The Tragedy Of Hamlet, Prince Of Denmark

1 Enter King, Queen, Rosencrantz, Guildenstern and Attendants.
2 KING.
3 Welcome, dear Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.
4 Moreover that we much did long to see you,
5 The need we have to use you did provoke
6 Our hasty sending. Something have you heard
7 Of Hamlet’s transformation; so I call it,
8 Since nor th’exterior nor the inward man
9 Resembles that it was. What it should be,
10 More than his father’s death, that thus hath put him
11 So much from th’understanding of himself,
12 I cannot dream of. I entreat you both
13 That, being of so young days brought up with him,
14 And since so neighbour’d to his youth and humour,
15 That you vouchsafe your rest here in our court
16 Some little time, so by your companies
17 To draw him on to pleasures and to gather,
18 So much as from occasion you may glean,
19 Whether aught to us unknown afflicts him thus
20 That, open’d, lies within our remedy.
21 QUEEN.
22 Good gentlemen, he hath much talk’d of you,
23 And sure I am, two men there are not living
24 To whom he more adheres. If it will please you
25 To show us so much gentry and good will
26 As to expend your time with us awhile,
27 For the supply and profit of our hope,
28 Your visitation shall receive such thanks
29 As fits a king’s remembrance.
30 ROSENCRANTZ.
31 Both your majesties
32 Might, by the sovereign power you have of us,
33 Put your dread pleasures more into command
34 Than to entreaty.
35 GUILDENSTERN.
36 We both obey,
37 And here give up ourselves, in the full bent,
38 To lay our service freely at your feet
39 To be commanded.
40 KING.
41 Thanks, Rosencrantz and gentle Guildenstern.
42 QUEEN.
43 Thanks, Guildenstern and gentle Rosencrantz.
44 And I beseech you instantly to visit
45 My too much changed son. Go, some of you,
46 And bring these gentlemen where Hamlet is.
47 GUILDENSTERN.
48 Heavens make our presence and our practices
49 Pleasant and helpful to him.
50 QUEEN.
51 Ay, amen.
52 [_Exeunt Rosencrantz, Guildenstern and some Attendants._]
53 Enter Polonius.
54 POLONIUS.
55 Th’ambassadors from Norway, my good lord,
56 Are joyfully return’d.
57 KING.
58 Thou still hast been the father of good news.
59 POLONIUS.
60 Have I, my lord? Assure you, my good liege,
61 I hold my duty, as I hold my soul,
62 Both to my God and to my gracious King:
63 And I do think,—or else this brain of mine
64 Hunts not the trail of policy so sure
65 As it hath us’d to do—that I have found
66 The very cause of Hamlet’s lunacy.
67 KING.
68 O speak of that, that do I long to hear.
69 POLONIUS.
70 Give first admittance to th’ambassadors;
71 My news shall be the fruit to that great feast.
72 KING.
73 Thyself do grace to them, and bring them in.
74 [_Exit Polonius._]
75 He tells me, my sweet queen, that he hath found
76 The head and source of all your son’s distemper.
77 QUEEN.
78 I doubt it is no other but the main,
79 His father’s death and our o’erhasty marriage.
80 KING.
81 Well, we shall sift him.
82 Enter Polonius with Voltemand and Cornelius.
83 Welcome, my good friends!
84 Say, Voltemand, what from our brother Norway?
85 VOLTEMAND.
86 Most fair return of greetings and desires.
87 Upon our first, he sent out to suppress
88 His nephew’s levies, which to him appear’d
89 To be a preparation ’gainst the Polack;
90 But better look’d into, he truly found
91 It was against your Highness; whereat griev’d,
92 That so his sickness, age, and impotence
93 Was falsely borne in hand, sends out arrests
94 On Fortinbras; which he, in brief, obeys,
95 Receives rebuke from Norway; and in fine,
96 Makes vow before his uncle never more
97 To give th’assay of arms against your Majesty.
98 Whereon old Norway, overcome with joy,
99 Gives him three thousand crowns in annual fee,
100 And his commission to employ those soldiers
101 So levied as before, against the Polack:
102 With an entreaty, herein further shown,
103 [_Gives a paper._]
104 That it might please you to give quiet pass
105 Through your dominions for this enterprise,
106 On such regards of safety and allowance
107 As therein are set down.
108 KING.
109 It likes us well;
110 And at our more consider’d time we’ll read,
111 Answer, and think upon this business.
112 Meantime we thank you for your well-took labour.
113 Go to your rest, at night we’ll feast together:.
114 Most welcome home.
115 [_Exeunt Voltemand and Cornelius._]
116 POLONIUS.
117 This business is well ended.
118 My liege and madam, to expostulate
119 What majesty should be, what duty is,
120 Why day is day, night night, and time is time
121 Were nothing but to waste night, day and time.
122 Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit,
123 And tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes,
124 I will be brief. Your noble son is mad.
125 Mad call I it; for to define true madness,
126 What is’t but to be nothing else but mad?
127 But let that go.
128 QUEEN.
129 More matter, with less art.
130 POLONIUS.
131 Madam, I swear I use no art at all.
132 That he is mad, ’tis true: ’tis true ’tis pity;
133 And pity ’tis ’tis true. A foolish figure,
134 But farewell it, for I will use no art.
135 Mad let us grant him then. And now remains
136 That we find out the cause of this effect,
137 Or rather say, the cause of this defect,
138 For this effect defective comes by cause.
139 Thus it remains, and the remainder thus. Perpend,
140 I have a daughter—have whilst she is mine—
141 Who in her duty and obedience, mark,
142 Hath given me this. Now gather, and surmise.
143 [_Reads._]
144 _To the celestial, and my soul’s idol, the most beautified Ophelia_—
145 That’s an ill phrase, a vile phrase; ‘beautified’ is a vile
146 phrase: but you shall hear.
147 [_Reads._]
148 _these; in her excellent white bosom, these, &c._
149 QUEEN.
150 Came this from Hamlet to her?
151 POLONIUS.
152 Good madam, stay awhile; I will be faithful.
153 [_Reads._]
154 _Doubt thou the stars are fire,
155 Doubt that the sun doth move,
156 Doubt truth to be a liar,
157 But never doubt I love.
158 O dear Ophelia, I am ill at these numbers. I have not art to reckon my
159 groans. But that I love thee best, O most best, believe it. Adieu.
160 Thine evermore, most dear lady, whilst this machine is to him,
161 HAMLET._
162 This in obedience hath my daughter show’d me;
163 And more above, hath his solicitings,
164 As they fell out by time, by means, and place,
165 All given to mine ear.
166 KING.
167 But how hath she receiv’d his love?
168 POLONIUS.
169 What do you think of me?
170 KING.
171 As of a man faithful and honourable.
172 POLONIUS.
173 I would fain prove so. But what might you think,
174 When I had seen this hot love on the wing,
175 As I perceiv’d it, I must tell you that,
176 Before my daughter told me, what might you,
177 Or my dear Majesty your queen here, think,
178 If I had play’d the desk or table-book,
179 Or given my heart a winking, mute and dumb,
180 Or look’d upon this love with idle sight,
181 What might you think? No, I went round to work,
182 And my young mistress thus I did bespeak:
183 ‘Lord Hamlet is a prince, out of thy star.
184 This must not be.’ And then I precepts gave her,
185 That she should lock herself from his resort,
186 Admit no messengers, receive no tokens.
187 Which done, she took the fruits of my advice,
188 And he, repulsed,—a short tale to make—
189 Fell into a sadness, then into a fast,
190 Thence to a watch, thence into a weakness,
191 Thence to a lightness, and, by this declension,
192 Into the madness wherein now he raves,
193 And all we wail for.
194 KING.
195 Do you think ’tis this?
196 QUEEN.
197 It may be, very likely.
198 POLONIUS.
199 Hath there been such a time, I’d fain know that,
200 That I have positively said ‘’Tis so,’
201 When it prov’d otherwise?
202 KING.
203 Not that I know.
204 POLONIUS.
205 Take this from this, if this be otherwise.
206 [_Points to his head and shoulder._]
207 If circumstances lead me, I will find
208 Where truth is hid, though it were hid indeed
209 Within the centre.
210 KING.
211 How may we try it further?
212 POLONIUS.
213 You know sometimes he walks four hours together
214 Here in the lobby.
215 QUEEN.
216 So he does indeed.
217 POLONIUS.
218 At such a time I’ll loose my daughter to him.
219 Be you and I behind an arras then,
220 Mark the encounter. If he love her not,
221 And be not from his reason fall’n thereon,
222 Let me be no assistant for a state,
223 But keep a farm and carters.
224 KING.
225 We will try it.
226 Enter Hamlet, reading.
227 QUEEN.
228 But look where sadly the poor wretch comes reading.
229 POLONIUS.
230 Away, I do beseech you, both away
231 I’ll board him presently. O, give me leave.
232 [_Exeunt King, Queen and Attendants._]
233 How does my good Lord Hamlet?
234 HAMLET.
235 Well, God-a-mercy.
236 POLONIUS.
237 Do you know me, my lord?
238 HAMLET.
239 Excellent well. You are a fishmonger.
240 POLONIUS.
241 Not I, my lord.
242 HAMLET.
243 Then I would you were so honest a man.
244 POLONIUS.
245 Honest, my lord?
246 HAMLET.
247 Ay sir, to be honest, as this world goes, is to be one man picked out
248 of ten thousand.
249 POLONIUS.
250 That’s very true, my lord.
251 HAMLET.
252 For if the sun breed maggots in a dead dog, being a good kissing
253 carrion,—
254 Have you a daughter?
255 POLONIUS.
256 I have, my lord.
257 HAMLET.
258 Let her not walk i’ th’ sun. Conception is a blessing, but not as your
259 daughter may conceive. Friend, look to’t.
260 POLONIUS.
261 How say you by that? [_Aside._] Still harping on my daughter. Yet he
262 knew me not at first; he said I was a fishmonger. He is far gone, far
263 gone. And truly in my youth I suffered much extremity for love; very
264 near this. I’ll speak to him again.—What do you read, my lord?
265 HAMLET.
266 Words, words, words.
267 POLONIUS.
268 What is the matter, my lord?
269 HAMLET.
270 Between who?
271 POLONIUS.
272 I mean the matter that you read, my lord.
273 HAMLET.
274 Slanders, sir. For the satirical slave says here that old men have grey
275 beards; that their faces are wrinkled; their eyes purging thick amber
276 and plum-tree gum; and that they have a plentiful lack of wit, together
277 with most weak hams. All which, sir, though I most powerfully and
278 potently believe, yet I hold it not honesty to have it thus set down.
279 For you yourself, sir, should be old as I am, if like a crab you could
280 go backward.
281 POLONIUS.
282 [_Aside._] Though this be madness, yet there is method in’t.—
283 Will you walk out of the air, my lord?
284 HAMLET.
285 Into my grave?
286 POLONIUS.
287 Indeed, that is out o’ the air. [_Aside._] How pregnant sometimes his
288 replies are! A happiness that often madness hits on, which reason and
289 sanity could not so prosperously be delivered of. I will leave him and
290 suddenly contrive the means of meeting between him and my daughter.
291 My honourable lord, I will most humbly take my leave of you.
292 HAMLET.
293 You cannot, sir, take from me anything that I will more willingly part
294 withal, except my life, except my life, except my life.
295 POLONIUS.
296 Fare you well, my lord.
297 HAMLET.
298 These tedious old fools.
299 Enter Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.
300 POLONIUS.
301 You go to seek the Lord Hamlet; there he is.
302 ROSENCRANTZ.
303 [_To Polonius._] God save you, sir.
304 [_Exit Polonius._]
305 GUILDENSTERN.
306 My honoured lord!
307 ROSENCRANTZ.
308 My most dear lord!
309 HAMLET.
310 My excellent good friends! How dost thou, Guildenstern? Ah,
311 Rosencrantz. Good lads, how do ye both?
312 ROSENCRANTZ.
313 As the indifferent children of the earth.
314 GUILDENSTERN.
315 Happy in that we are not over-happy;
316 On Fortune’s cap we are not the very button.
317 HAMLET.
318 Nor the soles of her shoe?
319 ROSENCRANTZ.
320 Neither, my lord.
321 HAMLET.
322 Then you live about her waist, or in the middle of her favours?
323 GUILDENSTERN.
324 Faith, her privates we.
325 HAMLET.
326 In the secret parts of Fortune? O, most true; she is a strumpet. What’s
327 the news?
328 ROSENCRANTZ.
329 None, my lord, but that the world’s grown honest.
330 HAMLET.
331 Then is doomsday near. But your news is not true. Let me question more
332 in particular. What have you, my good friends, deserved at the hands of
333 Fortune, that she sends you to prison hither?
334 GUILDENSTERN.
335 Prison, my lord?
336 HAMLET.
337 Denmark’s a prison.
338 ROSENCRANTZ.
339 Then is the world one.
340 HAMLET.
341 A goodly one; in which there are many confines, wards, and dungeons,
342 Denmark being one o’ th’ worst.
343 ROSENCRANTZ.
344 We think not so, my lord.
345 HAMLET.
346 Why, then ’tis none to you; for there is nothing either good or bad but
347 thinking makes it so. To me it is a prison.
348 ROSENCRANTZ.
349 Why, then your ambition makes it one; ’tis too narrow for your mind.
350 HAMLET.
351 O God, I could be bounded in a nutshell, and count myself a king of
352 infinite space, were it not that I have bad dreams.
353 GUILDENSTERN.
354 Which dreams, indeed, are ambition; for the very substance of the
355 ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream.
356 HAMLET.
357 A dream itself is but a shadow.
358 ROSENCRANTZ.
359 Truly, and I hold ambition of so airy and light a quality that it is
360 but a shadow’s shadow.
361 HAMLET.
362 Then are our beggars bodies, and our monarchs and outstretch’d heroes
363 the beggars’ shadows. Shall we to th’ court? For, by my fay, I cannot
364 reason.
365 ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN.
366 We’ll wait upon you.
367 HAMLET.
368 No such matter. I will not sort you with the rest of my servants; for,
369 to speak to you like an honest man, I am most dreadfully attended. But,
370 in the beaten way of friendship, what make you at Elsinore?
371 ROSENCRANTZ.
372 To visit you, my lord, no other occasion.
373 HAMLET.
374 Beggar that I am, I am even poor in thanks; but I thank you. And sure,
375 dear friends, my thanks are too dear a halfpenny. Were you not sent
376 for? Is it your own inclining? Is it a free visitation? Come, deal
377 justly with me. Come, come; nay, speak.
378 GUILDENSTERN.
379 What should we say, my lord?
380 HAMLET.
381 Why, anything. But to the purpose. You were sent for; and there is a
382 kind of confession in your looks, which your modesties have not craft
383 enough to colour. I know the good King and Queen have sent for you.
384 ROSENCRANTZ.
385 To what end, my lord?
386 HAMLET.
387 That you must teach me. But let me conjure you, by the rights of our
388 fellowship, by the consonancy of our youth, by the obligation of our
389 ever-preserved love, and by what more dear a better proposer could
390 charge you withal, be even and direct with me, whether you were sent
391 for or no.
392 ROSENCRANTZ.
393 [_To Guildenstern._] What say you?
394 HAMLET.
395 [_Aside._] Nay, then I have an eye of you. If you love me, hold not
396 off.
397 GUILDENSTERN.
398 My lord, we were sent for.
399 HAMLET.
400 I will tell you why; so shall my anticipation prevent your discovery,
401 and your secrecy to the King and Queen moult no feather. I have of
402 late, but wherefore I know not, lost all my mirth, forgone all custom
403 of exercises; and indeed, it goes so heavily with my disposition that
404 this goodly frame the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory; this
405 most excellent canopy the air, look you, this brave o’erhanging
406 firmament, this majestical roof fretted with golden fire, why, it
407 appears no other thing to me than a foul and pestilent congregation of
408 vapours. What a piece of work is man, how noble in reason, how infinite
409 in faculties, in form and moving, how express and admirable; in action
410 how like an angel, in apprehension, how like a god: the beauty of the
411 world, the paragon of animals. And yet, to me, what is this
412 quintessence of dust? Man delights not me; no, nor woman neither,
413 though by your smiling you seem to say so.
414 ROSENCRANTZ.
415 My lord, there was no such stuff in my thoughts.
416 HAMLET.
417 Why did you laugh then, when I said ‘Man delights not me’?
418 ROSENCRANTZ.
419 To think, my lord, if you delight not in man, what Lenten entertainment
420 the players shall receive from you. We coted them on the way, and
421 hither are they coming to offer you service.
422 HAMLET.
423 He that plays the king shall be welcome,—his Majesty shall have tribute
424 of me; the adventurous knight shall use his foil and target; the lover
425 shall not sigh gratis, the humorous man shall end his part in peace;
426 the clown shall make those laugh whose lungs are tickle o’ th’ sere;
427 and the lady shall say her mind freely, or the blank verse shall halt
428 for’t. What players are they?
429 ROSENCRANTZ.
430 Even those you were wont to take such delight in—the tragedians of the
431 city.
432 HAMLET.
433 How chances it they travel? Their residence, both in reputation and
434 profit, was better both ways.
435 ROSENCRANTZ.
436 I think their inhibition comes by the means of the late innovation.
437 HAMLET.
438 Do they hold the same estimation they did when I was in the city? Are
439 they so followed?
440 ROSENCRANTZ.
441 No, indeed, they are not.
442 HAMLET.
443 How comes it? Do they grow rusty?
444 ROSENCRANTZ.
445 Nay, their endeavour keeps in the wonted pace; but there is, sir, an
446 aerie of children, little eyases, that cry out on the top of question,
447 and are most tyrannically clapped for’t. These are now the fashion, and
448 so berattle the common stages—so they call them—that many wearing
449 rapiers are afraid of goose-quills and dare scarce come thither.
450 HAMLET.
451 What, are they children? Who maintains ’em? How are they escoted? Will
452 they pursue the quality no longer than they can sing? Will they not say
453 afterwards, if they should grow themselves to common players—as it is
454 most like, if their means are no better—their writers do them wrong to
455 make them exclaim against their own succession?
456 ROSENCRANTZ.
457 Faith, there has been much to do on both sides; and the nation holds it
458 no sin to tarre them to controversy. There was for a while, no money
459 bid for argument unless the poet and the player went to cuffs in the
460 question.
461 HAMLET.
462 Is’t possible?
463 GUILDENSTERN.
464 O, there has been much throwing about of brains.
465 HAMLET.
466 Do the boys carry it away?
467 ROSENCRANTZ.
468 Ay, that they do, my lord. Hercules and his load too.
469 HAMLET.
470 It is not very strange; for my uncle is King of Denmark, and those that
471 would make mouths at him while my father lived, give twenty, forty,
472 fifty, a hundred ducats apiece for his picture in little. ’Sblood,
473 there is something in this more than natural, if philosophy could find
474 it out.
475 [_Flourish of trumpets within._]
476 GUILDENSTERN.
477 There are the players.
478 HAMLET.
479 Gentlemen, you are welcome to Elsinore. Your hands, come. The
480 appurtenance of welcome is fashion and ceremony. Let me comply with you
481 in this garb, lest my extent to the players, which I tell you must show
482 fairly outward, should more appear like entertainment than yours. You
483 are welcome. But my uncle-father and aunt-mother are deceived.
484 GUILDENSTERN.
485 In what, my dear lord?
486 HAMLET.
487 I am but mad north-north-west. When the wind is southerly, I know a
488 hawk from a handsaw.
489 Enter Polonius.
490 POLONIUS.
491 Well be with you, gentlemen.
492 HAMLET.
493 Hark you, Guildenstern, and you too, at each ear a hearer. That great
494 baby you see there is not yet out of his swaddling clouts.
495 ROSENCRANTZ.
496 Happily he’s the second time come to them; for they say an old man is
497 twice a child.
498 HAMLET.
499 I will prophesy he comes to tell me of the players. Mark it.—You say
500 right, sir: for a Monday morning ’twas so indeed.
501 POLONIUS.
502 My lord, I have news to tell you.
503 HAMLET.
504 My lord, I have news to tell you. When Roscius was an actor in Rome—
505 POLONIUS.
506 The actors are come hither, my lord.
507 HAMLET.
508 Buzz, buzz.
509 POLONIUS.
510 Upon my honour.
511 HAMLET.
512 Then came each actor on his ass—
513 POLONIUS.
514 The best actors in the world, either for tragedy, comedy, history,
515 pastoral, pastoral-comical, historical-pastoral, tragical-historical,
516 tragical-comical-historical-pastoral, scene individable, or poem
517 unlimited. Seneca cannot be too heavy, nor Plautus too light, for the
518 law of writ and the liberty. These are the only men.
519 HAMLET.
520 O Jephthah, judge of Israel, what a treasure hadst thou!
521 POLONIUS.
522 What treasure had he, my lord?
523 HAMLET.
524 Why—
525 ’One fair daughter, and no more,
526 The which he loved passing well.’
527 POLONIUS.
528 [_Aside._] Still on my daughter.
529 HAMLET.
530 Am I not i’ th’ right, old Jephthah?
531 POLONIUS.
532 If you call me Jephthah, my lord, I have a daughter that I love passing
533 well.
534 HAMLET.
535 Nay, that follows not.
536 POLONIUS.
537 What follows then, my lord?
538 HAMLET.
539 Why,
540 As by lot, God wot,
541 and then, you know,
542 It came to pass, as most like it was.
543 The first row of the pious chanson will show you more. For look where
544 my abridgement comes.
545 Enter four or five Players.
546 You are welcome, masters, welcome all. I am glad to see thee well.
547 Welcome, good friends. O, my old friend! Thy face is valanc’d since I
548 saw thee last. Com’st thou to beard me in Denmark? What, my young lady
549 and mistress! By’r lady, your ladyship is nearer to heaven than when I
550 saw you last, by the altitude of a chopine. Pray God your voice, like a
551 piece of uncurrent gold, be not cracked within the ring. Masters, you
552 are all welcome. We’ll e’en to’t like French falconers, fly at anything
553 we see. We’ll have a speech straight. Come, give us a taste of your
554 quality. Come, a passionate speech.
555 FIRST PLAYER.
556 What speech, my lord?
557 HAMLET.
558 I heard thee speak me a speech once, but it was never acted, or if it
559 was, not above once, for the play, I remember, pleased not the million,
560 ’twas caviare to the general. But it was—as I received it, and others,
561 whose judgements in such matters cried in the top of mine—an excellent
562 play, well digested in the scenes, set down with as much modesty as
563 cunning. I remember one said there were no sallets in the lines to make
564 the matter savoury, nor no matter in the phrase that might indite the
565 author of affectation, but called it an honest method, as wholesome as
566 sweet, and by very much more handsome than fine. One speech in it, I
567 chiefly loved. ’Twas Aeneas’ tale to Dido, and thereabout of it
568 especially where he speaks of Priam’s slaughter. If it live in your
569 memory, begin at this line, let me see, let me see:
570 _The rugged Pyrrhus, like th’ Hyrcanian beast,—_
571 It is not so: it begins with Pyrrhus—
572 _The rugged Pyrrhus, he whose sable arms,
573 Black as his purpose, did the night resemble
574 When he lay couched in the ominous horse,
575 Hath now this dread and black complexion smear’d
576 With heraldry more dismal. Head to foot
577 Now is he total gules, horridly trick’d
578 With blood of fathers, mothers, daughters, sons,
579 Bak’d and impasted with the parching streets,
580 That lend a tyrannous and a damned light
581 To their vile murders. Roasted in wrath and fire,
582 And thus o’ersized with coagulate gore,
583 With eyes like carbuncles, the hellish Pyrrhus
584 Old grandsire Priam seeks._
585 So, proceed you.
586 POLONIUS.
587 ’Fore God, my lord, well spoken, with good accent and good discretion.
588 FIRST PLAYER.
589 _Anon he finds him,
590 Striking too short at Greeks. His antique sword,
591 Rebellious to his arm, lies where it falls,
592 Repugnant to command. Unequal match’d,
593 Pyrrhus at Priam drives, in rage strikes wide;
594 But with the whiff and wind of his fell sword
595 Th’unnerved father falls. Then senseless Ilium,
596 Seeming to feel this blow, with flaming top
597 Stoops to his base, and with a hideous crash
598 Takes prisoner Pyrrhus’ ear. For lo, his sword,
599 Which was declining on the milky head
600 Of reverend Priam, seem’d i’ th’air to stick.
601 So, as a painted tyrant, Pyrrhus stood,
602 And like a neutral to his will and matter,
603 Did nothing.
604 But as we often see against some storm,
605 A silence in the heavens, the rack stand still,
606 The bold winds speechless, and the orb below
607 As hush as death, anon the dreadful thunder
608 Doth rend the region; so after Pyrrhus’ pause,
609 Aroused vengeance sets him new a-work,
610 And never did the Cyclops’ hammers fall
611 On Mars’s armour, forg’d for proof eterne,
612 With less remorse than Pyrrhus’ bleeding sword
613 Now falls on Priam.
614 Out, out, thou strumpet Fortune! All you gods,
615 In general synod, take away her power;
616 Break all the spokes and fellies from her wheel,
617 And bowl the round nave down the hill of heaven,
618 As low as to the fiends._
619 POLONIUS.
620 This is too long.
621 HAMLET.
622 It shall to the barber’s, with your beard.—Prithee say on.
623 He’s for a jig or a tale of bawdry, or he sleeps.
624 Say on; come to Hecuba.
625 FIRST PLAYER.
626 _But who, O who, had seen the mobled queen,—_
627 HAMLET.
628 ‘The mobled queen’?
629 POLONIUS.
630 That’s good! ‘Mobled queen’ is good.
631 FIRST PLAYER.
632 _Run barefoot up and down, threat’ning the flames
633 With bisson rheum. A clout upon that head
634 Where late the diadem stood, and for a robe,
635 About her lank and all o’erteemed loins,
636 A blanket, in th’alarm of fear caught up—
637 Who this had seen, with tongue in venom steep’d,
638 ’Gainst Fortune’s state would treason have pronounc’d.
639 But if the gods themselves did see her then,
640 When she saw Pyrrhus make malicious sport
641 In mincing with his sword her husband’s limbs,
642 The instant burst of clamour that she made,—
643 Unless things mortal move them not at all,—
644 Would have made milch the burning eyes of heaven,
645 And passion in the gods._
646 POLONIUS.
647 Look, where he has not turn’d his colour, and has tears in’s eyes. Pray
648 you, no more.
649 HAMLET.
650 ’Tis well. I’ll have thee speak out the rest of this soon.—Good my
651 lord, will you see the players well bestowed? Do you hear, let them be
652 well used; for they are the abstracts and brief chronicles of the time.
653 After your death you were better have a bad epitaph than their ill
654 report while you live.
655 POLONIUS.
656 My lord, I will use them according to their desert.
657 HAMLET.
658 God’s bodikin, man, much better. Use every man after his desert, and who
659 should ’scape whipping? Use them after your own honour and dignity. The
660 less they deserve, the more merit is in your bounty. Take them in.
661 POLONIUS.
662 Come, sirs.
663 HAMLET.
664 Follow him, friends. We’ll hear a play tomorrow.
665 [_Exeunt Polonius with all the Players but the First._]
666 Dost thou hear me, old friend? Can you play _The Murder of Gonzago_?
667 FIRST PLAYER.
668 Ay, my lord.
669 HAMLET.
670 We’ll ha’t tomorrow night. You could for a need study a speech of some
671 dozen or sixteen lines, which I would set down and insert in’t, could
672 you not?
673 FIRST PLAYER.
674 Ay, my lord.
675 HAMLET.
676 Very well. Follow that lord, and look you mock him not.
677 [_Exit First Player._]
678 [_To Rosencrantz and Guildenstern_] My good friends, I’ll leave you
679 till night. You are welcome to Elsinore.
680 ROSENCRANTZ.
681 Good my lord.
682 [_Exeunt Rosencrantz and Guildenstern._]
683 HAMLET.
684 Ay, so, God b’ wi’ ye. Now I am alone.
685 O what a rogue and peasant slave am I!
686 Is it not monstrous that this player here,
687 But in a fiction, in a dream of passion,
688 Could force his soul so to his own conceit
689 That from her working all his visage wan’d;
690 Tears in his eyes, distraction in’s aspect,
691 A broken voice, and his whole function suiting
692 With forms to his conceit? And all for nothing!
693 For Hecuba?
694 What’s Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba,
695 That he should weep for her? What would he do,
696 Had he the motive and the cue for passion
697 That I have? He would drown the stage with tears
698 And cleave the general ear with horrid speech;
699 Make mad the guilty, and appal the free,
700 Confound the ignorant, and amaze indeed,
701 The very faculties of eyes and ears. Yet I,
702 A dull and muddy-mettled rascal, peak
703 Like John-a-dreams, unpregnant of my cause,
704 And can say nothing. No, not for a king
705 Upon whose property and most dear life
706 A damn’d defeat was made. Am I a coward?
707 Who calls me villain, breaks my pate across?
708 Plucks off my beard and blows it in my face?
709 Tweaks me by the nose, gives me the lie i’ th’ throat
710 As deep as to the lungs? Who does me this?
711 Ha! ’Swounds, I should take it: for it cannot be
712 But I am pigeon-liver’d, and lack gall
713 To make oppression bitter, or ere this
714 I should have fatted all the region kites
715 With this slave’s offal. Bloody, bawdy villain!
716 Remorseless, treacherous, lecherous, kindless villain!
717 Oh vengeance!
718 Why, what an ass am I! This is most brave,
719 That I, the son of a dear father murder’d,
720 Prompted to my revenge by heaven and hell,
721 Must, like a whore, unpack my heart with words
722 And fall a-cursing like a very drab,
723 A scullion! Fie upon’t! Foh!
724 About, my brain! I have heard
725 That guilty creatures sitting at a play,
726 Have by the very cunning of the scene,
727 Been struck so to the soul that presently
728 They have proclaim’d their malefactions.
729 For murder, though it have no tongue, will speak
730 With most miraculous organ. I’ll have these players
731 Play something like the murder of my father
732 Before mine uncle. I’ll observe his looks;
733 I’ll tent him to the quick. If he but blench,
734 I know my course. The spirit that I have seen
735 May be the devil, and the devil hath power
736 T’assume a pleasing shape, yea, and perhaps
737 Out of my weakness and my melancholy,
738 As he is very potent with such spirits,
739 Abuses me to damn me. I’ll have grounds
740 More relative than this. The play’s the thing
741 Wherein I’ll catch the conscience of the King.
742 [_Exit._]