion you may call it; go to, go to.
OPHELIA
And hath given countenance to his speech, my lord,With almost all the holy vows of heaven.
LORD POLONIUS
Ay, springes to catch woodcocks. I do know,When the blood burns, how prodigal the soulLends the tongue vows: these blazes, daughter,Giving more light than heat, extinct in both,Even in their promise, as it is a-making,You must not take for fire. From this timeBe somewhat scanter of your maiden presence;Set your entreatments at a higher rateThan a command to parley. For Lord Hamlet,Believe so much in him, that he is youngAnd with a larger tether may he walkThan may be given you: in few, Ophelia,Do not believe his vows; for they are brokers,Not of that dye which their investments show,But mere implorators of unholy suits,Breathing like sanctified and pious bawds,The better to beguile. This is for all:I would not, in plain terms, from this time forth,Have you so slander any moment leisure,As to give words or talk with the Lord Hamlet.Look to't, I charge you: come your ways.
OPHELIA
I shall obey, my lord.
Exeunt
SCENE IV. The platform.
Enter HAMLET, HORATIO, and MARCELLUS
HAMLET
The air bites shrewdly; it is very cold.
HORATIO
It is a nipping and an eager air.
HAMLET
What hour now?
HORATIO
I think it lacks of twelve.
HAMLET
No, it is struck.
HORATIO
Indeed? I heard it not: then it draws near the seasonWherein the spirit held his wont to walk.
A flourish of trumpets, and ordnance shot off, within
What does this mean, my lord?
HAMLET
The king doth wake to-night and takes his rouse,Keeps wassail, and the swaggering up-spring reels;And, as he drains his draughts of Rhenish down,The kettle-drum and trumpet thus bray outThe triumph of his pledge.
HORATIO
Is it a custom?
HAMLET
Ay, marry, is't:But to my mind, though I am native hereAnd to the manner born, it is a customMore honour'd in the breach than the observance.This heavy-headed revel east and westMakes us traduced and tax'd of other nations:They clepe us drunkards, and with swinish phraseSoil our addition; and indeed it takesFrom our achievements, though perform'd at height,The pith and marrow of our attribute.So, oft it chances in particular men,That for some vicious mole of nature in them,As, in their birth--wherein they are not guilty,Since nature cannot choose his origin--By the o'ergrowth of some complexion,Oft breaking down the pales and forts of reason,Or by some habit that too much o'er-leavensThe form of plausive manners, that these men,Carrying, I say, the stamp of one defect,Being nature's livery, or fortune's star,--Their virtues else--be they as pure as grace,As infinite as man may undergo--Shall in the general censure take corruptionFrom that particular fault: the dram of ealeDoth all the noble substance of a doubtTo his own scandal.
HORATIO
Look, my lord, it comes!
Enter Ghost
HAMLET
Angels and ministers of grace defend us!Be thou a spirit of health or goblin damn'd,Bring with thee airs from heaven or blasts from hell,Be thy intents wicked or charitable,Thou comest in such a questionable shapeThat I will speak to thee: I'll call thee Hamlet,King, father, royal Dane: O, answer me!Let me not burst in ignorance; but tellWhy thy canonized bones, hearsed in death,Have burst their cerements; why the sepulchre,Wherein we saw thee quietly inurn'd,Hath oped his ponderous and marble jaws,To cast thee up again. What may this mean,That thou, dead corse, again in complete steelRevisit'st thus the glimpses of the moon,Making night hideous; and we fools of natureSo horridly to shake our dispositionWith thoughts beyond the reaches of our souls?Say, why is this? wherefore? what should we do?
Ghost beckons HAMLET
HORATIO
It beckons you to go away with it,As if it some impartment did desireTo you alone.
MARCELLUS
Look, with what courteous actionIt waves you to a more removed ground:But do not go with it.
HORATIO
No, by no means.
HAMLET
It will not speak; then I will follow it.
HORATIO
Do not, my lord.
HAMLET
Why, what should be the fear?I do not set my life in a pin's fee;And for my soul, what can it do to that,Being a thing immortal as itself?It waves me forth again: I'll follow it.
HORATIO
What if it tempt you toward the flood, my lord,Or to the dreadful summit of the cliffThat beetles o'er his base into the sea,And there assume some other horrible form,Which might deprive your sovereignty of reasonAnd draw you into madness? think of it:The very place puts toys of desperation,Without more motive, into every brainThat looks so many fathoms to the seaAnd hears it roar beneath.
HAMLET
It waves me still.Go on; I'll follow thee.
MARCELLUS
You shall not go, my lord.
HAMLET
Hold off your hands.
HORATIO
Be ruled; you shall not go.
HAMLET
My fate cries out,And makes each petty artery in this bodyAs hardy as the Nemean lion's nerve.Still am I call'd. Unhand me, gentlemen.By heaven, I'll make a ghost of him that lets me!I say, away! Go on; I'll follow thee.
Exeunt Ghost and HAMLET
HORATIO
He waxes desperate with imagination.
MARCELLUS
Let's follow; 'tis not fit thus to obey him.
HORATIO
Have after. To what issue will this come?
MARCELLUS
Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.
HORATIO
Heaven will direct it.
MARCELLUS
Nay, let's follow him.
Exeunt
SCENE V. Another part of the platform.
Enter GHOST and HAMLET
HAMLET
Where wilt thou lead me? speak; I'll go no further.
Ghost
Mark me.
HAMLET
I will.
Ghost
My hour is almost come,When I to sulphurous and tormenting flamesMust render up myself.
HAMLET
Alas, poor ghost!
Ghost
Pity me not, but lend thy serious hearingTo what I shall unfold.
HAMLET
Speak; I am bound to hear.
Ghost
So art thou to revenge, when thou shalt hear.
HAMLET
What?
Ghost
I am thy father's spirit,Doom'd for a certain term to walk the night,And for the day confined to fast in fires,Till the foul crimes done in my days of natureAre burnt and purged away. But that I am forbidTo tell the secrets of my prison-house,I could a tale unfold whose lightest wordWould harrow up thy soul, freeze thy young blood,Make thy two eyes, like stars, start from their spheres,Thy knotted and combined locks to partAnd each particular hair to stand on end,Like quills upon the fretful porpentine:But this eternal blazon must not beTo ears of flesh and blood. List, list, O, list!If thou didst ever thy dear father love--
HAMLET
O God!
Ghost
Revenge his foul and most unnatural murder.
HAMLET
Murder!
Ghost
Murder most foul, as in the best it is;But this most foul, strange and unnatural.
HAMLET
Haste me to know't, that I, with wings as swiftAs meditation or the thoughts of love,May sweep to my revenge.
Ghost
I find thee apt;And duller shouldst thou be than the fat weedThat roots itself in ease on Lethe wharf,Wouldst thou not stir in this. Now, Hamlet, hear:'Tis given out that, sleeping in my orchard,A serpent stung me; so the whole ear of DenmarkIs by a forged process of my deathRankly abused: but know, thou noble youth,The serpent that did sting thy father's lifeNow wears his crown.
HAMLET
O my prophetic soul! My uncle!
Ghost
Ay, that incestuous, that adulterate beast,With witchcraft of his wit, with traitorous gifts,--O wicked wit and gifts, that have the powerSo to seduce!--won to his shameful lustThe will of my most seeming-virtuous queen:O Hamlet, what a falling-off was there!From me, whose love was of that dignityThat it went hand in hand even with the vowI made to her in marriage, and to declineUpon a wretch whose natural gifts were poorTo those of mine!But virtue, as it never will be moved,Though lewdness court it in a shape of heaven,So lust, though to a radiant angel link'd,Will sate itself in a celestial bed,And prey on garbage.But, soft! methinks I scent the morning air;Brief let me be. Sleeping within my orchard,My custom always of the afternoon,Upon my secure hour thy uncle stole,With juice of cursed hebenon in a vial,And in the porches of my ears did pourThe leperous distilment; whose effectHolds such an enmity with blood of manThat swift as quicksilver it courses throughThe natural gates and alleys of the body,And with a sudden vigour doth possetAnd curd, like eager droppings into milk,The thin and wholesome blood: so did it mine;And a most instant tetter bark'd about,Most lazar-like, with vile and loathsome crust,All my smooth body.Thus was I, sleeping, by a brother's handOf life, of crown, of queen, at once dispatch'd:Cut off even in the blossoms of my sin,Unhousel'd, disappointed, unanel'd,No reckoning made, but sent to my accountWith all my imperfections on my head:O, horrible! O, horrible! most horrible!If thou hast nature in thee, bear it not;Let not the royal bed of Denmark beA couch for luxury and damned incest.But, howsoever thou pursuest this act,Taint not thy mind, nor let thy soul contriveAgainst thy mother aught: leave her to heavenAnd to those thorns that in her bosom lodge,To prick and sting her. Fare thee well at once!The glow-worm shows the matin to be near,And 'gins to pale his uneffectual fire:Adieu, adieu! Hamlet, remember me.
Exit
HAMLET
O all you host of heaven! O earth! what else?And shall I couple hell? O, fie! Hold, hold, my heart;And you, my sinews, grow not instant old,But bear me stiffly up. Remember thee!Ay, thou poor ghost, while memory holds a seatIn this distracted globe. Remember thee!Yea, from the table of my memoryI'll wipe away all trivial fond records,All saws of books, all forms, all pressures past,That youth and observation copied there;And thy commandment all alone shall liveWithin the book and volume of my brain,Unmix'd with baser matter: yes, by heaven!O most pernicious woman!O villain, villain, smiling, damned villain!My tables,--meet it is I set it down,That one may smile, and smile, and be a villain;At least I'm sure it may be so in Denmark:
Writing
So, uncle, there you are. Now to my word;It is 'Adieu, adieu! remember me.'I have sworn 't.
MARCELLUS HORATIO
[Within] My lord, my lord,--
MARCELLUS
[Within] Lord Hamlet,--
HORATIO
[Within] Heaven secure him!
HAMLET
So be it!
HORATIO
[Within] Hillo, ho, ho, my lord!
HAMLET
Hillo, ho, ho, boy! come, bird, come.
Enter HORATIO and MARCELLUS
MARCELLUS
How is't, my noble lord?
HORATIO
What news, my lord?
HAMLET
O, wonderful!
HORATIO
Good my lord, tell it.
HAMLET
No; you'll reveal it.
HORATIO
Not I, my lord, by heaven.
MARCELLUS
Nor I, my lord.
HAMLET
How say you, then; would heart of man once think it?But you'll be secret?
HORATIO MARCELLUS
Ay, by heaven, my lord.
HAMLET
There's ne'er a villain dwelling in all DenmarkBut he's an arrant knave.
HORATIO
There needs no ghost, my lord, come from the graveTo tell us this.
HAMLET
Why, right; you are i' the right;And so, without more circumstance at all,I hold it fit that we shake hands and part:You, as your business and desire shall point you;For every man has business and desire,Such as it is; and for mine own poor part,Look you, I'll go pray.
HORATIO
These are but wild and whirling words, my lord.
HAMLET
I'm sorry they offend you, heartily;Yes, 'faith heartily.
HORATIO
There's no offence, my lord.
HAMLET
Yes, by Saint Patrick, but there is, Horatio,And much offence too. Touching this vision here,It is an honest ghost, that let me tell you:For your desire to know what is between us,O'ermaster 't as you may. And now, good friends,As you are friends, scholars and soldiers,Give me one poor request.
HORATIO
What is't, my lord? we will.
HAMLET
Never make known what you have seen to-night.
HORATIO MARCELLUS
My lord, we will not.
HAMLET
Nay, but swear't.
HORATIO
In faith,My lord, not I.
MARCELLUS
Nor I, my lord, in faith.
HAMLET
Upon my sword.
MARCELLUS
We have sworn, my lord, already.
HAMLET
Indeed, upon my sword, indeed.
Ghost
[Beneath] Swear.
HAMLET
Ah, ha, boy! say'st thou so? art thou there,truepenny?Come on--you hear this fellow in the cellarage--Consent to swear.
HORATIO
Propose the oath, my lord.
HAMLET
Never to speak of this that you have seen,Swear by my sword.
Ghost
[Beneath] Swear.
HAMLET
Hic et ubique? then we'll shift our ground.Come hither, gentlemen,And lay your hands again upon my sword:Never to speak of this that you have heard,Swear by my sword.
Ghost
[Beneath] Swear.
HAMLET
Well said, old mole! canst work i' the earth so fast?A worthy pioner! Once more remove, good friends.
HORATIO
O day and night, but this is wondrous strange!
HAMLET
And therefore as a stranger give it welcome.There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,Than are dreamt of in your philosophy. But come;Here, as before, never, so help you mercy,How strange or odd soe'er I bear myself,As I perchance hereafter shall think meetTo put an antic disposition on,That you, at such times seeing me, never shall,With arms encumber'd thus, or this headshake,Or by pronouncing of some doubtful phrase,As 'Well, well, we know,' or 'We could, an if we would,'Or 'If we list to speak,' or 'There be, an if they might,'Or such ambiguous giving out, to noteThat you know aught of me: this not to do,So grace and mercy at your most need help you, Swear.
Ghost
[Beneath] Swear.
HAMLET
Rest, rest, perturbed spirit!
They swear
So, gentlemen,With all my love I do commend me to you:And what so poor a man as Hamlet isMay do, to express his love and friending to you,God willing, shall not lack. Let us go in together;And still your fingers on your lips, I pray.The time is out of joint: O cursed spite,That ever I was born to set it right!Nay, come, let's go together.
Exeunt
SCENE I. A room in POLONIUS' house.
Enter POLONIUS and REYNALDO
LORD POLONIUS
Give him this money and these notes, Reynaldo.
REYNALDO
I will, my lord.
LORD POLONIUS
You shall do marvellous wisely, good Reynaldo,Before you visit him, to make inquireOf his behavior.
REYNALDO
My lord, I did intend it.
LORD POLONIUS
Marry, well said; very well said. Look you, sir,Inquire me first what Danskers are in Paris;And how, and who, what means, and where they keep,What company, at what expense; and findingBy this encompassment and drift of questionThat they do know my son, come you more nearerThan your particular demands will touch it:Take you, as 'twere, some distant knowledge of him;As thus, 'I know his father and his friends,And in part him: ' do you mark this, Reynaldo?
REYNALDO
Ay, very well, my lord.
LORD POLONIUS
'And in part him; but' you may say 'not well:But, if't be he I mean, he's very wild;Addicted so and so:' and there put on himWhat forgeries you please; marry, none so rankAs may dishonour him; take heed of that;But, sir, such wanton, wild and usual slipsAs are companions noted and most knownTo youth and liberty.
REYNALDO
As gaming, my lord.
LORD POLONIUS
Ay, or drinking, fencing, swearing, quarrelling,Drabbing: you may go so far.
REYNALDO
My lord, that would dishonour him.
LORD POLONIUS
'Faith, no; as you may season it in the chargeYou must not put another scandal on him,That he is open to incontinency;That's not my meaning: but breathe his faults so quaintlyThat they may seem the taints of liberty,The flash and outbreak of a fiery mind,A savageness in unreclaimed blood,Of general assault.
REYNALDO
But, my good lord,--
LORD POLONIUS
Wherefore should you do this?
REYNALDO
Ay, my lord,I would know that.
LORD POLONIUS
Marry, sir, here's my drift;And I believe, it is a fetch of wit:You laying these slight sullies on my son,As 'twere a thing a little soil'd i' the working, Mark you,Your party in converse, him you would sound,Having ever seen in the prenominate crimesThe youth you breathe of guilty, be assuredHe closes with you in this consequence;'Good sir,' or so, or 'friend,' or 'gentleman,'According to the phrase or the additionOf man and country.
REYNALDO
Very good, my lord.
LORD POLONIUS
And then, sir, does he this--he does--what was Iabout to say? By the mass, I was about to saysomething: where did I leave?
REYNALDO
At 'closes in the consequence,' at 'friend or so,'and 'gentleman.'
LORD POLONIUS
At 'closes in the consequence,' ay, marry;He closes thus: 'I know the gentleman;I saw him yesterday, or t' other day,Or then, or then; with such, or such; and, as you say,There was a' gaming; there o'ertook in's rouse;There falling out at tennis:' or perchance,'I saw him enter such a house of sale,'Videlicet, a brothel, or so forth.See you now;Your bait of falsehood takes this carp of truth:And thus do we of wisdom and of reach,With windlasses and with assays of bias,By indirections find directions out:So by my former lecture and advice,Shall you my son. You have me, have you not?
REYNALDO
My lord, I have.
LORD POLONIUS
God be wi' you; fare you well.
REYNALDO
Good my lord!
LORD POLONIUS
Observe his inclination in yourself.
REYNALDO
I shall, my lord.
LORD POLONIUS
And let him ply his music.
REYNALDO
Well, my lord.
LORD POLONIUS
Farewell!
Exit REYNALDO
Enter OPHELIA
How now, Ophelia! what's the matter?
OPHELIA
O, my lord, my lord, I have been so affrighted!
LORD POLONIUS
With what, i' the name of God?
OPHELIA
My lord, as I was sewing in my closet,Lord Hamlet, with his doublet all unbraced;No hat upon his head; his stockings foul'd,Ungarter'd, and down-gyved to his ancle;Pale as his shirt; his knees knocking each other;And with a look so piteous in purportAs if he had been loosed out of hellTo speak of horrors,--he comes before me.
LORD POLONIUS
Mad for thy love?
OPHELIA
My lord, I do not know;But truly, I do fear it.
LORD POLONIUS
What said he?
OPHELIA
He took me by the wrist and held me hard;Then goes he to the length of all his arm;And, with his other hand thus o'er his brow,He falls to such perusal of my faceAs he would draw it. Long stay'd he so;At last, a little shaking of mine armAnd thrice his head thus waving up and down,He raised a sigh so piteous and profoundAs it did seem to shatter all his bulkAnd end his being: that done, he lets me go:And, with his head over his shoulder turn'd,He seem'd to find his way without his eyes;For out o' doors he went without their helps,And, to the last, bended their light on me.
LORD POLONIUS
Come, go with me: I will go seek the king.This is the very ecstasy of love,Whose violent property fordoes itselfAnd leads the will to desperate undertakingsAs oft as any passion under heavenThat does afflict our natures. I am sorry.What, have you given him any hard words of late?
OPHELIA
No, my good lord, but, as you did command,I did repel his fetters and deniedHis access to me.
LORD POLONIUS
That hath made him mad.I am sorry that with better heed and judgmentI had not quoted him: I fear'd he did but trifle,And meant to wreck thee; but, beshrew my jealousy!By heaven, it is as proper to our ageTo cast beyond ourselves in our opinionsAs it is common for the younger sortTo lack discretion. Come, go we to the king:This must be known; which, being kept close, mightmoveMore grief to hide than hate to utter love.
Exeunt
SCENE II. A room in the castle.
Enter KING CLAUDIUS, QUEEN GERTRUDE, ROSENCRANTZ, GUILDENSTERN, and Attendants
KING CLAUDIUS
Welcome, dear Rosencrantz and Guildenstern!Moreover that we much did long to see you,The need we have to use you did provokeOur hasty sending. Something have you heardOf Hamlet's transformation; so call it,Sith nor the exterior nor the inward manResembles that it was. What it should be,More than his father's death, that thus hath put himSo much from the understanding of himself,I cannot dream of: I entreat you both,That, being of so young days brought up with him,And sith so neighbour'd to his youth and havior,That you vouchsafe your rest here in our courtSome little time: so by your companiesTo draw him on to pleasures, and to gather,So much as from occasion you may glean,Whether aught, to us unknown, afflicts him thus,That, open'd, lies within our remedy.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Good gentlemen, he hath much talk'd of you;And sure I am two men there are not livingTo whom he more adheres. If it will please youTo show us so much gentry and good willAs to expend your time with us awhile,For the supply and profit of our hope,Your visitation shall receive such thanksAs fits a king's remembrance.
ROSENCRANTZ
Both your majestiesMight, by the sovereign power you have of us,Put your dread pleasures more into commandThan to entreaty.
GUILDENSTERN
But we both obey,And here give up ourselves, in the full bentTo lay our service freely at your feet,To be commanded.
KING CLAUDIUS
Thanks, Rosencrantz and gentle Guildenstern.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Thanks, Guildenstern and gentle Rosencrantz:And I beseech you instantly to visitMy too much changed son. Go, some of you,And bring these gentlemen where Hamlet is.
GUILDENSTERN
Heavens make our presence and our practisesPleasant and helpful to him!
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Ay, amen!
Exeunt ROSENCRANTZ, GUILDENSTERN, and some Attendants
Enter POLONIUS
LORD POLONIUS
The ambassadors from Norway, my good lord,Are joyfully return'd.
KING CLAUDIUS
Thou still hast been the father of good news.
LORD POLONIUS
Have I, my lord? I assure my good liege,I hold my duty, as I hold my soul,Both to my God and to my gracious king:And I do think, or else this brain of mineHunts not the trail of policy so sureAs it hath used to do, that I have foundThe very cause of Hamlet's lunacy.
KING CLAUDIUS
O, speak of that; that do I long to hear.
LORD POLONIUS
Give first admittance to the ambassadors;My news shall be the fruit to that great feast.
KING CLAUDIUS
Thyself do grace to them, and bring them in.
Exit POLONIUS
He tells me, my dear Gertrude, he hath foundThe head and source of all your son's distemper.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
I doubt it is no other but the main;His father's death, and our o'erhasty marriage.
KING CLAUDIUS
Well, we shall sift him.
Re-enter POLONIUS, with VOLTIMAND and CORNELIUS
Welcome, my good friends!Say, Voltimand, what from our brother Norway?
VOLTIMAND
Most fair return of greetings and desires.Upon our first, he sent out to suppressHis nephew's levies; which to him appear'dTo be a preparation 'gainst the Polack;But, better look'd into, he truly foundIt was against your highness: whereat grieved,That so his sickness, age and impotenceWas falsely borne in hand, sends out arrestsOn Fortinbras; which he, in brief, obeys;Receives rebuke from Norway, and in fineMakes vow before his uncle never moreTo give the assay of arms against your majesty.Whereon old Norway, overcome with joy,Gives him three thousand crowns in annual fee,And his commission to employ those soldiers,So levied as before, against the Polack:With an entreaty, herein further shown,
Giving a paper
That it might please you to give quiet passThrough your dominions for this enterprise,On such regards of safety and allowanceAs therein are set down.
KING CLAUDIUS
It likes us well;And at our more consider'd time well read,Answer, and think upon this business.Meantime we thank you for your well-took labour:Go to your rest; at night we'll feast together:Most welcome home!
Exeunt VOLTIMAND and CORNELIUS
LORD POLONIUS
This business is well ended.My liege, and madam, to expostulateWhat majesty should be, what duty is,Why day is day, night night, and time is time,Were nothing but to waste night, day and time.Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit,And tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes,I will be brief: your noble son is mad:Mad call I it; for, to define true madness,What is't but to be nothing else but mad?But let that go.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
More matter, with less art.
LORD POLONIUS
Madam, I swear I use no art at all.That he is mad, 'tis true: 'tis true 'tis pity;And pity 'tis 'tis true: a foolish figure;But farewell it, for I will use no art.Mad let us grant him, then: and now remainsThat we find out the cause of this effect,Or rather say, the cause of this defect,For this effect defective comes by cause:Thus it remains, and the remainder thus. Perpend.I have a daughter--have while she is mine--Who, in her duty and obedience, mark,Hath given me this: now gather, and surmise.
Reads
'To the celestial and my soul's idol, the mostbeautified Ophelia,'--That's an ill phrase, a vile phrase; 'beautified' isa vile phrase: but you shall hear. Thus:
Reads
'In her excellent white bosom, these, & c.'
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Came this from Hamlet to her?
LORD POLONIUS
Good madam, stay awhile; I will be faithful.
Reads
'Doubt thou the stars are fire;Doubt that the sun doth move;Doubt truth to be a liar;But never doubt I love.'O dear Ophelia, I am ill at these numbers;I have not art to reckon my groans: but thatI love thee best, O most best, believe it. Adieu.'Thine evermore most dear lady, whilstthis machine is to him, HAMLET.'This, in obedience, hath my daughter shown me,And more above, hath his solicitings,As they fell out by time, by means and place,All given to mine ear.
KING CLAUDIUS
But how hath sheReceived his love?
LORD POLONIUS
What do you think of me?
KING CLAUDIUS
As of a man faithful and honourable.
LORD POLONIUS
I would fain prove so. But what might you think,When I had seen this hot love on the wing--As I perceived it, I must tell you that,Before my daughter told me--what might you,Or my dear majesty your queen here, think,If I had play'd the desk or table-book,Or given my heart a winking, mute and dumb,Or look'd upon this love with idle sight;What might you think? No, I went round to work,And my young mistress thus I did bespeak:'Lord Hamlet is a prince, out of thy star;This must not be:' and then I precepts gave her,That she should lock herself from his resort,Admit no messengers, receive no tokens.Which done, she took the fruits of my advice;And he, repulsed--a short tale to make--Fell into a sadness, then into a fast,Thence to a watch, thence into a weakness,Thence to a lightness, and, by this declension,Into the madness wherein now he raves,And all we mourn for.
KING CLAUDIUS
Do you think 'tis this?
QUEEN GERTRUDE
It may be, very likely.
LORD POLONIUS
Hath there been such a time--I'd fain know that--That I have positively said 'Tis so,'When it proved otherwise?
KING CLAUDIUS
Not that I know.
LORD POLONIUS
[Pointing to his head and shoulder]Take this from this, if this be otherwise:If circumstances lead me, I will findWhere truth is hid, though it were hid indeedWithin the centre.
KING CLAUDIUS
How may we try it further?
LORD POLONIUS
You know, sometimes he walks four hours togetherHere in the lobby.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
So he does indeed.
LORD POLONIUS
At such a time I'll loose my daughter to him:Be you and I behind an arras then;Mark the encounter: if he love her notAnd be not from his reason fall'n thereon,Let me be no assistant for a state,But keep a farm and carters.
KING CLAUDIUS
We will try it.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
But, look, where sadly the poor wretch comes reading.
LORD POLONIUS
Away, I do beseech you, both away:I'll board him presently.
Exeunt KING CLAUDIUS, QUEEN GERTRUDE, and Attendants
Enter HAMLET, reading
O, give me leave:How does my good Lord Hamlet?
HAMLET
Well, God-a-mercy.
LORD POLONIUS
Do you know me, my lord?
HAMLET
Excellent well; you are a fishmonger.
LORD POLONIUS
Not I, my lord.
HAMLET
Then I would you were so honest a man.
LORD POLONIUS
Honest, my lord!
HAMLET
Ay, sir; to be honest, as this world goes, is to beone man picked out of ten thousand.
LORD POLONIUS
That's very true, my lord.
HAMLET
For if the sun breed maggots in a dead dog, being agod kissing carrion,--Have you a daughter?
LORD POLONIUS
I have, my lord.
HAMLET
Let her not walk i' the sun: conception is ablessing: but not as your daughter may conceive.Friend, look to 't.
LORD POLONIUS
[Aside] How say you by that? Still harping on mydaughter: yet he knew me not at first; he said Iwas a fishmonger: he is far gone, far gone: andtruly in my youth I suffered much extremity forlove; very near this. I'll speak to him again.What do you read, my lord?
HAMLET
Words, words, words.
LORD POLONIUS
What is the matter, my lord?
HAMLET
Between who?
LORD POLONIUS
I mean, the matter that you read, my lord.
HAMLET
Slanders, sir: for the satirical rogue says herethat old men have grey beards, that their faces arewrinkled, their eyes purging thick amber andplum-tree gum and that they have a plentiful lack ofwit, together with most weak hams: all which, sir,though I most powerfully and potently believe, yetI hold it not honesty to have it thus set down, foryourself, sir, should be old as I am, if like a crabyou could go backward.
LORD POLONIUS
[Aside] Though this be madness, yet there is methodin 't. Will you walk out of the air, my lord?
HAMLET
Into my grave.
LORD POLONIUS
Indeed, that is out o' the air.
Aside
How pregnant sometimes his replies are! a happinessthat often madness hits on, which reason and sanitycould not so prosperously be delivered of. I willleave him, and suddenly contrive the means ofmeeting between him and my daughter.--My honourablelord, I will most humbly take my leave of you.
HAMLET
You cannot, sir, take from me any thing that I willmore willingly part withal: except my life, exceptmy life, except my life.
LORD POLONIUS
Fare you well, my lord.
HAMLET
These tedious old fools!
Enter ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN
LORD POLONIUS
You go to seek the Lord Hamlet; there he is.
ROSENCRANTZ
[To POLONIUS] God save you, sir!
Exit POLONIUS
GUILDENSTERN
My honoured lord!
ROSENCRANTZ
My most dear lord!
HAMLET
My excellent good friends! How dost thou,Guildenstern? Ah, Rosencrantz! Good lads, how do ye both?
ROSENCRANTZ
As the indifferent children of the earth.
GUILDENSTERN
Happy, in that we are not over-happy;On fortune's cap we are not the very button.
HAMLET
Nor the soles of her shoe?
ROSENCRANTZ
Neither, my lord.
HAMLET
Then you live about her waist, or in the middle ofher favours?
GUILDENSTERN
'Faith, her privates we.
HAMLET
In the secret parts of fortune? O, most true; sheis a strumpet. What's the news?
ROSENCRANTZ
None, my lord, but that the world's grown honest.
HAMLET
Then is doomsday near: but your news is not true.Let me question more in particular: what have you,my good friends, deserved at the hands of fortune,that she sends you to prison hither?
GUILDENSTERN
Prison, my lord!
HAMLET
Denmark's a prison.
ROSENCRANTZ
Then is the world one.
HAMLET
A goodly one; in which there are many confines,wards and dungeons, Denmark being one o' the worst.
ROSENCRANTZ
We think not so, my lord.
HAMLET
Why, then, 'tis none to you; for there is nothingeither good or bad, but thinking makes it so: to meit is a prison.
ROSENCRANTZ
Why then, your ambition makes it one; 'tis toonarrow for your mind.
HAMLET
O God, I could be bounded in a nut shell and countmyself a king of infinite space, were it not that Ihave bad dreams.
GUILDENSTERN
Which dreams indeed are ambition, for the verysubstance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream.
HAMLET
A dream itself is but a shadow.
ROSENCRANTZ
Truly, and I hold ambition of so airy and light a
quality that it is but a shadow's shadow.
HAMLET
Then are our beggars bodies, and our monarchs andoutstretched heroes the beggars' shadows. Shall weto the court? for, by my fay, I cannot reason.
ROSENCRANTZ GUILDENSTERN
We'll wait upon you.
HAMLET
No such matter: I will not sort you with the restof my servants, for, to speak to you like an honestman, I am most dreadfully attended. But, in thebeaten way of friendship, what make you at Elsinore?
ROSENCRANTZ
To visit you, my lord; no other occasion.
HAMLET
Beggar that I am, I am even poor in thanks; but Ithank you: and sure, dear friends, my thanks aretoo dear a halfpenny. Were you not sent for? Is ityour own inclining? Is it a free visitation? Come,deal justly with me: come, come; nay, speak.
GUILDENSTERN
What should we say, my lord?
HAMLET
Why, any thing, but to the purpose. You were sentfor; and there is a kind of confession in your lookswhich your modesties have not craft enough to colour:I know the good king and queen have sent for you.
ROSENCRANTZ
To what end, my lord?
HAMLET
That you must teach me. But let me conjure you, bythe rights of our fellowship, by the consonancy ofour youth, by the obligation of our ever-preservedlove, and by what more dear a better proposer couldcharge you withal, be even and direct with me,whether you were sent for, or no?
ROSENCRANTZ
[Aside to GUILDENSTERN] What say you?
HAMLET
[Aside] Nay, then, I have an eye of you.--If youlove me, hold not off.
GUILDENSTERN
My lord, we were sent for.
HAMLET
I will tell you why; so shall my anticipationprevent your discovery, and your secrecy to the kingand queen moult no feather. I have of late--butwherefore I know not--lost all my mirth, forgone allcustom of exercises; and indeed it goes so heavilywith my disposition that this goodly frame, theearth, seems to me a sterile promontory, this mostexcellent canopy, the air, look you, this braveo'erhanging firmament, this majestical roof frettedwith golden fire, why, it appears no other thing tome than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours.What a piece of work is a man! how noble in reason!how infinite in faculty! in form and moving howexpress and admirable! in action how like an angel!in apprehension how like a god! the beauty of theworld! the paragon of animals! And yet, to me,what is this quintessence of dust? man delights notme: no, nor woman neither, though by your smilingyou seem to say so.
ROSENCRANTZ
My lord, there was no such stuff in my thoughts.
HAMLET
Why did you laugh then, when I said 'man delights not me'?
ROSENCRANTZ
To think, my lord, if you delight not in man, whatlenten entertainment the players shall receive fromyou: we coted them on the way; and hither are theycoming, to offer you service.
HAMLET
He that plays the king shall be welcome; his majestyshall have tribute of me; the adventurous knightshall use his foil and target; the lover shall notsigh gratis; the humourous man shall end his partin peace; the clown shall make those laugh whoselungs are tickled o' the sere; and the lady shallsay her mind freely, or the blank verse shall haltfor't. What players are they?
ROSENCRANTZ
Even those you were wont to take delight in, thetragedians of the city.
HAMLET
How chances it they travel? their residence, bothin reputation and profit, was better both ways.
ROSENCRANTZ
I think their inhibition comes by the means of thelate innovation.
HAMLET
Do they hold the same estimation they did when I wasin the city? are they so followed?
ROSENCRANTZ
No, indeed, are they not.
HAMLET
How comes it? do they grow rusty?
ROSENCRANTZ
Nay, their endeavour keeps in the wonted pace: butthere is, sir, an aery of children, little eyases,that cry out on the top of question, and are mosttyrannically clapped for't: these are now thefashion, and so berattle the common stages--so theycall them--that many wearing rapiers are afraid ofgoose-quills and dare scarce come thither.
HAMLET
What, are they children? who maintains 'em? how arethey escoted? Will they pursue the quality nolonger than they can sing? will they not sayafterwards, if they should grow themselves to commonplayers--as it is most like, if their means are nobetter--their writers do them wrong, to make themexclaim against their own succession?
ROSENCRANTZ
'Faith, there has been much to do on both sides; andthe nation holds it no sin to tarre them tocontroversy: there was, for a while, no money bidfor argument, unless the poet and the player went tocuffs in the question.
HAMLET
Is't possible?
GUILDENSTERN
O, there has been much throwing about of brains.
HAMLET
Do the boys carry it away?
ROSENCRANTZ
Ay, that they do, my lord; Hercules and his load too.
HAMLET
It is not very strange; for mine uncle is king ofDenmark, and those that would make mows at him whilemy father lived, give twenty, forty, fifty, anhundred ducats a-piece for his picture in little.'Sblood, there is something in this more thannatural, if philosophy could find it out.
Flourish of trumpets within
GUILDENSTERN
There are the players.
HAMLET
Gentlemen, you are welcome to Elsinore. Your hands,come then: the appurtenance of welcome is fashionand ceremony: let me comply with you in this garb,lest my extent to the players, which, I tell you,must show fairly outward, should more appear likeentertainment than yours. You are welcome: but myuncle-father and aunt-mother are deceived.
GUILDENSTERN
In what, my dear lord?
HAMLET
I am but mad north-north-west: when the wind issoutherly I know a hawk from a handsaw.
Enter POLONIUS
LORD POLONIUS
Well be with you, gentlemen!
HAMLET
Hark you, Guildenstern; and you too: at each ear ahearer: that great baby you see there is not yetout of his swaddling-clouts.
ROSENCRANTZ
Happily he's the second time come to them; for theysay an old man is twice a child.
HAMLET
I will prophesy he comes to tell me of the players;mark it. You say right, sir: o' Monday morning;'twas so indeed.
LORD POLONIUS
My lord, I have news to tell you.
HAMLET
My lord, I have news to tell you.When Roscius was an actor in Rome,--
LORD POLONIUS
The actors are come hither, my lord.
HAMLET
Buz, buz!
LORD POLONIUS
Upon mine honour,--
HAMLET
Then came each actor on his ass,--
LORD POLONIUS
The best actors in the world, either for tragedy,comedy, history, pastoral, pastoral-comical,historical-pastoral, tragical-historical, tragical-comical-historical-pastoral, scene individable, orpoem unlimited: Seneca cannot be too heavy, norPlautus too light. For the law of writ and theliberty, these are the only men.
HAMLET
O Jephthah, judge of Israel, what a treasure hadst thou!
LORD POLONIUS
What a treasure had he, my lord?
HAMLET
Why,'One fair daughter and no more,The which he loved passing well.'
LORD POLONIUS
[Aside] Still on my daughter.
HAMLET
Am I not i' the right, old Jephthah?
LORD POLONIUS
If you call me Jephthah, my lord, I have a daughterthat I love passing well.
HAMLET
Nay, that follows not.
LORD POLONIUS
What follows, then, my lord?
HAMLET
Why,'As by lot, God wot,'and then, you know,'It came to pass, as most like it was,'--the first row of the pious chanson will show youmore; for look, where my abridgement comes.
Enter four or five Players
You are welcome, masters; welcome, all. I am gladto see thee well. Welcome, good friends. O, my oldfriend! thy face is valenced since I saw thee last:comest thou to beard me in Denmark? What, my younglady and mistress! By'r lady, your ladyship isnearer to heaven than when I saw you last, by thealtitude of a chopine. Pray God, your voice, likeapiece of uncurrent gold, be not cracked within thering. Masters, you are all welcome. We'll e'ento't like French falconers, fly at any thing we see:we'll have a speech straight: come, give us a tasteof your quality; come, a passionate speech.
First Player
What speech, my lord?
HAMLET
I heard thee speak me a speech once, but it wasnever acted; or, if it was, not above once; for theplay, I remember, pleased not the million; 'twascaviare to the general: but it was--as I receivedit, and others, whose judgments in such matterscried in the top of mine--an excellent play, welldigested in the scenes, set down with as muchmodesty as cunning. I remember, one said therewere no sallets in the lines to make the mattersavoury, nor no matter in the phrase that mightindict the author of affectation; but called it anhonest method, as wholesome as sweet, and by verymuch more handsome than fine. One speech in it Ichiefly loved: 'twas Aeneas' tale to Dido; andthereabout of it especially, where he speaks ofPriam's slaughter: if it live in your memory, beginat this line: let me see, let me see--'The rugged Pyrrhus, like the Hyrcanian beast,'--it is not so:--it begins with Pyrrhus:--'The rugged Pyrrhus, he whose sable arms,Black as his purpose, did the night resembleWhen he lay couched in the ominous horse,Hath now this dread and black complexion smear'dWith heraldry more dismal; head to footNow is he total gules; horridly trick'dWith blood of fathers, mothers, daughters, sons,Baked and impasted with the parching streets,That lend a tyrannous and damned lightTo their lord's murder: roasted in wrath and fire,And thus o'er-sized with coagulate gore,With eyes like carbuncles, the hellish PyrrhusOld grandsire Priam seeks.'So, proceed you.
LORD POLONIUS
'Fore God, my lord, well spoken, with good accent andgood discretion.
First Player
'Anon he finds himStriking too short at Greeks; his antique sword,Rebellious to his arm, lies where it falls,Repugnant to command: unequal match'd,Pyrrhus at Priam drives; in rage strikes wide;But with the whiff and wind of his fell swordThe unnerved father falls. Then senseless Ilium,Seeming to feel this blow, with flaming topStoops to his base, and with a hideous crashTakes prisoner Pyrrhus' ear: for, lo! his sword,Which was declining on the milky headOf reverend Priam, seem'd i' the air to stick:So, as a painted tyrant, Pyrrhus stood,And like a neutral to his will and matter,Did nothing.But, as we often see, against some storm,A silence in the heavens, the rack stand still,The bold winds speechless and the orb belowAs hush as death, anon the dreadful thunderDoth rend the region, so, after Pyrrhus' pause,Aroused vengeance sets him new a-work;And never did the Cyclops' hammers fallOn Mars's armour forged for proof eterneWith less remorse than Pyrrhus' bleeding swordNow falls on Priam.Out, out, thou strumpet, Fortune! All you gods,In general synod 'take away her power;Break all the spokes and fellies from her wheel,And bowl the round nave down the hill of heaven,As low as to the fiends!'
LORD POLONIUS
This is too long.
HAMLET
It shall to the barber's, with your beard. Prithee,say on: he's for a jig or a tale of bawdry, or hesleeps: say on: come to Hecuba.
First Player
'But who, O, who had seen the mobled queen--'
HAMLET
'The mobled queen?'
LORD POLONIUS
That's good; 'mobled queen' is good.
First Player
'Run barefoot up and down, threatening the flamesWith bisson rheum; a clout upon that headWhere late the diadem stood, and for a robe,About her lank and all o'er-teemed loins,A blanket, in the alarm of fear caught up;Who this had seen, with tongue in venom steep'd,'Gainst Fortune's state would treason havepronounced:But if the gods themselves did see her thenWhen she saw Pyrrhus make malicious sportIn mincing with his sword her husband's limbs,The instant burst of clamour that she made,Unless things mortal move them not at all,Would have made milch the burning eyes of heaven,And passion in the gods.'
LORD POLONIUS
Look, whether he has not turned his colour and hastears in's eyes. Pray you, no more.
HAMLET
'Tis well: I'll have thee speak out the rest soon.Good my lord, will you see the players wellbestowed? Do you hear, let them be well used; forthey are the abstract and brief chronicles of thetime: after your death you were better have a badepitaph than their ill report while you live.
LORD POLONIUS
My lord, I will use them according to their desert.
HAMLET
God's bodykins, man, much better: use every manafter his desert, and who should 'scape whipping?Use them after your own honour and dignity: the lessthey deserve, the more merit is in your bounty.Take them in.
LORD POLONIUS
Come, sirs.
HAMLET
Follow him, friends: we'll hear a play to-morrow.
Exit POLONIUS with all the Players but the First
Dost thou hear me, old friend; can you play theMurder of Gonzago?
First Player
Ay, my lord.
HAMLET
We'll ha't to-morrow night. You could, for a need,study a speech of some dozen or sixteen lines, whichI would set down and insert in't, could you not?
First Player
Ay, my lord.
HAMLET
Very well. Follow that lord; and look you mock himnot.
Exit First Player
My good friends, I'll leave you till night: you arewelcome to Elsinore.
ROSENCRANTZ
Good my lord!
HAMLET
Ay, so, God be wi' ye;
Exeunt ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN
Now I am alone.O, what a rogue and peasant slave am I!Is it not monstrous that this player here,But in a fiction, in a dream of passion,Could force his soul so to his own conceitThat from her working all his visage wann'd,Tears in his eyes, distraction in's aspect,A broken voice, and his whole function suitingWith forms to his conceit? and all for nothing!For Hecuba!What's Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba,That he should weep for her? What would he do,Had he the motive and the cue for passionThat I have? He would drown the stage with tearsAnd cleave the general ear with horrid speech,Make mad the guilty and appal the free,Confound the ignorant, and amaze indeedThe very faculties of eyes and ears. Yet I,A dull and muddy-mettled rascal, peak,Like John-a-dreams, unpregnant of my cause,And can say nothing; no, not for a king,Upon whose property and most dear lifeA damn'd defeat was made. Am I a coward?Who calls me villain? breaks my pate across?Plucks off my beard, and blows it in my face?Tweaks me by the nose? gives me the lie i' the throat,As deep as to the lungs? who does me this?Ha!'Swounds, I should take it: for it cannot beBut I am pigeon-liver'd and lack gallTo make oppression bitter, or ere thisI should have fatted all the region kitesWith this slave's offal: bloody, bawdy villain!Remorseless, treacherous, lecherous, kindless villain!O, vengeance!Why, what an ass am I! This is most brave,That I, the son of a dear father murder'd,Prompted to my revenge by heaven and hell,Must, like a whore, unpack my heart with words,And fall a-cursing, like a very drab,A scullion!Fie upon't! foh! About, my brain! I have heardThat guilty creatures sitting at a playHave by the very cunning of the sceneBeen struck so to the soul that presentlyThey have proclaim'd their malefactions;For murder, though it have no tongue, will speakWith most miraculous organ. I'll have these playersPlay something like the murder of my fatherBefore mine uncle: I'll observe his looks;I'll tent him to the quick: if he but blench,I know my course. The spirit that I have seenMay be the devil: and the devil hath powerTo assume a pleasing shape; yea, and perhapsOut of my weakness and my melancholy,As he is very potent with such spirits,Abuses me to damn me: I'll have groundsMore relative than this: the play 's the thingWherein I'll catch the conscience of the king.
Exit
SCENE I. A room in the castle.
Enter KING CLAUDIUS, QUEEN GERTRUDE, POLONIUS, OPHELIA, ROSENCRANTZ, and GUILDENSTERN
KING CLAUDIUS
And can you, by no drift of circumstance,Get from him why he puts on this confusion,Grating so harshly all his days of quietWith turbulent and dangerous lunacy?
ROSENCRANTZ
He does confess he feels himself distracted;But from what cause he will by no means speak.
GUILDENSTERN
Nor do we find him forward to be sounded,But, with a crafty madness, keeps aloof,When we would bring him on to some confessionOf his true state.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Did he receive you well?
ROSENCRANTZ
Most like a gentleman.
GUILDENSTERN
But with much forcing of his disposition.
ROSENCRANTZ
Niggard of question; but, of our demands,Most free in his reply.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Did you assay him?To any pastime?
ROSENCRANTZ
Madam, it so fell out, that certain playersWe o'er-raught on the way: of these we told him;And there did seem in him a kind of joyTo hear of it: they are about the court,And, as I think, they have already orderThis night to play before him.
LORD POLONIUS
'Tis most true:And he beseech'd me to entreat your majestiesTo hear and see the matter.
KING CLAUDIUS
With all my heart; and it doth much content meTo hear him so inclined.Good gentlemen, give him a further edge,And drive his purpose on to these delights.
ROSENCRANTZ
We shall, my lord.
Exeunt ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN
KING CLAUDIUS
Sweet Gertrude, leave us too;For we have closely sent for Hamlet hither,That he, as 'twere by accident, may hereAffront Ophelia:Her father and myself, lawful espials,Will so bestow ourselves that, seeing, unseen,We may of their encounter frankly judge,And gather by him, as he is behaved,If 't be the affliction of his love or noThat thus he suffers for.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
I shall obey you.And for your part, Ophelia, I do wishThat your good beauties be the happy causeOf Hamlet's wildness: so shall I hope your virtuesWill bring him to his wonted way again,To both your honours.
OPHELIA
Madam, I wish it may.
Exit QUEEN GERTRUDE
LORD POLONIUS
Ophelia, walk you here. Gracious, so please you,We will bestow ourselves.
To OPHELIA
Read on this book;That show of such an exercise may colourYour loneliness. We are oft to blame in this,--'Tis too much proved--that with devotion's visageAnd pious action we do sugar o'erThe devil himself.
KING CLAUDIUS
[Aside] O, 'tis too true!How smart a lash that speech doth give my conscience!The harlot's cheek, beautied with plastering art,Is not more ugly to the thing that helps itThan is my deed to my most painted word:O heavy burthen!
LORD POLONIUS
I hear him coming: let's withdraw, my lord.
Exeunt KING CLAUDIUS and POLONIUS
Enter HAMLET
HAMLET
To be, or not to be: that is the question:Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to sufferThe slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep;No more; and by a sleep to say we endThe heart-ache and the thousand natural shocksThat flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummationDevoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep;To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub;For in that sleep of death what dreams may comeWhen we have shuffled off this mortal coil,Must give us pause: there's the respectThat makes calamity of so long life;For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,The pangs of despised love, the law's delay,The insolence of office and the spurnsThat patient merit of the unworthy takes,When he himself might his quietus makeWith a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear,To grunt and sweat under a weary life,But that the dread of something after death,The undiscover'd country from whose bournNo traveller returns, puzzles the willAnd makes us rather bear those ills we haveThan fly to others that we know not of?Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;And thus the native hue of resolutionIs sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,And enterprises of great pith and momentWith this regard their currents turn awry,And lose the name of action.--Soft you now!The fair Ophelia! Nymph, in thy orisonsBe all my sins remember'd.
OPHELIA
Good my lord,How does your honour for this many a day?
HAMLET
I humbly thank you; well, well, well.
OPHELIA
My lord, I have remembrances of yours,That I have longed long to re-deliver;I pray you, now receive them.
HAMLET
No, not I;I never gave you aught.
OPHELIA
My honour'd lord, you know right well you did;And, with them, words of so sweet breath composedAs made the things more rich: their perfume lost,Take these again; for to the noble mindRich gifts wax poor when givers prove unkind.There, my lord.
HAMLET
Ha, ha! are you honest?
OPHELIA
My lord?
HAMLET
Are you fair?
OPHELIA
What means your lordship?
HAMLET
That if you be honest and fair, your honesty shouldadmit no discourse to your beauty.
OPHELIA
Could beauty, my lord, have better commerce thanwith honesty?
HAMLET
Ay, truly; for the power of beauty will soonertransform honesty from what it is to a bawd than theforce of honesty can translate beauty into hislikeness: this was sometime a paradox, but now thetime gives it proof. I did love you once.
OPHELIA
Indeed, my lord, you made me believe so.
HAMLET
You should not have believed me; for virtue cannotso inoculate our old stock but we shall relish ofit: I loved you not.
OPHELIA
I was the more deceived.
HAMLET
Get thee to a nunnery: why wouldst thou be abreeder of sinners? I am myself indifferent honest;but yet I could accuse me of such things that itwere better my mother had not borne me: I am veryproud, revengeful, ambitious, with more offences atmy beck than I have thoughts to put them in,imagination to give them shape, or time to act themin. What should such fellows as I do crawlingbetween earth and heaven? We are arrant knaves,all; believe none of us. Go thy ways to a nunnery.Where's your father?
OPHELIA
At home, my lord.
HAMLET
Let the doors be shut upon him, that he may play thefool no where but in's own house. Farewell.
OPHELIA
O, help him, you sweet heavens!
HAMLET
If thou dost marry, I'll give thee this plague forthy dowry: be thou as chaste as ice, as pure assnow, thou shalt not escape calumny. Get thee to anunnery, go: farewell. Or, if thou wilt needsmarry, marry a fool; for wise men know well enoughwhat monsters you make of them. To a nunnery, go,and quickly too. Farewell.
OPHELIA
O heavenly powers, restore him!
HAMLET
I have heard of your paintings too, well enough; Godhas given you one face, and you make yourselvesanother: you jig, you amble, and you lisp, andnick-name God's creatures, and make your wantonnessyour ignorance. Go to, I'll no more on't; it hathmade me mad. I say, we will have no more marriages:those that are married already, all but one, shalllive; the rest shall keep as they are. To anunnery, go.
Exit
OPHELIA
O, what a noble mind is here o'erthrown!The courtier's, soldier's, scholar's, eye, tongue, sword;The expectancy and rose of the fair state,The glass of fashion and the mould of form,The observed of all observers, quite, quite down!And I, of ladies most deject and wretched,That suck'd the honey of his music vows,Now see that noble and most sovereign reason,Like sweet bells jangled, out of tune and harsh;That unmatch'd form and feature of blown youthBlasted with ecstasy: O, woe is me,To have seen what I have seen, see what I see!
Re-enter KING CLAUDIUS and POLONIUS
KING CLAUDIUS
Love! his affections do not that way tend;Nor what he spake, though it lack'd form a little,Was not like madness. There's something in his soul,O'er which his melancholy sits on brood;And I do doubt the hatch and the discloseWill be some danger: which for to prevent,I have in quick determinationThus set it down: he shall with speed to England,For the demand of our neglected tributeHaply the seas and countries differentWith variable objects shall expelThis something-settled matter in his heart,Whereon his brains still beating puts him thusFrom fashion of himself. What think you on't?
LORD POLONIUS
It shall do well: but yet do I believeThe origin and commencement of his griefSprung from neglected love. How now, Ophelia!You need not tell us what Lord Hamlet said;We heard it all. My lord, do as you please;But, if you hold it fit, after the playLet his queen mother all alone entreat himTo show his grief: let her be round with him;And I'll be placed, so please you, in the earOf all their conference. If she find him not,To England send him, or confine him whereYour wisdom best shall think.
KING CLAUDIUS
It shall be so:Madness in great ones must not unwatch'd go.
Exeunt
SCENE II. A hall in the castle.
Enter HAMLET and Players
HAMLET
Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it toyou, trippingly on the tongue: but if you mouth it,as many of your players do, I had as lief thetown-crier spoke my lines. Nor do not saw the airtoo much with your hand, thus, but use all gently;for in the very torrent, tempest, and, as I may say,the whirlwind of passion, you must acquire and begeta temperance that may give it smoothness. O, itoffends me to the soul to hear a robustiousperiwig-pated fellow tear a passion to tatters, tovery rags, to split the ears of the groundlings, whofor the most part are capable of nothing butinexplicable dumbshows and noise: I would have sucha fellow whipped for o'erdoing Termagant; itout-herods Herod: pray you, avoid it.
First Player
I warrant your honour.
HAMLET
Be not too tame neither, but let your own discretionbe your tutor: suit the action to the word, theword to the action; with this special o'erstep notthe modesty of nature: for any thing so overdone isfrom the purpose of playing, whose end, both at thefirst and now, was and is, to hold, as 'twere, themirror up to nature; to show virtue her own feature,scorn her own image, and the very age and body ofthe time his form and pressure. Now this overdone,or come tardy off, though it make the unskilfullaugh, cannot but make the judicious grieve; thecensure of the which one must in your allowanceo'erweigh a whole theatre of others. O, there beplayers that I have seen play, and heard otherspraise, and that highly, not to speak it profanely,that, neither having the accent of Christians northe gait of Christian, pagan, nor man, have sostrutted and bellowed that I have thought some ofnature's journeymen had made men and not made themwell, they imitated humanity so abominably.
First Player
I hope we have reformed that indifferently with us,sir.
HAMLET
O, reform it altogether. And let those that playyour clowns speak no more than is set down for them;for there be of them that will themselves laugh, toset on some quantity of barren spectators to laughtoo; though, in the mean time, some necessaryquestion of the play be then to be considered:that's villanous, and shows a most pitiful ambitionin the fool that uses it. Go, make you ready.
Exeunt Players
Enter POLONIUS, ROSENCRANTZ, and GUILDENSTERN
How now, my lord! I will the king hear this piece of work?
LORD POLONIUS
And the queen too, and that presently.
HAMLET
Bid the players make haste.
Exit POLONIUS
Will you two help to hasten them?
ROSENCRANTZ GUILDENSTERN
We will, my lord.
Exeunt ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN
HAMLET
What ho! Horatio!
Enter HORATIO
HORATIO
Here, sweet lord, at your service.
HAMLET
Horatio, thou art e'en as just a manAs e'er my conversation coped withal.
HORATIO
O, my dear lord,--
HAMLET
Nay, do not think I flatter;For what advancement may I hope from theeThat no revenue hast but thy good spirits,To feed and clothe thee? Why should the poor be flatter'd?No, let the candied tongue lick absurd pomp,And crook the pregnant hinges of the kneeWhere thrift may follow fawning. Dost thou hear?Since my dear soul was mistress of her choiceAnd could of men distinguish, her electionHath seal'd thee for herself; for thou hast beenAs one, in suffering all, that suffers nothing,A man that fortune's buffets and rewardsHast ta'en with equal thanks: and blest are thoseWhose blood and judgment are so well commingled,That they are not a pipe for fortune's fingerTo sound what stop she please. Give me that manThat is not passion's slave, and I will wear himIn my heart's core, ay, in my heart of heart,As I do thee.--Something too much of this.--There is a play to-night before the king;One scene of it comes near the circumstanceWhich I have told thee of my father's death:I prithee, when thou seest that act afoot,Even with the very comment of thy soulObserve mine uncle: if his occulted guiltDo not itself unkennel in one speech,It is a damned ghost that we have seen,And my imaginations are as foulAs Vulcan's stithy. Give him heedful note;For I mine eyes will rivet to his face,And after we will both our judgments joinIn censure of his seeming.
HORATIO
Well, my lord:If he steal aught the whilst this play is playing,And 'scape detecting, I will pay the theft.
HAMLET
They are coming to the play; I must be idle:Get you a place.
Danish march. A flourish. Enter KING CLAUDIUS, QUEEN GERTRUDE, POLONIUS, OPHELIA, ROSENCRANTZ, GUILDENSTERN, and others
KING CLAUDIUS
How fares our cousin Hamlet?
HAMLET
Excellent, i' faith; of the chameleon's dish: I eatthe air, promise-crammed: you cannot feed capons so.
KING CLAUDIUS
I have nothing with this answer, Hamlet; these wordsare not mine.
HAMLET
No, nor mine now.
To POLONIUS
My lord, you played once i' the university, you say?
LORD POLONIUS
That did I, my lord; and was accounted a good actor.
HAMLET
What did you enact?
LORD POLONIUS
I did enact Julius Caesar: I was killed i' theCapitol; Brutus killed me.
HAMLET
It was a brute part of him to kill so capital a calfthere. Be the players ready?
ROSENCRANTZ
Ay, my lord; they stay upon your patience.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Come hither, my dear Hamlet, sit by me.
HAMLET
No, good mother, here's metal more attractive.
LORD POLONIUS
[To KING CLAUDIUS] O, ho! do you mark that?
HAMLET
Lady, shall I lie in your lap?
Lying down at OPHELIA's feet
OPHELIA
No, my lord.
HAMLET
I mean, my head upon your lap?
OPHELIA
Ay, my lord.
HAMLET
Do you think I meant country matters?
OPHELIA
I think nothing, my lord.
HAMLET
That's a fair thought to lie between maids' legs.
OPHELIA
What is, my lord?
HAMLET
Nothing.
OPHELIA
You are merry, my lord.
HAMLET
Who, I?
OPHELIA
Ay, my lord.
HAMLET
O God, your only jig-maker. What should a man dobut be merry? for, look you, how cheerfully mymother looks, and my father died within these two hours.
OPHELIA
Nay, 'tis twice two months, my lord.
HAMLET
So long? Nay then, let the devil wear black, forI'll have a suit of sables. O heavens! die twomonths ago, and not forgotten yet? Then there'shope a great man's memory may outlive his life halfa year: but, by'r lady, he must build churches,then; or else shall he suffer not thinking on, withthe hobby-horse, whose epitaph is 'For, O, for, O,the hobby-horse is forgot.'
Hautboys play. The dumb-show enters
Enter a King and a Queen very lovingly; the Queen embracing him, and he her. She kneels, and makes show of protestation unto him. He takes her up, and declines his head upon her neck: lays him down upon a bank of flowers: she, seeing him asleep, leaves him. Anon comes in a fellow, takes off his crown, kisses it, and pours poison in the King's ears, and exit. The Queen returns; finds the King dead, and makes passionate action. The Poisoner, with some two or three Mutes, comes in again, seeming to lament with her. The dead body is carried away. The Poisoner wooes the Queen with gifts: she seems loath and unwilling awhile, but in the end accepts his love
Exeunt
OPHELIA
What means this, my lord?
HAMLET
Marry, this is miching mallecho; it means mischief.
OPHELIA
Belike this show imports the argument of the play.
Enter Prologue
HAMLET
We shall know by this fellow: the players cannotkeep counsel; they'll tell all.
OPHELIA
Will he tell us what this show meant?
HAMLET
Ay, or any show that you'll show him: be not youashamed to show, he'll not shame to tell you what it means.
OPHELIA
You are naught, you are naught: I'll mark the play.
Prologue
For us, and for our tragedy,Here stooping to your clemency,We beg your hearing patiently.
Exit
HAMLET
Is this a prologue, or the posy of a ring?
OPHELIA
'Tis brief, my lord.
HAMLET
As woman's love.
Enter two Players, King and Queen
Player King
Full thirty times hath Phoebus' cart gone roundNeptune's salt wash and Tellus' orbed ground,And thirty dozen moons with borrow'd sheenAbout the world have times twelve thirties been,Since love our hearts and Hymen did our handsUnite commutual in most sacred bands.
Player Queen
So many journeys may the sun and moonMake us again count o'er ere love be done!But, woe is me, you are so sick of late,So far from cheer and from your former state,That I distrust you. Yet, though I distrust,Discomfort you, my lord, it nothing must:For women's fear and love holds quantity;In neither aught, or in extremity.Now, what my love is, proof hath made you know;And as my love is sized, my fear is so:Where love is great, the littlest doubts are fear;Where little fears grow great, great love grows there.
Player King
'Faith, I must leave thee, love, and shortly too;My operant powers their functions leave to do:And thou shalt live in this fair world behind,Honour'd, beloved; and haply one as kindFor husband shalt thou--
Player Queen
O, confound the rest!Such love must needs be treason in my breast:In second husband let me be accurst!None wed the second but who kill'd the first.
HAMLET
[Aside] Wormwood, wormwood.
Player Queen
The instances that second marriage moveAre base respects of thrift, but none of love:A second time I kill my husband dead,When second husband kisses me in bed.
Player King
I do believe you think what now you speak;But what we do determine oft we break.Purpose is but the slave to memory,Of violent birth, but poor validity;Which now, like fruit unripe, sticks on the tree;But fall, unshaken, when they mellow be.Most necessary 'tis that we forgetTo pay ourselves what to ourselves is debt:What to ourselves in passion we propose,The passion ending, doth the purpose lose.The violence of either grief or joyTheir own enactures with themselves destroy:Where joy most revels, grief doth most lament;Grief joys, joy grieves, on slender accident.This world is not for aye, nor 'tis not strangeThat even our loves should with our fortunes change;For 'tis a question left us yet to prove,Whether love lead fortune, or else fortune love.The great man down, you mark his favourite flies;The poor advanced makes friends of enemies.And hitherto doth love on fortune tend;For who not needs shall never lack a friend,And who in want a hollow friend doth try,Directly seasons him his enemy.But, orderly to end where I begun,Our wills and fates do so contrary runThat our devices still are overthrown;Our thoughts are ours, their ends none of our own:So think thou wilt no second husband wed;But die thy thoughts when thy first lord is dead.
Player Queen
Nor earth to me give food, nor heaven light!Sport and repose lock from me day and night!To desperation turn my trust and hope!An anchor's cheer in prison be my scope!Each opposite that blanks the face of joyMeet what I would have well and it destroy!Both here and hence pursue me lasting strife,If, once a widow, ever I be wife!
HAMLET
If she should break it now!
Player King
'Tis deeply sworn. Sweet, leave me here awhile;My spirits grow dull, and fain I would beguileThe tedious day with sleep.
Sleeps
Player Queen
Sleep rock thy brain,And never come mischance between us twain!
Exit
HAMLET
Madam, how like you this play?
QUEEN GERTRUDE
The lady protests too much, methinks.
HAMLET
O, but she'll keep her word.
KING CLAUDIUS
Have you heard the argument? Is there no offence in 't?
HAMLET
No, no, they do but jest, poison in jest; no offencei' the world.
KING CLAUDIUS
What do you call the play?
HAMLET
The Mouse-trap. Marry, how? Tropically. This playis the image of a murder done in Vienna: Gonzago isthe duke's name; his wife, Baptista: you shall seeanon; 'tis a knavish piece of work: but what o'that? your majesty and we that have free souls, ittouches us not: let the galled jade wince, ourwithers are unwrung.
Enter LUCIANUS
This is one Lucianus, nephew to the king.
OPHELIA
You are as good as a chorus, my lord.
HAMLET
I could interpret between you and your love, if Icould see the puppets dallying.
OPHELIA
You are keen, my lord, you are keen.
HAMLET
It would cost you a groaning to take off my edge.
OPHELIA
Still better, and worse.
HAMLET
So you must take your husbands. Begin, murderer;pox, leave thy damnable faces, and begin. Come:'the croaking raven doth bellow for revenge.'
LUCIANUS
Thoughts black, hands apt, drugs fit, and time agreeing;Confederate season, else no creature seeing;Thou mixture rank, of midnight weeds collected,With Hecate's ban thrice blasted, thrice infected,Thy natural magic and dire property,On wholesome life usurp immediately.
Pours the poison into the sleeper's ears
HAMLET
He poisons him i' the garden for's estate. Hisname's Gonzago: the story is extant, and writ inchoice Italian: you shall see anon how the murderergets the love of Gonzago's wife.
OPHELIA
The king rises.
HAMLET
What, frighted with false fire!
QUEEN GERTRUDE
How fares my lord?
LORD POLONIUS
Give o'er the play.
KING CLAUDIUS
Give me some light: away!
All
Lights, lights, lights!
Exeunt all but HAMLET and HORATIO
HAMLET
Why, let the stricken deer go weep,The hart ungalled play;For some must watch, while some must sleep:So runs the world away.Would not this, sir, and a forest of feathers-- ifthe rest of my fortunes turn Turk with me--with twoProvincial roses on my razed shoes, get me afellowship in a cry of players, sir?
HORATIO
Half a share.
HAMLET
A whole one, I.For thou dost know, O Damon dear,This realm dismantled wasOf Jove himself; and now reigns hereA very, very--pajock.
HORATIO
You might have rhymed.
HAMLET
O good Horatio, I'll take the ghost's word for athousand pound. Didst perceive?
HORATIO
Very well, my lord.
HAMLET
Upon the talk of the poisoning?
HORATIO
I did very well note him.
HAMLET
Ah, ha! Come, some music! come, the recorders!For if the king like not the comedy,Why then, belike, he likes it not, perdy.Come, some music!
Re-enter ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN
GUILDENSTERN
Good my lord, vouchsafe me a word with you.
HAMLET
Sir, a whole history.
GUILDENSTERN
The king, sir,--
HAMLET
Ay, sir, what of him?
GUILDENSTERN
Is in his retirement marvellous distempered.
HAMLET
With drink, sir?
GUILDENSTERN
No, my lord, rather with choler.
HAMLET
Your wisdom should show itself more richer tosignify this to his doctor; for, for me to put himto his purgation would perhaps plunge him into farmore choler.
GUILDENSTERN
Good my lord, put your discourse into some frame andstart not so wildly from my affair.
HAMLET
I am tame, sir: pronounce.
GUILDENSTERN
The queen, your mother, in most great affliction ofspirit, hath sent me to you.
HAMLET
You are welcome.
GUILDENSTERN
Nay, good my lord, this courtesy is not of the rightbreed. If it shall please you to make me awholesome answer, I will do your mother'scommandment: if not, your pardon and my returnshall be the end of my business.
HAMLET
Sir, I cannot.
GUILDENSTERN
What, my lord?
HAMLET
Make you a wholesome answer; my wit's diseased: but,sir, such answer as I can make, you shall command;or, rather, as you say, my mother: therefore nomore, but to the matter: my mother, you say,--
ROSENCRANTZ
Then thus she says; your behavior hath struck herinto amazement and admiration.
HAMLET
O wonderful son, that can so astonish a mother! Butis there no sequel at the heels of this mother'sadmiration? Impart.
ROSENCRANTZ
She desires to speak with you in her closet, ere yougo to bed.
HAMLET
We shall obey, were she ten times our mother. Haveyou any further trade with us?
ROSENCRANTZ
My lord, you once did love me.
HAMLET
So I do still, by these pickers and stealers.
ROSENCRANTZ
Good my lord, what is your cause of distemper? youdo, surely, bar the door upon your own liberty, ifyou deny your griefs to your friend.
HAMLET
Sir, I lack advancement.
ROSENCRANTZ
How can that be, when you have the voice of the kinghimself for your succession in Denmark?
HAMLET
Ay, but sir, 'While the grass grows,'--the proverbis something musty.
Re-enter Players with recorders
O, the recorders! let me see one. To withdraw withyou:--why do you go about to recover the wind of me,as if you would drive me into a toil?
GUILDENSTERN
O, my lord, if my duty be too bold, my love is toounmannerly.
HAMLET
I do not well understand that. Will you play uponthis pipe?
GUILDENSTERN
My lord, I cannot.
HAMLET
I pray you.
GUILDENSTERN
Believe me, I cannot.
HAMLET
I do beseech you.
GUILDENSTERN
I know no touch of it, my lord.
HAMLET
'Tis as easy as lying: govern these ventages withyour lingers and thumb, give it breath with yourmouth, and it will discourse most eloquent music.Look you, these are the stops.
GUILDENSTERN
But these cannot I command to any utterance ofharmony; I have not the skill.
HAMLET
Why, look you now, how unworthy a thing you make ofme! You would play upon me; you would seem to knowmy stops; you would pluck out the heart of mymystery; you would sound me from my lowest note tothe top of my compass: and there is much music,excellent voice, in this little organ; yet cannotyou make it speak. 'Sblood, do you think I ameasier to be played on than a pipe? Call me whatinstrument you will, though you can fret me, yet youcannot play upon me.
Enter POLONIUS
God bless you, sir!
LORD POLONIUS
My lord, the queen would speak with you, andpresently.
HAMLET
Do you see yonder cloud that's almost in shape of a camel?
LORD POLONIUS
By the mass, and 'tis like a camel, indeed.
HAMLET
Methinks it is like a weasel.
LORD POLONIUS
It is backed like a weasel.
HAMLET
Or like a whale?
LORD POLONIUS
Very like a whale.
HAMLET
Then I will come to my mother by and by. They foolme to the top of my bent. I will come by and by.
LORD POLONIUS
I will say so.
HAMLET
By and by is easily said.
Exit POLONIUS
Leave me, friends.
Exeunt all but HAMLET
Tis now the very witching time of night,When churchyards yawn and hell itself breathes outContagion to this world: now could I drink hot blood,And do such bitter business as the dayWould quake to look on. Soft! now to my mother.O heart, lose not thy nature; let not everThe soul of Nero enter this firm bosom:Let me be cruel, not unnatural:I will speak daggers to her, but use none;My tongue and soul in this be hypocrites;How in my words soever she be shent,To give them seals never, my soul, consent!
Exit
SCENE III. A room in the castle.
Enter KING CLAUDIUS, ROSENCRANTZ, and GUILDENSTERN
KING CLAUDIUS
I like him not, nor stands it safe with usTo let his madness range. Therefore prepare you;I your commission will forthwith dispatch,And he to England shall along with you:The terms of our estate may not endureHazard so dangerous as doth hourly growOut of his lunacies.
GUILDENSTERN
We will ourselves provide:Most holy and religious fear it isTo keep those many many bodies safeThat live and feed upon your majesty.
ROSENCRANTZ
The single and peculiar life is bound,With all the strength and armour of the mind,To keep itself from noyance; but much moreThat spirit upon whose weal depend and restThe lives of many. The cease of majestyDies not alone; but, like a gulf, doth drawWhat's near it with it: it is a massy wheel,Fix'd on the summit of the highest mount,To whose huge spokes ten thousand lesser thingsAre mortised and adjoin'd; which, when it falls,Each small annexment, petty consequence,Attends the boisterous ruin. Never aloneDid the king sigh, but with a general groan.
KING CLAUDIUS
Arm you, I pray you, to this speedy voyage;For we will fetters put upon this fear,Which now goes too free-footed.
ROSENCRANTZ GUILDENSTERN
We will haste us.
Exeunt ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN
Enter POLONIUS
LORD POLONIUS
My lord, he's going to his mother's closet:Behind the arras I'll convey myself,To hear the process; and warrant she'll tax him home:And, as you said, and wisely was it said,'Tis meet that some more audience than a mother,Since nature makes them partial, should o'erhearThe speech, of vantage. Fare you well, my liege:I'll call upon you ere you go to bed,And tell you what I know.
KING CLAUDIUS
Thanks, dear my lord.
Exit POLONIUS
O, my offence is rank it smells to heaven;It hath the primal eldest curse upon't,A brother's murder. Pray can I not,Though inclination be as sharp as will:My stronger guilt defeats my strong intent;And, like a man to double business bound,I stand in pause where I shall first begin,And both neglect. What if this cursed handWere thicker than itself with brother's blood,Is there not rain enough in the sweet heavensTo wash it white as snow? Whereto serves mercyBut to confront the visage of offence?And what's in prayer but this two-fold force,To be forestalled ere we come to fall,Or pardon'd being down? Then I'll look up;My fault is past. But, O, what form of prayerCan serve my turn? 'Forgive me my foul murder'?That cannot be; since I am still possess'dOf those effects for which I did the murder,My crown, mine own ambition and my queen.May one be pardon'd and retain the offence?In the corrupted currents of this worldOffence's gilded hand may shove by justice,And oft 'tis seen the wicked prize itselfBuys out the law: but 'tis not so above;There is no shuffling, there the action liesIn his true nature; and we ourselves compell'd,Even to the teeth and forehead of our faults,To give in evidence. What then? what rests?Try what repentance can: what can it not?Yet what can it when one can not repent?O wretched state! O bosom black as death!O limed soul, that, struggling to be free,Art more engaged! Help, angels! Make assay!Bow, stubborn knees; and, heart with strings of steel,Be soft as sinews of the newborn babe!All may be well.
Retires and kneels
Enter HAMLET
HAMLET
Now might I do it pat, now he is praying;And now I'll do't. And so he goes to heaven;And so am I revenged. That would be scann'd:A villain kills my father; and for that,I, his sole son, do this same villain sendTo heaven.O, this is hire and salary, not revenge.He took my father grossly, full of bread;With all his crimes broad blown, as flush as May;And how his audit stands who knows save heaven?But in our circumstance and course of thought,'Tis heavy with him: and am I then revenged,To take him in the purging of his soul,When he is fit and season'd for his passage?No!Up, sword; and know thou a more horrid hent:When he is drunk asleep, or in his rage,Or in the incestuous pleasure of his bed;At gaming, swearing, or about some actThat has no relish of salvation in't;Then trip him, that his heels may kick at heaven,And that his soul may be as damn'd and blackAs hell, whereto it goes. My mother stays:This physic but prolongs thy sickly days.
Exit
KING CLAUDIUS
[Rising] My words fly up, my thoughts remain below:Words without thoughts never to heaven go.
Exit
SCENE IV. The Queen's closet.
Enter QUEEN MARGARET and POLONIUS
LORD POLONIUS
He will come straight. Look you lay home to him:Tell him his pranks have been too broad to bear with,And that your grace hath screen'd and stood betweenMuch heat and him. I'll sconce me even here.Pray you, be round with him.
HAMLET
[Within] Mother, mother, mother!
QUEEN GERTRUDE
I'll warrant you,Fear me not: withdraw, I hear him coming.
POLONIUS hides behind the arras
Enter HAMLET
HAMLET
Now, mother, what's the matter?
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Hamlet, thou hast thy father much offended.
HAMLET
Mother, you have my father much offended.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Come, come, you answer with an idle tongue.
HAMLET
Go, go, you question with a wicked tongue.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Why, how now, Hamlet!
HAMLET
What's the matter now?
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Have you forgot me?
HAMLET
No, by the rood, not so:You are the queen, your husband's brother's wife;And--would it were not so!--you are my mother.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Nay, then, I'll set those to you that can speak.
HAMLET
Come, come, and sit you down; you shall not budge;You go not till I set you up a glassWhere you may see the inmost part of you.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
What wilt thou do? thou wilt not murder me?Help, help, ho!
LORD POLONIUS
[Behind] What, ho! help, help, help!
HAMLET
[Drawing] How now! a rat? Dead, for a ducat, dead!
Makes a pass through the arras
LORD POLONIUS
[Behind] O, I am slain!
Falls and dies
QUEEN GERTRUDE
O me, what hast thou done?
HAMLET
Nay, I know not:Is it the king?
QUEEN GERTRUDE
O, what a rash and bloody deed is this!
HAMLET
A bloody deed! almost as bad, good mother,As kill a king, and marry with his brother.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
As kill a king!
HAMLET
Ay, lady, 'twas my word.
Lifts up the array and discovers POLONIUS
Thou wretched, rash, intruding fool, farewell!I took thee for thy better: take thy fortune;Thou find'st to be too busy is some danger.Leave wringing of your hands: peace! sit you down,And let me wring your heart; for so I shall,If it be made of penetrable stuff,If damned custom have not brass'd it soThat it is proof and bulwark against sense.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
What have I done, that thou darest wag thy tongueIn noise so rude against me?
HAMLET
Such an actThat blurs the grace and blush of modesty,Calls virtue hypocrite, takes off the roseFrom the fair forehead of an innocent loveAnd sets a blister there, makes marriage-vowsAs false as dicers' oaths: O, such a deedAs from the body of contraction plucksThe very soul, and sweet religion makesA rhapsody of words: heaven's face doth glow:Yea, this solidity and compound mass,With tristful visage, as against the doom,Is thought-sick at the act.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Ay me, what act,That roars so loud, and thunders in the index?
HAMLET
Look here, upon this picture, and on this,The counterfeit presentment of two brothers.See, what a grace was seated on this brow;Hyperion's curls; the front of Jove himself;An eye like Mars, to threaten and command;A station like the herald MercuryNew-lighted on a heaven-kissing hill;A combination and a form indeed,Where every god did seem to set his seal,To give the world assurance of a man:This was your husband. Look you now, what follows:Here is your husband; like a mildew'd ear,Blasting his wholesome brother. Have you eyes?Could you on this fair mountain leave to feed,And batten on this moor? Ha! have you eyes?You cannot call it love; for at your ageThe hey-day in the blood is tame, it's humble,And waits upon the judgment: and what judgmentWould step from this to this? Sense, sure, you have,Else could you not have motion; but sure, that senseIs apoplex'd; for madness would not err,Nor sense to ecstasy was ne'er so thrall'dBut it reserved some quantity of choice,To serve in such a difference. What devil was'tThat thus hath cozen'd you at hoodman-blind?Eyes without feeling, feeling without sight,Ears without hands or eyes, smelling sans all,Or but a sickly part of one true senseCould not so mope.O shame! where is thy blush? Rebellious hell,If thou canst mutine in a matron's bones,To flaming youth let virtue be as wax,And melt in her own fire: proclaim no shameWhen the compulsive ardour gives the charge,Since frost itself as actively doth burnAnd reason panders will.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
O Hamlet, speak no more:Thou turn'st mine eyes into my very soul;And there I see such black and grained spotsAs will not leave their tinct.
HAMLET
Nay, but to liveIn the rank sweat of an enseamed bed,Stew'd in corruption, honeying and making loveOver the nasty sty,--
QUEEN GERTRUDE
O, speak to me no more;These words, like daggers, enter in mine ears;No more, sweet Hamlet!
HAMLET
A murderer and a villain;A slave that is not twentieth part the titheOf your precedent lord; a vice of kings;A cutpurse of the empire and the rule,That from a shelf the precious diadem stole,And put it in his pocket!
QUEEN GERTRUDE
No more!
HAMLET
A king of shreds and patches,--
Enter Ghost
Save me, and hover o'er me with your wings,You heavenly guards! What would your gracious figure?
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Alas, he's mad!
HAMLET
Do you not come your tardy son to chide,That, lapsed in time and passion, lets go byThe important acting of your dread command? O, say!
Ghost
Do not forget: this visitationIs but to whet thy almost blunted purpose.But, look, amazement on thy mother sits:O, step between her and her fighting soul:Conceit in weakest bodies strongest works:Speak to her, Hamlet.
HAMLET
How is it with you, lady?
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Alas, how is't with you,That you do bend your eye on vacancyAnd with the incorporal air do hold discourse?Forth at your eyes your spirits wildly peep;And, as the sleeping soldiers in the alarm,Your bedded hair, like life in excrements,Starts up, and stands on end. O gentle son,Upon the heat and flame of thy distemperSprinkle cool patience. Whereon do you look?
HAMLET
On him, on him! Look you, how pale he glares!His form and cause conjoin'd, preaching to stones,Would make them capable. Do not look upon me;Lest with this piteous action you convertMy stern effects: then what I have to doWill want true colour; tears perchance for blood.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
To whom do you speak this?
HAMLET
Do you see nothing there?
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Nothing at all; yet all that is I see.
HAMLET
Nor did you nothing hear?
QUEEN GERTRUDE
No, nothing but ourselves.
HAMLET
Why, look you there! look, how it steals away!My father, in his habit as he lived!Look, where he goes, even now, out at the portal!
Exit Ghost
QUEEN GERTRUDE
This the very coinage of your brain:This bodiless creation ecstasyIs very cunning in.
HAMLET
Ecstasy!My pulse, as yours, doth temperately keep time,And makes as healthful music: it is not madnessThat I have utter'd: bring me to the test,And I the matter will re-word; which madnessWould gambol from. Mother, for love of grace,Lay not that mattering unction to your soul,That not your trespass, but my madness speaks:It will but skin and film the ulcerous place,Whilst rank corruption, mining all within,Infects unseen. Confess yourself to heaven;Repent what's past; avoid what is to come;And do not spread the compost on the weeds,To make them ranker. Forgive me this my virtue;For in the fatness of these pursy timesVirtue itself of vice must pardon beg,Yea, curb and woo for leave to do him good.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
O Hamlet, thou hast cleft my heart in twain.
HAMLET
O, throw away the worser part of it,And live the purer with the other half.Good night: but go not to mine uncle's bed;Assume a virtue, if you have it not.That monster, custom, who all sense doth eat,Of habits devil, is angel yet in this,That to the use of actions fair and goodHe likewise gives a frock or livery,That aptly is put on. Refrain to-night,And that shall lend a kind of easinessTo the next abstinence: the next more easy;For use almost can change the stamp of nature,And either [ ] the devil, or throw him outWith wondrous potency. Once more, good night:And when you are desirous to be bless'd,I'll blessing beg of you. For this same lord,
Pointing to POLONIUS
I do repent: but heaven hath pleased it so,To punish me with this and this with me,That I must be their scourge and minister.I will bestow him, and will answer wellThe death I gave him. So, again, good night.I must be cruel, only to be kind:Thus bad begins and worse remains behind.One word more, good lady.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
What shall I do?
HAMLET
Not this, by no means, that I bid you do:Let the bloat king tempt you again to bed;Pinch wanton on your cheek; call you his mouse;And let him, for a pair of reechy kisses,Or paddling in your neck with his damn'd fingers,Make you to ravel all this matter out,That I essentially am not in madness,But mad in craft. 'Twere good you let him know;For who, that's but a queen, fair, sober, wise,Would from a paddock, from a bat, a gib,Such dear concernings hide? who would do so?No, in despite of sense and secrecy,Unpeg the basket on the house's top.Let the birds fly, and, like the famous ape,To try conclusions, in the basket creep,And break your own neck down.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Be thou assured, if words be made of breath,And breath of life, I have no life to breatheWhat thou hast said to me.
HAMLET
I must to England; you know that?
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Alack,I had forgot: 'tis so concluded on.
HAMLET
There's letters seal'd: and my two schoolfellows,Whom I will trust as I will adders fang'd,They bear the mandate; they must sweep my way,And marshal me to knavery. Let it work;For 'tis the sport to have the engineerHoist with his own petard: and 't shall go hardBut I will delve one yard below their mines,And blow them at the moon: O, 'tis most sweet,When in one line two crafts directly meet.This man shall set me packing:I'll lug the guts into the neighbour room.Mother, good night. Indeed this counsellorIs now most still, most secret and most grave,Who was in life a foolish prating knave.Come, sir, to draw toward an end with you.Good night, mother.
Exeunt severally; HAMLET dragging in POLONIUS
SCENE I. A room in the castle.
Enter KING CLAUDIUS, QUEEN GERTRUDE, ROSENCRANTZ, and GUILDENSTERN
KING CLAUDIUS
There's matter in these sighs, these profound heaves:You must translate: 'tis fit we understand them.Where is your son?
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Bestow this place on us a little while.
Exeunt ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN
Ah, my good lord, what have I seen to-night!
KING CLAUDIUS
What, Gertrude? How does Hamlet?
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Mad as the sea and wind, when both contendWhich is the mightier: in his lawless fit,Behind the arras hearing something stir,Whips out his rapier, cries, 'A rat, a rat!'And, in this brainish apprehension, killsThe unseen good old man.
KING CLAUDIUS
O heavy deed!It had been so with us, had we been there:His liberty is full of threats to all;To you yourself, to us, to every one.Alas, how shall this bloody deed be answer'd?It will be laid to us, whose providenceShould have kept short, restrain'd and out of haunt,This mad young man: but so much was our love,We would not understand what was most fit;But, like the owner of a foul disease,To keep it from divulging, let it feedEven on the pith of Life. Where is he gone?
QUEEN GERTRUDE
To draw apart the body he hath kill'd:O'er whom his very madness, like some oreAmong a mineral of metals base,Shows itself pure; he weeps for what is done.
KING CLAUDIUS
O Gertrude, come away!The sun no sooner shall the mountains touch,But we will ship him hence: and this vile deedWe must, with all our majesty and skill,Both countenance and excuse. Ho, Guildenstern!
Re-enter ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN
Friends both, go join you with some further aid:Hamlet in madness hath Polonius slain,And from his mother's closet hath he dragg'd him:Go seek him out; speak fair, and bring the bodyInto the chapel. I pray you, haste in this.
Exeunt ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN
Come, Gertrude, we'll call up our wisest friends;And let them know, both what we mean to do,And what's untimely done. O, come away!My soul is full of discord and dismay.
Exeunt
SCENE II. Another room in the castle.
Enter HAMLET
HAMLET
Safely stowed.
ROSENCRANTZ: GUILDENSTERN:
[Within] Hamlet! Lord Hamlet!
HAMLET
What noise? who calls on Hamlet?O, here they come.
Enter ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN
ROSENCRANTZ
What have you done, my lord, with the dead body?
HAMLET
Compounded it with dust, whereto 'tis kin.
ROSENCRANTZ
Tell us where 'tis, that we may take it thenceAnd bear it to the chapel.
HAMLET
Do not believe it.
ROSENCRANTZ
Believe what?
HAMLET
That I can keep your counsel and not mine own.Besides, to be demanded of a sponge! whatreplication should be made by the son of a king?
ROSENCRANTZ
Take you me for a sponge, my lord?
HAMLET
Ay, sir, that soaks up the king's countenance, hisrewards, his authorities. But such officers do theking best service in the end: he keeps them, likean ape, in the corner of his jaw; first mouthed, tobe last swallowed: when he needs what you havegleaned, it is but squeezing you, and, sponge, youshall be dry again.
ROSENCRANTZ
I understand you not, my lord.
HAMLET
I am glad of it: a knavish speech sleeps in afoolish ear.
ROSENCRANTZ
My lord, you must tell us where the body is, and gowith us to the king.
HAMLET
The body is with the king, but the king is not withthe body. The king is a thing--
GUILDENSTERN
A thing, my lord!
HAMLET
Of nothing: bring me to him. Hide fox, and all after.
Exeunt
SCENE III. Another room in the castle.
Enter KING CLAUDIUS, attended
KING CLAUDIUS
I have sent to seek him, and to find the body.How dangerous is it that this man goes loose!Yet must not we put the strong law on him:He's loved of the distracted multitude,Who like not in their judgment, but their eyes;And where tis so, the offender's scourge is weigh'd,But never the offence. To bear all smooth and even,This sudden sending him away must seemDeliberate pause: diseases desperate grownBy desperate appliance are relieved,Or not at all.
Enter ROSENCRANTZ
How now! what hath befall'n?
ROSENCRANTZ
Where the dead body is bestow'd, my lord,We cannot get from him.
KING CLAUDIUS
But where is he?
ROSENCRANTZ
Without, my lord; guarded, to know your pleasure.
KING CLAUDIUS
Bring him before us.
ROSENCRANTZ
Ho, Guildenstern! bring in my lord.
Enter HAMLET and GUILDENSTERN
KING CLAUDIUS
Now, Hamlet, where's Polonius?
HAMLET
At supper.
KING CLAUDIUS
At supper! where?
HAMLET
Not where he eats, but where he is eaten: a certainconvocation of politic worms are e'en at him. Yourworm is your only emperor for diet: we fat allcreatures else to fat us, and we fat ourselves formaggots: your fat king and your lean beggar is butvariable service, two dishes, but to one table:that's the end.
KING CLAUDIUS
Alas, alas!
HAMLET
A man may fish with the worm that hath eat of aking, and cat of the fish that hath fed of that worm.
KING CLAUDIUS
What dost you mean by this?
HAMLET
Nothing but to show you how a king may go aprogress through the guts of a beggar.
KING CLAUDIUS
Where is Polonius?
HAMLET
In heaven; send hither to see: if your messengerfind him not there, seek him i' the other placeyourself. But indeed, if you find him not withinthis month, you shall nose him as you go up thestairs into the lobby.
KING CLAUDIUS
Go seek him there.
To some Attendants
HAMLET
He will stay till ye come.
Exeunt Attendants
KING CLAUDIUS
Hamlet, this deed, for thine especial safety,--Which we do tender, as we dearly grieveFor that which thou hast done,--must send thee henceWith fiery quickness: therefore prepare thyself;The bark is ready, and the wind at help,The associates tend, and every thing is bentFor England.
HAMLET
For England!
KING CLAUDIUS
Ay, Hamlet.
HAMLET
Good.
KING CLAUDIUS
So is it, if thou knew'st our purposes.
HAMLET
I see a cherub that sees them. But, come; forEngland! Farewell, dear mother.
KING CLAUDIUS
Thy loving father, Hamlet.
HAMLET
My mother: father and mother is man and wife; manand wife is one flesh; and so, my mother. Come, for England!
Exit
KING CLAUDIUS
Follow him at foot; tempt him with speed aboard;Delay it not; I'll have him hence to-night:Away! for every thing is seal'd and doneThat else leans on the affair: pray you, make haste.
Exeunt ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN
And, England, if my love thou hold'st at aught--As my great power thereof may give thee sense,Since yet thy cicatrice looks raw and redAfter the Danish sword, and thy free awePays homage to us--thou mayst not coldly setOur sovereign process; which imports at full,By letters congruing to that effect,The present death of Hamlet. Do it, England;For like the hectic in my blood he rages,And thou must cure me: till I know 'tis done,Howe'er my haps, my joys were ne'er begun.
Exit
SCENE IV. A plain in Denmark.
Enter FORTINBRAS, a Captain, and Soldiers, marching
PRINCE FORTINBRAS
Go, captain, from me greet the Danish king;Tell him that, by his licence, FortinbrasCraves the conveyance of a promised marchOver his kingdom. You know the rendezvous.If that his majesty would aught with us,We shall express our duty in his eye;And let him know so.
Captain
I will do't, my lord.
PRINCE FORTINBRAS
Go softly on.
Exeunt FORTINBRAS and Soldiers
Enter HAMLET, ROSENCRANTZ, GUILDENSTERN, and others
HAMLET
Good sir, whose powers are these?
Captain
They are of Norway, sir.
HAMLET
How purposed, sir, I pray you?
Captain
Against some part of Poland.
HAMLET
Who commands them, sir?
Captain
The nephews to old Norway, Fortinbras.
HAMLET
Goes it against the main of Poland, sir,Or for some frontier?
Captain
Truly to speak, and with no addition,We go to gain a little patch of groundThat hath in it no profit but the name.To pay five ducats, five, I would not farm it;Nor will it yield to Norway or the PoleA ranker rate, should it be sold in fee.
HAMLET
Why, then the Polack never will defend it.
Captain
Yes, it is already garrison'd.
HAMLET
Two thousand souls and twenty thousand ducatsWill not debate the question of this straw:This is the imposthume of much wealth and peace,That inward breaks, and shows no cause withoutWhy the man dies. I humbly thank you, sir.
Captain
God be wi' you, sir.
Exit
ROSENCRANTZ
Wilt please you go, my lord?
HAMLET
I'll be with you straight go a little before.
Exeunt all except HAMLET
How all occasions do inform against me,And spur my dull revenge! What is a man,If his chief good and market of his timeBe but to sleep and feed? a beast, no more.Sure, he that made us with such large discourse,Looking before and after, gave us notThat capability and god-like reasonTo fust in us unused. Now, whether it beBestial oblivion, or some craven scrupleOf thinking too precisely on the event,A thought which, quarter'd, hath but one part wisdomAnd ever three parts coward, I do not knowWhy yet I live to say 'This thing's to do;'Sith I have cause and will and strength and meansTo do't. Examples gross as earth exhort me:Witness this army of such mass and chargeLed by a delicate and tender prince,Whose spirit with divine ambition puff'dMakes mouths at the invisible event,Exposing what is mortal and unsureTo all that fortune, death and danger dare,Even for an egg-shell. Rightly to be greatIs not to stir without great argument,But greatly to find quarrel in a strawWhen honour's at the stake. How stand I then,That have a father kill'd, a mother stain'd,Excitements of my reason and my blood,And let all sleep? while, to my shame, I seeThe imminent death of twenty thousand men,That, for a fantasy and trick of fame,Go to their graves like beds, fight for a plotWhereon the numbers cannot try the cause,Which is not tomb enough and continentTo hide the slain? O, from this time forth,My thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth!
Exit
SCENE V. Elsinore. A room in the castle.
Enter QUEEN GERTRUDE, HORATIO, and a Gentleman
QUEEN GERTRUDE
I will not speak with her.
Gentleman
She is importunate, indeed distract:Her mood will needs be pitied.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
What would she have?
Gentleman
She speaks much of her father; says she hearsThere's tricks i' the world; and hems, and beats her heart;Spurns enviously at straws; speaks things in doubt,That carry but half sense: her speech is nothing,Yet the unshaped use of it doth moveThe hearers to collection; they aim at it,And botch the words up fit to their own thoughts;Which, as her winks, and nods, and gesturesyield them,Indeed would make one think there might be thought,Though nothing sure, yet much unhappily.
HORATIO
'Twere good she were spoken with; for she may strewDangerous conjectures in ill-breeding minds.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Let her come in.
Exit HORATIO
To my sick soul, as sin's true nature is,Each toy seems prologue to some great amiss:So full of artless jealousy is guilt,It spills itself in fearing to be spilt.
Re-enter HORATIO, with OPHELIA
OPHELIA
Where is the beauteous majesty of Denmark?
QUEEN GERTRUDE
How now, Ophelia!
OPHELIA
[Sings]How should I your true love knowFrom another one?By his cockle hat and staff,And his sandal shoon.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Alas, sweet lady, what imports this song?
OPHELIA
Say you? nay, pray you, mark.
Sings
He is dead and gone, lady,He is dead and gone;At his head a grass-green turf,At his heels a stone.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Nay, but, Ophelia,--
OPHELIA
Pray you, mark.
Sings
White his shroud as the mountain snow,--
Enter KING CLAUDIUS
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Alas, look here, my lord.
OPHELIA
[Sings]Larded with sweet flowersWhich bewept to the grave did goWith true-love showers.
KING CLAUDIUS
How do you, pretty lady?
OPHELIA
Well, God 'ild you! They say the owl was a baker'sdaughter. Lord, we know what we are, but know notwhat we may be. God be at your table!
KING CLAUDIUS
Conceit upon her father.
OPHELIA
Pray you, let's have no words of this; but when theyask you what it means, say you this:
Sings
To-morrow is Saint Valentine's day,All in the morning betime,And I a maid at your window,To be your Valentine.Then up he rose, and donn'd his clothes,And dupp'd the chamber-door;Let in the maid, that out a maidNever departed more.
KING CLAUDIUS
Pretty Ophelia!
OPHELIA
Indeed, la, without an oath, I'll make an end on't:
Sings
By Gis and by Saint Charity,Alack, and fie for shame!Young men will do't, if they come to't;By cock, they are to blame.Quoth she, before you tumbled me,You promised me to wed.So would I ha' done, by yonder sun,An thou hadst not come to my bed.
KING CLAUDIUS
How long hath she been thus?
OPHELIA
I hope all will be well. We must be patient: but Icannot choose but weep, to think they should lay himi' the cold ground. My brother shall know of it:and so I thank you for your good counsel. Come, mycoach! Good night, ladies; good night, sweet ladies;good night, good night.
Exit
KING CLAUDIUS
Follow her close; give her good watch,I pray you.
Exit HORATIO
O, this is the poison of deep grief; it springsAll from her father's death. O Gertrude, Gertrude,When sorrows come, they come not single spiesBut in battalions. First, her father slain:Next, your son gone; and he most violent authorOf his own just remove: the people muddied,Thick and unwholesome in their thoughts and whispers,For good Polonius' death; and we have done but greenly,In hugger-mugger to inter him: poor OpheliaDivided from herself and her fair judgment,Without the which we are pictures, or mere beasts:Last, and as much containing as all these,Her brother is in secret come from France;Feeds on his wonder, keeps himself in clouds,And wants not buzzers to infect his earWith pestilent speeches of his father's death;Wherein necessity, of matter beggar'd,Will nothing stick our person to arraignIn ear and ear. O my dear Gertrude, this,Like to a murdering-piece, in many placesGives me superfluous death.
A noise within
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Alack, what noise is this?
KING CLAUDIUS
Where are my Switzers? Let them guard the door.
Enter another Gentleman
What is the matter?
Gentleman
Save yourself, my lord:The ocean, overpeering of his list,Eats not the flats with more impetuous hasteThan young Laertes, in a riotous head,O'erbears your officers. The rabble call him lord;And, as the world were now but to begin,Antiquity forgot, custom not known,The ratifiers and props of every word,They cry 'Choose we: Laertes shall be king:'Caps, hands, and tongues, applaud it to the clouds:'Laertes shall be king, Laertes king!'
QUEEN GERTRUDE
How cheerfully on the false trail they cry!O, this is counter, you false Danish dogs!
KING CLAUDIUS
The doors are broke.
Noise within
Enter LAERTES, armed; Danes following
LAERTES
Where is this king? Sirs, stand you all without.
Danes
No, let's come in.
LAERTES
I pray you, give me leave.
Danes
We will, we will.
They retire without the door
LAERTES
I thank you: keep the door. O thou vile king,Give me my father!
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Calmly, good Laertes.
LAERTES
That drop of blood that's calm proclaims me bastard,Cries cuckold to my father, brands the harlotEven here, between the chaste unsmirched browOf my true mother.
KING CLAUDIUS
What is the cause, Laertes,That thy rebellion looks so giant-like?Let him go, Gertrude; do not fear our person:There's such divinity doth hedge a king,That treason can but peep to what it would,Acts little of his will. Tell me, Laertes,Why thou art thus incensed. Let him go, Gertrude.Speak, man.
LAERTES
Where is my father?
KING CLAUDIUS
Dead.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
But not by him.
KING CLAUDIUS
Let him demand his fill.
LAERTES
How came he dead? I'll not be juggled with:To hell, allegiance! vows, to the blackest devil!Conscience and grace, to the profoundest pit!I dare damnation. To this point I stand,That both the worlds I give to negligence,Let come what comes; only I'll be revengedMost thoroughly for my father.
KING CLAUDIUS
Who shall stay you?
LAERTES
My will, not all the world:And for my means, I'll husband them so well,They shall go far with little.
KING CLAUDIUS
Good Laertes,If you desire to know the certaintyOf your dear father's death, is't writ in your revenge,That, swoopstake, you will draw both friend and foe,Winner and loser?
LAERTES
None but his enemies.
KING CLAUDIUS
Will you know them then?
LAERTES
To his good friends thus wide I'll ope my arms;And like the kind life-rendering pelican,Repast them with my blood.
KING CLAUDIUS
Why, now you speakLike a good child and a true gentleman.That I am guiltless of your father's death,And am most sensible in grief for it,It shall as level to your judgment pierceAs day does to your eye.
Danes
[Within] Let her come in.
LAERTES
How now! what noise is that?
Re-enter OPHELIA
O heat, dry up my brains! tears seven times salt,Burn out the sense and virtue of mine eye!By heaven, thy madness shall be paid by weight,Till our scale turn the beam. O rose of May!Dear maid, kind sister, sweet Ophelia!O heavens! is't possible, a young maid's witsShould be as moral as an old man's life?Nature is fine in love, and where 'tis fine,It sends some precious instance of itselfAfter the thing it loves.
OPHELIA
[Sings]They bore him barefaced on the bier;Hey non nonny, nonny, hey nonny;And in his grave rain'd many a tear:--Fare you well, my dove!
LAERTES
Hadst thou thy wits, and didst persuade revenge,It could not move thus.
OPHELIA
[Sings]You must sing a-down a-down,An you call him a-down-a.O, how the wheel becomes it! It is the falsesteward, that stole his master's daughter.
LAERTES
This nothing's more than matter.
OPHELIA
There's rosemary, that's for remembrance; pray,love, remember: and there is pansies. that's for thoughts.
LAERTES
A document in madness, thoughts and remembrance fitted.
OPHELIA
There's fennel for you, and columbines: there's ruefor you; and here's some for me: we may call itherb-grace o' Sundays: O you must wear your rue witha difference. There's a daisy: I would give yousome violets, but they withered all when my fatherdied: they say he made a good end,--
Sings
For bonny sweet Robin is all my joy.
LAERTES
Thought and affliction, passion, hell itself,She turns to favour and to prettiness.
OPHELIA
[Sings]And will he not come again?And will he not come again?No, no, he is dead:Go to thy death-bed:He never will come again.His beard was as white as snow,All flaxen was his poll:He is gone, he is gone,And we cast away moan:God ha' mercy on his soul!And of all Christian souls, I pray God. God be wi' ye.
Exit
LAERTES
Do you see this, O God?
KING CLAUDIUS
Laertes, I must commune with your grief,Or you deny me right. Go but apart,Make choice of whom your wisest friends you will.And they shall hear and judge 'twixt you and me:If by direct or by collateral handThey find us touch'd, we will our kingdom give,Our crown, our life, and all that we can ours,To you in satisfaction; but if not,Be you content to lend your patience to us,And we shall jointly labour with your soulTo give it due content.
LAERTES
Let this be so;His means of death, his obscure funeral--No trophy, sword, nor hatchment o'er his bones,No noble rite nor formal ostentation--Cry to be heard, as 'twere from heaven to earth,That I must call't in question.
KING CLAUDIUS
So you shall;And where the offence is let the great axe fall.I pray you, go with me.
Exeunt
SCENE VI. Another room in the castle.
Enter HORATIO and a Servant
HORATIO
What are they that would speak with me?
Servant
Sailors, sir: they say they have letters for you.
HORATIO
Let them come in.
Exit Servant
I do not know from what part of the worldI should be greeted, if not from Lord Hamlet.
Enter Sailors
First Sailor
God bless you, sir.
HORATIO
Let him bless thee too.
First Sailor
He shall, sir, an't please him. There's a letter foryou, sir; it comes from the ambassador that wasbound for England; if your name be Horatio, as I amlet to know it is.
HORATIO
[Reads] 'Horatio, when thou shalt have overlookedthis, give these fellows some means to the king:they have letters for him. Ere we were two days oldat sea, a pirate of very warlike appointment gave uschase. Finding ourselves too slow of sail, we put ona compelled valour, and in the grapple I boardedthem: on the instant they got clear of our ship; soI alone became their prisoner. They have dealt withme like thieves of mercy: but they knew what theydid; I am to do a good turn for them. Let the kinghave the letters I have sent; and repair thou to mewith as much speed as thou wouldst fly death. Ihave words to speak in thine ear will make theedumb; yet are they much too light for the bore ofthe matter. These good fellows will bring theewhere I am. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern hold theircourse for England: of them I have much to tellthee. Farewell.'He that thou knowest thine, HAMLET.'Come, I will make you way for these your letters;And do't the speedier, that you may direct meTo him from whom you brought them.
Exeunt
SCENE VII. Another room in the castle.
Enter KING CLAUDIUS and LAERTES
KING CLAUDIUS
Now must your conscience my acquaintance seal,And you must put me in your heart for friend,Sith you have heard, and with a knowing ear,That he which hath your noble father slainPursued my life.
LAERTES
It well appears: but tell meWhy you proceeded not against these feats,So crimeful and so capital in nature,As by your safety, wisdom, all things else,You mainly were stirr'd up.
KING CLAUDIUS
O, for two special reasons;Which may to you, perhaps, seem much unsinew'd,But yet to me they are strong. The queen his motherLives almost by his looks; and for myself--My virtue or my plague, be it either which--She's so conjunctive to my life and soul,That, as the star moves not but in his sphere,I could not but by her. The other motive,Why to a public count I might not go,Is the great love the general gender bear him;Who, dipping all his faults in their affection,Would, like the spring that turneth wood to stone,Convert his gyves to graces; so that my arrows,Too slightly timber'd for so loud a wind,Would have reverted to my bow again,And not where I had aim'd them.
LAERTES
And so have I a noble father lost;A sister driven into desperate terms,Whose worth, if praises may go back again,Stood challenger on mount of all the ageFor her perfections: but my revenge will come.
KING CLAUDIUS
Break not your sleeps for that: you must not thinkThat we are made of stuff so flat and dullThat we can let our beard be shook with dangerAnd think it pastime. You shortly shall hear more:I loved your father, and we love ourself;And that, I hope, will teach you to imagine--
Enter a Messenger
How now! what news?
Messenger
Letters, my lord, from Hamlet:This to your majesty; this to the queen.
KING CLAUDIUS
From Hamlet! who brought them?
Messenger
Sailors, my lord, they say; I saw them not:They were given me by Claudio; he received themOf him that brought them.
KING CLAUDIUS
Laertes, you shall hear them. Leave us.
Exit Messenger
Reads
'High and mighty, You shall know I am set naked onyour kingdom. To-morrow shall I beg leave to seeyour kingly eyes: when I shall, first asking yourpardon thereunto, recount the occasion of my suddenand more strange return. 'HAMLET.'What should this mean? Are all the rest come back?Or is it some abuse, and no such thing?
LAERTES
Know you the hand?
KING CLAUDIUS
'Tis Hamlets character. 'Naked!And in a postscript here, he says 'alone.'Can you advise me?
LAERTES
I'm lost in it, my lord. But let him come;It warms the very sickness in my heart,That I shall live and tell him to his teeth,'Thus didest thou.'
KING CLAUDIUS
If it be so, Laertes--As how should it be so? how otherwise?--Will you be ruled by me?
LAERTES
Ay, my lord;So you will not o'errule me to a peace.
KING CLAUDIUS
To thine own peace. If he be now return'd,As checking at his voyage, and that he meansNo more to undertake it, I will work himTo an exploit, now ripe in my device,Under the which he shall not choose but fall:And for his death no wind of blame shall breathe,But even his mother shall uncharge the practiseAnd call it accident.
LAERTES
My lord, I will be ruled;The rather, if you could devise it soThat I might be the organ.
KING CLAUDIUS
It falls right.You have been talk'd of since your travel much,And that in Hamlet's hearing, for a qualityWherein, they say, you shine: your sum of partsDid not together pluck such envy from himAs did that one, and that, in my regard,Of the unworthiest siege.
LAERTES
What part is that, my lord?
KING CLAUDIUS
A very riband in the cap of youth,Yet needful too; for youth no less becomesThe light and careless livery that it wearsThan settled age his sables and his weeds,Importing health and graveness. Two months since,Here was a gentleman of Normandy:--I've seen myself, and served against, the French,And they can well on horseback: but this gallantHad witchcraft in't; he grew unto his seat;And to such wondrous doing brought his horse,As he had been incorpsed and demi-naturedWith the brave beast: so far he topp'd my thought,That I, in forgery of shapes and tricks,Come short of what he did.
LAERTES
A Norman was't?
KING CLAUDIUS
A Norman.
LAERTES
Upon my life, Lamond.
KING CLAUDIUS
The very same.
LAERTES
I know him well: he is the brooch indeedAnd gem of all the nation.
KING CLAUDIUS
He made confession of you,And gave you such a masterly reportFor art and exercise in your defenceAnd for your rapier most especially,That he cried out, 'twould be a sight indeed,If one could match you: the scrimers of their nation,He swore, had had neither motion, guard, nor eye,If you opposed them. Sir, this report of hisDid Hamlet so envenom with his envyThat he could nothing do but wish and begYour sudden coming o'er, to play with him.Now, out of this,--
LAERTES
What out of this, my lord?
KING CLAUDIUS
Laertes, was your father dear to you?Or are you like the painting of a sorrow,A face without a heart?
LAERTES
Why ask you this?
KING CLAUDIUS
Not that I think you did not love your father;But that I know love is begun by time;And that I see, in passages of proof,Time qualifies the spark and fire of it.There lives within the very flame of loveA kind of wick or snuff that will abate it;And nothing is at a like goodness still;For goodness, growing to a plurisy,Dies in his own too much: that we would doWe should do when we would; for this 'would' changesAnd hath abatements and delays as manyAs there are tongues, are hands, are accidents;And then this 'should' is like a spendthrift sigh,That hurts by easing. But, to the quick o' the ulcer:--Hamlet comes back: what would you undertake,To show yourself your father's son in deedMore than in words?
LAERTES
To cut his throat i' the church.
KING CLAUDIUS
No place, indeed, should murder sanctuarize;Revenge should have no bounds. But, good Laertes,Will you do this, keep close within your chamber.Hamlet return'd shall know you are come home:We'll put on those shall praise your excellenceAnd set a double varnish on the fameThe Frenchman gave you, bring you in fine togetherAnd wager on your heads: he, being remiss,Most generous and free from all contriving,Will not peruse the foils; so that, with ease,Or with a little shuffling, you may chooseA sword unbated, and in a pass of practiseRequite him for your father.
LAERTES
I will do't:And, for that purpose, I'll anoint my sword.I bought an unction of a mountebank,So mortal that, but dip a knife in it,Where it draws blood no cataplasm so rare,Collected from all simples that have virtueUnder the moon, can save the thing from deathThat is but scratch'd withal: I'll touch my pointWith this contagion, that, if I gall him slightly,It may be death.
KING CLAUDIUS
Let's further think of this;Weigh what convenience both of time and meansMay fit us to our shape: if this should fail,And that our drift look through our bad performance,'Twere better not assay'd: therefore this projectShould have a back or second, that might hold,If this should blast in proof. Soft! let me see:We'll make a solemn wager on your cunnings: I ha't.When in your motion you are hot and dry--As make your bouts more violent to that end--And that he calls for drink, I'll have prepared himA chalice for the nonce, whereon but sipping,If he by chance escape your venom'd stuck,Our purpose may hold there.
Enter QUEEN GERTRUDE
How now, sweet queen!
QUEEN GERTRUDE
One woe doth tread upon another's heel,So fast they follow; your sister's drown'd, Laertes.
LAERTES
Drown'd! O, where?
QUEEN GERTRUDE
There is a willow grows aslant a brook,That shows his hoar leaves in the glassy stream;There with fantastic garlands did she comeOf crow-flowers, nettles, daisies, and long purplesThat liberal shepherds give a grosser name,But our cold maids do dead men's fingers call them:There, on the pendent boughs her coronet weedsClambering to hang, an envious sliver broke;When down her weedy trophies and herselfFell in the weeping brook. Her clothes spread wide;And, mermaid-like, awhile they bore her up:Which time she chanted snatches of old tunes;As one incapable of her own distress,Or like a creature native and induedUnto that element: but long it could not beTill that her garments, heavy with their drink,Pull'd the poor wretch from her melodious layTo muddy death.
LAERTES
Alas, then, she is drown'd?
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Drown'd, drown'd.
LAERTES
Too much of water hast thou, poor Ophelia,And therefore I forbid my tears: but yetIt is our trick; nature her custom holds,Let shame say what it will: when these are gone,The woman will be out. Adieu, my lord:I have a speech of fire, that fain would blaze,But that this folly douts it.
Exit
KING CLAUDIUS
Let's follow, Gertrude:How much I had to do to calm his rage!Now fear I this will give it start again;Therefore let's follow.
Exeunt
SCENE I. A churchyard.
Enter two Clowns, with spades, & c
First Clown
Is she to be buried in Christian burial thatwilfully seeks her own salvation?
Second Clown
I tell thee she is: and therefore make her gravestraight: the crowner hath sat on her, and finds itChristian burial.
First Clown
How can that be, unless she drowned herself in herown defence?
Second Clown
Why, 'tis found so.
First Clown
It must be 'se offendendo;' it cannot be else. Forhere lies the point: if I drown myself wittingly,it argues an act: and an act hath three branches: itis, to act, to do, to perform: argal, she drownedherself wittingly.
Second Clown
Nay, but hear you, goodman delver,--
First Clown
Give me leave. Here lies the water; good: herestands the man; good; if the man go to this water,and drown himself, it is, will he, nill he, hegoes,--mark you that; but if the water come to himand drown him, he drowns not himself: argal, hethat is not guilty of his own death shortens not his own life.
Second Clown
But is this law?
First Clown
Ay, marry, is't; crowner's quest law.
Second Clown
Will you ha' the truth on't? If this had not beena gentlewoman, she should have been buried out o'Christian burial.
First Clown
Why, there thou say'st: and the more pity thatgreat folk should have countenance in this world todrown or hang themselves, more than their evenChristian. Come, my spade. There is no ancientgentleman but gardeners, ditchers, and grave-makers:they hold up Adam's profession.
Second Clown
Was he a gentleman?
First Clown
He was the first that ever bore arms.
Second Clown
Why, he had none.
First Clown
What, art a heathen? How dost thou understand theScripture? The Scripture says 'Adam digged:'could he dig without arms? I'll put anotherquestion to thee: if thou answerest me not to thepurpose, confess thyself--
Second Clown
Go to.
First Clown
What is he that builds stronger than either themason, the shipwright, or the carpenter?
Second Clown
The gallows-maker; for that frame outlives athousand tenants.
First Clown
I like thy wit well, in good faith: the gallowsdoes well; but how does it well? it does well tothose that do in: now thou dost ill to say thegallows is built stronger than the church: argal,the gallows may do well to thee. To't again, come.
Second Clown
'Who builds stronger than a mason, a shipwright, ora carpenter?'
First Clown
Ay, tell me that, and unyoke.
Second Clown
Marry, now I can tell.
First Clown
To't.
Second Clown
Mass, I cannot tell.
Enter HAMLET and HORATIO, at a distance
First Clown
Cudgel thy brains no more about it, for your dullass will not mend his pace with beating; and, whenyou are asked this question next, say 'agrave-maker: 'the houses that he makes last tilldoomsday. Go, get thee to Yaughan: fetch me astoup of liquor.
Exit Second Clown
He digs and sings
In youth, when I did love, did love,Methought it was very sweet,To contract, O, the time, for, ah, my behove,O, methought, there was nothing meet.
HAMLET
Has this fellow no feeling of his business, that hesings at grave-making?
HORATIO
Custom hath made it in him a property of easiness.
HAMLET
'Tis e'en so: the hand of little employment haththe daintier sense.
First Clown
[Sings]But age, with his stealing steps,Hath claw'd me in his clutch,And hath shipped me intil the land,As if I had never been such.
Throws up a skull
HAMLET
That skull had a tongue in it, and could sing once:how the knave jowls it to the ground, as if it wereCain's jaw-bone, that did the first murder! Itmight be the pate of a politician, which this assnow o'er-reaches; one that would circumvent God,might it not?
HORATIO
It might, my lord.
HAMLET
Or of a courtier; which could say 'Good morrow,sweet lord! How dost thou, good lord?' This mightbe my lord such-a-one, that praised my lordsuch-a-one's horse, when he meant to beg it; might it not?
HORATIO
Ay, my lord.
HAMLET
Why, e'en so: and now my Lady Worm's; chapless, andknocked about the mazzard with a sexton's spade:here's fine revolution, an we had the trick tosee't. Did these bones cost no more the breeding,but to play at loggats with 'em? mine ache to think on't.
First Clown
[Sings]A pick-axe, and a spade, a spade,For and a shrouding sheet:O, a pit of clay for to be madeFor such a guest is meet.
Throws up another skull
HAMLET
There's another: why may not that be the skull of alawyer? Where be his quiddities now, his quillets,his cases, his tenures, and his tricks? why does hesuffer this rude knave now to knock him about thesconce with a dirty shovel, and will not tell him ofhis action of battery? Hum! This fellow might bein's time a great buyer of land, with his statutes,his recognizances, his fines, his double vouchers,his recoveries: is this the fine of his fines, andthe recovery of his recoveries, to have his finepate full of fine dirt? will his vouchers vouch himno more of his purchases, and double ones too, thanthe length and breadth of a pair of indentures? Thevery conveyances of his lands will hardly lie inthis box; and must the inheritor himself have no more, ha?
HORATIO
Not a jot more, my lord.
HAMLET
Is not parchment made of sheepskins?
HORATIO
Ay, my lord, and of calf-skins too.
HAMLET
They are sheep and calves which seek out assurancein that. I will speak to this fellow. Whosegrave's this, sirrah?
First Clown
Mine, sir.
Sings
O, a pit of clay for to be madeFor such a guest is meet.
HAMLET
I think it be thine, indeed; for thou liest in't.
First Clown
You lie out on't, sir, and therefore it is notyours: for my part, I do not lie in't, and yet it is mine.
HAMLET
'Thou dost lie in't, to be in't and say it is thine:'tis for the dead, not for the quick; therefore thou liest.
First Clown
'Tis a quick lie, sir; 'twill away gain, from me toyou.
HAMLET
What man dost thou dig it for?
First Clown
For no man, sir.
HAMLET
What woman, then?
First Clown
For none, neither.
HAMLET
Who is to be buried in't?
First Clown
One that was a woman, sir; but, rest her soul, she's dead.
HAMLET
How absolute the knave is! we must speak by thecard, or equivocation will undo us. By the Lord,Horatio, these three years I have taken a note ofit; the age is grown so picked that the toe of thepeasant comes so near the heel of the courtier, hegaffs his kibe. How long hast thou been agrave-maker?
First Clown
Of all the days i' the year, I came to't that daythat our last king Hamlet overcame Fortinbras.
HAMLET
How long is that since?
First Clown
Cannot you tell that? every fool can tell that: itwas the very day that young Hamlet was born; he thatis mad, and sent into England.
HAMLET
Ay, marry, why was he sent into England?
First Clown
Why, because he was mad: he shall recover his witsthere; or, if he do not, it's no great matter there.
HAMLET
Why?
First Clown
'Twill, a not be seen in him there; there the menare as mad as he.
HAMLET
How came he mad?
First Clown
Very strangely, they say.
HAMLET
How strangely?
First Clown
Faith, e'en with losing his wits.
HAMLET
Upon what ground?
First Clown
Why, here in Denmark: I have been sexton here, manand boy, thirty years.
HAMLET
How long will a man lie i' the earth ere he rot?
First Clown
I' faith, if he be not rotten before he die--as wehave many pocky corses now-a-days, that will scarcehold the laying in--he will last you some eight yearor nine year: a tanner will last you nine year.
HAMLET
Why he more than another?
First Clown
Why, sir, his hide is so tanned with his trade, thathe will keep out water a great while; and your wateris a sore decayer of your whoreson dead body.Here's a skull now; this skull has lain in the earththree and twenty years.
HAMLET
Whose was it?
First Clown
A whoreson mad fellow's it was: whose do you think it was?
HAMLET
Nay, I know not.
First Clown
A pestilence on him for a mad rogue! a' poured aflagon of Rhenish on my head once. This same skull,sir, was Yorick's skull, the king's jester.
HAMLET
This?
First Clown
E'en that.
HAMLET
Let me see.
Takes the skull
Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio: a fellowof infinite jest, of most excellent fancy: he hathborne me on his back a thousand times; and now, howabhorred in my imagination it is! my gorge rims atit. Here hung those lips that I have kissed I knownot how oft. Where be your gibes now? yourgambols? your songs? your flashes of merriment,that were wont to set the table on a roar? Not onenow, to mock your own grinning? quite chap-fallen?Now get you to my lady's chamber, and tell her, lether paint an inch thick, to this favour she mustcome; make her laugh at that. Prithee, Horatio, tellme one thing.
HORATIO
What's that, my lord?
HAMLET
Dost thou think Alexander looked o' this fashion i'the earth?
HORATIO
E'en so.
HAMLET
And smelt so? pah!
Puts down the skull
HORATIO
E'en so, my lord.
HAMLET
To what base uses we may return, Horatio! Why maynot imagination trace the noble dust of Alexander,till he find it stopping a bung-hole?
HORATIO
'Twere to consider too curiously, to consider so.
HAMLET
No, faith, not a jot; but to follow him thither withmodesty enough, and likelihood to lead it: asthus: Alexander died, Alexander was buried,Alexander returneth into dust; the dust is earth; ofearth we make loam; and why of that loam, whereto hewas converted, might they not stop a beer-barrel?Imperious Caesar, dead and turn'd to clay,Might stop a hole to keep the wind away:O, that that earth, which kept the world in awe,Should patch a wall to expel the winter flaw!But soft! but soft! aside: here comes the king.
Enter Priest, & c. in procession; the Corpse of OPHELIA, LAERTES and Mourners following; KING CLAUDIUS, QUEEN GERTRUDE, their trains, & c
The queen, the courtiers: who is this they follow?And with such maimed rites? This doth betokenThe corse they follow did with desperate handFordo its own life: 'twas of some estate.Couch we awhile, and mark.
Retiring with HORATIO
LAERTES
What ceremony else?
HAMLET
That is Laertes,A very noble youth: mark.
LAERTES
What ceremony else?
First Priest
Her obsequies have been as far enlargedAs we have warrantise: her death was doubtful;And, but that great command o'ersways the order,She should in ground unsanctified have lodgedTill the last trumpet: for charitable prayers,Shards, flints and pebbles should be thrown on her;Yet here she is allow'd her virgin crants,Her maiden strewments and the bringing homeOf bell and burial.
LAERTES
Must there no more be done?
First Priest
No more be done:We should profane the service of the deadTo sing a requiem and such rest to herAs to peace-parted souls.
LAERTES
Lay her i' the earth:And from her fair and unpolluted fleshMay violets spring! I tell thee, churlish priest,A ministering angel shall my sister be,When thou liest howling.
HAMLET
What, the fair Ophelia!
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Sweets to the sweet: farewell!
Scattering flowers
I hoped thou shouldst have been my Hamlet's wife;I thought thy bride-bed to have deck'd, sweet maid,And not have strew'd thy grave.
LAERTES
O, treble woeFall ten times treble on that cursed head,Whose wicked deed thy most ingenious senseDeprived thee of! Hold off the earth awhile,Till I have caught her once more in mine arms:
Leaps into the grave
Now pile your dust upon the quick and dead,Till of this flat a mountain you have made,To o'ertop old Pelion, or the skyish headOf blue Olympus.
HAMLET
[Advancing] What is he whose griefBears such an emphasis? whose phrase of sorrowConjures the wandering stars, and makes them standLike wonder-wounded hearers? This is I,Hamlet the Dane.
Leaps into the grave
LAERTES
The devil take thy soul!
Grappling with him
HAMLET
Thou pray'st not well.I prithee, take thy fingers from my throat;For, though I am not splenitive and rash,Yet have I something in me dangerous,Which let thy wiseness fear: hold off thy hand.
KING CLAUDIUS
Pluck them asunder.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Hamlet, Hamlet!
All
Gentlemen,--
HORATIO
Good my lord, be quiet.
The Attendants part them, and they come out of the grave
HAMLET
Why I will fight with him upon this themeUntil my eyelids will no longer wag.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
O my son, what theme?
HAMLET
I loved Ophelia: forty thousand brothersCould not, with all their quantity of love,Make up my sum. What wilt thou do for her?
KING CLAUDIUS
O, he is mad, Laertes.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
For love of God, forbear him.
HAMLET
'Swounds, show me what thou'lt do:Woo't weep? woo't fight? woo't fast? woo't tear thyself?Woo't drink up eisel? eat a crocodile?I'll do't. Dost thou come here to whine?To outface me with leaping in her grave?Be buried quick with her, and so will I:And, if thou prate of mountains, let them throwMillions of acres on us, till our ground,Singeing his pate against the burning zone,Make Ossa like a wart! Nay, an thou'lt mouth,I'll rant as well as thou.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
This is mere madness:And thus awhile the fit will work on him;Anon, as patient as the female dove,When that her golden couplets are disclosed,His silence will sit drooping.
HAMLET
Hear you, sir;What is the reason that you use me thus?I loved you ever: but it is no matter;Let Hercules himself do what he may,The cat will mew and dog will have his day.
Exit
KING CLAUDIUS
I pray you, good Horatio, wait upon him.
Exit HORATIO
To LAERTES
Strengthen your patience in our last night's speech;We'll put the matter to the present push.Good Gertrude, set some watch over your son.This grave shall have a living monument:An hour of quiet shortly shall we see;Till then, in patience our proceeding be.
Exeunt
SCENE II. A hall in the castle.
Enter HAMLET and HORATIO
HAMLET
So much for this, sir: now shall you see the other;You do remember all the circumstance?
HORATIO
Remember it, my lord?
HAMLET
Sir, in my heart there was a kind of fighting,That would not let me sleep: methought I layWorse than the mutines in the bilboes. Rashly,And praised be rashness for it, let us know,Our indiscretion sometimes serves us well,When our deep plots do pall: and that should teach usThere's a divinity that shapes our ends,Rough-hew them how we will,--
HORATIO
That is most certain.
HAMLET
Up from my cabin,My sea-gown scarf'd about me, in the darkGroped I to find out them; had my desire.Finger'd their packet, and in fine withdrewTo mine own room again; making so bold,My fears forgetting manners, to unsealTheir grand commission; where I found, Horatio,--O royal knavery!--an exact command,Larded with many several sorts of reasonsImporting Denmark's health and England's too,With, ho! such bugs and goblins in my life,That, on the supervise, no leisure bated,No, not to stay the grinding of the axe,My head should be struck off.
HORATIO
Is't possible?
HAMLET
Here's the commission: read it at more leisure.But wilt thou hear me how I did proceed?
HORATIO
I beseech you.
HAMLET
Being thus be-netted round with villanies,--Ere I could make a prologue to my brains,They had begun the play--I sat me down,Devised a new commission, wrote it fair:I once did hold it, as our statists do,A baseness to write fair and labour'd muchHow to forget that learning, but, sir, nowIt did me yeoman's service: wilt thou knowThe effect of what I wrote?
HORATIO
Ay, good my lord.
HAMLET
An earnest conjuration from the king,As England was his faithful tributary,As love between them like the palm might flourish,As peace should stiff her wheaten garland wearAnd stand a comma 'tween their amities,And many such-like 'As'es of great charge,That, on the view and knowing of these contents,Without debatement further, more or less,He should the bearers put to sudden death,Not shriving-time allow'd.
HORATIO
How was this seal'd?
HAMLET
Why, even in that was heaven ordinant.I had my father's signet in my purse,Which was the model of that Danish seal;Folded the writ up in form of the other,Subscribed it, gave't the impression, placed it safely,The changeling never known. Now, the next dayWas our sea-fight; and what to this was sequentThou know'st already.
HORATIO
So Guildenstern and Rosencrantz go to't.
HAMLET
Why, man, they did make love to this employment;They are not near my conscience; their defeatDoes by their own insinuation grow:'Tis dangerous when the baser nature comesBetween the pass and fell incensed pointsOf mighty opposites.
HORATIO
Why, what a king is this!
HAMLET
Does it not, think'st thee, stand me now upon--He that hath kill'd my king and whored my mother,Popp'd in between the election and my hopes,Thrown out his angle for my proper life,And with such cozenage--is't not perfect conscience,To quit him with this arm? and is't not to be damn'd,To let this canker of our nature comeIn further evil?
HORATIO
It must be shortly known to him from EnglandWhat is the issue of the business there.
HAMLET
It will be short: the interim is mine;And a man's life's no more than to say 'One.'But I am very sorry, good Horatio,That to Laertes I forgot myself;For, by the image of my cause, I seeThe portraiture of his: I'll court his favours.But, sure, the bravery of his grief did put meInto a towering passion.
HORATIO
Peace! who comes here?
Enter OSRIC
OSRIC
Your lordship is right welcome back to Denmark.
HAMLET
I humbly thank you, sir. Dost know this water-fly?
HORATIO
No, my good lord.
HAMLET
Thy state is the more gracious; for 'tis a vice toknow him. He hath much land, and fertile: let abeast be lord of beasts, and his crib shall stand atthe king's mess: 'tis a chough; but, as I say,spacious in the possession of dirt.
OSRIC
Sweet lord, if your lordship were at leisure, Ishould impart a thing to you from his majesty.
HAMLET
I will receive it, sir, with all diligence ofspirit. Put your bonnet to his right use; 'tis for the head.
OSRIC
I thank your lordship, it is very hot.
HAMLET
No, believe me, 'tis very cold; the wind isnortherly.
OSRIC
It is indifferent cold, my lord, indeed.
HAMLET
But yet methinks it is very sultry and hot for mycomplexion.
OSRIC
Exceedingly, my lord; it is very sultry,--as'twere,--I cannot tell how. But, my lord, hismajesty bade me signify to you that he has laid agreat wager on your head: sir, this is the matter,--
HAMLET
I beseech you, remember--
HAMLET moves him to put on his hat
OSRIC
Nay, good my lord; for mine ease, in good faith.Sir, here is newly come to court Laertes; believeme, an absolute gentleman, full of most excellentdifferences, of very soft society and great showing:indeed, to speak feelingly of him, he is the card orcalendar of gentry, for you shall find in him thecontinent of what part a gentleman would see.
HAMLET
Sir, his definement suffers no perdition in you;though, I know, to divide him inventorially woulddizzy the arithmetic of memory, and yet but yawneither, in respect of his quick sail. But, in theverity of extolment, I take him to be a soul ofgreat article; and his infusion of such dearth andrareness, as, to make true diction of him, hissemblable is his mirror; and who else would tracehim, his umbrage, nothing more.
OSRIC
Your lordship speaks most infallibly of him.
HAMLET
The concernancy, sir? why do we wrap the gentlemanin our more rawer breath?
OSRIC
Sir?
HORATIO
Is't not possible to understand in another tongue?You will do't, sir, really.
HAMLET
What imports the nomination of this gentleman?
OSRIC
Of Laertes?
HORATIO
His purse is empty already; all's golden words are spent.
HAMLET
Of him, sir.
OSRIC
I know you are not ignorant--
HAMLET
I would you did, sir; yet, in faith, if you did,it would not much approve me. Well, sir?
OSRIC
You are not ignorant of what excellence Laertes is--
HAMLET
I dare not confess that, lest I should compare withhim in excellence; but, to know a man well, were toknow himself.
OSRIC
I mean, sir, for his weapon; but in the imputationlaid on him by them, in his meed he's unfellowed.
HAMLET
What's his weapon?
OSRIC
Rapier and dagger.
HAMLET
That's two of his weapons: but, well.
OSRIC
The king, sir, hath wagered with him six Barbaryhorses: against the which he has imponed, as I takeit, six French rapiers and poniards, with theirassigns, as girdle, hangers, and so: three of thecarriages, in faith, are very dear to fancy, veryresponsive to the hilts, most delicate carriages,and of very liberal conceit.
HAMLET
What call you the carriages?
HORATIO
I knew you must be edified by the margent ere you had done.
OSRIC
The carriages, sir, are the hangers.
HAMLET
The phrase would be more german to the matter, if wecould carry cannon by our sides: I would it mightbe hangers till then. But, on: six Barbary horsesagainst six French swords, their assigns, and threeliberal-conceited carriages; that's the French betagainst the Danish. Why is this 'imponed,' as you call it?
OSRIC
The king, sir, hath laid, that in a dozen passesbetween yourself and him, he shall not exceed youthree hits: he hath laid on twelve for nine; and itwould come to immediate trial, if your lordshipwould vouchsafe the answer.
HAMLET
How if I answer 'no'?
OSRIC
I mean, my lord, the opposition of your person in trial.
HAMLET
Sir, I will walk here in the hall: if it please hismajesty, 'tis the breathing time of day with me; letthe foils be brought, the gentleman willing, and theking hold his purpose, I will win for him an I can;if not, I will gain nothing but my shame and the odd hits.
OSRIC
Shall I re-deliver you e'en so?
HAMLET
To this effect, sir; after what flourish your nature will.
OSRIC
I commend my duty to your lordship.
HAMLET
Yours, yours.
Exit OSRIC
He does well to commend it himself; there are notongues else for's turn.
HORATIO
This lapwing runs away with the shell on his head.
HAMLET
He did comply with his dug, before he sucked it.Thus has he--and many more of the same bevy that Iknow the dressy age dotes on--only got the tune ofthe time and outward habit of encounter; a kind ofyesty collection, which carries them through andthrough the most fond and winnowed opinions; and dobut blow them to their trial, the bubbles are out.
Enter a Lord
Lord
My lord, his majesty commended him to you by youngOsric, who brings back to him that you attend him inthe hall: he sends to know if your pleasure hold toplay with Laertes, or that you will take longer time.
HAMLET
I am constant to my purpose; they follow the king'spleasure: if his fitness speaks, mine is ready; nowor whensoever, provided I be so able as now.
Lord
The king and queen and all are coming down.
HAMLET
In happy time.
Lord
The queen desires you to use some gentleentertainment to Laertes before you fall to play.
HAMLET
She well instructs me.
Exit Lord
HORATIO
You will lose this wager, my lord.
HAMLET
I do not think so: since he went into France, Ihave been in continual practise: I shall win at theodds. But thou wouldst not think how ill all's hereabout my heart: but it is no matter.
HORATIO
Nay, good my lord,--
HAMLET
It is but foolery; but it is such a kind ofgain-giving, as would perhaps trouble a woman.
HORATIO
If your mind dislike any thing, obey it: I willforestall their repair hither, and say you are notfit.
HAMLET
Not a whit, we defy augury: there's a specialprovidence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now,'tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will benow; if it be not now, yet it will come: thereadiness is all: since no man has aught of what heleaves, what is't to leave betimes?
Enter KING CLAUDIUS, QUEEN GERTRUDE, LAERTES, Lords, OSRIC, and Attendants with foils, & c
KING CLAUDIUS
Come, Hamlet, come, and take this hand from me.
KING CLAUDIUS puts LAERTES' hand into HAMLET's
HAMLET
Give me your pardon, sir: I've done you wrong;But pardon't, as you are a gentleman.This presence knows,And you must needs have heard, how I am punish'dWith sore distraction. What I have done,That might your nature, honour and exceptionRoughly awake, I here proclaim was madness.Was't Hamlet wrong'd Laertes? Never Hamlet:If Hamlet from himself be ta'en away,And when he's not himself does wrong Laertes,Then Hamlet does it not, Hamlet denies it.Who does it, then? His madness: if't be so,Hamlet is of the faction that is wrong'd;His madness is poor Hamlet's enemy.Sir, in this audience,Let my disclaiming from a purposed evilFree me so far in your most generous thoughts,That I have shot mine arrow o'er the house,And hurt my brother.
LAERTES
I am satisfied in nature,Whose motive, in this case, should stir me mostTo my revenge: but in my terms of honourI stand aloof; and will no reconcilement,Till by some elder masters, of known honour,I have a voice and precedent of peace,To keep my name ungored. But till that time,I do receive your offer'd love like love,And will not wrong it.
HAMLET
I embrace it freely;And will this brother's wager frankly play.Give us the foils. Come on.
LAERTES
Come, one for me.
HAMLET
I'll be your foil, Laertes: in mine ignoranceYour skill shall, like a star i' the darkest night,Stick fiery off indeed.
LAERTES
You mock me, sir.
HAMLET
No, by this hand.
KING CLAUDIUS
Give them the foils, young Osric. Cousin Hamlet,You know the wager?
HAMLET
Very well, my lordYour grace hath laid the odds o' the weaker side.
KING CLAUDIUS
I do not fear it; I have seen you both:But since he is better'd, we have therefore odds.
LAERTES
This is too heavy, let me see another.
HAMLET
This likes me well. These foils have all a length?
They prepare to play
OSRIC
Ay, my good lord.
KING CLAUDIUS
Set me the stoops of wine upon that table.If Hamlet give the first or second hit,Or quit in answer of the third exchange,Let all the battlements their ordnance fire:The king shall drink to Hamlet's better breath;And in the cup an union shall he throw,Richer than that which four successive kingsIn Denmark's crown have worn. Give me the cups;And let the kettle to the trumpet speak,The trumpet to the cannoneer without,The cannons to the heavens, the heavens to earth,'Now the king dunks to Hamlet.' Come, begin:And you, the judges, bear a wary eye.
HAMLET
Come on, sir.
LAERTES
Come, my lord.
They play
HAMLET
One.
LAERTES
No.
HAMLET
Judgment.
OSRIC
A hit, a very palpable hit.
LAERTES
Well; again.
KING CLAUDIUS
Stay; give me drink. Hamlet, this pearl is thine;Here's to thy health.
Trumpets sound, and cannon shot off within
Give him the cup.
HAMLET
I'll play this bout first; set it by awhile. Come.
They play
Another hit; what say you?
LAERTES
A touch, a touch, I do confess.
KING CLAUDIUS
Our son shall win.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
He's fat, and scant of breath.Here, Hamlet, take my napkin, rub thy brows;The queen carouses to thy fortune, Hamlet.
HAMLET
Good madam!
KING CLAUDIUS
Gertrude, do not drink.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
I will, my lord; I pray you, pardon me.
KING CLAUDIUS
[Aside] It is the poison'd cup: it is too late.
HAMLET
I dare not drink yet, madam; by and by.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
Come, let me wipe thy face.
LAERTES
My lord, I'll hit him now.
KING CLAUDIUS
I do not think't.
LAERTES
[Aside] And yet 'tis almost 'gainst my conscience.
HAMLET
Come, for the third, Laertes: you but dally;I pray you, pass with your best violence;I am afeard you make a wanton of me.
LAERTES
Say you so? come on.
They play
OSRIC
Nothing, neither way.
LAERTES
Have at you now!
LAERTES wounds HAMLET; then in scuffling, they change rapiers, and HAMLET wounds LAERTES
KING CLAUDIUS
Part them; they are incensed.
HAMLET
Nay, come, again.
QUEEN GERTRUDE falls
OSRIC
Look to the queen there, ho!
HORATIO
They bleed on both sides. How is it, my lord?
OSRIC
How is't, Laertes?
LAERTES
Why, as a woodcock to mine own springe, Osric;I am justly kill'd with mine own treachery.
HAMLET
How does the queen?
KING CLAUDIUS
She swounds to see them bleed.
QUEEN GERTRUDE
No, no, the drink, the drink,--O my dear Hamlet,--The drink, the drink! I am poison'd.
Dies
HAMLET
O villany! Ho! let the door be lock'd:Treachery! Seek it out.
LAERTES
It is here, Hamlet: Hamlet, thou art slain;No medicine in the world can do thee good;In thee there is not half an hour of life;The treacherous instrument is in thy hand,Unbated and envenom'd: the foul practiseHath turn'd itself on me lo, here I lie,Never to rise again: thy mother's poison'd:I can no more: the king, the king's to blame.
HAMLET
The point!--envenom'd too!Then, venom, to thy work.
Stabs KING CLAUDIUS
All
Treason! treason!
KING CLAUDIUS
O, yet defend me, friends; I am but hurt.
HAMLET
Here, thou incestuous, murderous, damned Dane,Drink off this potion. Is thy union here?Follow my mother.
KING CLAUDIUS dies
LAERTES
He is justly served;It is a poison temper'd by himself.Exchange forgiveness with me, noble Hamlet:Mine and my father's death come not upon thee,Nor thine on me.
Dies
HAMLET
Heaven make thee free of it! I follow thee.I am dead, Horatio. Wretched queen, adieu!You that look pale and tremble at this chance,That are but mutes or audience to this act,Had I but time--as this fell sergeant, death,Is strict in his arrest--O, I could tell you--But let it be. Horatio, I am dead;Thou livest; report me and my cause arightTo the unsatisfied.
HORATIO
Never believe it:I am more an antique Roman than a Dane:Here's yet some liquor left.
HAMLET
As thou'rt a man,Give me the cup: let go; by heaven, I'll have't.O good Horatio, what a wounded name,Things standing thus unknown, shall live behind me!If thou didst ever hold me in thy heartAbsent thee from felicity awhile,And in this harsh world draw thy breath in pain,To tell my story.
March afar off, and shot within
What warlike noise is this?
OSRIC
Young Fortinbras, with conquest come from Poland,To the ambassadors of England givesThis warlike volley.
HAMLET
O, I die, Horatio;The potent poison quite o'er-crows my spirit:I cannot live to hear the news from England;But I do prophesy the election lightsOn Fortinbras: he has my dying voice;So tell him, with the occurrents, more and less,Which have solicited. The rest is silence.
Dies
HORATIO
Now cracks a noble heart. Good night sweet prince:And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest!Why does the drum come hither?
March within
Enter FORTINBRAS, the English Ambassadors, and others
PRINCE FORTINBRAS
Where is this sight?
HORATIO
What is it ye would see?If aught of woe or wonder, cease your search.
PRINCE FORTINBRAS
This quarry cries on havoc. O proud death,What feast is toward in thine eternal cell,That thou so many princes at a shotSo bloodily hast struck?
First Ambassador
The sight is dismal;And our affairs from England come too late:The ears are senseless that should give us hearing,To tell him his commandment is fulfill'd,That Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead:Where should we have our thanks?
HORATIO
Not from his mouth,Had it the ability of life to thank you:He never gave commandment for their death.But since, so jump upon this bloody question,You from the Polack wars, and you from England,Are here arrived give order that these bodiesHigh on a stage be placed to the view;And let me speak to the yet unknowing worldHow these things came about: so shall you hearOf carnal, bloody, and unnatural acts,Of accidental judgments, casual slaughters,Of deaths put on by cunning and forced cause,And, in this upshot, purposes mistookFall'n on the inventors' reads: all this can ITruly deliver.
PRINCE FORTINBRAS
Let us haste to hear it,And call the noblest to the audience.For me, with sorrow I embrace my fortune:I have some rights of memory in this kingdom,Which now to claim my vantage doth invite me.
HORATIO
Of that I shall have also cause to speak,And from his mouth whose voice will draw on more;But let this same be presently perform'd,Even while men's minds are wild; lest more mischanceOn plots and errors, happen.
PRINCE FORTINBRAS
Let four captainsBear Hamlet, like a soldier, to the stage;For he was likely, had he been put on,To have proved most royally: and, for his passage,The soldiers' music and the rites of warSpeak loudly for him.Take up the bodies: such a sight as thisBecomes the field, but here shows much amiss.Go, bid the soldiers shoot.
A dead march. Exeunt, bearing off the dead bodies; after which a peal of ordnance is shot off



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