The Tragedy Of Hamlet, Prince Of Denmark

1 Enter Francisco and Barnardo, two sentinels.
2 BARNARDO.
3 Who’s there?
4 FRANCISCO.
5 Nay, answer me. Stand and unfold yourself.
6 BARNARDO.
7 Long live the King!
8 FRANCISCO.
9 Barnardo?
10 BARNARDO.
11 He.
12 FRANCISCO.
13 You come most carefully upon your hour.
14 BARNARDO.
15 ’Tis now struck twelve. Get thee to bed, Francisco.
16 FRANCISCO.
17 For this relief much thanks. ’Tis bitter cold,
18 And I am sick at heart.
19 BARNARDO.
20 Have you had quiet guard?
21 FRANCISCO.
22 Not a mouse stirring.
23 BARNARDO.
24 Well, good night.
25 If you do meet Horatio and Marcellus,
26 The rivals of my watch, bid them make haste.
27 Enter Horatio and Marcellus.
28 FRANCISCO.
29 I think I hear them. Stand, ho! Who is there?
30 HORATIO.
31 Friends to this ground.
32 MARCELLUS.
33 And liegemen to the Dane.
34 FRANCISCO.
35 Give you good night.
36 MARCELLUS.
37 O, farewell, honest soldier, who hath reliev’d you?
38 FRANCISCO.
39 Barnardo has my place. Give you good-night.
40 [_Exit._]
41 MARCELLUS.
42 Holla, Barnardo!
43 BARNARDO.
44 Say, what, is Horatio there?
45 HORATIO.
46 A piece of him.
47 BARNARDO.
48 Welcome, Horatio. Welcome, good Marcellus.
49 MARCELLUS.
50 What, has this thing appear’d again tonight?
51 BARNARDO.
52 I have seen nothing.
53 MARCELLUS.
54 Horatio says ’tis but our fantasy,
55 And will not let belief take hold of him
56 Touching this dreaded sight, twice seen of us.
57 Therefore I have entreated him along
58 With us to watch the minutes of this night,
59 That if again this apparition come
60 He may approve our eyes and speak to it.
61 HORATIO.
62 Tush, tush, ’twill not appear.
63 BARNARDO.
64 Sit down awhile,
65 And let us once again assail your ears,
66 That are so fortified against our story,
67 What we two nights have seen.
68 HORATIO.
69 Well, sit we down,
70 And let us hear Barnardo speak of this.
71 BARNARDO.
72 Last night of all,
73 When yond same star that’s westward from the pole,
74 Had made his course t’illume that part of heaven
75 Where now it burns, Marcellus and myself,
76 The bell then beating one—
77 MARCELLUS.
78 Peace, break thee off. Look where it comes again.
79 Enter Ghost.
80 BARNARDO.
81 In the same figure, like the King that’s dead.
82 MARCELLUS.
83 Thou art a scholar; speak to it, Horatio.
84 BARNARDO.
85 Looks it not like the King? Mark it, Horatio.
86 HORATIO.
87 Most like. It harrows me with fear and wonder.
88 BARNARDO
89 It would be spoke to.
90 MARCELLUS.
91 Question it, Horatio.
92 HORATIO.
93 What art thou that usurp’st this time of night,
94 Together with that fair and warlike form
95 In which the majesty of buried Denmark
96 Did sometimes march? By heaven I charge thee speak.
97 MARCELLUS.
98 It is offended.
99 BARNARDO.
100 See, it stalks away.
101 HORATIO.
102 Stay! speak, speak! I charge thee speak!
103 [_Exit Ghost._]
104 MARCELLUS.
105 ’Tis gone, and will not answer.
106 BARNARDO.
107 How now, Horatio! You tremble and look pale.
108 Is not this something more than fantasy?
109 What think you on’t?
110 HORATIO.
111 Before my God, I might not this believe
112 Without the sensible and true avouch
113 Of mine own eyes.
114 MARCELLUS.
115 Is it not like the King?
116 HORATIO.
117 As thou art to thyself:
118 Such was the very armour he had on
119 When he th’ambitious Norway combated;
120 So frown’d he once, when in an angry parle
121 He smote the sledded Polacks on the ice.
122 ’Tis strange.
123 MARCELLUS.
124 Thus twice before, and jump at this dead hour,
125 With martial stalk hath he gone by our watch.
126 HORATIO.
127 In what particular thought to work I know not;
128 But in the gross and scope of my opinion,
129 This bodes some strange eruption to our state.
130 MARCELLUS.
131 Good now, sit down, and tell me, he that knows,
132 Why this same strict and most observant watch
133 So nightly toils the subject of the land,
134 And why such daily cast of brazen cannon
135 And foreign mart for implements of war;
136 Why such impress of shipwrights, whose sore task
137 Does not divide the Sunday from the week.
138 What might be toward, that this sweaty haste
139 Doth make the night joint-labourer with the day:
140 Who is’t that can inform me?
141 HORATIO.
142 That can I;
143 At least, the whisper goes so. Our last King,
144 Whose image even but now appear’d to us,
145 Was, as you know, by Fortinbras of Norway,
146 Thereto prick’d on by a most emulate pride,
147 Dar’d to the combat; in which our valiant Hamlet,
148 For so this side of our known world esteem’d him,
149 Did slay this Fortinbras; who by a seal’d compact,
150 Well ratified by law and heraldry,
151 Did forfeit, with his life, all those his lands
152 Which he stood seiz’d of, to the conqueror;
153 Against the which, a moiety competent
154 Was gaged by our King; which had return’d
155 To the inheritance of Fortinbras,
156 Had he been vanquisher; as by the same cov’nant
157 And carriage of the article design’d,
158 His fell to Hamlet. Now, sir, young Fortinbras,
159 Of unimproved mettle, hot and full,
160 Hath in the skirts of Norway, here and there,
161 Shark’d up a list of lawless resolutes,
162 For food and diet, to some enterprise
163 That hath a stomach in’t; which is no other,
164 As it doth well appear unto our state,
165 But to recover of us by strong hand
166 And terms compulsatory, those foresaid lands
167 So by his father lost. And this, I take it,
168 Is the main motive of our preparations,
169 The source of this our watch, and the chief head
170 Of this post-haste and rummage in the land.
171 BARNARDO.
172 I think it be no other but e’en so:
173 Well may it sort that this portentous figure
174 Comes armed through our watch so like the King
175 That was and is the question of these wars.
176 HORATIO.
177 A mote it is to trouble the mind’s eye.
178 In the most high and palmy state of Rome,
179 A little ere the mightiest Julius fell,
180 The graves stood tenantless and the sheeted dead
181 Did squeak and gibber in the Roman streets;
182 As stars with trains of fire and dews of blood,
183 Disasters in the sun; and the moist star,
184 Upon whose influence Neptune’s empire stands,
185 Was sick almost to doomsday with eclipse.
186 And even the like precurse of fierce events,
187 As harbingers preceding still the fates
188 And prologue to the omen coming on,
189 Have heaven and earth together demonstrated
190 Unto our climatures and countrymen.
191 Re-enter Ghost.
192 But, soft, behold! Lo, where it comes again!
193 I’ll cross it, though it blast me. Stay, illusion!
194 If thou hast any sound, or use of voice,
195 Speak to me.
196 If there be any good thing to be done,
197 That may to thee do ease, and grace to me,
198 Speak to me.
199 If thou art privy to thy country’s fate,
200 Which, happily, foreknowing may avoid,
201 O speak!
202 Or if thou hast uphoarded in thy life
203 Extorted treasure in the womb of earth,
204 For which, they say, you spirits oft walk in death,
205 Speak of it. Stay, and speak!
206 [_The cock crows._]
207 Stop it, Marcellus!
208 MARCELLUS.
209 Shall I strike at it with my partisan?
210 HORATIO.
211 Do, if it will not stand.
212 BARNARDO.
213 ’Tis here!
214 HORATIO.
215 ’Tis here!
216 [_Exit Ghost._]
217 MARCELLUS.
218 ’Tis gone!
219 We do it wrong, being so majestical,
220 To offer it the show of violence,
221 For it is as the air, invulnerable,
222 And our vain blows malicious mockery.
223 BARNARDO.
224 It was about to speak, when the cock crew.
225 HORATIO.
226 And then it started, like a guilty thing
227 Upon a fearful summons. I have heard
228 The cock, that is the trumpet to the morn,
229 Doth with his lofty and shrill-sounding throat
230 Awake the god of day; and at his warning,
231 Whether in sea or fire, in earth or air,
232 Th’extravagant and erring spirit hies
233 To his confine. And of the truth herein
234 This present object made probation.
235 MARCELLUS.
236 It faded on the crowing of the cock.
237 Some say that ever ’gainst that season comes
238 Wherein our Saviour’s birth is celebrated,
239 The bird of dawning singeth all night long;
240 And then, they say, no spirit dare stir abroad,
241 The nights are wholesome, then no planets strike,
242 No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm;
243 So hallow’d and so gracious is the time.
244 HORATIO.
245 So have I heard, and do in part believe it.
246 But look, the morn in russet mantle clad,
247 Walks o’er the dew of yon high eastward hill.
248 Break we our watch up, and by my advice,
249 Let us impart what we have seen tonight
250 Unto young Hamlet; for upon my life,
251 This spirit, dumb to us, will speak to him.
252 Do you consent we shall acquaint him with it,
253 As needful in our loves, fitting our duty?
254 MARCELLUS.
255 Let’s do’t, I pray, and I this morning know
256 Where we shall find him most conveniently.
257 [_Exeunt._]