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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark
+by George MacDonald
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark
+       A Study with the Text of the Folio of 1623
+
+Author: George MacDonald
+
+Release Date: January 5, 2004 [EBook #10606]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A STUDY OF HAMLET ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Jonathan Ingram, David King, and the Online Distributed
+proofreading Team
+
+
+
+
+
+THE TRAGEDIE OF
+HAMLET,
+PRINCE OF DENMARKE
+
+A STUDY WITH THE TEXT
+OF
+THE FOLIO OF 1623
+
+BY
+GEORGE MACDONALD
+
+"What would you gracious figure?"
+
+
+
+TO
+
+MY HONOURED RELATIVE
+
+ALEXANDER STEWART MACCOLL
+
+A LITTLE _LESS_ THAN KIN, AND _MORE_ THAN KIND
+
+TO WHOM I OWE IN ESPECIAL THE TRUE UNDERSTANDING OF
+
+THE GREAT SOLILOQUY
+
+I DEDICATE
+
+WITH LOVE AND GRATITUDE
+
+THIS EFFORT TO GIVE HAMLET AND SHAKSPERE THEIR DUE
+
+GEORGE MAC DONALD
+
+BORDIGHERA
+
+_Christmas_, 1884
+
+
+               Summary:
+
+The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark:
+ a study of the text of the folio of 1623
+          By George MacDonald
+[Motto]: "What would you, gracious figure?"
+
+Dr. Greville MacDonald looks on his father's commentary as the "most
+important interpretation of the play ever written... It is his intuitive
+understanding ... rather than learned analysis--of which there is yet
+overwhelming evidence--that makes it so splendid."
+
+Reading Level: Mature youth and adults.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE
+
+
+By this edition of HAMLET I hope to help the student of Shakspere to
+understand the play--and first of all Hamlet himself, whose spiritual
+and moral nature are the real material of the tragedy, to which every
+other interest of the play is subservient. But while mainly attempting,
+from the words and behaviour Shakspere has given him, to explain the
+man, I have cast what light I could upon everything in the play,
+including the perplexities arising from extreme condensation of meaning,
+figure, and expression.
+
+As it is more than desirable that the student should know when he is
+reading the most approximate presentation accessible of what Shakspere
+uttered, and when that which modern editors have, with reason good or
+bad, often not without presumption, substituted for that which they
+received, I have given the text, letter for letter, point for point, of
+the First Folio, with the variations of the Second Quarto in the margin
+and at the foot of the page.
+
+Of HAMLET there are but two editions of authority, those called the
+Second Quarto and the First Folio; but there is another which requires
+remark.
+
+In the year 1603 came out the edition known as the First Quarto--clearly
+without the poet's permission, and doubtless as much to his displeasure:
+the following year he sent out an edition very different, and larger in
+the proportion of one hundred pages to sixty-four. Concerning the former
+my theory is--though it is not my business to enter into the question
+here--that it was printed from Shakspere's sketch for the play, written
+with matter crowding upon him too fast for expansion or development, and
+intended only for a continuous memorandum of things he would take up and
+work out afterwards. It seems almost at times as if he but marked
+certain bales of thought so as to find them again, and for the present
+threw them aside--knowing that by the marks he could recall the thoughts
+they stood for, but not intending thereby to convey them to any reader.
+I cannot, with evidence before me, incredible but through the eyes
+themselves, of the illimitable scope of printers' blundering, believe
+_all_ the confusion, unintelligibility, neglect of grammar,
+construction, continuity, sense, attributable to them. In parts it is
+more like a series of notes printed with the interlineations horribly
+jumbled; while in other parts it looks as if it had been taken down from
+the stage by an ear without a brain, and then yet more incorrectly
+printed; parts, nevertheless, in which it most differs from the
+authorized editions, are yet indubitably from the hand of Shakspere. I
+greatly doubt if any ready-writer would have dared publish some of its
+chaotic passages as taken down from the stage; nor do I believe the play
+was ever presented in anything like such an unfinished state. I rather
+think some fellow about the theatre, whether more rogue or fool we will
+pay him the thankful tribute not to enquire, chancing upon the crude
+embryonic mass in the poet's hand, traitorously pounced upon it, and
+betrayed it to the printers--therein serving the poet such an evil turn
+as if a sculptor's workman took a mould of the clay figure on which his
+master had been but a few days employed, and published casts of it as
+the sculptor's work.[1] To us not the less is the _corpus delicti_
+precious--and that unspeakably--for it enables us to see something of
+the creational development of the drama, besides serving occasionally to
+cast light upon portions of it, yielding hints of the original intention
+where the after work has less plainly presented it.
+
+[Footnote 1: Shakspere has in this matter fared even worse than Sir
+Thomas Browne, the first edition of whose _Religio Medici_, nowise
+intended for the public, was printed without his knowledge.]
+
+The Second Quarto bears on its title-page, compelled to a recognition of
+the former,--'Newly imprinted and enlarged to almost as much againe as
+it was, according to the true and perfect Coppie'; and it is in truth a
+harmonious world of which the former issue was but the chaos. It is the
+drama itself, the concluded work of the master's hand, though yet to be
+once more subjected to a little pruning, a little touching, a little
+rectifying. But the author would seem to have been as trusting over the
+work of the printers, as they were careless of his, and the result is
+sometimes pitiable. The blunders are appalling. Both in it and in the
+Folio the marginal note again and again suggests itself: 'Here the
+compositor was drunk, the press-reader asleep, the devil only aware.'
+But though the blunders elbow one another in tumultuous fashion, not
+therefore all words and phrases supposed to be such are blunders. The
+old superstition of plenary inspiration may, by its reverence for the
+very word, have saved many a meaning from the obliteration of a
+misunderstanding scribe: in all critical work it seems to me well to
+cling to the _word_ until one sinks not merely baffled, but exhausted.
+
+I come now to the relation between the Second Quarto and the Folio.
+
+My theory is--that Shakspere worked upon his own copy of the Second
+Quarto, cancelling and adding, and that, after his death, this copy
+came, along with original manuscripts, into the hands of his friends the
+editors of the Folio, who proceeded to print according to his
+alterations.
+
+These friends and editors in their preface profess thus: 'It had bene a
+thing, we confesse, worthie to haue bene wished, that the Author
+himselfe had liu'd to haue set forth, and ouerseen his owne writings;
+But since it hath bin ordain'd otherwise, and he by death departed from
+that right, we pray you do not envie his Friends, the office of their
+care, and paine, to haue collected & publish'd them, as where (before)
+you were abus'd with diuerse stolne, and surreptitious copies, maimed,
+and deformed by the frauds and stealthes of iniurious impostors, that
+expos'd them: euen those, are now offer'd to your view cur'd, and
+perfect of their limbes; and all the rest, absolute in their numbers, as
+he conceiued th[=e]. Who, as he was a happie imitator of Nature, was a
+most gentle expresser of it. His mind and hand went together: And what
+he thought, he vttered with that easinesse, that wee haue scarse
+receiued from him a blot in his papers. But it is not our prouince, who
+onely gather his works, and giue them you, to praise him. It is yours
+that reade him.'
+
+These are hardly the words of men who would take liberties, and
+liberties enormous, after ideas of their own, with the text of a friend
+thus honoured. But although they printed with intent altogether
+faithful, they did so certainly without any adequate jealousy of the
+printers--apparently without a suspicion of how they could blunder. Of
+blunders therefore in the Folio also there are many, some through mere
+following of blundered print, some in fresh corruption of the same, some
+through mistaking of the manuscript corrections, and some probably from
+the misprinting of mistakes, so that the corrections themselves are at
+times anything but correctly recorded. I assume also that the printers
+were not altogether above the mean passion, common to the day-labourers
+of Art, from Chaucer's Adam Scrivener down to the present carvers of
+marble, for modifying and improving the work of the master. The vain
+incapacity of a self-constituted critic will make him regard his poorest
+fancy as an emendation; seldom has he the insight of Touchstone to
+recognize, or his modesty to acknowledge, that although his own, it is
+none the less an ill-favoured thing.
+
+Not such, however, was the spirit of the editors; and all the changes of
+importance from the text of the Quarto I receive as Shakspere's own.
+With this belief there can be no presumption in saying that they seem to
+me not only to trim the parts immediately affected, but to render the
+play more harmonious and consistent. It is no presumption to take the
+Poet for superior to his work and capable of thinking he could better
+it--neither, so believing, to imagine one can see that he has been
+successful.
+
+A main argument for the acceptance of the Folio edition as the Poet's
+last presentment of his work, lies in the fact that there are passages
+in it which are not in the Quarto, and are very plainly from his hand.
+If we accept these, what right have we to regard the omission from the
+Folio of passages in the Quarto as not proceeding from the same hand?
+Had there been omissions only, we might well have doubted; but the
+insertions greatly tend to remove the doubt. I cannot even imagine the
+arguments which would prevail upon me to accept the latter and refuse
+the former. Omission itself shows for a master-hand: see the magnificent
+passage omitted, and rightly, by Milton from the opening of his _Comus_.
+
+'But when a man has published two forms of a thing, may we not judge
+between him and himself, and take the reading we like better?'
+Assuredly. Take either the Quarto or the Folio; both are Shakspere's.
+Take any reading from either, and defend it. But do not mix up the two,
+retaining what he omits along with what he inserts, and print them so.
+This is what the editors do--and the thing is not Shakspere's. With
+homage like this, no artist could be other than indignant. It is well to
+show every difference, even to one of spelling where it might indicate
+possibly a different word, but there ought to be no mingling of
+differences. If I prefer the reading of the Quarto to that of the Folio,
+as may sometimes well happen where blunders so abound, I say I
+_prefer_--I do not dare to substitute. My student shall owe nothing of
+his text to any but the editors of the Folio, John Heminge and Henrie
+Condell.
+
+I desire to take him with me. I intend a continuous, but ever-varying,
+while one-ended lesson. We shall follow the play step by step, avoiding
+almost nothing that suggests difficulty, and noting everything that
+seems to throw light on the character of a person of the drama. The
+pointing I consider a matter to be dealt with as any one pleases--for
+the sake of sense, of more sense, of better sense, as much as if the
+text were a Greek manuscript without any division of words. This
+position I need not argue with anyone who has given but a cursory glance
+to the original page, or knows anything of printers' pointing. I hold
+hard by the word, for that is, or may be, grain: the pointing as we have
+it is merest chaff, and more likely to be wrong than right. Here also,
+however, I change nothing in the text, only suggest in the notes. Nor do
+I remark on any of the pointing where all that is required is the
+attention of the student.
+
+Doubtless many will consider not a few of the notes unnecessary. But
+what may be unnecessary to one, may be welcome to another, and it is
+impossible to tell what a student may or may not know. At the same time
+those form a large class who imagine they know a thing when they do not
+understand it enough to see there is a difficulty in it: to such, an
+attempt at explanation must of course seem foolish.
+
+A _number_ in the margin refers to a passage of the play or in the
+notes, and is the number of the page where the passage is to be found.
+If the student finds, for instance, against a certain line upon page 8,
+the number 12, and turns to page 12, he will there find the number 8
+against a certain line: the two lines or passages are to be compared,
+and will be found in some way parallel, or mutually explanatory.
+
+Wherever I refer to the Quarto, I intend the 2nd Quarto--that is
+Shakspere's own authorized edition, published in his life-time. Where
+occasionally I refer to the surreptitious edition, the mere inchoation
+of the drama, I call it, as it is, the _1st Quarto_.
+
+Any word or phrase or stage-direction in the 2nd Quarto differing from
+that in the Folio, is placed on the margin in a line with the other:
+choice between them I generally leave to my student. Omissions are
+mainly given as footnotes. Each edition does something to correct the
+errors of the other.
+
+I beg my companion on this journey to let Hamlet reveal himself in the
+play, to observe him as he assumes individuality by the concretion of
+characteristics. I warn him that any popular notion concerning him which
+he may bring with him, will be only obstructive to a perception of the
+true idea of the grandest of all Shakspere's presentations.
+
+It will amuse this and that man to remark how often I speak of Hamlet as
+if he were a real man and not the invention of Shakspere--for indeed the
+Hamlet of the old story is no more that of Shakspere than a lump of coal
+is a diamond; but I imagine, if he tried the thing himself, he would
+find it hardly possible to avoid so speaking, and at the same time say
+what he had to say.
+
+I give hearty thanks to the press-reader, a gentleman whose name I do
+not know, not only for keen watchfulness over the printing-difficulties
+of the book, but for saving me from several blunders in derivation.
+
+BORDIGHERA: _December_, 1884.
+
+[Transcriber's Note: In the paper original, each left-facing page
+contained the text of the play, with sidenotes and footnote references,
+and the corresponding right-facing page contained the footnotes
+themselves and additional commentary. In this electronic text, the
+play-text pages are numbered (contrary to custom in electronic texts),
+to allow use of the cross-references provided in the sidenotes and
+footnotes. In the play text, sidenotes towards the left of the page are
+those marginal cross-references described earlier, and sidenotes toward
+the right of the page are the differences noted a few paragraphs later.]
+
+[Page 1]
+
+
+
+
+THE TRAGEDIE
+
+OF
+
+HAMLET
+
+PRINCE OF DENMARKE.
+
+[Page 2]
+
+
+
+
+_ACTUS PRIMUS._
+
+
+_Enter Barnardo and Francisco two Centinels_[1].
+
+_Barnardo._ Who's there?
+
+_Fran._[2] Nay answer me: Stand and vnfold yourselfe.
+
+_Bar._ Long liue the King.[3]
+
+_Fran._ _Barnardo?_
+
+_Bar._ He.
+
+_Fran._ You come most carefully vpon your houre.
+
+_Bar._ 'Tis now strook twelue, get thee to bed _Francisco_.
+
+_Fran._ For this releefe much thankes:  'Tis
+[Sidenote: 42] bitter cold,
+And I am sicke at heart.[4]
+
+_Barn._ Haue you had quiet Guard?[5]
+
+_Fran._ Not a Mouse stirring.
+
+_Barn._ Well, goodnight. If you do meet _Horatio_ and
+_Marcellus_, the Riuals[6] of my Watch, bid them make hast.
+
+_Enter Horatio and Marcellus._
+
+_Fran._ I thinke I heare them. Stand: who's there?
+                                     [Sidenote: Stand ho, who is there?]
+
+_Hor._ Friends to this ground.
+
+_Mar._ And Leige-men to the Dane.
+
+_Fran._ Giue you good night.
+
+_Mar._ O farwel honest Soldier, who hath           [Sidenote: souldiers]
+relieu'd you?
+
+[Footnote 1: --meeting. Almost dark.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --on the post, and with the right of challenge.]
+
+[Footnote 3: The watchword.]
+
+[Footnote 4: The key-note to the play--as in _Macbeth_: 'Fair is
+foul and foul is fair.' The whole nation is troubled by late events at
+court.]
+
+[Footnote 5: --thinking of the apparition.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _Companions_.]
+
+[Page 4]
+
+_Fra._ _Barnardo_ ha's my place: giue you good-night.   [Sidenote: hath]
+_Exit Fran._
+
+_Mar._ Holla _Barnardo_.
+
+_Bar._ Say, what is Horatio there?
+
+_Hor._ A peece of him.
+
+_Bar._ Welcome _Horatio_, welcome good _Marcellus_.
+
+_Mar._ What, ha's this thing appear'd againe to    [Sidenote: _Hor_.[1]]
+night.
+
+_Bar._ I haue seene nothing.
+
+_Mar._ Horatio saies, 'tis but our Fantasie,
+And will not let beleefe take hold of him
+Touching this dreaded sight, twice seene of vs,
+Therefore I haue intreated him along
+With vs, to watch the minutes of this Night,
+That if againe this Apparition come,
+[Sidenote: 6] He may approue our eyes, and speake to it.[2]
+
+_Hor._ Tush, tush, 'twill not appeare.
+
+_Bar._ Sit downe a-while,
+And let vs once againe assaile your eares,
+That are so fortified against our Story,
+What we two Nights haue seene.          [Sidenote: have two nights seen]
+
+_Hor._ Well, sit we downe,
+And let vs heare _Barnardo_ speake of this.
+
+_Barn._ Last night of all,
+When yond same Starre that's Westward from the Pole
+Had made his course t'illume that part of Heauen
+Where now it burnes, _Marcellus_ and my selfe,
+The Bell then beating one.[3]
+
+_Mar._ Peace, breake thee of: _Enter the Ghost_. [Sidenote: Enter Ghost]
+Looke where it comes againe.
+
+_Barn._ In the same figure, like the King that's dead.
+
+[Footnote 1: Better, I think; for the tone is scoffing, and Horatio is
+the incredulous one who has not seen it.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --being a scholar, and able to address it as an apparition
+ought to be addressed--Marcellus thinking, perhaps, with others, that a
+ghost required Latin.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _1st Q._ 'towling one.]
+
+[Page 6]
+
+[Sidenote: 4] _Mar._ Thou art a Scholler; speake to it _Horatio._
+
+_Barn._ Lookes it not like the King? Marke it _Horatio_.
+                                                 [Sidenote: Looks a not]
+_Hora._ Most like: It harrowes me with fear and wonder.
+                                                 [Sidenote: horrowes[1]]
+
+_Barn._ It would be spoke too.[2]
+
+_Mar._ Question it _Horatio._          [Sidenote: Speak to it _Horatio_]
+
+_Hor._ What art thou that vsurp'st this time of night,[3]
+Together with that Faire and Warlike forme[4]
+In which the Maiesty of buried Denmarke
+Did sometimes[5] march: By Heauen I charge thee speake.
+
+_Mar._ It is offended.[6]
+
+_Barn._ See, it stalkes away.
+
+_Hor._ Stay: speake; speake: I Charge thee, speake.
+               _Exit the Ghost._               [Sidenote: _Exit Ghost._]
+
+_Mar._ 'Tis gone, and will not answer.
+
+_Barn._ How now _Horatio_? You tremble and look pale:
+Is not this something more then Fantasie?
+What thinke you on't?
+
+_Hor._ Before my God, I might not this beleeue
+Without the sensible and true auouch
+Of mine owne eyes.
+
+_Mar._ Is it not like the King?
+
+_Hor._ As thou art to thy selfe,
+Such was the very Armour he had on,
+When th' Ambitious Norwey combatted: [Sidenote: when he the ambitious]
+So frown'd he once, when in an angry parle
+He smot the sledded Pollax on the Ice.[8]         [Sidenote: sleaded[7]]
+'Tis strange.
+
+[Sidenote: 274] _Mar._ Thus twice before, and iust at this dead houre,
+                                            [Sidenote: and jump at this]
+
+[Footnote 1: _1st Q_. 'horrors mee'.]
+
+[Footnote 2: A ghost could not speak, it was believed, until it was
+spoken to.]
+
+[Footnote 3: It was intruding upon the realm of the embodied.]
+
+[Footnote 4: None of them took it as certainly the late king: it was
+only clear to them that it was like him. Hence they say, 'usurp'st the
+forme.']
+
+[Footnote 5: _formerly_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: --at the word _usurp'st_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Also _1st Q_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: The usual interpretation is 'the sledged Poles'; but not to
+mention that in a parley such action would have been treacherous, there
+is another far more picturesque, and more befitting the _angry parle_,
+at the same time more characteristic and forcible: the king in his anger
+smote his loaded pole-axe on the ice. There is some uncertainty about
+the word _sledded_ or _sleaded_ (which latter suggests _lead_), but we
+have the word _sledge_ and _sledge-hammer_, the smith's heaviest, and
+the phrase, 'a sledging blow.' The quarrel on the occasion referred to
+rather seems with the Norwegians (See Schmidt's _Shakespeare-Lexicon:
+Sledded_.) than with the Poles; and there would be no doubt as to the
+latter interpretation being the right one, were it not that _the
+Polacke_, for the Pole, or nation of the Poles, does occur in the play.
+That is, however, no reason why the Dane should not have carried a
+pole-axe, or caught one from the hand of an attendant. In both our
+authorities, and in the _1st Q_. also, the word is _pollax_--as in
+Chaucer's _Knights Tale_: 'No maner schot, ne pollax, ne schort
+knyf,'--in the _Folio_ alone with a capital; whereas not once in the
+play is the similar word that stands for the Poles used in the plural.
+In the _2nd Quarto_ there is _Pollacke_ three times, _Pollack_ once,
+_Pole_ once; in the _1st Quarto_, _Polacke_ twice; in the _Folio_,
+_Poleak_ twice, _Polake_ once. The Poet seems to have avoided the plural
+form.]
+
+[Page 8]
+
+With Martiall stalke,[1] hath he gone by our Watch.
+
+_Hor_. In what particular thought to work, I know not:
+But in the grosse and scope of my Opinion,              [Sidenote: mine]
+This boades some strange erruption to our State.
+
+_Mar_. Good now sit downe, and tell me he that knowes
+[Sidenote: 16] Why this same strict and most obseruant Watch,[2]
+So nightly toyles the subiect of the Land,
+And why such dayly Cast of Brazon Cannon
+                                    [Sidenote: And with such dayly cost]
+And Forraigne Mart for Implements of warre:
+Why such impresse of Ship-wrights, whose sore Taske
+Do's not diuide the Sunday from the weeke,
+What might be toward, that this sweaty hast[3]
+Doth make the Night ioynt-Labourer with the day:
+Who is't that can informe me?
+
+_Hor._ That can I,
+At least the whisper goes so: Our last King,
+Whose Image euen but now appear'd to vs,
+Was (as you know) by _Fortinbras_ of Norway,
+(Thereto prick'd on by a most emulate Pride)[4]
+Dar'd to the Combate. In which, our Valiant _Hamlet_,
+(For so this side of our knowne world esteem'd him)[5]
+[Sidenote: 6] Did slay this _Fortinbras_: who by a Seal'd Compact,
+Well ratified by Law, and Heraldrie,                 [Sidenote: heraldy]
+Did forfeite (with his life) all those his Lands       [Sidenote: these]
+Which he stood seiz'd on,[6] to the Conqueror:    [Sidenote: seaz'd of,]
+Against the which, a Moity[7] competent
+Was gaged by our King: which had return'd        [Sidenote: had returne]
+To the Inheritance of _Fortinbras_,
+
+[Footnote 1: _1st Q_. 'Marshall stalke'.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Here is set up a frame of external relations, to inclose
+with fitting contrast, harmony, and suggestion, the coming show of
+things. 273]
+
+[Footnote 3: _1st Q_. 'sweaty march'.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Pride that leads to emulate: the ambition to excel--not
+oneself, but another.]
+
+[Footnote 5: The whole western hemisphere.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _stood possessed of_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Used by Shakspere for _a part_.]
+
+[Page 10]
+
+Had he bin Vanquisher, as by the same Cou'nant
+                                             [Sidenote: the same comart]
+And carriage of the Article designe,[1]           [Sidenote: desseigne,]
+His fell to _Hamlet_. Now sir, young _Fortinbras_,
+Of vnimproued[2] Mettle, hot and full,
+Hath in the skirts of Norway, heere and there,
+Shark'd[3] vp a List of Landlesse Resolutes,     [Sidenote: of lawlesse]
+For Foode and Diet, to some Enterprize
+That hath a stomacke in't[4]: which is no other
+(And it doth well appeare vnto our State)              [Sidenote: As it]
+But to recouer of vs by strong hand
+And termes Compulsatiue, those foresaid Lands  [Sidenote: compulsatory,]
+So by his Father lost: and this (I take it)
+Is the maine Motiue of our Preparations,
+The Sourse of this our Watch, and the cheefe head
+Of this post-hast, and Romage[5] in the Land.
+
+       [A]_Enter Ghost againe_.
+
+But soft, behold: Loe, where it comes againe:
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+_Bar._ I thinke it be no other, but enso;
+Well may it sort[6] that this portentous figure
+Comes armed through our watch so like the King
+That was and is the question of these warres.
+
+_Hora._ A moth it is to trouble the mindes eye:
+In the most high and palmy state of Rome,
+A little ere the mightiest _Iulius_ fell
+The graues stood tennatlesse, and the sheeted dead
+Did squeake and gibber in the Roman streets[7]
+As starres with traines of fier, and dewes of blood
+Disasters in the sunne; and the moist starre,
+Vpon whose influence _Neptunes_ Empier stands
+Was sicke almost to doomesday with eclipse.
+And euen the like precurse of feare euents
+As harbindgers preceading still the fates
+And prologue to the _Omen_ comming on
+Haue heauen and earth together demonstrated
+Vnto our Climatures and countrymen.[8]
+
+               _Enter Ghost_.]
+
+[Footnote 1: French désigné.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _not proved_ or _tried. Improvement_, as we use the word,
+is the result of proof or trial: _upon-proof-ment_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Is _shark'd_ related to the German _scharren_? _Zusammen
+scharren--to scrape together._ The Anglo-Saxon _searwian_ is _to
+prepare, entrap, take_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Some enterprise of acquisition; one for the sake of getting
+something.]
+
+[Footnote 5: In Scotch, _remish_--the noise of confused and varied
+movements; a _row_; a _rampage_.--Associated with French _remuage_?]
+
+[Footnote 6: _suit_: so used in Scotland still, I think.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _Julius Caesar_, act i. sc. 3, and act ii. sc. 2.]
+
+[Footnote 8: The only suggestion I dare make for the rectifying of the
+confusion of this speech is, that, if the eleventh line were inserted
+between the fifth and sixth, there would be sense, and very nearly
+grammar.
+
+                              and the sheeted dead
+    Did squeake and gibber in the Roman streets,
+    As harbindgers preceading still the fates;
+    As starres with traines of fier, and dewes of blood
+(Here understand _precede_)
+    Disasters in the sunne;
+
+The tenth will close with the twelfth line well enough.
+
+But no one, any more than myself, will be _satisfied_ with the
+suggestion. The probability is, of course, that a line has dropped out
+between the fifth and sixth. Anything like this would restore the
+connection:
+
+_The labouring heavens themselves teemed dire portent_
+As starres &c.]
+
+[Page 12]
+
+Ile crosse it, though it blast me.[1] Stay Illusion:[2]
+                                  [Sidenote: _It[4] spreads his armes_.]
+If thou hast any sound, or vse of Voyce,[3]
+Speake to me. If there be any good thing to be done,
+That may to thee do ease, and grace to me; speak to me.
+If thou art priuy to thy Countries Fate
+(Which happily foreknowing may auoyd) Oh speake.
+Or, if thou hast vp-hoorded in thy life
+Extorted Treasure in the wombe of Earth,
+(For which, they say, you Spirits oft walke in death)   [Sidenote: your]
+                                          [Sidenote: _The cocke crowes_]
+Speake of it. Stay, and speake. Stop it _Marcellus_.
+
+_Mar_. Shall I strike at it with my Partizan? [Sidenote: strike it with]
+
+_Hor_. Do, if it will not stand.
+
+_Barn_. 'Tis heere.
+
+_Hor_. 'Tis heere.
+
+_Mar_. 'Tis gone.         _Exit Ghost_[5]
+We do it wrong, being so Maiesticall[6]
+To offer it the shew of Violence,
+For it is as the Ayre, invulnerable,
+And our vaine blowes, malicious Mockery.
+
+_Barn_. It was about to speake, when the Cocke crew.
+
+_Hor_. And then it started, like a guilty thing
+Vpon a fearfull Summons. I haue heard,
+The Cocke that is the Trumpet to the day,      [Sidenote: to the morne,]
+Doth with his lofty and shrill-sounding Throate[7]
+Awake the God of Day: and at his warning,
+Whether in Sea, or Fire, in Earth, or Ayre,
+Th'extrauagant,[8] and erring[9] Spirit, hyes
+To his Confine. And of the truth heerein,
+This present Obiect made probation.[10]
+
+_Mar_. It faded on the crowing of the Cocke.[11]
+
+[Footnote 1: There are various tales of the blasting power of evil
+ghosts.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Plain doubt, and strong.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'sound of voice, or use of voice': physical or mental
+faculty of speech.]
+
+[Footnote 4: I judge this _It_ a mistake for _H._, standing for
+_Horatio_: he would stop it.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'As we cannot hurt it, our blows are a mockery; and it is
+wrong to mock anything so majestic': _For_ belongs to _shew_; 'We do it
+wrong, being so majestical, to offer it what is but a _show_ of
+violence, for it is, &c.']
+
+[Footnote 7: _1st Q._ 'his earely and shrill crowing throate.']
+
+[Footnote 8: straying beyond bounds.]
+
+[Footnote 9: wandering.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'gave proof.']
+
+[Footnote 11: This line said thoughtfully--as the text of the
+observation following it. From the _eerie_ discomfort of their position,
+Marcellus takes refuge in the thought of the Saviour's birth into the
+haunted world, bringing sweet law, restraint, and health.]
+
+[Page 14]
+
+Some sayes, that euer 'gainst that Season comes          [Sidenote: say]
+Wherein our Sauiours Birth is celebrated,
+The Bird of Dawning singeth all night long:        [Sidenote: This bird]
+And then (they say) no Spirit can walke abroad,
+                                          [Sidenote: spirit dare sturre]
+The nights are wholsome, then no Planets strike,
+No Faiery talkes, nor Witch hath power to Charme:
+                                             [Sidenote: fairy takes,[1]]
+So hallow'd, and so gracious is the time.      [Sidenote: is that time.]
+
+_Hor._ So haue I heard, and do in part beleeue it.
+But looke, the Morne in Russet mantle clad,
+Walkes o're the dew of yon high Easterne Hill,   [Sidenote: Eastward[2]]
+Breake we our Watch vp, and by my aduice              [Sidenote: advise]
+Let vs impart what we haue scene to night
+Vnto yong _Hamlet_. For vpon my life,
+This Spirit dumbe to vs, will speake to him:
+Do you consent we shall acquaint him with it,
+As needfull in our Loues, fitting our Duty?
+
+[Sidenote: 30] _Mar._ Let do't I pray, and I this morning know
+Where we shall finde him most conueniently.      [Sidenote: convenient.]
+                                       _Exeunt._
+
+
+SCENA SECUNDA[3]
+
+
+_Enter Claudius King of Denmarke. Gertrude the
+Queene, Hamlet, Polonius, Laertes, and his Sister
+Ophelia, Lords Attendant._[4]
+                  [Sidenote: _Florish. Enter Claudius, King of Denmarke,
+                   Gertrad the Queene, Counsaile: as Polonius, and his
+                   sonne Laertes, Hamelt Cum Abijs._]
+
+_King._ Though yet of _Hamlet_ our deere Brothers death
+                                                    [Sidenote: _Claud._]
+The memory be greene: and that it vs befitted
+To beare our hearts in greefe, and our whole Kingdome
+To be contracted in one brow of woe:
+Yet so farre hath Discretion fought with Nature,
+That we with wisest sorrow thinke on him,
+
+[Footnote 1: Does it mean--_carries off any child, leaving a
+changeling_? or does it mean--_affect with evil_, as a disease might
+infect or _take_?]
+
+[Footnote 2: _1st Q_. 'hie mountaine top,']
+
+[Footnote 3: _In neither Q._]
+
+[Footnote 4: The first court after the marriage.]
+
+[Page 16]
+
+Together with remembrance of our selues.
+Therefore our sometimes Sister, now our Queen,
+Th'Imperiall Ioyntresse of this warlike State,       [Sidenote: to this]
+Haue we, as 'twere, with a defeated ioy,
+With one Auspicious, and one Dropping eye,
+                                         [Sidenote: an auspitious and a]
+With mirth in Funerall, and with Dirge in Marriage,
+In equall Scale weighing Delight and Dole[1]
+Taken to Wife; nor haue we heerein barr'd[2]
+Your better Wisedomes, which haue freely gone
+With this affaire along, for all our Thankes.
+[Sidenote: 8] Now followes, that you know young _Fortinbras_,[3]
+Holding a weake supposall of our worth;
+Or thinking by our late deere Brothers death,
+Our State to be disioynt, and out of Frame,
+Colleagued with the dreame of his Aduantage;[4]  [Sidenote: this dreame]
+He hath not fayl'd to pester vs with Message,
+Importing the surrender of those Lands
+Lost by his Father: with all Bonds of Law              [Sidenote: bands]
+To our most valiant Brother. So much for him.
+
+_Enter Voltemand and Cornelius._[5]
+
+Now for our selfe, and for this time of meeting
+Thus much the businesse is. We haue heere writ
+To Norway, Vncle of young _Fortinbras_,
+Who Impotent and Bedrid, scarsely heares
+Of this his Nephewes purpose, to suppresse
+His further gate[6] heerein. In that the Leuies,
+The Lists, and full proportions are all made
+Out of his subiect: and we heere dispatch
+You good _Cornelius_, and you _Voltemand_,
+For bearing of this greeting to old Norway,          [Sidenote: bearers]
+Giuing to you no further personall power
+To businesse with the King, more then the scope
+Of these dilated Articles allow:[7]               [Sidenote: delated[8]]
+Farewell and let your hast commend your duty.[9]
+
+[Footnote 1: weighing out an equal quantity of each.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Like _crossed_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'Now follows--that (_which_) you know--young
+Fortinbras:--']
+
+[Footnote 4: _Colleagued_ agrees with _supposall_. The preceding two
+lines may be regarded as somewhat parenthetical. _Dream of
+advantage_--hope of gain.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 6: _going; advance._ Note in Norway also, as well as in
+Denmark, the succession of the brother.]
+
+[Footnote 7: (_giving them papers_).]
+
+[Footnote 8: Which of these is right, I cannot tell. _Dilated_ means
+_expanded_, and would refer to _the scope; _delated_ means
+_committed_--to them, to limit them.]
+
+[Footnote 9: idea of duty.]
+
+[Page 18]
+
+_Volt._ In that, and all things, will we shew our duty.
+
+_King._ We doubt it nothing, heartily farewell.
+
+[Sidenote: 74]           [1]_Exit Voltemand and Cornelius._
+
+And now _Laertes_, what's the newes with you?
+You told vs of some suite. What is't _Laertes_?
+You cannot speake of Reason to the Dane,
+And loose your voyce. What would'st thou beg _Laertes_,
+That shall not be my Offer, not thy Asking?[2]
+The Head is not more Natiue to the Heart,
+The Hand more Instrumentall to the Mouth,
+Then is the Throne of Denmarke to thy Father.[3]
+What would'st thou haue _Laertes_?
+
+_Laer._ Dread my Lord,                              [Sidenote: My dread]
+Your leaue and fauour to returne to France,
+From whence, though willingly I came to Denmarke
+To shew my duty in your Coronation,
+Yet now I must confesse, that duty done,
+[Sidenote: 22] My thoughts and wishes bend againe towards toward
+France,[4]
+And bow them to your gracious leaue and pardon.
+
+_King._ Haue you your Fathers leaue?
+What sayes _Pollonius_?
+
+[A] _Pol._ He hath my Lord:
+I do beseech you giue him leaue to go.
+
+_King._ Take thy faire houre _Laertes_, time be thine,
+And thy best graces spend it at thy will:
+But now my Cosin _Hamlet_, and my Sonne?
+
+[Footnote A: _In the Quarto_:--
+
+_Polo._ Hath[5] my Lord wroung from me my slowe leaue
+By laboursome petition, and at last
+Vpon his will I seald my hard consent,[6]
+I doe beseech you giue him leaue to goe.]
+
+[Footnote 1: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'Before they call, I will answer; and while they are yet
+speaking, I will hear.'--_Isaiah_, lxv. 24.]
+
+[Footnote 3: The villain king courts his courtiers.]
+
+[Footnote 4: He had been educated there. Compare 23. But it would seem
+rather to the court than the university he desired to return. See his
+father's instructions, 38.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _H'ath_--a contraction for _He hath_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: A play upon the act of sealing a will with wax.]
+
+[Page 20]
+
+_Ham._ A little more then kin, and lesse then kinde.[1]
+
+_King._ How is it that the Clouds still hang on you?
+
+_Ham._ Not so my Lord, I am too much i'th'Sun.[2]
+                                [Sidenote: so much my ... in the sonne.]
+
+_Queen._ Good Hamlet cast thy nightly colour off,[4]
+                                                  [Sidenote: nighted[3]]
+And let thine eye looke like a Friend on Denmarke.
+Do not for euer with thy veyled[5] lids               [Sidenote: vailed]
+Seeke for thy Noble Father in the dust;
+Thou know'st 'tis common, all that liues must dye,
+Passing through Nature, to Eternity.
+
+_Ham._ I Madam, it is common.[6]
+
+_Queen._ If it be;
+Why seemes it so particular with thee.
+
+_Ham._ Seemes Madam? Nay, it is: I know not Seemes:[7]
+'Tis not alone my Inky Cloake (good Mother)
+                                     [Sidenote: cloake coold mother [8]]
+Nor Customary suites of solemne Blacke,
+Nor windy suspiration of forc'd breath,
+No, nor the fruitfull Riuer in the Eye,
+Nor the deiected hauiour of the Visage,
+Together with all Formes, Moods, shewes of Griefe,
+                                           [Sidenote: moodes, chapes of]
+That can denote me truly. These indeed Seeme,[9]      [Sidenote: deuote]
+For they are actions that a man might[10] play:
+But I haue that Within, which passeth show;           [Sidenote: passes]
+These, but the Trappings, and the Suites of woe.
+
+_King._ 'Tis sweet and commendable
+In your Nature _Hamlet_,
+To giue these mourning duties to your Father:[11]
+But you must know, your Father lost a Father,
+That Father lost, lost his, and the Suruiuer bound
+In filiall Obligation, for some terme
+To do obsequious[12] Sorrow. But to perseuer
+In obstinate Condolement, is a course
+
+[Footnote 1: An _aside_. Hamlet's first utterance is of dislike to his
+uncle. He is more than _kin_ through his unwelcome marriage--less than
+_kind_ by the difference in their natures. To be _kind_ is to behave as
+one _kinned_ or related. But the word here is the noun, and means
+_nature_, or sort by birth.]
+
+[Footnote 2: A word-play may be here intended between _sun_ and _son_:
+_a little more than kin--too much i' th' Son_. So George Herbert:
+
+    For when he sees my ways, I die;
+    But I have got his _Son_, and he hath none;
+
+and Dr. Donne:
+
+                at my death thy Son
+    Shall shine, as he shines now and heretofore.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'Wintred garments'--_As You Like It_, iii. 2.]
+
+[Footnote 4: He is the only one who has not for the wedding put off his
+mourning.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _lowered_, or cast down: _Fr. avaler_, to lower.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'Plainly you treat it as a common matter--a thing of no
+significance!' _I_ is constantly used for _ay_, _yes_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: He pounces on the word _seems_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Not unfrequently the type would appear to have been set up
+from dictation.]
+
+[Footnote 9: They are things of the outside, and must _seem_, for they
+are capable of being imitated; they are the natural _shows_ of grief.
+But he has that in him which cannot _show_ or _seem_, because nothing
+can represent it. These are 'the Trappings and the Suites of _woe_;'
+they fitly represent woe, but they cannot shadow forth that which is
+within him--a something different from woe, far beyond it and worse,
+passing all reach of embodiment and manifestation. What this something
+is, comes out the moment he is left by himself.]
+
+[Footnote 10: The emphasis is on _might_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: Both his uncle and his mother decline to understand him.
+They will have it he mourns the death of his father, though they must at
+least suspect another cause for his grief. Note the intellectual mastery
+of the hypocrite--which accounts for his success.]
+
+[Footnote 12: belonging to _obsequies_.]
+
+[Page 22]
+
+Of impious stubbornnesse. Tis vnmanly greefe,
+It shewes a will most incorrect to Heauen,
+A Heart vnfortified, a Minde impatient,             [Sidenote: or minde]
+An Vnderstanding simple, and vnschool'd:
+For, what we know must be, and is as common
+As any the most vulgar thing to sence,
+Why should we in our peeuish Opposition
+Take it to heart? Fye, 'tis a fault to Heauen,
+A fault against the Dead, a fault to Nature,
+To Reason most absurd, whose common Theame
+Is death of Fathers, and who still hath cried,
+From the first Coarse,[1] till he that dyed to day,   [Sidenote: course]
+This must be so. We pray you throw to earth
+This vnpreuayling woe, and thinke of vs
+As of a Father; For let the world take note,
+You are the most immediate to our Throne,[2]
+And with no lesse Nobility of Loue,
+Then that which deerest Father beares his Sonne,
+Do I impart towards you. For your intent              [Sidenote: toward]
+[Sidenote: 18] In going backe to Schoole in Wittenberg,[3]
+It is most retrograde to our desire:               [Sidenote: retrogard]
+And we beseech you, bend you to remaine
+Heere in the cheere and comfort of our eye,
+Our cheefest Courtier Cosin, and our Sonne.
+
+_Qu._ Let not thy Mother lose her Prayers _Hamlet_:    [Sidenote: loose]
+I prythee stay with vs, go not to Wittenberg.      [Sidenote: pray thee]
+
+_Ham._ I shall in all my best
+Obey you Madam.[4]
+
+_King._ Why 'tis a louing, and a faire Reply,
+Be as our selfe in Denmarke. Madam come,
+This gentle and vnforc'd accord of _Hamlet_[5]
+Sits smiling to my heart; in grace whereof,
+No iocond health that Denmarke drinkes to day,
+[Sidenote: 44] But the great Cannon to the Clowds shall tell,
+
+[Footnote 1: _Corpse_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --seeking to propitiate him with the hope that his
+succession had been but postponed by his uncle's election.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Note that Hamlet was educated in Germany--at Wittenberg,
+the university where in 1508 Luther was appointed professor of
+Philosophy. Compare 19. There was love of study as well as disgust with
+home in his desire to return to _Schoole_: this from what we know of him
+afterwards.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Emphasis on _obey_. A light on the character of Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 5: He takes it, or pretends to take it, for far more than it
+was. He desires friendly relations with Hamlet.]
+
+[Page 24]
+
+And the Kings Rouce,[1] the Heauens shall bruite againe,
+Respeaking earthly Thunder. Come away.
+     _Exeunt_              [Sidenote: _Florish. Exeunt all but Hamlet._]
+
+_Manet Hamlet._
+
+[2]_Ham._ Oh that this too too solid Flesh, would melt,
+                                            [Sidenote: sallied flesh[3]]
+Thaw, and resolue it selfe into a Dew:
+[Sidenote: 125,247,260] Or that the Euerlasting had not fixt
+[Sidenote: 121 _bis_] His Cannon 'gainst Selfe-slaughter. O God, O God!
+                                [Sidenote: seale slaughter, o God, God,]
+How weary, stale, flat, and vnprofitable                [Sidenote: wary]
+Seemes to me all the vses of this world?               [Sidenote: seeme]
+Fie on't? Oh fie, fie, 'tis an vnweeded Garden       [Sidenote: ah fie,]
+That growes to Seed: Things rank, and grosse in Nature
+Possesse it meerely. That it should come to this:
+                            [Sidenote: meerely that it should come thus]
+But two months dead[4]: Nay, not so much; not two,
+So excellent a King, that was to this
+_Hiperion_ to a Satyre: so louing to my Mother,
+That he might not beteene the windes of heauen    [Sidenote: beteeme[5]]
+Visit her face too roughly. Heauen and Earth
+Must I remember: why she would hang on him,           [Sidenote: should]
+As if encrease of Appetite had growne
+By what it fed on; and yet within a month?
+Let me not thinke on't: Frailty, thy name is woman.[6]
+A little Month, or ere those shooes were old,
+With which she followed my poore Fathers body
+Like _Niobe_, all teares. Why she, euen she.[7]
+(O Heauen! A beast that wants discourse[8] of Reason   [Sidenote: O God]
+Would haue mourn'd longer) married with mine Vnkle,       [Sidenote: my]
+
+[Footnote 1: German _Rausch_, _drunkenness_. 44, 68]
+
+[Footnote 2: A soliloquy is as the drawing called a section of a thing:
+it shows the inside of the man. Soliloquy is only rare, not unnatural,
+and in art serves to reveal more of nature. In the drama it is the
+lifting of a veil through which dialogue passes. The scene is for the
+moment shifted into the lonely spiritual world, and here we begin to
+know Hamlet. Such is his wretchedness, both in mind and circumstance,
+that he could well wish to vanish from the world. The suggestion of
+suicide, however, he dismisses at once--with a momentary regret, it is
+true--but he dismisses it--as against the will of God to whom he appeals
+in his misery. The cause of his misery is now made plain to us--his
+trouble that passes show, deprives life of its interest, and renders the
+world a disgust to him. There is no lamentation over his father's death,
+so dwelt upon by the king; for loving grief does not crush. Far less
+could his uncle's sharp practice, in scheming for his own election
+during Hamlet's absence, have wrought in a philosopher like him such an
+effect. The one makes him sorrowful, the other might well annoy him, but
+neither could render him unhappy: his misery lies at his mother's door;
+it is her conduct that has put out the light of her son's life. She who
+had been to him the type of all excellence, she whom his father had
+idolized, has within a month of his death married his uncle, and is
+living in habitual incest--for as such, a marriage of the kind was then
+unanimously regarded. To Hamlet's condition and behaviour, his mother,
+her past and her present, is the only and sufficing key. His very idea
+of unity had been rent in twain.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _1st Q_. 'too much grieu'd and sallied flesh.' _Sallied_,
+sullied: compare _sallets_, 67, 103. I have a strong suspicion that
+_sallied_ and not _solid_ is the true word. It comes nearer the depth of
+Hamlet's mood.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Two months at the present moment.]
+
+[Footnote 5: This is the word all the editors take: which is right, I do
+not know; I doubt if either is. The word in _A Midsummer Night's Dream_,
+act i. sc. 1--
+
+    Belike for want of rain; which I could well
+    Beteem them from the tempest of mine eyes--
+
+I cannot believe the same word. The latter means _produce for_, as from
+the place of origin. The word, in the sense necessary to this passage,
+is not, so far as I know, to be found anywhere else. I have no
+suggestion to make.]
+
+[Footnote 6: From his mother he generalizes to _woman_. After having
+believed in such a mother, it may well be hard for a man to believe in
+any woman.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _Q._ omits 'euen she.']
+
+[Footnote 8: the going abroad among things.]
+
+[Page 26]
+
+My Fathers Brother: but no more like my Father,
+Then I to _Hercules_. Within a Moneth?
+Ere yet the salt of most vnrighteous Teares
+Had left the flushing of her gauled eyes,             [Sidenote: in her]
+She married. O most wicked speed, to post[1]
+With such dexterity to Incestuous sheets:
+It is not, nor it cannot come to good,
+But breake my heart, for I must hold my tongue.[2]
+
+_Enter Horatio, Barnard, and Marcellus._
+                                  [Sidenote: _Marcellus, and Bernardo._]
+
+_Hor._ Haile to your Lordship.[3]
+
+_Ham._ I am glad to see you well:
+_Horatio_, or I do forget my selfe.
+
+_Hor._ The same my Lord,
+And your poore Seruant euer.
+
+[Sidenote: 134] _Ham._ [4]Sir my good friend,
+Ile change that name with you:[5]
+And what make you from Wittenberg _Horatio_?[6]
+_Marcellus._[7]
+
+_Mar._ My good Lord.
+
+_Ham._ I am very glad to see you: good euen Sir.[8]
+But what in faith make you from _Wittemberge_?
+
+_Hor._ A truant disposition, good my Lord.[9]
+
+_Ham._ I would not haue your Enemy say so;[10]     [Sidenote: not heare]
+Nor shall you doe mine eare that violence,[11]       [Sidenote: my eare]
+[Sidenote: 134] To make it truster of your owne report
+Against your selfe. I know you are no Truant:
+But what is your affaire in _Elsenour_?
+Wee'l teach you to drinke deepe, ere you depart.[12]
+                                       [Sidenote: you for to drinke ere]
+
+_Hor._ My Lord, I came to see your Fathers Funerall.
+
+_Ham._ I pray thee doe not mock me (fellow Student) [Sidenote: pre thee]
+I thinke it was to see my Mothers Wedding.         [Sidenote: was to my]
+
+[Footnote 1: I suggest the pointing:
+
+    speed! To post ... sheets!]
+
+[Footnote 2: Fit moment for the entrance of his father's messengers.]
+
+[Footnote 3: They do not seem to have been intimate before, though we
+know from Hamlet's speech (134) that he had had the greatest respect for
+Horatio. The small degree of doubt in Hamlet's recognition of his friend
+is due to the darkness, and the unexpectedness of his appearance.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _1st Q._ 'O my good friend, I change, &c.' This would leave
+it doubtful whether he wished to exchange servant or friend; but 'Sir,
+my _good friend_,' correcting Horatio, makes his intent plain.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Emphasis on _that_: 'I will exchange the name of _friend_
+with you.']
+
+[Footnote 6: 'What are you doing from--out of, _away
+from_--Wittenberg?']
+
+[Footnote 7: In recognition: the word belongs to Hamlet's speech.]
+
+[Footnote 8: _Point thus_: 'you.--Good even, sir.'--_to Barnardo, whom
+he does not know._]
+
+[Footnote 9: An ungrammatical reply. He does not wish to give the real,
+painful answer, and so replies confusedly, as if he had been asked,
+'What makes you?' instead of, 'What do you make?']
+
+[Footnote 10: '--I should know how to answer him.']
+
+[Footnote 11: Emphasis on _you_.]
+
+[Footnote 12: Said with contempt for his surroundings.]
+
+[Page 28]
+
+_Hor._ Indeed my Lord, it followed hard vpon.
+
+_Ham._ Thrift, thrift _Horatio_: the Funerall Bakt-meats
+Did coldly furnish forth the Marriage Tables;
+Would I had met my dearest foe in heauen,[1]
+Ere I had euer seerie that day _Horatio_.[2]   [Sidenote: Or ever I had]
+My father, me thinkes I see my father.
+
+_Hor._ Oh where my Lord?                            [Sidenote: Where my]
+
+_Ham._ In my minds eye (_Horatio_)[3]
+
+_Hor._ I saw him once; he was a goodly King.     [Sidenote: once, a was]
+
+_Ham._ He was a man, take him for all in all:    [Sidenote: A was a man]
+I shall not look vpon his like againe.
+
+_Hor._ My Lord, I thinke I saw him yesternight.
+
+_Ham._ Saw? Who?[4]
+
+_Hor._ My Lord, the King your Father.
+
+_Ham._ The King my Father?[5]
+
+_Hor._ Season[6] your admiration for a while
+With an attent eare;[7] till I may deliuer
+Vpon the witnesse of these Gentlemen,
+This maruell to you.
+
+_Ham._ For Heauens loue let me heare.             [Sidenote: God's love]
+
+_Hor._ Two nights together, had these Gentlemen
+(_Marcellus_ and _Barnardo_) on their Watch
+In the dead wast and middle of the night[8]
+Beene thus encountred. A figure like your Father,[9]
+Arm'd at all points exactly, _Cap a Pe_,[10]  [Sidenote: Armed at poynt]
+Appeares before them, and with sollemne march
+Goes slow and stately: By them thrice he walkt,
+                                     [Sidenote: stately by them; thrice]
+By their opprest and feare-surprized eyes,
+Within his Truncheons length; whilst they bestil'd
+                                          [Sidenote: they distill'd[11]]
+Almost to Ielly with the Act of feare,[12]
+Stand dumbe and speake not to him. This to me
+In dreadfull[13] secrecie impart they did,
+And I with them the third Night kept the Watch,
+Whereas[14] they had deliuer'd both in time,
+
+[Footnote 1: _Dear_ is not unfrequently used as an intensive; but 'my
+dearest foe' is not 'the man who hates me most,' but 'the man whom most
+I regard as my foe.']
+
+[Footnote 2: Note Hamlet's trouble: the marriage, not the death, nor the
+supplantation.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --with a little surprise at Horatio's question.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Said as if he must have misheard. Astonishment comes only
+with the next speech.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _1st Q_. 'Ha, ha, the King my father ke you.']
+
+[Footnote 6: Qualify.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _1st Q_. 'an attentiue eare,'.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Possibly, _dead vast_, as in _1st Q_.; but _waste_ as good,
+leaving also room to suppose a play in the word.]
+
+[Footnote 9: Note the careful uncertainty.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _1st Q. 'Capapea_.']
+
+[Footnote 11: Either word would do: the _distilling_ off of the animal
+spirits would leave the man a jelly; the cold of fear would _bestil_
+them and him to a jelly. _1st Q. distilled_. But I judge _bestil'd_ the
+better, as the truer to the operation of fear. Compare _The Winter's
+Tale_, act v. sc. 3:--
+
+    There's magic in thy majesty, which has
+
+    From thy admiring daughter took the spirits,
+    Standing like stone with thee.]
+
+[Footnote 12: Act: present influence.]
+
+[Footnote 13: a secrecy more than solemn.]
+
+[Footnote 14: 'Where, as'.]
+
+[Page 30]
+
+Forme of the thing; each word made true and good,
+The Apparition comes. I knew your Father:
+These hands are not more like.
+
+_Ham_. But where was this?
+
+_Mar_. My Lord, vpon the platforme where we watcht.    [Sidenote: watch]
+
+_Ham_. Did you not speake to it?
+
+_Her_. My Lord, I did;
+But answere made it none: yet once me thought
+It lifted vp it head, and did addresse
+It selfe to motion, like as it would speake:
+But euen then, the Morning Cocke crew lowd;
+And at the sound it shrunke in hast away,
+And vanisht from our sight.
+
+_Ham_. Tis very strange.
+
+_Hor_. As I doe liue my honourd Lord 'tis true;
+[Sidenote: 14] And we did thinke it writ downe in our duty
+To let you know of it.
+
+[Sidenote: 32,52] _Ham_. Indeed, indeed Sirs; but this troubles me.
+                                            [Sidenote: Indeede Sirs but]
+Hold you the watch to Night?
+
+_Both_. We doe my Lord.                               [Sidenote: _All_.]
+
+_Ham_. Arm'd, say you?
+
+_Both_. Arm'd, my Lord.                               [Sidenote: _All_.]
+
+_Ham_. From top to toe?
+
+_Both_. My Lord, from head to foote.                  [Sidenote: _All_.]
+
+_Ham_. Then saw you not his face?
+
+_Hor_. O yes, my Lord, he wore his Beauer vp.
+
+_Ham_. What, lookt he frowningly?
+
+[Sidenote: 54,174] _Hor_. A countenance more in sorrow then in anger.[1]
+
+[Sidenote: 120] _Ham_. Pale, or red?
+
+_Hor_. Nay very pale.
+
+[Footnote 1: The mood of the Ghost thus represented, remains the same
+towards his wife throughout the play.]
+
+[Page 32]
+
+_Ham._ And fixt his eyes vpon you?
+
+_Hor._ Most constantly.
+
+_Ham._ I would I had beene there.
+
+_Hor._ It would haue much amaz'd you.
+
+_Ham._ Very like, very like: staid it long? [Sidenote: Very like, stayd]
+
+_Hor._ While one with moderate hast might tell a hundred.
+                                                    [Sidenote: hundreth]
+
+_All._ Longer, longer.                               [Sidenote: _Both._]
+
+_Hor._ Not when I saw't.
+
+_Ham._ His Beard was grisly?[1] no.                 [Sidenote: grissl'd]
+
+_Hor._ It was, as I haue seene it in his life,
+[Sidenote: 138] A Sable[2] Siluer'd.
+
+_Ham._ Ile watch to Night; perchance 'twill wake againe.
+                                               [Sidenote: walke againe.]
+
+_Hor._ I warrant you it will.                     [Sidenote:  warn't it]
+
+[Sidenote: 44] _Ham._ If it assume my noble Fathers person,[3]
+Ile speake to it, though Hell it selfe should gape
+And bid me hold my peace.  I pray you all,
+If you haue hitherto conceald this sight;
+Let it bee treble[5] in your silence still: [Sidenote: be tenable in[4]]
+And whatsoeuer els shall hap to night,      [Sidenote: what someuer els]
+Giue it an vnderstanding but no tongue;
+I will requite your loues; so, fare ye well:       [Sidenote: farre you]
+Vpon the Platforme twixt eleuen and twelue,
+                                         [Sidenote: a leauen and twelfe]
+Ile visit you.
+
+_All._  Our duty to your Honour.   _Exeunt._
+
+_Ham._ Your loue, as mine to you: farewell.           [Sidenote: loves,]
+My Fathers Spirit in Armes?[6] All is not well:
+[Sidenote: 30,52] I doubt some foule play: would the Night were come;
+Till then sit still my soule; foule deeds will rise,
+                                                [Sidenote: fonde deedes]
+Though all the earth orewhelm them to mens eies.
+                                           _Exit._
+
+[Footnote 1: _grisly_--gray; _grissl'd_--turned gray;--mixed with
+white.]
+
+[Footnote 2: The colour of sable-fur, I think.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Hamlet does not _accept_ the Appearance as his father; he
+thinks it may be he, but seems to take a usurpation of his form for very
+possible.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _1st Q_. 'tenible']
+
+[Footnote 5: If _treble_ be the right word, the actor in uttering it
+must point to each of the three, with distinct yet rapid motion. The
+phrase would be a strange one, but not unlike Shakspere. Compare
+_Cymbeline_, act v. sc. 5: 'And your three motives to the battle,'
+meaning 'the motives of you three.' Perhaps, however, it is only the
+adjective for the adverb: '_having concealed it hitherto, conceal it
+trebly now_.' But _tenible_ may be the word: 'let it be a thing to be
+kept in your silence still.']
+
+[Footnote 6: Alone, he does not dispute _the idea_ of its being his
+father.]
+
+[Page 34]
+
+
+_SCENA TERTIA_[1]
+
+
+_Enter Laertes and Ophelia_.           [Sidenote: _Ophelia his Sister._]
+
+_Laer_. My necessaries are imbark't; Farewell:     [Sidenote: inbarckt,]
+And Sister, as the Winds giue Benefit,
+And Conuoy is assistant: doe not sleepe,
+                                    [Sidenote: conuay, in assistant doe]
+But let me heare from you.
+
+_Ophel_. Doe you doubt that?
+
+_Laer_. For _Hamlet_, and the trifling of his fauours,
+                                                     [Sidenote: favour,]
+Hold it a fashion and a toy in Bloud;
+A Violet in the youth of Primy Nature;
+Froward,[2] not permanent; sweet not lasting
+The suppliance of a minute? No more.[3]
+                                  [Sidenote: The perfume and suppliance]
+
+_Ophel_. No more but so.[4]
+
+_Laer_. Thinke it no more.
+For nature cressant does not grow alone,
+[Sidenote: 172] In thewes[5] and Bulke: but as his Temple waxes,[6]
+                                         [Sidenote: bulkes, but as this]
+The inward seruice of the Minde and Soule
+Growes wide withall. Perhaps he loues you now,[7]
+And now no soyle nor cautell[8] doth besmerch
+The vertue of his feare: but you must feare
+                                            [Sidenote: of his will, but]
+His greatnesse weigh'd, his will is not his owne;[9]    [Sidenote: wayd]
+For hee himselfe is subiect to his Birth:[10]
+Hee may not, as vnuallued persons doe,
+Carue for himselfe; for, on his choyce depends
+The sanctity and health of the weole State.
+                                  [Sidenote: The safty and | this whole]
+And therefore must his choyce be circumscrib'd[11]
+Vnto the voyce and yeelding[12] of that Body,
+Whereof he is the Head. Then if he sayes he loues you,
+It fits your wisedome so farre to beleeue it;
+As he in his peculiar Sect and force[13]
+                                [Sidenote: his particuler act and place]
+May giue his saying deed: which is no further,
+
+[Footnote 1: _Not in Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Same as _forward_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'No more' makes a new line in the _Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: I think this speech should end with a point of
+interrogation.]
+
+[Footnote 5: muscles.]
+
+[Footnote 6: The body is the temple, in which the mind and soul are the
+worshippers: their service grows with the temple--wide, changing and
+increasing its objects. The degraded use of the grand image is after the
+character of him who makes it.]
+
+[Footnote 7: The studied contrast between Laertes and Hamlet begins
+already to appear: the dishonest man, honestly judging after his own
+dishonesty, warns his sister against the honest man.]
+
+[Footnote 8: deceit.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'You have cause to fear when you consider his greatness:
+his will &c.' 'You must fear, his greatness being weighed; for because
+of that greatness, his will is not his own.']
+
+[Footnote 10: _This line not in Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 11: limited.]
+
+[Footnote 12: allowance.]
+
+[Footnote 13: This change from the _Quarto_ seems to me to bear the mark
+of Shakspere's hand. The meaning is the same, but the words are more
+individual and choice: the _sect_, the _head_ in relation to the body,
+is more pregnant than _place_; and _force_, that is _power_, is a fuller
+word than _act_, or even _action_, for which it plainly appears to
+stand.]
+
+[Page 36]
+
+Then the maine voyce of _Denmarke_ goes withall.
+Then weigh what losse your Honour may sustaine,
+If with too credent eare you list his Songs;
+Or lose your Heart; or your chast Treasure open     [Sidenote: Or loose]
+To his vnmastred[1] importunity.
+Feare it _Ophelia_, feare it my deare Sister,
+And keepe within the reare of your Affection;[2]
+                                            [Sidenote: keepe you in the]
+Out of the shot and danger of Desire.
+The chariest Maid is Prodigall enough,                   [Sidenote: The]
+If she vnmaske her beauty to the Moone:[3]
+Vertue it selfe scapes not calumnious stroakes,       [Sidenote: Vertue]
+The Canker Galls, the Infants of the Spring
+                                       [Sidenote: The canker gaules the]
+Too oft before the buttons[6] be disclos'd,    [Sidenote: their buttons]
+And in the Morne and liquid dew of Youth,
+Contagious blastments are most imminent.
+Be wary then, best safety lies in feare;
+Youth to it selfe rebels, though none else neere.[6]
+
+_Ophe_. I shall th'effect of this good Lesson keepe,
+As watchmen to my heart: but good my Brother        [Sidenote: watchman]
+Doe not as some vngracious Pastors doe,
+Shew me the steepe and thorny way to Heauen;
+Whilst like a puft and recklesse Libertine
+Himselfe, the Primrose path of dalliance treads,
+And reaks not his owne reade.[7][8][9]
+
+_Laer_. Oh, feare me not.[10]
+
+_Enter Polonius_.
+
+I stay too long; but here my Father comes:
+A double blessing is a double grace;
+Occasion smiles vpon a second leaue.[11]
+
+_Polon_. Yet heere _Laertes_? Aboord, aboord for shame,
+The winde sits in the shoulder of your saile,
+And you are staid for there: my blessing with you;
+                                   [Sidenote: for, there my | with thee]
+
+[Footnote 1: Without a master; lawless.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Do not go so far as inclination would lead you. Keep behind
+your liking. Do not go to the front with your impulse.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --_but_ to the moon--which can show it so little.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Opened but not closed quotations in the _Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: The French _bouton_ is also both _button_ and _bud_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'Inclination is enough to have to deal with, let alone
+added temptation.' Like his father, Laertes is wise for another--a man
+of maxims, not behaviour. His morality is in his intellect and for
+self-ends, not in his will, and for the sake of truth and
+righteousness.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _1st Q_.
+
+    But my deere brother, do not you
+    Like to a cunning Sophister,
+    Teach me the path and ready way to heauen,
+    While you forgetting what is said to me,
+    Your selfe, like to a carelesse libertine
+    Doth giue his heart, his appetite at ful,
+    And little recks how that his honour dies.
+
+    'The primrose way to the everlasting bonfire.'
+    --_Macbeth_, ii. 3:
+
+    'The flowery way that leads to the broad gate and the great fire.'
+    _All's Well_, iv. 5.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'heeds not his own counsel.']
+
+[Footnote 9: Here in Quarto, _Enter Polonius._]
+
+[Footnote 10: With the fitting arrogance and impertinence of a libertine
+brother, he has read his sister a lecture on propriety of behaviour; but
+when she gently suggests that what is good for her is good for him
+too,--'Oh, fear me not!--I stay too long.']
+
+[Footnote 11: 'A second leave-taking is a happy chance': the chance, or
+occasion, because it is happy, smiles. It does not mean that occasion
+smiles upon a second leave, but that, upon a second leave, occasion
+smiles. There should be a comma after _smiles_.]
+
+[Footnote 12: As many of Polonius' aphorismic utterances as are given in
+the 1st Quarto have there inverted commas; but whether intended as
+gleanings from books or as fruits of experience, the light they throw on
+the character of him who speaks them is the same: they show it
+altogether selfish. He is a man of the world, wise in his generation,
+his principles the best of their bad sort. Of these his son is a fit
+recipient and retailer, passing on to his sister their father's grand
+doctrine of self-protection. But, wise in maxim, Polonius is foolish in
+practice--not from senility, but from vanity.]
+
+[Page 38]
+
+And these few Precepts in thy memory,[1]
+See thou Character.[2] Giue thy thoughts no tongue,
+                                                  [Sidenote: Looke thou]
+Nor any vnproportion'd[3] thought his Act:
+Be thou familiar; but by no meanes vulgar:[4]
+The friends thou hast, and their adoption tride,[5]
+                                               [Sidenote: Those friends]
+Grapple them to thy Soule, with hoopes of Steele:       [Sidenote: unto]
+But doe not dull thy palme, with entertainment
+Of each vnhatch't, vnfledg'd Comrade.[6] Beware
+                           [Sidenote: each new hatcht unfledgd courage,]
+Of entrance to a quarrell: but being in
+Bear't that th'opposed may beware of thee.
+Giue euery man thine eare; but few thy voyce:      [Sidenote: thy eare,]
+Take each mans censure[7]; but reserue thy Judgement;
+Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy;
+But not exprest in fancie; rich, not gawdie:
+For the Apparell oft proclaimes the man.
+And they in France of the best ranck and station,
+Are of a most select and generous[8] cheff in that.[10]
+                                 [Sidenote: Or of a generous, chiefe[9]]
+Neither a borrower, nor a lender be;             [Sidenote: lender boy,]
+For lone oft loses both it selfe and friend:            [Sidenote: loue]
+And borrowing duls the edge of Husbandry.[11]
+                                                [Sidenote: dulleth edge]
+This aboue all; to thine owne selfe be true:
+And it must follow, as the Night the Day,
+Thou canst not then be false to any man.[12]
+Farewell: my Blessing season[13] this in thee.
+
+_Laer_. Most humbly doe I take my leaue, my Lord.
+
+_Polon_. The time inuites you, goe, your seruants tend.
+                                                [Sidenote: time inuests]
+
+_Laer._ Farewell _Ophelia_, and remember well
+What I haue said to you.[14]
+
+_Ophe_. Tis in my memory lockt,
+And you your selfe shall keepe the key of it,
+
+_Laer_. Farewell.        _Exit Laer_.
+
+_Polon_. What ist _Ophelia_ he hath said to you?
+
+[Footnote 1: He hurries him to go, yet immediately begins to prose.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Engrave.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Not settled into its true shape (?) or, out of proportion
+with its occasions (?)--I cannot say which.]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'Cultivate close relations, but do not lie open to common
+access.' 'Have choice intimacies, but do not be _hail, fellow! well met_
+with everybody.' What follows is an expansion of the lesson.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'The friends thou hast--and the choice of them justified by
+trial--'_equal to_: 'provided their choice be justified &c.']
+
+[Footnote 6: 'Do not make the palm hard, and dull its touch of
+discrimination, by shaking hands in welcome with every one that turns
+up.']
+
+[Footnote 7: judgment, opinion.]
+
+[Footnote 8: _Generosus_, of good breed, a gentleman.]
+
+[Footnote 9: _1st Q_. 'generall chiefe.']
+
+[Footnote 10: No doubt the omission of _of a_ gives the right number of
+syllables to the verse, and makes room for the interpretation which a
+dash between _generous_ and _chief_ renders clearer: 'Are most select
+and generous--chief in that,'--'are most choice and well-bred--chief,
+indeed--at the head or top, in the matter of dress.' But without
+_necessity_ or _authority_--one of the two, I would not throw away a
+word; and suggest therefore that Shakspere had here the French idiom _de
+son chef_ in his mind, and qualifies the noun in it with adjectives of
+his own. The Academy Dictionary gives _de son propre mouvement_ as one
+interpretation of the phrase. The meaning would be, 'they are of a most
+choice and developed instinct in dress.' _Cheff_ or _chief_ suggests the
+upper third of the heraldic shield, but I cannot persuade the suggestion
+to further development. The hypercatalectic syllables _of a_, swiftly
+spoken, matter little to the verse, especially as it is _dramatic_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: Those that borrow, having to pay, lose heart for saving.
+
+    'There's husbandry in heaven;
+    Their candles are all out.'--_Macbeth_, ii. 1.]
+
+[Footnote 12: Certainly a man cannot be true to himself without being
+true to others; neither can he be true to others without being true to
+himself; but if a man make himself the centre for the birth of action,
+it will follow, '_as the night the day_,' that he will be true neither
+to himself nor to any other man. In this regard note the history of
+Laertes, developed in the play.]
+
+[Footnote 13: --as salt, to make the counsel keep.]
+
+[Footnote 14: See _note 9, page 37_.]
+
+[Page 40]
+
+_Ophe._ So please you, somthing touching the L. _Hamlet._
+
+_Polon._ Marry, well bethought:
+Tis told me he hath very oft of late
+Giuen priuate time to you; and you your selfe
+Haue of your audience beene most free and bounteous.[1]
+If it be so, as so tis put on me;[2]
+And that in way of caution: I must tell you,
+You doe not vnderstand your selfe so cleerely,
+As it behoues my Daughter, and your Honour
+What is betweene you, giue me vp the truth?
+
+_Ophe._ He hath my Lord of late, made many tenders
+Of his affection to me.
+
+_Polon._ Affection, puh.  You speake like a greene Girle,
+Vnsifted in such perillous Circumstance.
+Doe you beleeue his tenders, as you call them?
+
+_Ophe._ I do not know, my Lord, what I should thinke.
+
+_Polon._ Marry Ile teach you; thinke your self a Baby,
+                                                      [Sidenote: I will]
+That you haue tane his tenders for true pay,      [Sidenote: tane these]
+Which are not starling. Tender your selfe more dearly;
+                                                    [Sidenote: sterling]
+Or not to crack the winde of the poore Phrase,
+                                                [Sidenote: (not ... &c.]
+Roaming it[3] thus, you'l tender me a foole.[4]
+                                               [Sidenote: Wrong it thus]
+
+_Ophe._ My Lord, he hath importun'd me with loue,
+In honourable fashion.
+
+_Polon._ I, fashion you may call it, go too, go too.
+
+_Ophe._ And hath giuen countenance to his speech,
+My Lord, with all the vowes of Heauen.
+                           [Sidenote: with almost all the holy vowes of]
+
+[Footnote 1: There had then been a good deal of intercourse between
+Hamlet and Ophelia: she had heartily encouraged him.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'as so I am informed, and that by way of caution,']
+
+[Footnote 3: --making it, 'the poor phrase' _tenders_, gallop wildly
+about--as one might _roam_ a horse; _larking it_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'you will in your own person present me a fool.']
+
+[Page 42]
+
+_Polon_. I, Springes to catch Woodcocks.[1] I doe know
+                                                     [Sidenote: springs]
+When the Bloud burnes, how Prodigall the Soule[2]
+Giues the tongue vowes: these blazes, Daughter,    [Sidenote: Lends the]
+Giuing more light then heate; extinct in both,[3]
+Euen in their promise, as it is a making;
+You must not take for fire. For this time Daughter,[4]
+                                             [Sidenote: fire, from this]
+Be somewhat scanter of your Maiden presence;       [Sidenote: something]
+Set your entreatments[5] at a higher rate,
+Then a command to parley. For Lord _Hamlet_,          [Sidenote: parle;]
+Beleeue so much in him, that he is young,
+And with a larger tether may he walke,                 [Sidenote: tider]
+Then may be giuen you. In few,[6] _Ophelia_,
+Doe not beleeue his vowes; for they are Broakers,
+Not of the eye,[7] which their Inuestments show:
+                                                 [Sidenote: of that die]
+But meere implorators of vnholy Sutes,         [Sidenote: imploratators]
+Breathing like sanctified and pious bonds,
+The better to beguile. This is for all:[8]           [Sidenote: beguide]
+I would not, in plaine tearmes, from this time forth,
+Haue you so slander any moment leisure,[9]
+[Sidenote: 70, 82] As to giue words or talke with the Lord _Hamlet_:[10]
+Looke too't, I charge you; come your wayes.
+
+_Ophe_. I shall obey my Lord.[11]     _Exeunt_.
+
+_Enter Hamlet, Horatio, Marcellus._          [Sidenote: _and Marcellus_]
+
+[Sidenote: 2] _Ham_. [12]The Ayre bites shrewdly: is it very cold?[13]
+
+_Hor_. It is a nipping and an eager ayre.
+
+_Ham_. What hower now?
+
+_Hor_. I thinke it lacks of twelue.
+
+_Mar_. No, it is strooke.
+
+_Hor_. Indeed I heard it not: then it drawes neere the season,
+                                                     [Sidenote: it then]
+Wherein the Spirit held his wont to walke.
+What does this meane my Lord? [14]
+          [Sidenote: _A flourish of trumpets and 2 peeces goes of._[14]]
+
+[Footnote 1: Woodcocks were understood to have no brains.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _1st Q_. 'How prodigall the tongue lends the heart vowes.'
+I was inclined to take _Prodigall_ for a noun, a proper name or epithet
+given to the soul, as in a moral play: _Prodigall, the soul_; but I
+conclude it only an adjective used as an adverb, and the capital P a
+blunder.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --in both light and heat.]
+
+[Footnote 4: The _Quarto_ has not 'Daughter.']
+
+[Footnote 5: _To be entreated_ is _to yield_: 'he would nowise be
+entreated:' _entreatments, yieldings_: 'you are not to see him just
+because he chooses to command a parley.']
+
+[Footnote 6: 'In few words'; in brief.]
+
+[Footnote 7: I suspect a misprint in the Folio here--that an _e_ has got
+in for a _d_, and that the change from the _Quarto_ should be _Not of
+the dye_. Then the line would mean, using the antecedent word _brokers_
+in the bad sense, 'Not themselves of the same colour as their garments
+(_investments_); his vows are clothed in innocence, but are not
+innocent; they are mere panders.' The passage is rendered yet more
+obscure to the modern sense by the accidental propinquity of _bonds,
+brokers_, and _investments_--which have nothing to do with _stocks_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'This means in sum:'.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'so slander any moment with the name of leisure as to': to
+call it leisure, if leisure stood for talk with Hamlet, would be to
+slander the time. We might say, 'so slander any man friend as to expect
+him to do this or that unworthy thing for you.']
+
+[Footnote 10: _1st Q_.
+
+    _Ofelia_, receiue none of his letters,
+    For louers lines are snares to intrap the heart;
+    [Sidenote: 82] Refuse his tokens, both of them are keyes
+    To vnlocke Chastitie vnto Desire;
+    Come in _Ofelia_; such men often proue,
+    Great in their wordes, but little in their loue.
+
+'_men often prove such_--great &c.'--Compare _Twelfth Night_, act ii.
+sc. 4, lines 120, 121, _Globe ed.]
+
+[Footnote 11: Fresh trouble for Hamlet_.]
+
+[Footnote 12: _1st Q._
+
+    The ayre bites shrewd; it is an eager and
+    An nipping winde, what houre i'st?]
+
+[Footnote 13: Again the cold.]
+
+[Footnote 14: The stage-direction of the _Q_. is necessary here.]
+
+[Page 44]
+
+[Sidenote: 22, 25] _Ham_. The King doth wake to night, and takes his
+rouse,
+Keepes wassels and the swaggering vpspring reeles,[1]
+                                         [Sidenote: wassell | up-spring]
+And as he dreines his draughts of Renish downe,
+The kettle Drum and Trumpet thus bray out
+The triumph of his Pledge.
+
+_Horat_. Is it a custome?
+
+_Ham_. I marry ist;
+And to my mind, though I am natiue heere,             [Sidenote: But to]
+And to the manner borne: It is a Custome
+More honour'd in the breach, then the obseruance.
+[A]
+
+_Enter Ghost._
+
+_Hor_. Looke my Lord, it comes.
+
+[Sidenote: 172] _Ham_. Angels and Ministers of Grace defend vs:
+[Sidenote: 32] Be thou a Spirit of health, or Goblin damn'd,
+Bring with thee ayres from Heauen, or blasts from Hell,[2]
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto:--_
+
+This heauy headed reueale east and west[3]
+Makes vs tradust, and taxed of other nations,
+They clip[4] vs drunkards, and with Swinish phrase
+Soyle our addition,[5] and indeede it takes
+From our atchieuements, though perform'd at height[6]
+The pith and marrow of our attribute,
+So oft it chaunces in particuler men,[7]
+That for some vicious mole[8] of nature in them
+As in their birth wherein they are not guilty,[8]
+(Since nature cannot choose his origin)
+By their ore-grow'th of some complextion[10]
+Oft breaking downe the pales and forts of reason
+Or by[11] some habit, that too much ore-leauens
+The forme of plausiue[12] manners, that[13] these men
+Carrying I say the stamp of one defect
+Being Natures liuery, or Fortunes starre,[14]
+His[15] vertues els[16] be they as pure as grace,
+As infinite as man may vndergoe,[17]
+Shall in the generall censure[18] take corruption
+From that particuler fault:[19] the dram of eale[20]
+Doth all the noble substance of a doubt[21]
+To his[22] owne scandle.]
+
+[Footnote 1: Does Hamlet here call his uncle an _upspring_, an
+_upstart_? or is the _upspring_ a dance, the English equivalent of 'the
+high _lavolt_' of _Troil. and Cress_. iv. 4, and governed by
+_reels_--'keeps wassels, and reels the swaggering upspring'--a dance
+that needed all the steadiness as well as agility available, if, as I
+suspect, it was that in which each gentleman lifted the lady high, and
+kissed her before setting her down? I cannot answer, I can only put the
+question. The word _swaggering_ makes me lean to the former
+interpretation.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Observe again Hamlet's uncertainty. He does not take it for
+granted that it is _his father's_ spirit, though it is plainly his
+form.]
+
+[Footnote 3: The Quarto surely came too early for this passage to have
+been suggested by the shameful habits which invaded the court through
+the example of Anne of Denmark! Perhaps Shakspere cancelled it both
+because he would not have it supposed he had meant to reflect on the
+queen, and because he came to think it too diffuse.]
+
+[Footnote 4: clepe, _call_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Same as _attribute_, two lines lower--the thing imputed to,
+or added to us--our reputation, our title or epithet.]
+
+[Footnote 6: performed to perfection.]
+
+[Footnote 7: individuals.]
+
+[Footnote 8: A mole on the body, according to the place where it
+appeared, was regarded as significant of character: in that relation, a
+_vicious mole_ would be one that indicated some special vice; but here
+the allusion is to a live mole of constitutional fault, burrowing
+within, whose presence the mole-_heap_ on the skin indicates.]
+
+[Footnote 9: The order here would be: 'for some vicious mole of nature
+in them, as by their o'er-growth, in their birth--wherein they are not
+guilty, since nature cannot choose his origin (or parentage)--their
+o'ergrowth of (their being overgrown or possessed by) some complexion,
+&c.']
+
+[Footnote 10: _Complexion_, as the exponent of the _temperament_, or
+masterful tendency of the nature, stands here for _temperament_--'oft
+breaking down &c.' Both words have in them the element of _mingling_--a
+mingling to certain results.]
+
+[Footnote 11: The connection is:
+
+    That for some vicious mole--
+    As by their o'ergrowth--
+    Or by some habit, &c.]
+
+[Footnote 12: pleasing.]
+
+[Footnote 13: Repeat from above '--so oft it chaunces,' before 'that
+these men.']
+
+[Footnote 14: 'whether the thing come by Nature or by Destiny,'
+_Fortune's star_: the mark set on a man by fortune to prove her share in
+him. 83.]
+
+[Footnote 15: A change to the singular.]
+
+[Footnote l6: 'be his virtues besides as pure &c.']
+
+[Footnote 17: _walk under; carry_.]
+
+[Footnote 18: the judgment of the many.]
+
+[Footnote 19: 'Dead flies cause the ointment of the apothecary to send
+forth a stinking savour: so doth a little folly him that is in
+reputation for wisdom and honour.' Eccles. x. 1.]
+
+[Footnote 20: Compare Quarto reading, page 112:
+
+    The spirit that I haue scene
+    May be a deale, and the deale hath power &c.
+
+If _deale_ here stand for _devil_, then _eale_ may in the same edition
+be taken to stand for _evil_. It is hardly necessary to suspect a Scotch
+printer; _evil_ is often used as a monosyllable, and _eale_ may have
+been a pronunciation of it half-way towards _ill_, which is its
+contraction.]
+
+[Footnote 21: I do not believe there is any corruption in the rest of
+the passage. 'Doth it of a doubt:' _affects it with a doubt_, brings it
+into doubt. The following from _Measure for Measure_, is like, though
+not the same.
+
+    I have on Angelo imposed the office,
+    Who may, in the ambush of my name, strike home
+    And yet my nature never in the fight
+    _To do in slander._
+
+'To do my nature in slander'; to affect it with slander; to bring it
+into slander, 'Angelo may punish in my name, but, not being present, I
+shall not be accused of cruelty, which would be to slander my nature.']
+
+[Footnote 22: _his_--the man's; see _note_ 13 above.]
+
+[Page 46]
+
+[Sidenote: 112] Be thy euents wicked or charitable,
+                                                  [Sidenote: thy intent]
+Thou com'st in such a questionable shape[1]
+That I will speake to thee. Ile call thee _Hamlet_,[2]
+King, Father, Royall Dane: Oh, oh, answer me,
+                                             [Sidenote: Dane, ô answere]
+Let me not burst in Ignorance; but tell
+Why thy Canoniz'd bones Hearsed in death,[3]
+Haue burst their cerments; why the Sepulcher
+Wherein we saw thee quietly enurn'd,[4]
+                                         [Sidenote: quietly interr'd[3]]
+Hath op'd his ponderous and Marble iawes,
+To cast thee vp againe? What may this meane?
+That thou dead Coarse againe in compleat steele,
+Reuisits thus the glimpses of the Moone,
+Making Night hidious? And we fooles of Nature,[6]
+So horridly to shake our disposition,[7]
+With thoughts beyond thee; reaches of our Soules,[8]
+                                                 [Sidenote: the reaches]
+Say, why is this? wherefore? what should we doe?[9]
+
+_Ghost beckens Hamlet._
+
+_Hor._ It beckons you to goe away with it,           [Sidenote: Beckins]
+As if it some impartment did desire
+To you alone.
+
+_Mar._ Looke with what courteous action
+It wafts you to a more remoued ground:                 [Sidenote: waues]
+But doe not goe with it.
+
+_Hor._ No, by no meanes.
+
+_Ham_. It will not speake: then will I follow it.
+                                                      [Sidenote: I will]
+
+_Hor._ Doe not my Lord.
+
+_Ham._ Why, what should be the feare?
+I doe not set my life at a pins fee;
+And for my Soule, what can it doe to that?
+Being a thing immortall as it selfe:[10]
+It waues me forth againe; Ile follow it.
+
+_Hor._ What if it tempt you toward the Floud my Lord?[11]
+
+[Footnote 1: --that of his father, so moving him to question it.
+_Questionable_ does not mean _doubtful_, but _fit to be questioned_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'I'll _call_ thee'--for the nonce.]
+
+[Footnote 3: I think _hearse_ was originally the bier--French _herse_, a
+harrow--but came to be applied to the coffin: _hearsed_ in
+death--_coffined_ in death.]
+
+[Footnote 4: There is no impropriety in the use of the word _inurned_.
+It is a figure--a word once-removed in its application: the sepulchre is
+the urn, the body the ashes. _Interred_ Shakspere had concluded
+incorrect, for the body was not laid in the earth.]
+
+[Footnote 5: So in _1st Q_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'fooles of Nature'--fools in the presence of her
+knowledge--to us no knowledge--of her action, to us inexplicable. _A
+fact_ that looks unreasonable makes one feel like a fool. See Psalm
+lxxiii. 22: 'So foolish was I and ignorant, I was as a beast before
+thee.' As some men are our fools, we are all Nature's fools; we are so
+far from knowing anything as it is.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Even if Shakspere cared more about grammar than he does, a
+man in Hamlet's perturbation he might well present as making a breach in
+it; but we are not reduced even to justification. _Toschaken_ (_to_ as
+German _zu_ intensive) is a recognized English word; it means _to shake
+to pieces_. The construction of the passage is, 'What may this mean,
+that thou revisitest thus the glimpses of the moon, and that we so
+horridly to-shake our disposition?' So in _The Merry Wives_,
+
+    And fairy-like to-pinch the unclean knight.
+
+'our disposition': our _cosmic structure_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'with thoughts that are too much for them, and as an
+earthquake to them.']
+
+[Footnote 9: Like all true souls, Hamlet wants to know what he is _to
+do_. He looks out for the action required of him.]
+
+[Footnote 10: Note here Hamlet's mood--dominated by his faith. His life
+in this world his mother has ruined; he does not care for it a pin: he
+is not the less confident of a nature that is immortal. In virtue of
+this belief in life, he is indifferent to the form of it. When, later in
+the play, he seems to fear death, it is death the consequence of an
+action of whose rightness he is not convinced.]
+
+[Footnote 11: _The Quarto has dropped out_ 'Lord.']
+
+[Page 48]
+
+Or to the dreadfull Sonnet of the Cliffe,             [Sidenote: somnet]
+That beetles[1] o're his base into the Sea,          [Sidenote: bettles]
+[Sidenote: 112] And there assumes some other horrible forme,[2]
+                                                      [Sidenote: assume]
+Which might depriue your Soueraignty[3] of Reason
+And draw you into madnesse thinke of it?
+
+[A]
+
+_Ham._ It wafts me still; goe on, Ile follow thee.
+                                                       [Sidenote: waues]
+
+_Mar._ You shall not goe my Lord.
+
+_Ham._ Hold off your hand.                             [Sidenote: hands]
+
+_Hor._ Be rul'd, you shall not goe.
+
+_Ham._ My fate cries out,
+And makes each petty Artire[4] in this body,       [Sidenote: arture[4]]
+As hardy as the Nemian Lions nerue:
+Still am I cal'd? Vnhand me Gentlemen:
+By Heau'n, Ile make a Ghost of him that lets me:
+I say away, goe on, Ile follow thee.
+
+_Exeunt Ghost & Hamlet._
+
+_Hor._ He waxes desperate with imagination.[5]       [Sidenote: imagion]
+
+_Mar._ Let's follow; 'tis not fit thus to obey him.
+
+_Hor._ Haue after, to what issue will this come?
+
+_Mar._ Something is rotten in the State of Denmarke.
+
+_Hor._ Heauen will direct it.
+
+_Mar._ Nay, let's follow him.     _Exeunt._
+
+_Enter Ghost and Hamlet._
+
+_Ham._ Where wilt thou lead me? speak; Ile go no further.
+                                                     [Sidenote: Whether]
+
+_Gho._ Marke me.
+
+_Ham._ I will.
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+The very place puts toyes of desperation
+Without more motiue, into euery braine
+That lookes so many fadoms to the sea
+And heares it rore beneath.]
+
+[Footnote 1: _1st Q_. 'beckles'--perhaps for _buckles--bends_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Note the unbelief in the Ghost.]
+
+[Footnote 3: sovereignty--_soul_: so in _Romeo and Juliet_, act v. sc.
+1, l. 3:--
+
+    My bosom's lord sits lightly in his throne.]
+
+[Footnote 4: The word _artery_, invariably substituted by the editors,
+is without authority. In the first Quarto, the word is _Artiue_; in the
+second (see margin) _arture_. This latter I take to be the right
+one--corrupted into _Artire_ in the Folio. It seems to have troubled the
+printers, and possibly the editors. The third Q. has followed the
+second; the fourth has _artyre_; the fifth Q. and the fourth F. have
+_attire_; the second and third Folios follow the first. Not until the
+sixth Q. does _artery_ appear. See _Cambridge Shakespeare. Arture_ was
+to all concerned, and to the language itself, a new word. That _artery_
+was not Shakspere's intention might be concluded from its unfitness:
+what propriety could there be in _making an artery hardy_? The sole,
+imperfect justification I was able to think of for such use of the word
+arose from the fact that, before the discovery of the circulation of the
+blood (published in 1628), it was believed that the arteries (found
+empty after death) served for the movements of the animal spirits: this
+might vaguely _associate_ the arteries with _courage_. But the sight of
+the word _arture_ in the second Quarto at once relieved me.
+
+I do not know if a list has ever been gathered of the words _made_ by
+Shakspere: here is one of them--_arture_, from the same root as _artus,
+a joint--arcere, to hold together_, adjective _arctus, tight. Arture_,
+then, stands for _juncture_. This perfectly fits. In terror the weakest
+parts are the joints, for their _artures_ are not _hardy_. 'And you, my
+sinews, ... bear me stiffly up.' 55, 56.
+
+Since writing as above, a friend informs me that _arture_ is the exact
+equivalent of the [Greek: haphae] of Colossians ii. 19, as interpreted
+by Bishop Lightfoot--'the relation between contiguous limbs, not the
+parts of the limbs themselves in the neighbourhood of contact,'--for
+which relation 'there is no word in our language in common use.']
+
+[Footnote 5: 'with the things he imagines.']
+
+[Page 50]
+
+_Gho._ My hower is almost come,[1]
+When I to sulphurous and tormenting Flames
+Must render vp my selfe.
+
+_Ham._ Alas poore Ghost.
+
+_Gho._ Pitty me not, but lend thy serious hearing
+To what I shall vnfold.
+
+_Ham._ Speake, I am bound to heare.
+
+_Gho._ So art thou to reuenge, when thou shalt heare.
+
+_Ham._ What?
+
+_Gho._ I am thy Fathers Spirit,
+Doom'd for a certaine terme to walke the night;[2]
+And for the day confin'd to fast in Fiers,[3]
+Till the foule crimes done in my dayes of Nature
+Are burnt and purg'd away? But that I am forbid
+To tell the secrets of my Prison-House;
+I could a Tale vnfold, whose lightest word[4]
+Would harrow vp thy soule, freeze thy young blood,
+Make thy two eyes like Starres, start from their Spheres,
+Thy knotty and combined locks to part,               [Sidenote: knotted]
+And each particular haire to stand an end,[5]
+Like Quilles vpon the fretfull[6] Porpentine    [Sidenote: fearefull[6]]
+But this eternall blason[7] must not be
+To eares of flesh and bloud; list _Hamlet_, oh list,
+                                        [Sidenote: blood, list, ô list;]
+If thou didst euer thy deare Father loue.
+
+_Ham._ Oh Heauen![8]                                     [Sidenote: God]
+
+_Gho._ Reuenge his foule and most vnnaturall Murther.[9]
+
+_Ham._ Murther?
+
+_Ghost._ Murther most foule, as in the best it is;
+But this most foule, strange, and vnnaturall.
+
+_Ham._ Hast, hast me to know it,          [Sidenote: Hast me to know't,]
+That with wings as swift
+
+[Footnote 1: The night is the Ghost's day.]
+
+[Footnote 2: To walk the night, and see how things go, without being
+able to put a finger to them, is part of his cleansing.]
+
+[Footnote 3: More horror yet for Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 4: He would have him think of life and its doings as of awful
+import. He gives his son what warning he may.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _An end_ is like _agape, an hungred_. 71, 175.]
+
+[Footnote 6: The word in the Q. suggests _fretfull_ a misprint for
+_frightful_. It is _fretfull_ in the 1st Q. as well.]
+
+[Footnote 7: To _blason_ is to read off in proper heraldic terms the
+arms blasoned upon a shield. _A blason_ is such a reading, but is here
+used for a picture in words of other objects.]
+
+[Footnote 8: --in appeal to God whether he had not loved his father.]
+
+[Footnote 9: The horror still accumulates. The knowledge of evil--not
+evil in the abstract, but evil alive, and all about him--comes darkening
+down upon Hamlet's being. Not only is his father an inhabitant of the
+nether fires, but he is there by murder.]
+
+[Page 52]
+
+As meditation, or the thoughts of Loue,
+May sweepe to my Reuenge.[1]
+
+_Ghost._ I finde thee apt,
+And duller should'st thou be then the fat weede[2]
+[Sidenote: 194] That rots it selfe in ease, on Lethe Wharfe,[4]
+                                                   [Sidenote: rootes[3]]
+Would'st thou not stirre in this. Now _Hamlet_ heare:
+It's giuen out, that sleeping in mine Orchard,          [Sidenote: 'Tis]
+A Serpent stung me: so the whole eare of Denmarke,
+Is by a forged processe of my death
+Rankly abus'd: But know thou Noble youth,
+The Serpent that did sting thy Fathers life,
+Now weares his Crowne.
+
+[Sidenote: 30,32] _Ham._ O my Propheticke soule: mine Vncle?[5]
+                                                          [Sidenote: my]
+
+_Ghost._ I that incestuous, that adulterate Beast[6]
+With witchcraft of his wits, hath Traitorous guifts.
+                                                  [Sidenote: wits, with]
+Oh wicked Wit, and Gifts, that haue the power
+So to seduce? Won to to this shamefull Lust     [Sidenote: wonne to his]
+The will of my most seeming vertuous Queene:
+Oh _Hamlet_, what a falling off was there,      [Sidenote: what failing]
+From me, whose loue was of that dignity,
+That it went hand in hand, euen with[7] the Vow
+I made to her in Marriage; and to decline
+Vpon a wretch, whose Naturall gifts were poore
+To those of mine. But Vertue, as it neuer wil be moued,
+Though Lewdnesse court it in a shape of Heauen:
+So Lust, though to a radiant Angell link'd,    [Sidenote: so but though]
+Will sate it selfe in[8] a Celestiall bed, and prey on Garbage.[9]
+                                          [Sidenote: Will sort it selfe]
+But soft, me thinkes I sent the Mornings Ayre; [Sidenote: morning ayre,]
+Briefe let me be: Sleeping within mine Orchard,           [Sidenote: my]
+My custome alwayes in the afternoone;                 [Sidenote: of the]
+Vpon my secure hower thy Vncle stole
+
+[Footnote 1: Now, _for the moment_, he has no doubt, and vengeance is
+his first thought.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Hamlet may be supposed to recall this, if we suppose him
+afterwards to accuse himself so bitterly and so unfairly as in the
+_Quarto_, 194.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Also _1st Q_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: landing-place on the bank of Lethe, the hell-river of
+oblivion.]
+
+[Footnote 5: This does not mean that he had suspected his uncle, but
+that his dislike to him was prophetic.]
+
+[Footnote 6: How can it be doubted that in this speech the Ghost accuses
+his wife and brother of adultery? Their marriage was not adultery. See
+how the ghastly revelation grows on Hamlet--his father in hell--murdered
+by his brother--dishonoured by his wife!]
+
+[Footnote 7: _parallel with; correspondent to_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: _1st Q_. 'fate itself from a'.]
+
+[Footnote 9: This passage, from 'Oh _Hamlet_,' most indubitably asserts
+the adultery of Gertrude.]
+
+[Page 54]
+
+With iuyce of cursed Hebenon[1] in a Violl,           [Sidenote: Hebona]
+And in the Porches of mine eares did poure                [Sidenote: my]
+The leaperous Distilment;[2] whose effect
+Holds such an enmity with bloud of Man,
+That swift as Quick-siluer, it courses[3] through
+The naturall Gates and Allies of the Body;
+And with a sodaine vigour it doth posset       [Sidenote: doth possesse]
+And curd, like Aygre droppings into Milke,          [Sidenote: eager[4]]
+The thin and wholsome blood: so did it mine;
+And a most instant Tetter bak'd about,       [Sidenote: barckt about[5]]
+Most Lazar-like, with vile and loathsome crust,
+All my smooth Body.
+Thus was I, sleeping, by a Brothers hand,
+Of Life, of Crowne, and Queene at once dispatcht;  [Sidenote: of Queene]
+[Sidenote: 164] Cut off euen in the Blossomes of my Sinne,
+Vnhouzzled, disappointed, vnnaneld,[6] [Sidenote: Vnhuzled, | vnanueld,]
+[Sidenote: 262] No reckoning made, but sent to my account
+With all my imperfections on my head;
+Oh horrible, Oh horrible, most horrible:
+If thou hast nature in thee beare it not;
+Let not the Royall Bed of Denmarke be
+A Couch for Luxury and damned Incest.[7]
+But howsoeuer thou pursuest this Act,
+                                     [Sidenote: howsomeuer thou pursues]
+[Sidenote: 30,174] Taint not thy mind; nor let thy Soule contriue
+[Sidenote: 140] Against thy Mother ought; leaue her to heauen,
+And to those Thornes that in her bosome lodge,
+To pricke and sting her. Fare thee well at once;
+The Glow-worme showes the Matine to be neere,
+And gins to pale his vneffectuall Fire:
+Adue, adue, _Hamlet_: remember me. _Exit_.
+                        [Sidenote: Adiew, adiew, adiew, remember me.[8]]
+
+_Ham._ Oh all you host of Heauen! Oh Earth: what els?
+And shall I couple Hell?[9] Oh fie[10]: hold my heart;
+                                               [Sidenote: hold, hold my]
+And you my sinnewes, grow not instant Old;
+
+[Footnote 1: Ebony.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _producing leprosy_--as described in result below.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _1st Q_. 'posteth'.]
+
+[Footnote 4: So also _1st Q_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: This _barckt_--meaning _cased as a bark cases its tree_--is
+used in _1st Q_. also: 'And all my smoothe body, barked, and tetterd
+ouer.' The word is so used in Scotland still.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _Husel (Anglo-Saxon)_ is _an offering, the sacrament.
+Disappointed, not appointed_: Dr. Johnson. _Unaneled, unoiled, without
+the extreme unction_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: It is on public grounds, as a king and a Dane, rather than
+as a husband and a murdered man, that he urges on his son the execution
+of justice. Note the tenderness towards his wife that follows--more
+marked, 174; here it is mingled with predominating regard to his son to
+whose filial nature he dreads injury.]
+
+[Footnote 8: _Q_. omits _Exit_.]
+
+[Footnote 9: He must: his father is there!]
+
+[Footnote 10: The interjection is addressed to _heart_ and _sinews_,
+which forget their duty.]
+
+[Page 56]
+
+But beare me stiffely vp: Remember thee?[1]       [Sidenote: swiftly vp]
+I, thou poore Ghost, while memory holds a seate       [Sidenote: whiles]
+In this distracted Globe[2]: Remember thee?
+Yea, from the Table of my Memory,[3]
+Ile wipe away all triuiall fond Records,
+All sawes[4] of Bookes, all formes, all presures past,
+That youth and obseruation coppied there;
+And thy Commandment all alone shall liue
+Within the Booke and Volume of my Braine,
+Vnmixt with baser matter; yes, yes, by Heauen:
+                                              [Sidenote: matter, yes by]
+[Sidenote: 168] Oh most pernicious woman![5]
+Oh Villaine, Villaine, smiling damned Villaine!
+My Tables, my Tables; meet it is I set it downe,[6]
+                                             [Sidenote: My tables, meet]
+That one may smile, and smile and be a Villaine;
+At least I'm sure it may be so in Denmarke;             [Sidenote: I am]
+So Vnckle there you are: now to my word;[7]
+It is; Adue, Adue, Remember me:[8] I haue sworn't.
+                              [Sidenote: _Enter Horatio, and Marcellus_]
+
+_Hor. and Mar. within_. My Lord, my Lord.         [Sidenote: _Hora._ My]
+
+_Enter Horatio and Marcellus._
+
+_Mar_. Lord _Hamlet_.
+
+_Hor_. Heauen secure him.                            [Sidenote: Heauens]
+
+_Mar_. So be it.
+
+_Hor_. Illo, ho, ho, my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Hillo, ho, ho, boy; come bird, come.[9]
+                                         [Sidenote: boy come, and come.]
+
+_Mar_. How ist't my Noble Lord?
+
+_Hor_. What newes, my Lord?
+
+_Ham_. Oh wonderfull![10]
+
+_Hor_. Good my Lord tell it.
+
+_Ham_. No you'l reueale it.                         [Sidenote: you will]
+
+_Hor_. Not I, my Lord, by Heauen.
+
+_Mar_. Nor I, my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. How say you then, would heart of man once think it?
+But you'l be secret?
+
+[Footnote 1: For the moment he has no doubt that he has seen and spoken
+with the ghost of his father.]
+
+[Footnote 2: his head.]
+
+[Footnote 3: The whole speech is that of a student, accustomed to books,
+to take notes, and to fix things in his memory. 'Table,' _tablet_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _wise sayings_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: The Ghost has revealed her adultery: Hamlet suspects her of
+complicity in the murder, 168.]
+
+[Footnote 6: It may well seem odd that Hamlet should be represented as,
+at such a moment, making a note in his tablets; but without further
+allusion to the student-habit, I would remark that, in cases where
+strongest passion is roused, the intellect has yet sometimes an
+automatic trick of working independently. For instance from Shakspere,
+see Constance in _King John_--how, in her agony over the loss of her
+son, both her fancy, playing with words, and her imagination, playing
+with forms, are busy.
+
+Note the glimpse of Hamlet's character here given: he had been something
+of an optimist; at least had known villainy only from books; at thirty
+years of age it is to him a discovery that a man may smile and be a
+villain! Then think of the shock of such discoveries as are here forced
+upon him! Villainy is no longer a mere idea, but a fact! and of all
+villainous deeds those of his own mother and uncle are the worst! But
+note also his honesty, his justice to humanity, his philosophic
+temperament, in the qualification he sets to the memorandum, '--at least
+in Denmark!']
+
+[Footnote 7: 'my word,'--the word he has to keep in mind; his cue.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Should not the actor here make a pause, with hand uplifted,
+as taking a solemn though silent oath?]
+
+[Footnote 9: --as if calling to a hawk.]
+
+[Footnote 10: Here comes the test of the actor's _possible_: here Hamlet
+himself begins to act, and will at once assume a _rôle_, ere yet he well
+knows what it must be. One thing only is clear to him--that the
+communication of the Ghost is not a thing to be shared--that he must
+keep it with all his power of secrecy: the honour both of father and of
+mother is at stake. In order to do so, he must begin by putting on
+himself a cloak of darkness, and hiding his feelings--first of all the
+present agitation which threatens to overpower him. His immediate
+impulse or instinctive motion is to force an air, and throw a veil of
+grimmest humour over the occurrence. The agitation of the horror at his
+heart, ever working and constantly repressed, shows through the veil,
+and gives an excited uncertainty to his words, and a wild vacillation to
+his manner and behaviour.]
+
+[Page 58]
+
+_Both_. I, by Heau'n, my Lord.[1]
+
+_Ham_. There's nere a villaine dwelling in all Denmarke
+But hee's an arrant knaue.
+
+_Hor_. There needs no Ghost my Lord, come from the
+Graue, to tell vs this.
+
+_Ham_. Why right, you are i'th'right;                 [Sidenote: in the]
+And so, without more circumstance at all,
+I hold it fit that we shake hands, and part:
+You, as your busines and desires shall point you:     [Sidenote: desire]
+For euery man ha's businesse and desire,[2]             [Sidenote: hath]
+Such as it is: and for mine owne poore part,              [Sidenote: my]
+Looke you, Ile goe pray.[4]              [Sidenote: I will goe pray.[3]]
+
+_Hor_. These are but wild and hurling words, my Lord.
+                                                 [Sidenote: whurling[5]]
+
+_Ham_. I'm sorry they offend you heartily:              [Sidenote: I am]
+Yes faith, heartily.
+
+_Hor_. There's no offence my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Yes, by Saint _Patricke_, but there is my Lord,[6]
+                                          [Sidenote: there is _Horatio_]
+And much offence too, touching this Vision heere;[7]
+[Sidenote: 136] It is an honest Ghost, that let me tell you:[8]
+For your desire to know what is betweene vs,
+O'remaster't as you may. And now good friends,
+As you are Friends, Schollers and Soldiers,
+Giue me one poore request.
+
+_Hor_. What is't my Lord? we will.
+
+_Ham_. Neuer make known what you haue seen to night.[9]
+
+_Both_. My Lord, we will not.
+
+_Ham_. Nay, but swear't.
+
+_Hor_. Infaith my Lord, not I.[10]
+
+_Mar_. Nor I my Lord: in faith.
+
+_Ham_. Vpon my sword.[11]
+
+[Footnote 1: _Q. has not_ 'my Lord.']
+
+[Footnote 2: Here shows the philosopher.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _Q. has not_ 'Looke you.']
+
+[Footnote 4: '--nothing else is left me.' This seems to me one of the
+finest touches in the revelation of Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _1st Q_. 'wherling'.]
+
+[Footnote 6: I take the change from the _Quarto_ here to be no blunder.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _Point thus_: 'too!--Touching.']
+
+[Footnote 8: The struggle to command himself is plain throughout.]
+
+[Footnote 9: He could not endure the thought of the resulting
+gossip;--which besides would interfere with, possibly frustrate, the
+carrying out of his part.]
+
+[Footnote 10: This is not a refusal to swear; it is the oath itself:
+'_In faith I will not_!']
+
+[Footnote 11: He would have them swear on the cross-hilt of his sword.]
+
+[Page 60]
+
+_Marcell._ We haue sworne my Lord already.[1]
+
+_Ham._ Indeed, vpon my sword, Indeed.
+
+_Gho._ Sweare.[2]  _Ghost cries vnder the Stage._[3]
+
+_Ham._ Ah ha boy, sayest thou so. Art thou           [Sidenote: Ha, ha,]
+there truepenny?[4] Come one you here this fellow
+                                          [Sidenote: Come on, you heare]
+in the selleredge
+Consent to sweare.
+
+_Hor._ Propose the Oath my Lord.[5]
+
+_Ham._ Neuer to speake of this that you haue seene.
+Sweare by my sword.
+
+_Gho._ Sweare.
+
+_Ham. Hic & vbique_? Then wee'l shift for grownd,  [Sidenote: shift our]
+Come hither Gentlemen,
+And lay your hands againe vpon my sword,
+Neuer to speake of this that you haue heard:[6]
+Sweare by my Sword.
+
+_Gho._ Sweare.[7]                       [Sidenote: Sweare by his sword.]
+
+_Ham._ Well said old Mole, can'st worke i'th' ground so fast?
+                                                 [Sidenote: it'h' earth]
+A worthy Pioner, once more remoue good friends.
+
+_Hor._ Oh day and night: but this is wondrous strange.
+
+_Ham._ And therefore as a stranger giue it welcome.
+There are more things in Heauen and Earth, _Horatio_,
+Then are dream't of in our Philosophy But come,      [Sidenote: in your]
+Here as before, neuer so helpe you mercy,
+How strange or odde so ere I beare my selfe;   [Sidenote: How | so mere]
+(As I perchance heereafter shall thinke meet              [Sidenote: As]
+[Sidenote: 136, 156, 178] To put an Anticke disposition on:)[8]
+                                                          [Sidenote: on]
+That you at such time seeing me, neuer shall           [Sidenote: times]
+With Armes encombred thus, or thus, head shake;
+                                                [Sidenote: or this head]
+
+[Footnote 1: He feels his honour touched.]
+
+[Footnote 2: The Ghost's interference heightens Hamlet's agitation. If
+he does not talk, laugh, jest, it will overcome him. Also he must not
+show that he believes it his father's ghost: that must be kept to
+himself--for the present at least. He shows it therefore no
+respect--treats the whole thing humorously, so avoiding, or at least
+parrying question. It is all he can do to keep the mastery of himself,
+dodging horror with half-forced, half-hysterical laughter. Yet is he all
+the time intellectually on the alert. See how, instantly active, he
+makes use of the voice from beneath to enforce his requisition of
+silence. Very speedily too he grows quiet: a glimmer of light as to the
+course of action necessary to him has begun to break upon him: it breaks
+from his own wild and disjointed behaviour in the attempt to hide the
+conflict of his feelings--which suggests to him the idea of shrouding
+himself, as did David at the court of the Philistines, in the cloak of
+madness: thereby protected from the full force of what suspicion any
+absorption of manner or outburst of feeling must occasion, he may win
+time to lay his plans. Note how, in the midst of his horror, he is yet
+able to think, plan, resolve.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _1st Q. 'The Gost under the stage.'_]
+
+[Footnote 4: While Hamlet seems to take it so coolly, the others have
+fled in terror from the spot. He goes to them. Their fear must be what,
+on the two occasions after, makes him shift to another place when the
+Ghost speaks.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Now at once he consents.]
+
+[Footnote 6: In the _Quarto_ this and the next line are transposed.]
+
+[Footnote 7: What idea is involved as the cause of the Ghost's thus
+interfering?--That he too sees what difficulties must encompass the
+carrying out of his behest, and what absolute secrecy is thereto
+essential.]
+
+[Footnote 8: This idea, hardly yet a resolve, he afterwards carries out
+so well, that he deceives not only king and queen and court, but the
+most of his critics ever since: to this day they believe him mad. Such
+must have studied in the play a phantom of their own misconception, and
+can never have seen the Hamlet of Shakspere. Thus prejudiced, they
+mistake also the effects of moral and spiritual perturbation and misery
+for further sign of intellectual disorder--even for proof of moral
+weakness, placing them in the same category with the symptoms of the
+insanity which he simulates, and by which they are deluded.]
+
+[Page 62]
+
+Or by pronouncing of some doubtfull Phrase;
+As well, we know, or we could and if we would,
+                                           [Sidenote: As well, well, we]
+Or if we list to speake; or there be and if there might,
+                                               [Sidenote: if they might]
+Or such ambiguous giuing out to note,                   [Sidenote: note]
+That you know ought of me; this not to doe:
+                                        [Sidenote: me, this doe sweare,]
+So grace and mercy at your most neede helpe you:
+Sweare.[1]
+
+_Ghost_. Sweare.[2]
+
+_Ham_. Rest, rest perturbed Spirit[3]: so Gentlemen,
+With all my loue I doe commend me to you;
+And what so poore a man as _Hamlet_ is,
+May doe t'expresse his loue and friending to you,
+God willing shall not lacke: let vs goe in together,
+And still your fingers on your lippes I pray,
+The time is out of ioynt: Oh cursed spight,[4]
+[Sidenote: 126] That euer I was borne to set it right.
+Nay, come let's goe together.         _Exeunt._[5]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+SUMMARY OF ACT I.
+
+
+This much of Hamlet we have now learned: he is a thoughtful man, a
+genuine student, little acquainted with the world save through books,
+and a lover of his kind. His university life at Wittenberg is suddenly
+interrupted by a call to the funeral of his father, whom he dearly loves
+and honours. Ere he reaches Denmark, his uncle Claudius has contrived,
+in an election (202, 250, 272) probably hastened and secretly
+influenced, to gain the voice of the representatives at least of the
+people, and ascend the throne. Hence his position must have been an
+irksome one from the first; but, within a month of his father's death,
+his mother's marriage with his uncle--a relation universally regarded as
+incestuous--plunges him in the deepest misery. The play introduces him
+at the first court held after the wedding. He is attired in the mourning
+of his father's funeral, which he had not laid aside for the wedding.
+His aspect is of absolute dejection, and he appears in a company for
+which he is so unfit only for the sake of desiring permission to leave
+the court, and go back to his studies at Wittenberg.[A] Left to himself,
+he breaks out in agonized and indignant lamentation over his mother's
+conduct, dwelling mainly on her disregard of his father's memory. Her
+conduct and his partial discovery of her character, is the sole cause of
+his misery. In such his mood, Horatio, a fellow-student, brings him word
+that his father's spirit walks at night. He watches for the Ghost, and
+receives from him a frightful report of his present condition, into
+which, he tells him, he was cast by the murderous hand of his brother,
+with whom his wife had been guilty of adultery. He enjoins him to put a
+stop to the crime in which they are now living, by taking vengeance on
+his uncle. Uncertain at the moment how to act, and dreading the
+consequences of rousing suspicion by the perturbation which he could not
+but betray, he grasps at the sudden idea of affecting madness. We have
+learned also Hamlet's relation to Ophelia, the daughter of the selfish,
+prating, busy Polonius, who, with his son Laertes, is destined to work
+out the earthly fate of Hamlet. Of Laertes, as yet, we only know that he
+prates like his father, is self-confident, and was educated at Paris,
+whither he has returned. Of Ophelia we know nothing but that she is
+gentle, and that she is fond of Hamlet, whose attentions she has
+encouraged, but with whom, upon her father's severe remonstrance, she is
+ready, outwardly at least, to break.
+
+[Footnote A: Roger Ascham, in his _Scholemaster_, if I mistake not, sets
+the age, up to which a man should be under tutors, at twenty-nine.]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'Sweare' _not in Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: They do not this time shift their ground, but swear--in
+dumb show.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --for now they had obeyed his command and sworn secrecy.]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'cursed spight'--not merely that he had been born to do
+hangman's work, but that he should have been born at all--of a mother
+whose crime against his father had brought upon him the wretched
+necessity which must proclaim her ignominy. Let the student do his best
+to realize the condition of Hamlet's heart and mind in relation to his
+mother.]
+
+[Footnote: 5 This first act occupies part of a night, a day, and part of
+the next night.]
+
+[Page 64]
+
+
+
+ACTUS SECUNDUS.[1]
+
+
+_Enter Polonius, and Reynoldo._
+                 [Sidenote: _Enter old Polonius, with his man, or two._]
+
+_Polon._ Giue him his money, and these notes _Reynoldo_.[2]
+                                                  [Sidenote: this money]
+
+_Reynol._ I will my Lord.
+
+_Polon._ You shall doe maruels wisely: good _Reynoldo_,
+                                                    [Sidenote: meruiles]
+Before you visite him you make inquiry
+                                        [Sidenote: him, to make inquire]
+Of his behauiour.[3]
+
+_Reynol._ My Lord, I did intend it.
+
+_Polon._ Marry, well said;
+Very well said. Looke you Sir,
+Enquire me first what Danskers are in Paris;
+And how, and who; what meanes; and where they keepe:
+What company, at what expence: and finding
+By this encompassement and drift of question,
+That they doe know my sonne: Come you more neerer[4]
+Then your particular demands will touch it,
+Take you as 'twere some distant knowledge of him,
+And thus I know his father and his friends,          [Sidenote: As thus]
+And in part him. Doe you marke this _Reynoldo_?
+
+_Reynol._ I, very well my Lord.
+
+_Polon._ And in part him, but you may say not well;
+But if't be hee I meane, hees very wilde;
+Addicted so and so; and there put on him
+What forgeries you please: marry, none so ranke,
+As may dishonour him; take heed of that:
+But Sir, such wanton, wild, and vsuall slips,
+As are Companions noted and most knowne
+To youth and liberty.
+
+[Footnote 1: _Not in Quarto._
+
+Between this act and the former, sufficient time has passed to allow the
+ambassadors to go to Norway and return: 74. See 138, and what Hamlet
+says of the time since his father's death, 24, by which together the
+interval _seems_ indicated as about two months, though surely so much
+time was not necessary.
+
+Cause and effect _must_ be truly presented; time and space are mere
+accidents, and of small consequence in the drama, whose very idea is
+compression for the sake of presentation. All that is necessary in
+regard to time is, that, either by the act-pause, or the intervention of
+a fresh scene, the passing of it should be indicated.
+
+This second act occupies the forenoon of one day.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _1st Q._
+
+    _Montano_, here, these letters to my sonne,
+    And this same mony with my blessing to him,
+    And bid him ply his learning good _Montano_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: The father has no confidence in the son, and rightly, for
+both are unworthy: he turns on him the cunning of the courtier, and
+sends a spy on his behaviour. The looseness of his own principles comes
+out very clear in his anxieties about his son; and, having learned the
+ideas of the father as to what becomes a gentleman, we are not surprised
+to find the son such as he afterwards shows himself. Till the end
+approaches, we hear no more of Laertes, nor is more necessary; but
+without this scene we should have been unprepared for his vileness.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _Point thus_: 'son, come you more nearer; then &c.' The
+_then_ here does not stand for _than_, and to change it to _than_ makes
+at once a contradiction. The sense is: 'Having put your general
+questions first, and been answered to your purpose, then your particular
+demands will come in, and be of service; they will reach to the
+point--_will touch it_.' The _it_ is impersonal. After it should come a
+period.]
+
+[Page 66]
+
+_Reynol._ As gaming my Lord.
+
+_Polon._ I, or drinking, fencing, swearing,
+Quarelling, drabbing. You may goe so farre.
+
+_Reynol._ My Lord that would dishonour him.
+
+_Polon._ Faith no, as you may season it in the charge;[1]
+                                                [Sidenote: Fayth as you]
+You must not put another scandall on him,
+That hee is open to Incontinencie;[2]
+That's not my meaning: but breath his faults so quaintly,
+That they may seeme the taints of liberty;
+The flash and out-breake of a fiery minde,
+A sauagenes in vnreclaim'd[3] bloud of generall assault.[4]
+
+_Reynol._ But my good Lord.[5]
+
+_Polon._ Wherefore should you doe this?[6]
+
+_Reynol._ I my Lord, I would know that.
+
+_Polon._ Marry Sir, heere's my drift,
+And I belieue it is a fetch of warrant:[7]           [Sidenote: of wit,]
+You laying these slight sulleyes[8] on my Sonne,
+                                                  [Sidenote: sallies[8]]
+As 'twere a thing a little soil'd i'th'working:
+                                        [Sidenote: soiled with working,]
+Marke you your party in conuerse; him you would sound,
+Hauing euer seene. In the prenominate crimes,   [Sidenote: seene in the]
+The youth you breath of guilty, be assur'd
+He closes with you in this consequence:
+Good sir, or so, or friend, or Gentleman.
+According to the Phrase and the Addition,[9]   [Sidenote: phrase or the]
+Of man and Country.
+
+_Reynol._ Very good my Lord.
+
+_Polon._ And then Sir does he this?
+                            [Sidenote: doos a this a doos, what was _I_]
+He does: what was I about to say?
+I was about to say somthing: where did I leaue?
+                                          [Sidenote: By the masse I was]
+
+_Reynol._ At closes in the consequence:
+At friend, or so, and Gentleman.[10]
+
+[Footnote 1: _1st Q._
+
+    I faith not a whit, no not a whit,
+
+    As you may bridle it not disparage him a iote.]
+
+[Footnote 2: This may well seem prating inconsistency, but I suppose
+means that he must not be represented as without moderation in his
+wickedness.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _Untamed_, as a hawk.]
+
+[Footnote 4: The lines are properly arranged in _Q_.
+
+    A sauagenes in vnreclamed blood,
+    Of generall assault.
+
+--that is, 'which assails all.']
+
+[Footnote 5: Here a hesitating pause.]
+
+[Footnote 6: --with the expression of, 'Is that what you would say?']
+
+[Footnote 7: 'a fetch with warrant for it'--a justifiable trick.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Compare _sallied_, 25, both Quartos; _sallets_ 67, 103; and
+see _soil'd_, next line.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'Addition,' epithet of courtesy in address.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _Q_. has not this line]
+
+[Page 68]
+
+_Polon._ At closes in the consequence, I marry,
+He closes with you thus. I know the Gentleman,
+                                             [Sidenote: He closes thus,]
+I saw him yesterday, or tother day;                 [Sidenote: th'other]
+Or then or then, with such and such; and as you say,
+                                                    [Sidenote: or such,]
+[Sidenote: 25] There was he gaming, there o'retooke in's Rouse,
+                                [Sidenote: was a gaming there, or tooke]
+There falling out at Tennis; or perchance,
+I saw him enter such a house of saile;                 [Sidenote: sale,]
+_Videlicet_, a Brothell, or so forth. See you now;
+Your bait of falshood, takes this Cape of truth;
+                                             [Sidenote: take this carpe]
+And thus doe we of wisedome and of reach[1]
+With windlesses,[2] and with assaies of Bias,
+By indirections finde directions out:
+So by my former Lecture and aduice
+Shall you my Sonne; you haue me, haue you not?
+
+_Reynol._ My Lord I haue.
+
+_Polon._ God buy you; fare you well,                 [Sidenote: ye | ye]
+
+_Reynol._ Good my Lord.
+
+_Polon._ Obserue his inclination in your selfe.[3]
+
+_Reynol._ I shall my Lord.
+
+_Polon._ And let him[4] plye his Musicke.
+
+_Reynol._ Well, my Lord.        _Exit_.
+
+_Enter Ophelia_.
+
+_Polon_. Farewell:
+How now _Ophelia_, what's the matter?
+
+_Ophe_. Alas my Lord, I haue beene so affrighted.
+                                         [Sidenote: O my Lord, my Lord,]
+
+_Polon_. With what, in the name of Heauen?
+                                           [Sidenote: i'th name of God?]
+
+_Ophe_. My Lord, as I was sowing in my Chamber,     [Sidenote: closset,]
+Lord _Hamlet_ with his doublet all vnbrac'd,[5]
+No hat vpon his head, his stockings foul'd,
+Vngartred, and downe giued[6] to his Anckle,
+Pale as his shirt, his knees knocking each other,
+And with a looke so pitious in purport,
+As if he had been loosed out of hell,
+
+[Footnote 1: of far reaching mind.]
+
+[Footnote 2: The word windlaces is explained in the dictionaries as
+_shifts, subtleties_--but apparently on the sole authority of this
+passage. There must be a figure in _windlesses_, as well as in _assaies
+of Bias_, which is a phrase plain enough to bowlers: the trying of other
+directions than that of the _jack_, in the endeavour to come at one with
+the law of the bowl's bias. I find _wanlass_ a term in hunting: it had
+to do with driving game to a given point--whether in part by getting to
+windward of it, I cannot tell. The word may come of the verb wind, from
+its meaning '_to manage by shifts or expedients_': _Barclay_. As he has
+spoken of fishing, could the _windlesses_ refer to any little instrument
+such as now used upon a fishing-rod? I do not think it. And how do the
+words _windlesses_ and _indirections_ come together? Was a windless some
+contrivance for determining how the wind blew? I bethink me that a thin
+withered straw is in Scotland called a _windlestrae_: perhaps such
+straws were thrown up to find out 'by indirection' the direction of the
+wind.
+
+The press-reader sends me two valuable quotations, through Latham's
+edition of Johnson's Dictionary, from Dr. H. Hammond (1605-1660), in
+which _windlass_ is used as a verb:--
+
+'A skilful woodsman, by windlassing, presently gets a shoot, which,
+without taking a compass, and thereby a commodious stand, he could never
+have obtained.'
+
+'She is not so much at leasure as to windlace, or use craft, to satisfy
+them.'
+
+To _windlace_ seems then to mean 'to steal along to leeward;' would it
+be absurd to suggest that, so-doing, the hunter _laces the wind_?
+Shakspere, with many another, I fancy, speaks of _threading the night_
+or _the darkness_.
+
+Johnson explains the word in the text as 'A handle by which anything is
+turned.']
+
+[Footnote 3: 'in your selfe.' may mean either 'through the insight
+afforded by your own feelings'; or 'in respect of yourself,' 'toward
+yourself.' I do not know which is intended.]
+
+[Footnote 4: 1st Q. 'And bid him'.]
+
+[Footnote 5: loose; _undone_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: His stockings, slipped down in wrinkles round his ankles,
+suggested the rings of _gyves_ or fetters. The verb _gyve_, of which the
+passive participle is here used, is rarer.]
+
+[Page 70]
+
+To speake of horrors: he comes before me.
+
+_Polon._ Mad for thy Loue?
+
+_Ophe._ My Lord, I doe not know: but truly I do feare it.[1]
+
+_Polon._ What said he?
+
+_Ophe._[2] He tooke me by the wrist, and held me hard;
+Then goes he to the length of all his arme;
+And with his other hand thus o're his brow,
+He fals to such perusall of my face,
+As he would draw it. Long staid he so,                  [Sidenote: As a]
+At last, a little shaking of mine Arme:
+And thrice his head thus wauing vp and downe;
+He rais'd a sigh, so pittious and profound,
+That it did seeme to shatter all his bulke,            [Sidenote: As it]
+And end his being. That done, he lets me goe,
+And with his head ouer his shoulders turn'd,        [Sidenote: shoulder]
+He seem'd to finde his way without his eyes,
+For out adores[3] he went without their helpe;        [Sidenote: helps,]
+And to the last, bended their light on me.
+
+_Polon._ Goe with me, I will goe seeke the King,   [Sidenote: Come, goe]
+This is the very extasie of Loue,
+Whose violent property foredoes[4] it selfe,
+And leads the will to desperate Vndertakings,
+As oft as any passion vnder Heauen,                 [Sidenote: passions]
+That does afflict our Natures. I am sorrie,
+What haue you giuen him any hard words of late?
+
+_Ophe_. No my good Lord: but as you did command,
+[Sidenote: 42, 82] I did repell his Letters, and deny'de
+His accesse to me.[5]
+
+_Pol_. That hath made him mad.
+I am sorrie that with better speed and Judgement
+                                                [Sidenote: better heede]
+[Sidenote: 83] I had not quoted[6] him. I feare he did but trifle,
+                                           [Sidenote: coted[6] | fear'd]
+And meant to wracke thee: but beshrew my iealousie:
+
+[Footnote 1: She would be glad her father should think so.]
+
+[Footnote 2: The detailed description of Hamlet and his behaviour that
+follows, must be introduced in order that the side mirror of narrative
+may aid the front mirror of drama, and between them be given a true
+notion of his condition both mental and bodily. Although weeks have
+passed since his interview with the Ghost, he is still haunted with the
+memory of it, still broods over its horrible revelation. That he had,
+probably soon, begun to feel far from certain of the truth of the
+apparition, could not make the thoughts and questions it had awaked,
+cease tormenting his whole being. The stifling smoke of his mother's
+conduct had in his mind burst into loathsome flame, and through her he
+has all but lost his faith in humanity. To know his uncle a villain, was
+to know his uncle a villain; to know his mother false, was to doubt
+women, doubt the whole world.
+
+In the meantime Ophelia, in obedience to her father, and evidently
+without reason assigned, has broken off communication with him: he reads
+her behaviour by the lurid light of his mother's. She too is false! she
+too is heartless! he can look to her for no help! She has turned against
+him to curry favour with his mother and his uncle!
+
+Can she be such as his mother! Why should she not be? His mother had
+seemed as good! He would give his life to know her honest and pure.
+Might he but believe her what he had believed her, he would yet have a
+hiding-place from the wind, a covert from the tempest! If he could but
+know the truth! Alone with her once more but for a moment, he would read
+her very soul by the might of his! He must see her! He would see her! In
+the agony of a doubt upon which seemed to hang the bliss or bale of his
+being, yet not altogether unintimidated by a sense of his intrusion, he
+walks into the house of Polonius, and into the chamber of Ophelia.
+
+Ever since the night of the apparition, the court, from the behaviour
+assumed by Hamlet, has believed his mind affected; and when he enters
+her room, Ophelia, though such is the insight of love that she is able
+to read in the face of the son the father's purgatorial sufferings, the
+picture of one 'loosed out of hell, to speak of horrors,' attributes all
+the strangeness of his appearance and demeanour, such as she describes
+them to her father, to that supposed fact. But there is, in truth, as
+little of affected as of actual madness in his behaviour in her
+presence. When he comes before her pale and trembling, speechless and
+with staring eyes, it is with no simulated insanity, but in the agonized
+hope, scarce distinguishable from despair, of finding, in the testimony
+of her visible presence, an assurance that the doubts ever tearing his
+spirit and sickening his brain, are but the offspring of his phantasy.
+There she sits!--and there he stands, vainly endeavouring through her
+eyes to read her soul! for, alas,
+
+                    there's no art
+    To find the mind's construction in the face!
+
+--until at length, finding himself utterly baffled, but unable, save by
+the removal of his person, to take his eyes from her face, he retires
+speechless as he came. Such is the man whom we are now to see wandering
+about the halls and corridors of the great castle-palace.
+
+He may by this time have begun to doubt even the reality of the sight he
+had seen. The moment the pressure of a marvellous presence is removed,
+it is in the nature of man the same moment to begin to doubt; and
+instead of having any reason to wish the apparition a true one, he had
+every reason to desire to believe it an illusion or a lying spirit.
+Great were his excuse even if he forced likelihoods, and suborned
+witnesses in the court of his own judgment. To conclude it false was to
+think his father in heaven, and his mother not an adulteress, not a
+murderess! At once to kill his uncle would be to seal these horrible
+things irrevocable, indisputable facts. Strongest reasons he had for not
+taking immediate action in vengeance; but no smallest incapacity for
+action had share in his delay. The Poet takes recurrent pains, as if he
+foresaw hasty conclusions, to show his hero a man of promptitude, with
+this truest fitness for action, that he would not make unlawful haste.
+Without sufficing assurance, he would have no part in the fate either of
+the uncle he disliked or the mother he loved.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _a doors_, like _an end_. 51, 175.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _undoes, frustrates, destroys_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: See quotation from _1st Quarto,_ 43.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _Quoted_ or _coted: observed_; Fr. _coter_, to mark the
+number. Compare 95.]
+
+[Page 72]
+
+It seemes it is as proper to our Age,        [Sidenote: By heauen it is]
+To cast beyond our selues[1] in our Opinions,
+As it is common for the yonger sort
+To lacke discretion.[2] Come, go we to the King,
+This must be knowne, which being kept close might moue
+More greefe to hide, then hate to vtter loue.[3]       [Sidenote: Come.]
+                                     _Exeunt._
+
+
+_SCENA SECUNDA._[4]
+
+
+_Enter King, Queene, Rosincrane, and Guildensterne Cum alijs.
+               [Sidenote: Florish: Enter King and Queene, Rosencraus and
+                                                      Guyldensterne.[5]]
+
+_King._ Welcome deere _Rosincrance_ and _Guildensterne_.
+Moreouer,[6] that we much did long to see you,
+The neede we haue to vse you, did prouoke
+[Sidenote: 92] Our hastie sending.[7] Something haue you heard
+Of _Hamlets_ transformation: so I call it,           [Sidenote: so call]
+Since not th'exterior, nor the inward man           [Sidenote: Sith nor]
+Resembles that it was. What it should bee
+More then his Fathers death, that thus hath put him
+So much from th'understanding of himselfe,
+I cannot deeme of.[8] I intreat you both,             [Sidenote: dreame]
+That being of so young dayes[9] brought vp with him:
+And since so Neighbour'd to[10] his youth,and humour,
+                                      [Sidenote: And sith | and hauior,]
+That you vouchsafe your rest heere in our Court
+Some little time: so by your Companies
+To draw him on to pleasures, and to gather
+[Sidenote: 116] So much as from Occasions you may gleane,
+                                                    [Sidenote: occasion]
+[A]
+That open'd lies within our remedie.[11]
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+Whether ought to vs vnknowne afflicts him thus,]
+
+[Footnote 1:
+
+    'to be overwise--to overreach ourselves'
+    'ambition, which o'erleaps itself,'
+    --_Macbeth_, act i. sc. 7.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Polonius is a man of faculty. His courtier-life, his
+self-seeking, his vanity, have made and make him the fool he is.]
+
+[Footnote 3: He hopes now to get his daughter married to the prince.
+
+We have here a curious instance of Shakspere's not unfrequently
+excessive condensation. Expanded, the clause would be like this: 'which,
+being kept close, might move more grief by the hiding of love, than to
+utter love might move hate:' the grief in the one case might be greater
+than the hate in the other would be. It verges on confusion, and may not
+be as Shakspere wrote it, though it is like his way.
+
+_1st Q._
+
+    Lets to the king, this madnesse may prooue,
+    Though wilde a while, yet more true to thy loue.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 5: _Q._ has not _Cum alijs._]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'Moreover that &c.': _moreover_ is here used as a
+preposition, with the rest of the clause for its objective.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Rosincrance and Guildensterne are, from the first and
+throughout, the creatures of the king.]
+
+[Footnote 8: The king's conscience makes him suspicious of Hamlet's
+suspicion.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'from such an early age'.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'since then so familiar with'.]
+
+[Footnote 11: 'to gather as much as you may glean from opportunities, of
+that which, when disclosed to us, will lie within our remedial power.'
+If the line of the Quarto be included, it makes plainer construction.
+The line beginning with '_So much_,' then becomes parenthetical, and _to
+gather_ will not immediately govern that line, but the rest of the
+sentence.]
+
+[Page 74]
+
+_Qu._ Good Gentlemen, he hath much talk'd of you,
+And sure I am, two men there are not liuing,    [Sidenote: there is not]
+To whom he more adheres. If it will please you
+To shew vs so much Gentrie,[1] and good will,
+As to expend your time with vs a-while,
+For the supply and profit of our Hope,[2]
+Your Visitation shall receiue such thankes
+As fits a Kings remembrance.
+
+_Rosin._ Both your Maiesties
+Might by the Soueraigne power you haue of vs,
+Put your dread pleasures, more into Command
+Then to Entreatie,
+
+_Guil._ We both[3] obey,                              [Sidenote: But we]
+And here giue vp our selues, in the full bent,[4]
+To lay our Seruices freely at your feete,            [Sidenote: seruice]
+To be commanded.
+
+_King._ Thankes _Rosincrance_, and gentle _Guildensterne_.
+
+_Qu._ Thankes _Guildensterne_ and gentle _Rosincrance_,[5]
+And I beseech you instantly to visit
+My too much changed Sonne.
+Go some of ye,                                           [Sidenote: you]
+And bring the Gentlemen where _Hamlet_ is,       [Sidenote: bring these]
+
+_Guil._ Heauens make our presence and our practises
+Pleasant and helpfull to him.          _Exit_[6]
+
+_Queene._ Amen.               [Sidenote: Amen. _Exeunt Ros. and Guyld._]
+
+_Enter Polonius._
+
+[Sidenote: 18] _Pol._ Th'Ambassadors from Norwey, my good Lord,
+Are ioyfully return'd.
+
+[Footnote 1: gentleness, grace, favour.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Their hope in Hamlet, as their son and heir.]
+
+[Footnote 3: both majesties.]
+
+[Footnote 4: If we put a comma after _bent_, the phrase will mean 'in
+the full _purpose_ or _design_ to lay our services &c.' Without the
+comma, the content of the phrase would be general:--'in the devoted
+force of our faculty.' The latter is more like Shakspere.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Is there not tact intended in the queen's reversal of her
+husband's arrangement of the two names--that each might have precedence,
+and neither take offence?]
+
+[Footnote 6: _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Page 76]
+
+_King._ Thou still hast bin the Father of good Newes.
+
+_Pol._ Haue I, my Lord?[1] Assure you, my good Liege,
+                                                 [Sidenote: I assure my]
+I hold my dutie, as I hold my Soule,
+Both to my God, one to my gracious King:[2]   [Sidenote: God, and to[2]]
+And I do thinke, or else this braine of mine
+Hunts not the traile of Policie, so sure
+As I haue vs'd to do: that I haue found          [Sidenote: it hath vsd]
+The very cause of _Hamlets_ Lunacie.
+
+_King._ Oh speake of that, that I do long to heare.
+                                                  [Sidenote: doe I long]
+
+_Pol._ Giue first admittance to th'Ambassadors,
+My Newes shall be the Newes to that great Feast,
+                                          [Sidenote: the fruite to that]
+
+_King._ Thy selfe do grace to them, and bring them in.
+He tels me my sweet Queene, that he hath found
+                                        [Sidenote: my deere Gertrard he]
+The head[3] and sourse of all your Sonnes distemper.
+
+_Qu._ I doubt it is no other, but the maine,
+His Fathers death, and our o're-hasty Marriage.[4]
+                                                  [Sidenote: our hastie]
+
+_Enter Polonius, Voltumand, and Cornelius._
+                                        [Sidenote: _Enter_ Embassadors.]
+
+_King._ Well, we shall sift him. Welcome good Frends:
+                                                     [Sidenote: my good]
+Say _Voltumand_, what from our Brother Norwey?
+
+_Volt._ Most faire returne of Greetings, and Desires.
+Vpon our first,[5] he sent out to suppresse
+His Nephewes Leuies, which to him appear'd
+To be a preparation 'gainst the Poleak:            [Sidenote: Pollacke,]
+But better look'd into, he truly found
+It was against your Highnesse, whereat greeued,
+That so his Sicknesse, Age, and Impotence
+Was falsely borne in hand,[6] sends[7] out Arrests
+On _Fortinbras_, which he (in breefe) obeyes,
+
+[Footnote 1: To be spoken triumphantly, but in the peculiar tone of one
+thinking, 'You little know what better news I have behind!']
+
+[Footnote 2: I cannot tell which is the right reading; if the _Q.'s_, it
+means, '_I hold my duty precious as my soul, whether to my God or my
+king_'; if the _F.'s_, it is a little confused by the attempt of
+Polonius to make a fine euphuistic speech:--'_I hold my duty as I hold
+my soul,--both at the command of my God, one at the command of my
+king_.']
+
+[Footnote 3: the spring; the river-head
+
+    'The spring, the head, the fountain of your blood'
+
+    _Macbeth,_ act ii. sc. 3.]
+
+[Footnote 4: She goes a step farther than the king in accounting for
+Hamlet's misery--knows there is more cause of it yet, but hopes he does
+not know so much cause for misery as he might know.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Either 'first' stands for _first desire_, or it is a noun,
+and the meaning of the phrase is, 'The instant we mentioned the
+matter'.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'borne in hand'--played with, taken advantage of.
+
+    'How you were borne in hand, how cross'd,'
+
+    _Macbeth,_ act iii. sc. 1.]
+
+[Footnote 7: The nominative pronoun was not _quite_ indispensable to the
+verb in Shakspere's time.]
+
+[Page 78]
+
+Receiues rebuke from Norwey: and in fine,
+Makes Vow before his Vnkle, neuer more
+To giue th'assay of Armes against your Maiestie.
+Whereon old Norwey, ouercome with ioy,
+Giues him three thousand Crownes in Annuall Fee,
+                                         [Sidenote: threescore thousand]
+And his Commission to imploy those Soldiers
+So leuied as before, against the Poleak:           [Sidenote: Pollacke,]
+With an intreaty heerein further shewne,
+[Sidenote: 190] That it might please you to giue quiet passe
+Through your Dominions, for his Enterprize,         [Sidenote: for this]
+On such regards of safety and allowance,
+As therein are set downe.
+
+_King_. It likes vs well:
+And at our more consider'd[1] time wee'l read,
+Answer, and thinke vpon this Businesse.
+Meane time we thanke you, for your well-tooke Labour.
+Go to your rest, at night wee'l Feast together.[2]
+Most welcome home.       _Exit Ambass_.
+                                          [Sidenote: Exeunt Embassadors]
+
+_Pol_. This businesse is very well ended.[3]         [Sidenote: is well]
+My Liege, and Madam, to expostulate[4]
+What Maiestie should be, what Dutie is,[5]
+Why day is day; night, night; and time is time,
+Were nothing but to waste Night, Day and Time.
+Therefore, since Breuitie is the Soule of Wit,
+                                          [Sidenote: Therefore breuitie]
+And tediousnesse, the limbes and outward flourishes,[6]
+I will be breefe. Your Noble Sonne is mad:
+Mad call I it; for to define true Madnesse,
+What is't, but to be nothing else but mad.[7]
+But let that go.
+
+_Qu_. More matter, with lesse Art.[8]
+
+_Pol_. Madam, I sweare I vse no Art at all:
+That he is mad, 'tis true: 'Tis true 'tis pittie,  [Sidenote: hee's mad]
+And pittie it is true; A foolish figure,[9]
+                                         [Sidenote: pitty tis tis true,]
+
+[Footnote 1: time given up to, or filled with consideration; _or,
+perhaps_, time chosen for a purpose.]
+
+[Footnote 2: He is always feasting.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Now for _his_ turn! He sets to work at once with his
+rhetoric.]
+
+[Footnote 4: to lay down beforehand as postulates.]
+
+[Footnote 5: We may suppose a dash and pause after '_Dutie is_'. The
+meaning is plain enough, though logical form is wanting.]
+
+[Footnote 6: As there is no imagination in Polonius, we cannot look for
+great aptitude in figure.]
+
+[Footnote 7: The nature of madness also is a postulate.]
+
+[Footnote 8: She is impatient, but wraps her rebuke in a compliment.
+Art, so-called, in speech, was much favoured in the time of Elizabeth.
+And as a compliment Polonius takes the form in which she expresses her
+dislike of his tediousness, and her anxiety after his news: pretending
+to wave it off, he yet, in his gratification, coming on the top of his
+excitement with the importance of his fancied discovery, plunges
+immediately into a very slough of _art_, and becomes absolutely silly.]
+
+[Footnote 9: It is no figure at all. It is hardly even a play with the
+words.]
+
+[Page 80]
+
+But farewell it: for I will vse no Art.
+Mad let vs grant him then: and now remaines
+That we finde out the cause of this effect,
+Or rather say, the cause of this defect;
+For this effect defectiue, comes by cause,
+Thus it remaines, and the remainder thus. Perpend,
+I haue a daughter: haue, whil'st she is mine,          [Sidenote: while]
+Who in her Dutie and Obedience, marke,
+Hath giuen me this: now gather, and surmise.
+
+                   _The Letter_.[1]
+_To the Celestiall, and my Soules Idoll, the most
+                   beautified Ophelia_.
+That's an ill Phrase, a vilde Phrase, beautified
+is a vilde Phrase: but you shall heare these in her thus in her
+excellent white bosome, these.[2]                  [Sidenote: these, &c]
+
+_Qu_. Came this from _Hamlet_ to her.
+
+_Pol_. Good Madam stay awhile, I will be faithfull.
+_Doubt thou, the Starres are fire_,                 [Sidenote: _Letter_]
+_Doubt, that the Sunne doth moue;
+Doubt Truth to be a Lier,
+But neuer Doubt, I loue.[3]
+O deere Ophelia, I am ill at these Numbers: I
+haue not Art to reckon my grones; but that I loue
+thee best, oh most Best beleeue it. Adieu.
+          Thine euermore most deere Lady, whilst this
+                  Machine is to him_, Hamlet.
+This in Obedience hath my daughter shew'd me:
+                                          [Sidenote: _Pol_. This showne]
+And more aboue hath his soliciting,   [Sidenote: more about solicitings]
+As they fell out by Time, by Meanes, and Place,
+All giuen to mine eare.
+
+_King_. But how hath she receiu'd his Loue?
+
+_Pol_. What do you thinke of me?
+
+_King_. As of a man, faithfull and Honourable.
+
+_Pol_. I wold faine proue so. But what might you think?
+
+[Footnote 1: _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 2: _Point thus_: 'but you shall heare. _These, in her
+excellent white bosom, these_:'
+
+Ladies, we are informed, wore a small pocket in front of the
+bodice;--but to accept the fact as an explanation of this passage, is to
+cast the passage away. Hamlet _addresses_ his letter, not to Ophelia's
+pocket, but to Ophelia herself, at her house--that is, in the palace of
+her bosom, excellent in whiteness. In like manner, signing himself, he
+makes mention of his body as a machine of which he has the use for a
+time. So earnest is Hamlet that when he makes love, he is the more a
+philosopher. But he is more than a philosopher: he is a man of the
+Universe, not a man of this world only.
+
+We must not allow the fashion of the time in which the play was written,
+to cause doubt as to the genuine heartiness of Hamlet's love-making.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _1st Q._
+
+    Doubt that in earth is fire,
+    Doubt that the starres doe moue,
+    Doubt trueth to be a liar,
+    But doe not doubt I loue.]
+
+[Page 82]
+
+When I had seene this hot loue on the wing,
+As I perceiued it, I must tell you that
+Before my Daughter told me, what might you
+Or my deere Maiestie your Queene heere, think,
+If I had playd the Deske or Table-booke,[1]
+Or giuen my heart a winking, mute and dumbe,         [Sidenote: working]
+Or look'd vpon this Loue, with idle sight,[2]
+What might you thinke? No, I went round to worke,
+And (my yong Mistris) thus I did bespeake[3]
+Lord _Hamlet_ is a Prince out of thy Starre,[4]
+This must not be:[5] and then, I Precepts gaue her,
+                                                [Sidenote: I prescripts]
+That she should locke her selfe from his Resort,    [Sidenote: from her]
+[Sidenote: 42[6], 43, 70] Admit no Messengers, receiue no Tokens:
+Which done, she tooke the Fruites of my Aduice,[7]
+And he repulsed. A short Tale to make,           [Sidenote: repell'd, a]
+Fell into a Sadnesse, then into a Fast,[8]
+Thence to a Watch, thence into a Weaknesse,       [Sidenote: to a wath,]
+Thence to a Lightnesse, and by this declension   [Sidenote: to lightnes]
+Into the Madnesse whereon now he raues,              [Sidenote: wherein]
+And all we waile for.[9]                          [Sidenote: mourne for]
+
+_King_. Do you thinke 'tis this?[10]            [Sidenote: thinke this?]
+
+_Qu_. It may be very likely.                            [Sidenote: like]
+
+_Pol_. Hath there bene such a time, I'de fain know that,
+                                                     [Sidenote: I would]
+That I haue possitiuely said, 'tis so,
+When it prou'd otherwise?
+
+_King_. Not that I know.
+
+_Pol_. Take this from this[11]; if this be otherwise,
+If Circumstances leade me, I will finde
+Where truth is hid, though it were hid indeede
+Within the Center.
+
+_King_. How may we try it further?
+
+[Footnote 1: --behaved like a piece of furniture.]
+
+[Footnote 2: The love of talk makes a man use many idle words, foolish
+expressions, and useless repetitions.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Notwithstanding the parenthesis, I take 'Mistris' to be the
+objective to 'bespeake'--that is, _address_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _Star_, mark of sort or quality; brand (45). The _1st Q_.
+goes on--
+
+    An'd one that is vnequall for your loue:
+
+But it may mean, as suggested by my _Reader_, 'outside thy destiny,'--as
+ruled by the star of nativity--and I think it does.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Here is a change from the impression conveyed in the first
+act: he attributes his interference to his care for what befitted
+royalty; whereas, talking to Ophelia (40, 72), he attributes it entirely
+to his care for her;--so partly in the speech correspondent to the
+present in _1st Q_.:--
+
+    Now since which time, seeing his loue thus cross'd,
+    Which I tooke to be idle, and but sport,
+    He straitway grew into a melancholy,]
+
+[Footnote 6: See also passage in note from _1st Q_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: She obeyed him. The 'fruits' of his advice were her
+conformed actions.]
+
+[Footnote 8: When the appetite goes, and the sleep follows, doubtless
+the man is on the steep slope of madness. But as to Hamlet, and how
+matters were with him, what Polonius says is worth nothing.]
+
+[Footnote 9: '_wherein_ now he raves, and _wherefor_ all we wail.']
+
+[Footnote 10: _To the queen_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: head from shoulders.]
+
+[Page 84]
+
+_Pol_. You know sometimes
+He walkes foure houres together, heere[1]
+In the Lobby.
+
+_Qu_. So he ha's indeed.                    [Sidenote: he dooes indeede]
+
+[Sidenote: 118] _Pol_. At such a time Ile loose my Daughter to him,
+Be you and I behinde an Arras then,
+Marke the encounter: If he loue her not,
+And be not from his reason falne thereon;
+Let me be no Assistant for a State,
+And keepe a Farme and Carters.                     [Sidenote: But keepe]
+
+_King_. We will try it.
+
+_Enter Hamlet reading on a Booke._[2]
+
+_Qu_. But looke where sadly the poore wretch
+Comes reading.[3]
+
+_Pol_. Away I do beseech you, both away,
+He boord[4] him presently.        _Exit King & Queen_[5]
+Oh giue me leaue.[6] How does my good Lord _Hamlet_?
+
+_Ham_. Well, God-a-mercy.
+
+_Pol_. Do you know me, my Lord?
+
+[Sidenote: 180] _Ham_. Excellent, excellent well: y'are a
+Fish-monger.[7]                      [Sidenote: Excellent well, you are]
+
+_Pol_. Not I my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Then I would you were so honest a man.
+
+_Pol_. Honest, my Lord?
+
+_Ham_. I sir, to be honest as this world goes, is
+to bee one man pick'd out of two thousand.
+                                           [Sidenote: tenne thousand[8]]
+
+_Pol_. That's very true, my Lord.
+
+_Ham_.[9] For if the Sun breed Magots in a dead
+dogge, being a good kissing Carrion--[10]      [Sidenote: carrion. Have]
+Haue you a daughter?[11]
+
+_Pol_. I haue my Lord.
+
+[Footnote 1: _1st Q_.
+
+    The Princes walke is here in the galery,
+    There let _Ofelia_, walke vntill hee comes:
+    Your selfe and I will stand close in the study,]
+
+[Footnote 2: _Not in Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _1st Q_.--
+
+    _King_. See where hee comes poring vppon a booke.]
+
+[Footnote 4: The same as accost, both meaning originally _go to the side
+of_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _A line back in the Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'Please you to go away.' 89, 203. Here should come the
+preceding stage-direction.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Now first the Play shows us Hamlet in his affected madness.
+He has a great dislike to the selfish, time-serving courtier, who, like
+his mother, has forsaken the memory of his father--and a great distrust
+of him as well. The two men are moral antipodes. Each is given to
+moralizing--but compare their reflections: those of Polonius reveal a
+lover of himself, those of Hamlet a lover of his kind; Polonius is
+interested in success; Hamlet in humanity.]
+
+[Footnote 8: So also in _1st Q_.]
+
+[Footnote 9: --reading, or pretending to read, the words from the book
+he carries.]
+
+[Footnote 10: When the passion for emendation takes possession of a man,
+his opportunities are endless--so many seeming emendations offer
+themselves which are in themselves not bad, letters and words affording
+as much play as the keys of a piano. 'Being a god kissing carrion,' is
+in itself good enough; but Shakspere meant what stands in both Quarto
+and Folio: _the dead dog being a carrion good at kissing_. The arbitrary
+changes of the editors are amazing.]
+
+[Footnote 11: He cannot help his mind constantly turning upon women; and
+if his thoughts of them are often cruelly false, it is not Hamlet but
+his mother who is to blame: her conduct has hurled him from the peak of
+optimism into the bottomless pool of pessimistic doubt, above the foul
+waters of which he keeps struggling to lift his head.]
+
+[Page 86]
+
+_Ham_. Let her not walke i'th'Sunne: Conception[1]
+is a blessing, but not as your daughter may      [Sidenote: but as your]
+conceiue. Friend looke too't.
+
+[Sidenote: 100] _Pol_.[2] How say you by that? Still harping on
+my daughter: yet he knew me not at first; he said   [Sidenote: a sayd I]
+I was a Fishmonger: he is farre gone, farre gone:
+                      [Sidenote: Fishmonger, a is farre gone, and truly]
+and truly in my youth, I suffred much extreamity and truly
+for loue: very neere this.  Ile speake to him
+againe.
+
+What do you read my Lord?
+
+_Ham_. Words, words, words.
+
+_Pol_. What is the matter, my Lord?
+
+_Ham_. Betweene who?[3]
+
+_Pol_. I meane the matter you meane, my
+                                    [Sidenote: matter that you reade my]
+Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Slanders Sir: for the Satyricall slaue
+                                      [Sidenote: satericall rogue sayes]
+saies here, that old men haue gray Beards; that
+their faces are wrinkled; their eyes purging thicke
+Amber, or Plum-Tree Gumme: and that they haue     [Sidenote: Amber, and]
+a plentifull locke of Wit, together with weake
+                                     [Sidenote: lacke | with most weake]
+Hammes. All which Sir, though I most powerfully,
+and potently beleeue; yet I holde it not
+Honestie[4] to haue it thus set downe: For you
+                  [Sidenote: for your selfe sir shall grow old as I am:]
+your selfe Sir, should be old as I am, if like a Crab
+you could go backward.
+
+_Pol_.[5] Though this be madnesse,
+Yet there is Method in't: will you walke
+Out of the ayre[6] my Lord?
+
+_Ham_. Into my Graue?
+
+_Pol_. Indeed that is out o'th'Ayre:
+                                     [Sidenote: that's out of the ayre;]
+How pregnant (sometimes) his Replies are?
+A happinesse,
+That often Madnesse hits on,
+Which Reason and Sanitie could not                  [Sidenote: sanctity]
+So prosperously be deliuer'd of.
+
+[Footnote 1: One of the meanings of the word, and more in use then than
+now, is _understanding_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: (_aside_).]
+
+[Footnote 3: --pretending to take him to mean by _matter_, the _point of
+quarrel_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Propriety.]
+
+[Footnote 5: (_aside_).]
+
+[Footnote 6: the draught.]
+
+[Page 88]
+
+[A] I will leaue him,
+And sodainely contriue the meanes of meeting
+Betweene him,[1] and my daughter.
+My Honourable Lord, I will most humbly
+Take my leaue of you.
+
+_Ham_. You cannot Sir take from[2] me any thing,
+that I will more willingly part withall, except my
+                          [Sidenote: will not more | my life, except my]
+life, my life.[3]
+                      [Sidenote: _Enter Guyldersterne, and Rosencrans_.]
+
+_Polon_. Fare you well my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. These tedious old fooles.
+
+_Polon_. You goe to seeke my Lord _Hamlet_;         [Sidenote: the Lord]
+there hee is.
+
+_Enter Rosincran and Guildensterne_.[4]
+
+_Rosin_. God saue you Sir.
+
+_Guild_. Mine honour'd Lord?
+
+_Rosin_. My most deare Lord?
+
+_Ham_. My excellent good friends? How do'st   [Sidenote: My extent good]
+thou _Guildensterne_? Oh, _Rosincrane_; good Lads:
+                                                [Sidenote: A Rosencraus]
+How doe ye both?                                         [Sidenote: you]
+
+_Rosin_. As the indifferent Children of the earth.
+
+_Guild_. Happy, in that we are not ouer-happy: [Sidenote: euer happy on]
+on Fortunes Cap, we are not the very Button.  [Sidenote:  Fortunes lap,]
+
+_Ham_. Nor the Soales of her Shoo?
+
+_Rosin_. Neither my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Then you liue about her waste, or in the
+middle of her fauour?                                [Sidenote: fauors.]
+
+_Guil_. Faith, her priuates, we.
+
+_Ham_. In the secret parts of Fortune? Oh,
+most true: she is a Strumpet.[5] What's the newes?
+                                                 [Sidenote: What newes?]
+
+_Rosin_. None my Lord; but that the World's          [Sidenote: but the]
+growne honest.
+
+_Ham_. Then is Doomesday neere: But your
+
+[Footnote A: _In the Quarto, the speech ends thus_:--I will leaue him
+and my daughter.[6] My Lord, I will take my leaue of you.]
+
+[Footnote 1: From 'And sodainely' _to_ 'betweene him,' _not in Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: It is well here to recall the modes of the word _leave_:
+'_Give me leave_,' Polonius says with proper politeness to the king and
+queen when he wants _them_ to go--that is, 'Grant me your _departure_';
+but he would, going himself, _take_ his leave, his departure, _of_ or
+_from_ them--by their permission to go. Hamlet means, 'You cannot take
+from me anything I will more willingly part with than your leave, or, my
+permission to you to go.' 85, 203. See the play on the two meanings of
+the word in _Twelfth Night_, act ii. sc. 4:
+
+    _Duke_. Give me now leave to leave thee;
+
+though I suspect it ought to be--
+
+    _Duke_. Give me now leave.
+
+    _Clown_. To leave thee!--Now, the melancholy &c.]
+
+[Footnote 3: It is a relief to him to speak the truth under the cloak of
+madness--ravingly. He has no one to whom to open his heart: what lies
+there he feels too terrible for even the eye of Horatio. He has not
+apparently told him as yet more than the tale of his father's murder.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _Above, in Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: In this and all like utterances of Hamlet, we see what worm
+it is that lies gnawing at his heart.]
+
+[Footnote 6: This is a slip in the _Quarto_--rectified in the _Folio_:
+his daughter was not present.]
+
+[Page 90]
+
+newes is not true.[1] [2] Let me question more in particular:
+what haue you my good friends, deserued
+at the hands of Fortune, that she sends you to
+Prison hither?
+
+_Guil_. Prison, my Lord?
+
+_Ham_. Denmark's a Prison.
+
+_Rosin_. Then is the World one.
+
+_Ham_. A goodly one, in which there are many
+Confines, Wards, and Dungeons; _Denmarke_ being
+one o'th'worst.
+
+_Rosin_. We thinke not so my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Why then 'tis none to you; for there is
+nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it
+so[3]: to me it is a prison.
+
+_Rosin_. Why then your Ambition makes it one:
+'tis too narrow for your minde.[4]
+
+_Ham_. O God, I could be bounded in a nutshell,
+and count my selfe a King of infinite space; were
+it not that I haue bad dreames.
+
+_Guil_. Which dreames indeed are Ambition:
+for the very substance[5] of the Ambitious, is meerely
+the shadow of a Dreame.
+
+_Ham_. A dreame it selfe is but a shadow.
+
+_Rosin_. Truely, and I hold Ambition of so ayry
+and light a quality, that it is but a shadowes shadow.
+
+_Ham_. Then are our Beggers bodies; and our
+Monarchs and out-stretcht Heroes the Beggers
+Shadowes: shall wee to th'Court: for, by my fey[6]
+I cannot reason?[7]
+
+_Both_. Wee'l wait vpon you.
+
+_Ham_. No such matter.[8] I will not sort you
+with the rest of my seruants: for to speake to you
+like an honest man: I am most dreadfully attended;[9]
+but in the beaten way of friendship,[10]              [Sidenote: But in]
+
+What make you at _Elsonower_?
+
+[Footnote 1: 'it is not true that the world is grown honest': he doubts
+themselves. His eye is sharper because his heart is sorer since he left
+Wittenberg. He proceeds to examine them.]
+
+[Footnote 2: This passage, beginning with 'Let me question,' and ending
+with 'dreadfully attended,' is not in the _Quarto_.
+
+Who inserted in the Folio this and other passages? Was it or was it not
+Shakspere? Beyond a doubt they are Shakspere's all. Then who omitted
+those omitted? Was Shakspere incapable of refusing any of his own work?
+Or would these editors, who profess to have all opportunity, and who,
+belonging to the theatre, must have had the best of opportunities, have
+desired or dared to omit what far more painstaking editors have since
+presumed, though out of reverence, to restore?]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'but it is thinking that makes it so:']
+
+[Footnote 4: --feeling after the cause of Hamlet's strangeness, and
+following the readiest suggestion, that of chagrin at missing the
+succession.]
+
+[Footnote 5: objects and aims.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _foi_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Does he choose beggars as the representatives of substance
+because they lack ambition--that being shadow? Or does he take them as
+the shadows of humanity, that, following Rosincrance, he may get their
+shadows, the shadows therefore of shadows, to parallel _monarchs_ and
+_heroes_? But he is not satisfied with his own analogue--therefore will
+to the court, where good logic is not wanted--where indeed he knows a
+hellish lack of reason.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'On no account.']
+
+[Footnote 9: 'I have very bad servants.' Perhaps he judges his servants
+spies upon him. Or might he mean that he was _haunted with bad
+thoughts_? Or again, is it a stroke of his pretence of
+madness--suggesting imaginary followers?]
+
+[Footnote: 10: 'to speak plainly, as old friends.']
+
+[Page 92]
+
+_Rosin_. To visit you my Lord, no other occasion.
+
+_Ham_. Begger that I am, I am euen poore in    [Sidenote: am ever poore]
+thankes; but I thanke you: and sure deare friends
+my thanks are too deare a halfepeny[1]; were you
+[Sidenote: 72] not sent for? Is it your owne inclining? Is it a
+free visitation?[2] Come, deale iustly with me:
+come, come; nay speake.                          [Sidenote: come, come,]
+
+_Guil_. What should we say my Lord?[3]
+
+_Ham_. Why any thing. But to the purpose;
+                                [Sidenote: Any thing but to'th purpose:]
+you were sent for; and there is a kinde confession
+                                          [Sidenote: kind of confession]
+in your lookes; which your modesties haue not
+craft enough to color, I know the good King and
+[Sidenote: 72] Queene haue sent for you.
+
+_Rosin_. To what end my Lord?
+
+_Ham_. That you must teach me: but let mee
+coniure[4] you by the rights of our fellowship, by
+the consonancy of our youth,[5] by the Obligation
+of our euer-preserued loue, and by what more
+deare, a better proposer could charge you withall;       [Sidenote: can]
+be euen and direct with me, whether you were sent
+for or no.
+
+_Rosin_. What say you?[6]
+
+_Ham_. Nay then I haue an eye of you[7]: if you
+loue me hold not off.[8]
+
+[Sidenote: 72] _Guil_. My Lord, we were sent for.
+
+_Ham_. I will tell you why; so shall my anticipation
+preuent your discouery of your secricie to [Sidenote: discovery, and
+          your secrecie to the King and Queene moult no feather,[10]]
+the King and Queene[9] moult no feather, I haue
+[Sidenote: 116] of late, but wherefore I know not, lost all my
+mirth, forgone all custome of exercise; and indeed,
+                                                  [Sidenote: exercises;]
+it goes so heauenly with my disposition; that this   [Sidenote: heauily]
+goodly frame the Earth, seemes to me a sterrill
+Promontory; this most excellent Canopy the Ayre,
+look you, this braue ore-hanging, this Maiesticall
+                                       [Sidenote: orehanging firmament,]
+Roofe, fretted with golden fire: why, it appeares no
+                                                   [Sidenote: appeareth]
+
+[Footnote 1: --because they were by no means hearty thanks.]
+
+[Footnote 2: He wants to know whether they are in his uncle's employment
+and favour; whether they pay court to himself for his uncle's ends.]
+
+[Footnote 3: He has no answer ready.]
+
+[Footnote 4: He will not cast them from him without trying a direct
+appeal to their old friendship for plain dealing. This must be
+remembered in relation to his treatment of them afterwards. He affords
+them every chance of acting truly--conjuring them to honesty--giving
+them a push towards repentance.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Either, 'the harmony of our young days,' or, 'the
+sympathies of our present youth.']
+
+[Footnote 6: --_to Guildenstern_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: (_aside_) 'I will keep an eye upon you;'.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'do not hold back.']
+
+[Footnote 9: The _Quarto_ seems here to have the right reading.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'your promise of secrecy remain intact;'.]
+
+[Page 94]
+
+other thing to mee, then a foule and pestilent congregation
+                                         [Sidenote: nothing to me but a]
+of vapours. What a piece of worke is              [Sidenote: what peece]
+a man! how Noble in Reason? how infinite in
+faculty? in forme and mouing how expresse and     [Sidenote: faculties,]
+admirable? in Action, how like an Angel? in apprehension,
+how like a God? the beauty of the
+world, the Parragon of Animals; and yet to me,
+what is this Quintessence of Dust? Man delights
+not me;[1] no, nor Woman neither; though by your
+                                           [Sidenote: not me, nor women]
+smiling you seeme to say so.[2]
+
+_Rosin._ My Lord, there was no such stuffe in
+my thoughts.
+
+_Ham._ Why did you laugh, when I said, Man
+                                        [Sidenote: yee laugh then, when]
+delights not me?
+
+_Rosin._ To thinke, my Lord, if you delight not
+in Man, what Lenton entertainment the Players
+shall receiue from you:[3] wee coated them[4] on the
+way, and hither are they comming to offer you
+Seruice.
+
+_Ham._[5] He that playes the King shall be welcome;
+his Maiesty shall haue Tribute of mee:                [Sidenote: on me,]
+the aduenturous Knight shal vse his Foyle and
+Target: the Louer shall not sigh _gratis_, the
+humorous man[6] shall end his part in peace: [7] the
+Clowne shall make those laugh whose lungs are
+tickled a'th' sere:[8] and the Lady shall say her
+minde freely; or the blanke Verse shall halt for't[9]:
+                                                 [Sidenote: black verse]
+what Players are they?
+
+_Rosin._ Euen those you Were wont to take
+                                           [Sidenote: take such delight]
+delight in the Tragedians of the City.
+
+_Ham._ How chances it they trauaile? their residence
+both in reputation and profit was better both
+wayes.
+
+_Rosin._ I thinke their Inhibition comes by the
+meanes of the late Innouation?[10]
+
+[Footnote 1: A genuine description, so far as it goes, of the state of
+Hamlet's mind. But he does not reveal the operating cause--his loss of
+faith in women, which has taken the whole poetic element out of heaven,
+earth, and humanity: he would have his uncle's spies attribute his
+condition to mere melancholy.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --said angrily, I think.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --a ready-witted subterfuge.]
+
+[Footnote 4: came alongside of them; got up with them; apparently rather
+from Fr. _côté_ than _coter_; like _accost_. Compare 71. But I suspect
+it only means _noted_, _observed_, and is from _coter_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: --_with humorous imitation, perhaps, of each of the
+characters_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: --the man with a whim.]
+
+[Footnote 7: This part of the speech--from [7] to [8], is not in the
+_Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Halliwell gives a quotation in which the touch-hole of a
+pistol is called the _sere_: the _sere_, then, of the lungs would mean
+the opening of the lungs--the part with which we laugh: those 'whose
+lungs are tickled a' th' sere,' are such as are ready to laugh on the
+least provocation: _tickled_--_irritable, ticklish_--ready to laugh, as
+another might be to cough. 'Tickled o' the sere' was a common phrase,
+signifying, thus, _propense_.
+
+    _1st Q._ The clowne shall make them laugh
+    That are tickled in the lungs,]
+
+[Footnote 9: Does this refer to the pause that expresses the
+unutterable? or to the ruin of the measure of the verse by an
+incompetent heroine?]
+
+[Footnote 10: Does this mean, 'I think their prohibition comes through
+the late innovation,'--of the children's acting; or, 'I think they are
+prevented from staying at home by the late new measures,'--such, namely,
+as came of the puritan opposition to stage-plays? This had grown so
+strong, that, in 1600, the Privy Council issued an order restricting the
+number of theatres in London to two: by such an _innovation_ a number of
+players might well be driven to the country.]
+
+[Page 96]
+
+_Ham_. Doe they hold the same estimation they
+did when I was in the City? Are they so follow'd?
+
+_Rosin_. No indeed, they are not.              [Sidenote: are they not.]
+
+[1]_Ham_. How comes it? doe they grow rusty?
+
+_Rosin_. Nay, their indeauour keepes in the
+wonted pace; But there is Sir an ayrie of Children,[2]
+little Yases,[3] that crye out[4] on the top of question;[5]
+and are most tyrannically clap't for't: these are
+now the fashion, and so be-ratled the common
+Stages[6] (so they call them) that many wearing
+Rapiers,[7] are affraide of Goose-quils, and dare
+scarse come thither.[8]
+
+_Ham_. What are they Children? Who maintains
+'em? How are they escoted?[9] Will they pursue
+the Quality[10] no longer then they can sing?[11] Will
+they not say afterwards if they should grow themselues
+to common Players (as it is like most[12] if
+their meanes are no better) their Writers[13] do them
+wrong, to make them exclaim against their owne
+Succession.[14]
+
+_Rosin_. Faith there ha's bene much to do on
+both sides: and the Nation holds it no sinne, to
+tarre them[15] to Controuersie. There was for a
+while, no mony bid for argument, vnlesse the Poet
+and the Player went to Cuffes in the Question.[16]
+
+_Ham_. Is't possible?
+
+_Guild_. Oh there ha's beene much throwing
+about of Braines.
+
+_Ham_. Do the Boyes carry it away?[17]
+
+_Rosin_. I that they do my Lord, _Hercules_ and
+his load too.[18]
+
+_Ham_. It is not strange: for mine Vnckle is
+                                      [Sidenote: not very strange, | my]
+King of Denmarke, and those that would make
+mowes at him while my Father liued; giue twenty,
+                                                 [Sidenote: make mouths]
+
+[Footnote 1: The whole of the following passage, beginning with 'How
+comes it,' and ending with 'Hercules and his load too,' belongs to the
+_Folio_ alone--is not in the _Quarto_.
+
+In the _1st Quarto_ we find the germ of the passage--unrepresented in
+the _2nd_, developed in the _Folio_.
+
+    _Ham_. Players, what Players be they?
+
+    _Ross_. My Lord, the Tragedians of the Citty,
+    Those that you tooke delight to see so often.
+
+    _Ham_. How comes it that they trauell? Do
+    they grow restie?
+
+    _Gil_. No my Lord, their reputation holds as it was wont.
+
+    _Ham_. How then?
+
+    _Gil_. Yfaith my Lord, noueltie carries it away,
+    For the principall publike audience that
+    Came to them, are turned to priuate playes,[19]
+    And to the humour[20] of children.
+
+    _Ham_. I doe not greatly wonder of it,
+    For those that would make mops and moes
+    At my vncle, when my father liued, &c.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _a nest of children_. The acting of the children of two or
+three of the chief choirs had become the rage.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _Eyases_--unfledged hawks.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Children _cry out_ rather than _speak_ on the stage.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'cry out beyond dispute'--_unquestionably_; 'cry out and no
+mistake.' 'He does not top his part.' _The Rehearsal_, iii. 1.--'_He is
+not up to it_.' But perhaps here is intended _above reason_: 'they cry
+out excessively, excruciatingly.' 103.
+
+This said, in top of rage the lines she rents,--_A Lover's Complaint_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: I presume it should be the present tense, _beratle_--except
+the _are_ of the preceding member be understood: 'and so beratled _are_
+the common stages.' If the _present_, then the children 'so abuse the
+grown players,'--in the pieces they acted, particularly in the new
+_arguments_, written for them--whence the reference to _goose-quills_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: --of the play-going public.]
+
+[Footnote 8: --for dread of sharing in the ridicule.]
+
+[Footnote 9: _paid_--from the French _escot_, a shot or reckoning: _Dr.
+Johnson_.]
+
+[Footnote 10: --the quality of players; the profession of the stage.]
+
+[Footnote 11: 'Will they cease playing when their voices change?']
+
+[Footnote 12: Either _will_ should follow here, or _like_ and _most_
+must change places.]
+
+[Footnote 13: 'those that write for them'.]
+
+[Footnote 14: --what they had had to come to themselves.]
+
+[Footnote 15: 'to incite the children and the grown players to
+controversy': _to tarre them on like dogs_: see _King John_, iv. 1.]
+
+[Footnote 16: 'No stage-manager would buy a new argument, or prologue,
+to a play, unless the dramatist and one of the actors were therein
+represented as falling out on the question of the relative claims of the
+children and adult actors.']
+
+[Footnote 17: 'Have the boys the best of it?']
+
+[Footnote 18: 'That they have, out and away.' Steevens suggests that
+allusion is here made to the sign of the Globe Theatre--Hercules bearing
+the world for Atlas.]
+
+[Footnote 19: amateur-plays.]
+
+[Footnote 20: whimsical fashion.]
+
+[Page 98]
+
+forty, an hundred Ducates a peece, for his picture[1]
+                                    [Sidenote: fortie, fifty, a hundred]
+in Little.[2] There is something in this more then
+                                    [Sidenote: little, s'bloud there is]
+Naturall, if Philosophic could finde it out.
+
+_Flourish for tke Players_.[3]                  [Sidenote: _A Florish_.]
+
+_Guil_. There are the Players.
+
+_Ham_. Gentlemen, you are welcom to _Elsonower_:
+your hands, come: The appurtenance of         [Sidenote: come then, th']
+Welcome, is Fashion and Ceremony. Let me
+[Sidenote: 260] comply with you in the Garbe,[4] lest my extent[5] to
+                                 [Sidenote: in this garb: let me extent]
+the Players (which I tell you must shew fairely
+outward) should more appeare like entertainment[6]
+                                                   [Sidenote: outwards,]
+then yours.[7] You are welcome: but my Vnckle
+Father, and Aunt Mother are deceiu'd.
+
+_Guil_. In what my deere Lord?
+
+_Ham_. I am but mad North, North-West: when
+the Winde is Southerly, I know a Hawke from a
+Handsaw.[8]
+
+_Enter Polonius_.
+
+_Pol_. Well[9] be with you Gentlemen.
+
+_Ham_. Hearke you _Guildensterne_, and you too:
+at each eare a hearer: that great Baby you see
+there, is not yet out of his swathing clouts.
+                                            [Sidenote: swadling clouts.]
+
+_Rosin_. Happily he's the second time come to          [Sidenote: he is]
+them: for they say, an old man is twice a childe.
+
+_Ham_. I will Prophesie. Hee comes to tell me
+of the Players. Mark it, you say right Sir: for a
+                                               [Sidenote: sir, a Monday]
+Monday morning 'twas so indeed.[10]      [Sidenote: t'was then indeede.]
+
+_Pol_. My Lord, I haue Newes to tell you.
+
+_Ham_. My Lord, I haue Newes to tell you.
+When _Rossius_ an Actor in Rome----[11]     [Sidenote: _Rossius_ was an]
+
+_Pol_. The Actors are come hither my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Buzze, buzze.[12]
+
+_Pol_. Vpon mine Honor.[13]                               [Sidenote: my]
+
+_Ham_. Then can each Actor on his Asse----         [Sidenote: came each]
+
+[Footnote 1: If there be any logical link here, except that, after the
+instance adduced, no change in social fashion--nothing at all indeed, is
+to be wondered at, I fail to see it. Perhaps the speech is intended to
+belong to the simulation. The last sentence of it appears meant to
+convey the impression that he suspects nothing--is only bewildered by
+the course of things.]
+
+[Footnote 2: his miniature.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --to indicate their approach.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _com'ply_--accent on first syllable--'pass compliments with
+you' (260)--_in the garb_, either 'in appearance,' or 'in the fashion of
+the hour.']
+
+[Footnote 5: 'the amount of courteous reception I extend'--'my advances
+to the players.']
+
+[Footnote 6: reception, welcome.]
+
+[Footnote 7: He seems to desire that they shall no more be on the
+footing of fellow-students, and thus to rid himself of the old relation.
+Perhaps he hints that they are players too. From any further show of
+friendliness he takes refuge in convention--and professed
+convention--supplying a reason in order to escape a dangerous
+interpretation of his sudden formality--'lest you should suppose me more
+cordial to the players than to you.' The speech is full of inwoven
+irony, doubtful, and refusing to be ravelled out. With what merely
+half-shown, yet scathing satire it should be spoken and accompanied!]
+
+[Footnote 8: A proverb of the time comically corrupted--_handsaw for
+hernshaw_--a heron, the quarry of the hawk. He denies his madness as
+madmen do--and in terms themselves not unbefitting madness--so making it
+seem the more genuine. Yet every now and then, urged by the commotion of
+his being, he treads perilously on the border of self-betrayal.]
+
+[Footnote 9: used as a noun.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _Point thus_: 'Mark it.--You say right, sir; &c.' He takes
+up a speech that means nothing, and might mean anything, to turn aside
+the suspicion their whispering might suggest to Polonius that they had
+been talking about him--so better to lay his trap for him.]
+
+[Footnote 11: He mentions the _actor_ to lead Polonius so that his
+prophecy of him shall come true.]
+
+[Footnote 12: An interjection of mockery: he had made a fool of him.]
+
+[Footnote 13: Polonius thinks he is refusing to believe him.]
+
+[Page 100]
+
+_Polon_. The best Actors in the world, either for
+Tragedie, Comedie, Historic, Pastorall: Pastoricall-
+Comicall-Historicall-Pastorall: [1] Tragicall-Historicall:
+Tragicall-Comicall--Historicall-Pastorall[1]:
+Scene indiuible,[2] or Poem vnlimited.[3] _Seneca_ cannot
+                                       [Sidenote: scene indeuidible,[2]]
+be too heauy, nor _Plautus_ too light, for the law of
+Writ, and the Liberty. These are the onely men.[4]
+
+_Ham_. O _Iephta_ Iudge of Israel, what a Treasure
+had'st thou?
+
+_Pol_. What a Treasure had he, my Lord?[5]
+
+_Ham_. Why one faire Daughter, and no more,[6]
+The which he loued passing well.[6]
+
+[Sidenote: 86] _Pol_. Still on my Daughter.
+
+_Ham_. Am I not i'th'right old _Iephta_?
+
+_Polon_. If you call me _Iephta_ my Lord, I haue
+a daughter that I loue passing well.
+
+_Ham_. Nay that followes not.[7]
+
+_Polon_. What followes then, my Lord?
+
+_Ham_. Why, As by lot, God wot:[6] and then you
+know, It came to passe, as most like it was:[6] The
+first rowe of the _Pons[8] Chanson_ will shew you more,
+                                               [Sidenote: pious chanson]
+For looke where my Abridgements[9] come.
+                                         [Sidenote: abridgment[9] comes]
+
+_Enter foure or fiue Players._
+                                        [Sidenote: _Enter the Players._]
+
+Y'are welcome Masters, welcome all. I am glad        [Sidenote: You are]
+to see thee well: Welcome good Friends. O my
+               [Sidenote: oh old friend, why thy face is valanct[10]]
+olde Friend? Thy face is valiant[10] since I saw thee
+last: Com'st thou to beard me in Denmarke?
+What, my yong Lady and Mistris?[11] Byrlady          [Sidenote: by lady]
+your Ladiship is neerer Heauen then when I saw      [Sidenote: nerer to]
+you last, by the altitude of a Choppine.[12] Pray
+God your voice like a peece of vncurrant Gold be
+not crack'd within the ring.[13] Masters, you are all
+welcome: wee'l e'ne to't like French Faulconers,[14]
+                                       [Sidenote: like friendly Fankner]
+flie at any thing we see: wee'l haue a Speech
+
+[Footnote 1: From [1] to [1] is not in the _Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Does this phrase mean _all in one scene_?]
+
+[Footnote 3: A poem to be recited only--one not _limited_, or _divided_
+into speeches.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _Point thus_: 'too light. For the law of Writ, and the
+Liberty, these are the onely men':--_either for written plays_, that is,
+_or for those in which the players extemporized their speeches_.
+
+    _1st Q_. 'For the law hath writ those are the onely men.']
+
+[Footnote 5: Polonius would lead him on to talk of his daughter.]
+
+[Footnote 6: These are lines of the first stanza of an old ballad still
+in existence. Does Hamlet suggest that as Jephthah so Polonius had
+sacrificed his daughter? Or is he only desirous of making him talk about
+her?]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'That is not as the ballad goes.']
+
+[Footnote 8: That this is a corruption of the _pious_ in the _Quarto_,
+is made clearer from the _1st Quarto_: 'the first verse of the godly
+Ballet wil tel you all.']
+
+[Footnote 9: _abridgment_--that which _abridges_, or cuts short. His
+'Abridgements' were the Players.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _1st Q_. 'Vallanced'--_with a beard_, that is. Both
+readings may be correct.]
+
+[Footnote 11: A boy of course: no women had yet appeared on the stage.]
+
+[Footnote 12: A Venetian boot, stilted, sometimes very high.]
+
+[Footnote 13: --because then it would be unfit for a woman-part. A piece
+of gold so worn that it had a crack reaching within the inner circle was
+no longer current. _1st Q_. 'in the ring:'--was a pun intended?]
+
+[Footnote 14: --like French sportsmen of the present day too.]
+
+[Page 102]
+
+straight. Come giue vs a tast of your quality:
+come, a passionate speech.
+
+_1. Play._ What speech, my Lord?               [Sidenote: my good Lord?]
+
+_Ham._ I heard thee speak me a speech once, but
+it was neuer Acted: or if it was, not aboue once,
+for the Play I remember pleas'd not the Million,
+'twas _Cauiarie_ to the Generall[1]: but it was (as I
+receiu'd it, and others, whose iudgement in such
+matters, cried in the top of mine)[2] an excellent
+Play; well digested in the Scoenes, set downe with
+as much modestie, as cunning.[3] I remember one
+said there was no Sallets[4] in the lines, to make the  [Sidenote: were]
+matter sauoury; nor no matter in the phrase,[5] that
+might indite the Author of affectation, but cal'd it
+                                                  [Sidenote: affection,]
+an honest method[A]. One cheefe Speech in it, I
+                                           [Sidenote: one speech in't I]
+cheefely lou'd, 'twas _Ćneas_ Tale to _Dido_, and
+                                           [Sidenote: _Aeneas_ talke to]
+thereabout of it especially, where he speaks of         [Sidenote: when]
+_Priams_[6] slaughter. If it liue in your memory,
+begin at this Line, let me see, let me see: The
+rugged _Pyrrhus_ like th'_Hyrcanian_ Beast.[7] It is
+                                                     [Sidenote: tis not]
+not so: it begins[8] with _Pyrrhus_.[9]
+
+[10] The rugged _Pyrrhus_, he whose Sable Armes[11]
+Blacke as his purpose, did the night resemble
+When he lay couched in the Ominous[12] Horse,
+Hath now this dread and blacke Complexion smear'd
+With Heraldry more dismall: Head to foote
+Now is he to take Geulles,[13] horridly Trick'd
+                                     [Sidenote: is he totall Gules [18]]
+With blood of Fathers, Mothers, Daughters, Sonnes,
+[14] Bak'd and impasted with the parching streets,
+That lend a tyrannous, and damned light         [Sidenote: and a damned]
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto:_--
+as wholesome as sweete, and by very much, more handsome then
+fine:]
+
+[Footnote 1: The salted roe of the sturgeon is a delicacy disliked by
+most people.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'were superior to mine.'
+
+The _1st Quarto_ has,
+
+'Cried in the toppe of their iudgements, an excellent play,'--that is,
+_pronounced it, to the best of their judgments, an excellent play_.
+
+Note the difference between 'the top of _my_ judgment', and 'the top of
+_their_ judgments'. 97.]
+
+[Footnote 3: skill.]
+
+[Footnote 4: coarse jests. 25, 67.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _style_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _1st Q_. 'Princes slaughter.']
+
+[Footnote 7: _1st Q_. 'th'arganian beast:' 'the Hyrcan tiger,' Macbeth,
+iii. 4.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'it _begins_': emphasis on begins.]
+
+[Footnote 9: A pause; then having recollected, he starts afresh.]
+
+[Footnote 10: These passages are Shakspere's own, not quotations: the
+Quartos differ. But when he wrote them he had in his mind a phantom of
+Marlowe's _Dido, Queen of Carthage_. I find Steevens has made a similar
+conjecture, and quotes from Marlowe two of the passages I had marked as
+being like passages here.]
+
+[Footnote 11: The poetry is admirable in its kind--intentionally
+_charged_, to raise it to the second stage-level, above the blank verse,
+that is, of the drama in which it is set, as that blank verse is raised
+above the ordinary level of speech. 143.
+
+The correspondent passage in _1st Q_. runs nearly parallel for a few
+lines.]
+
+[Footnote 12:--like _portentous_.]
+
+[Footnote 13: 'all red', _1st Q_. 'totall guise.']
+
+[Footnote 14: Here the _1st Quarto_ has:--
+
+    Back't and imparched in calagulate gore,
+    Rifted in earth and fire, olde grandsire _Pryam_ seekes:
+    So goe on.]
+
+[Page 104]
+
+To their vilde Murthers, roasted in wrath and fire,
+                                        [Sidenote: their Lords murther,]
+And thus o're-sized with coagulate gore,
+With eyes like Carbuncles, the hellish _Pyrrhus_
+Old Grandsire _Priam_ seekes.[1]
+                                 [Sidenote: seekes; so proceede you.[2]]
+
+_Pol_. Fore God, my Lord, well spoken, with
+good accent, and good discretion.[3]
+
+_1. Player_. Anon he findes him,                      [Sidenote: _Play_]
+Striking too short at Greekes.[4] His anticke Sword,
+Rebellious to his Arme, lyes where it falles
+Repugnant to command[4]: vnequall match,             [Sidenote: matcht,]
+_Pyrrhus_ at _Priam_ driues, in Rage strikes wide:
+But with the whiffe and winde of his fell Sword,
+Th'vnnerued Father fals.[5] Then senselesse Illium,[6]
+Seeming to feele his blow, with flaming top
+                                        [Sidenote: seele[7] this blowe,]
+Stoopes to his Bace, and with a hideous crash
+Takes Prisoner _Pyrrhus_ eare. For loe, his Sword
+Which was declining on the Milkie head
+Of Reuerend _Priam_, seem'd i'th'Ayre to sticke:
+So as a painted Tyrant _Pyrrhus_ stood,[8]        [Sidenote: stood Like]
+And like a Newtrall to his will and matter,[9] did nothing.[10]
+[11] But as we often see against some storme,
+A silence in the Heauens, the Racke stand still,
+The bold windes speechlesse, and the Orbe below
+As hush as death: Anon the dreadfull Thunder
+[Sidenote: 110] Doth rend the Region.[11] So after _Pyrrhus_ pause,
+Arowsed Vengeance sets him new a-worke,
+And neuer did the Cyclops hammers fall
+On Mars his Armours, forg'd for proofe Eterne,
+                                              [Sidenote: _Marses_ Armor]
+With lesse remorse then _Pyrrhus_ bleeding sword
+Now falles on _Priam_.
+[12] Out, out, thou Strumpet-Fortune, all you Gods,
+In generall Synod take away her power:
+Breake all the Spokes and Fallies from her wheele,   [Sidenote: follies]
+
+[Footnote 1: This, though horrid enough, is in degree below the
+description in _Dido_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: He is directing the player to take up the speech there
+where he leaves it. See last quotation from _1st Q_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _judgment_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: --with an old man's under-reaching blows--till his arm is
+so jarred by a missed blow, that he cannot raise his sword again.]
+
+[Footnote 5:
+
+    Whereat he lifted up his bedrid limbs,
+    And would have grappled with Achilles' son,
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    Which he, disdaining, whisk'd his sword about,
+    And with the wound[13] thereof the king fell down.
+
+    Marlowe's _Dido, Queen of Carthage_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: The _Quarto_ has omitted '_Then senselesse Illium_,' or
+something else.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Printed with the long f[symbol for archaic long s].]
+
+[Footnote 8: --motionless as a tyrant in a picture.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'standing between his will and its object as if he had no
+relation to either.']
+
+[Footnote 10:
+
+    And then in triumph ran into the streets,
+    Through which he could not pass for slaughtered men;
+    So, leaning on his sword, he stood stone still,
+    Viewing the fire wherewith rich Ilion burnt.
+
+    Marlowe's _Dido, Queen of Carthage_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: Who does not feel this passage, down to 'Region,'
+thoroughly Shaksperean!]
+
+[Footnote 12: Is not the rest of this speech very plainly Shakspere's?]
+
+[Footnote 13: _wind_, I think it should be.]
+
+[Page 106]
+
+And boule the round Naue downe the hill of Heauen,
+As low as to the Fiends.
+
+_Pol_. This is too long.
+
+_Ham_. It shall to'th Barbars, with your beard.       [Sidenote: to the]
+Prythee say on: He's for a Iigge, or a tale of
+Baudry, or hee sleepes. Say on; come to _Hecuba_.
+
+_1. Play_. But who, O who, had seen the inobled[1] Queen.
+                             [Sidenote: But who, a woe, had | mobled[1]]
+
+_Ham_. The inobled[1] Queene?                         [Sidenote: mobled]
+
+_Pol_. That's good: Inobled[1] Queene is good.[2]
+
+_1. Play_. Run bare-foot vp and downe,
+Threatning the flame                                  [Sidenote: flames]
+With Bisson Rheume:[3] A clout about that head,  [Sidenote: clout vppon]
+Where late the Diadem stood, and for a Robe
+About her lanke and all ore-teamed Loines,[4]
+A blanket in th'Alarum of feare caught vp.        [Sidenote: the alarme]
+Who this had seene, with tongue in Venome steep'd,
+'Gainst Fortunes State, would Treason haue pronounc'd?[5]
+But if the Gods themselues did see her then,
+When she saw _Pyrrhus_ make malicious sport
+In mincing with his Sword her Husbands limbes,[6]    [Sidenote: husband]
+The instant Burst of Clamour that she made
+(Vnlesse things mortall moue them not at all)
+Would haue made milche[7] the Burning eyes of Heauen,
+And passion in the Gods.[8]
+
+_Pol_. Looke where[9] he ha's not turn'd his colour,
+and ha's teares in's eyes. Pray you no more.         [Sidenote: prethee]
+
+_Ham_. 'Tis well, He haue thee speake out the
+rest, soone. Good my Lord, will you see the     [Sidenote: rest of this]
+Players wel bestow'd. Do ye heare, let them be           [Sidenote: you]
+well vs'd: for they are the Abstracts and breefe    [Sidenote: abstract]
+Chronicles of the time. After your death, you
+
+[Footnote 1: '_mobled_'--also in _1st Q_.--may be the word: _muffled_
+seems a corruption of it: compare _mob-cap_, and
+
+    'The moon does mobble up herself'
+
+    --_Shirley_, quoted by _Farmer_;
+
+but I incline to '_inobled_,' thrice in the _Folio_--once with a
+capital: I take it to stand for _'ignobled,' degraded_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'Inobled Queene is good.' _Not in Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --threatening to put the flames out with blind tears:
+'_bisen,' blind_--Ang. Sax.]
+
+[Footnote 4: --she had had so many children.]
+
+[Footnote 5: There should of course be no point of interrogation here.]
+
+[Footnote 6:
+
+    This butcher, whilst his hands were yet held up,
+    Treading upon his breast, struck off his hands.
+
+    Marlowe's _Dido, Queen of Carthage_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: '_milche_'--capable of giving milk: here _capable of
+tears_, which the burning eyes of the gods were not before.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'And would have made passion in the Gods.']
+
+[Footnote 9: 'whether'.]
+
+[Page 108]
+
+were better haue a bad Epitaph, then their ill
+report while you liued.[1]                              [Sidenote: live]
+
+_Pol_. My Lord, I will vse them according to
+their desart.
+
+_Ham_. Gods bodykins man, better. Vse euerie
+                                    [Sidenote: bodkin man, much better,]
+man after his desart, and who should scape whipping:
+                                                       [Sidenote: shall]
+vse them after your own Honor and Dignity.
+The lesse they deserue, the more merit is in
+your bountie. Take them in.
+
+_Pol_. Come sirs.            _Exit Polon_.[2]
+
+_Ham_. Follow him Friends: wee'l heare a play
+to morrow.[3] Dost thou heare me old Friend, can
+you play the murther of _Gonzago_?
+
+_Play_. I my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Wee'l ha't to morrow night. You could
+for a need[4] study[5] a speech of some dosen or sixteene
+                                 [Sidenote: for neede | dosen lines, or]
+lines, which I would set downe, and insert
+in't? Could ye not?[6]                                   [Sidenote: you]
+
+_Play_. I my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Very well. Follow that Lord, and looke
+you mock him not.[7] My good Friends, Ile leaue
+you til night you are welcome to _Elsonower_?
+                                 [Sidenote: _Exeuent Pol. and Players_.]
+
+_Rosin_. Good my Lord.         _Exeunt_.
+
+_Manet Hamlet_.[8]
+
+_Ham_. I so, God buy'ye[9]: Now I am alone.   [Sidenote: buy to you,[9]]
+Oh what a Rogue and Pesant slaue am I?[10]
+Is it not monstrous that this Player heere,[11]
+But in a Fixion, in a dreame of Passion,
+Could force his soule so to his whole conceit,[12]
+                                             [Sidenote: his own conceit]
+That from her working, all his visage warm'd;
+                                        [Sidenote: all the visage wand,]
+Teares in his eyes, distraction in's Aspect,          [Sidenote: in his]
+A broken voyce, and his whole Function suiting        [Sidenote: an his]
+With Formes, to his Conceit?[13] And all for nothing?
+
+[Footnote 1: Why do the editors choose the present tense of the
+_Quarto_? Hamlet does not mean, 'It is worse to have the ill report of
+the Players while you live, than a bad epitaph after your death.' The
+order of the sentence has provided against that meaning. What he means
+is, that their ill report in life will be more against your reputation
+after death than a bad epitaph.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _Not in Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: He detains their leader.]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'for a special reason'.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _Study_ is still the Player's word for _commit to memory_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Note Hamlet's quick resolve, made clearer towards the end
+of the following soliloquy.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Polonius is waiting at the door: this is intended for his
+hearing.]
+
+[Footnote 8: _Not in Q_.]
+
+[Footnote 9: Note the varying forms of _God be with you_.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _1st Q_.
+
+    Why what a dunghill idiote slaue am I?
+    Why these Players here draw water from eyes:
+    For Hecuba, why what is Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba?]
+
+[Footnote 11: Everything rings on the one hard, fixed idea that
+possesses him; but this one idea has many sides. Of late he has been
+thinking more upon the woman-side of it; but the Player with his speech
+has brought his father to his memory, and he feels he has been
+forgetting him: the rage of the actor recalls his own 'cue for passion.'
+Always more ready to blame than justify himself, he feels as if he ought
+to have done more, and so falls to abusing himself.]
+
+[Footnote 12: _imagination_.]
+
+[Footnote 13: 'his whole operative nature providing fit forms for the
+embodiment of his imagined idea'--of which forms he has already
+mentioned his _warmed visage_, his _tears_, his _distracted look_, his
+_broken voice_.
+
+In this passage we have the true idea of the operation of the genuine
+_acting faculty_. Actor as well as dramatist, the Poet gives us here his
+own notion of his second calling.]
+
+[Page 110]
+
+For _Hecuba_?
+What's _Hecuba_ to him, or he to _Hecuba_,[1]
+                                               [Sidenote: or he to her,]
+That he should weepe for her? What would he doe,
+Had he the Motiue and the Cue[2] for passion
+                                              [Sidenote: , and that for]
+That I haue? He would drowne the Stage with teares,
+And cleaue the generall eare with horrid speech:
+Make mad the guilty, and apale[3] the free,[4]
+Confound the ignorant, and amaze indeed,
+The very faculty of Eyes and Eares. Yet I,         [Sidenote: faculties]
+A dull and muddy-metled[5] Rascall, peake
+Like Iohn a-dreames, vnpregnant of my cause,[6]
+And can say nothing: No, not for a King,
+Vpon whose property,[7] and most deere life,
+A damn'd defeate[8] was made. Am I a Coward?[9]
+Who calles me Villaine? breakes my pate a-crosse?
+Pluckes off my Beard, and blowes it in my face?
+Tweakes me by'th'Nose?[10] giues me the Lye i'th' Throate,
+                                                      [Sidenote: by the]
+As deepe as to the Lungs? Who does me this?
+Ha? Why I should take it: for it cannot be,
+                                             [Sidenote: Hah, s'wounds I]
+But I am Pigeon-Liuer'd, and lacke Gall[11]
+To make Oppression bitter, or ere this,
+[Sidenote: 104] I should haue fatted all the Region Kites
+                                             [Sidenote: should a fatted]
+With this Slaues Offall, bloudy: a Bawdy villaine,
+                                               [Sidenote: bloody, baudy]
+Remorselesse,[12] Treacherous, Letcherous, kindles[13] villaine!
+Oh Vengeance![14]
+Who? What an Asse am I? I sure, this is most braue,
+                                 [Sidenote: Why what an Asse am I, this]
+That I, the Sonne of the Deere murthered,            [Sidenote: a deere]
+Prompted to my Reuenge by Heauen, and Hell,
+Must (like a Whore) vnpacke my heart with words,
+And fall a Cursing like a very Drab,[15]
+A Scullion? Fye vpon't: Foh. About my Braine.[16]
+                                 [Sidenote: a stallyon, | braines; hum,]
+
+[Footnote 1: Here follows in 1st _Q_.
+
+    What would he do and if he had my losse?
+    His father murdred, and a Crowne bereft him,
+    [Sidenote: 174] He would turne all his teares to droppes of blood,
+    Amaze the standers by with his laments,
+
+    &c. &c.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Speaking of the Player, he uses the player-word.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _make pale_--appal.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _the innocent_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _Mettle_ is spirit--rather in the sense of _animal-spirit_:
+_mettlesome_--spirited, _as a horse_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: '_unpossessed by_ my cause'.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _personality, proper person_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: _undoing, destruction_--from French _défaire_.]
+
+[Footnote 9: In this mood he no more understands, and altogether doubts
+himself, as he has previously come to doubt the world.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _1st Q_. 'or twites my nose.']
+
+[Footnote 11: It was supposed that pigeons had no gall--I presume from
+their livers not tasting bitter like those of perhaps most birds.]
+
+[Footnote 12: _pitiless_.]
+
+[Footnote 13: _unnatural_.]
+
+[Footnote 14: This line is not in the _Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 15: Here in _Q._ the line runs on to include _Foh_. The next
+line ends with _heard_.]
+
+[Footnote 16: _Point thus_: 'About! my brain.' He apostrophizes his
+brain, telling it to set to work.]
+
+[Page 112]
+
+I haue heard, that guilty Creatures sitting at a Play,
+Haue by the very cunning of the Scoene,[1]
+Bene strooke so to the soule, that presently
+They haue proclaim'd their Malefactions.
+For Murther, though it haue no tongue, will speake
+With most myraculous Organ.[2] Ile haue these Players,
+Play something like the murder of my Father,
+Before mine Vnkle. Ile obserue his lookes,
+[Sidenote: 137] Ile tent him to the quicke: If he but blench[3]
+                                             [Sidenote: if a doe blench]
+I know my course. The Spirit that I haue seene
+[Sidenote: 48] May[4] be the Diuell, and the Diuel hath power
+                               [Sidenote: May be a deale, and the deale]
+T'assume a pleasing shape, yea and perhaps
+Out of my Weaknesse, and my Melancholly,[5]
+As he is very potent with such Spirits,[6]
+[Sidenote: 46] Abuses me to damne me.[7] Ile haue grounds
+More Relatiue then this: The Play's the thing,
+Wherein Ile catch the Conscience of the King.
+                                        _Exit._
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+SUMMARY.
+
+
+The division between the second and third acts is by common consent
+placed here. The third act occupies the afternoon, evening, and night of
+the same day with the second.
+
+This soliloquy is Hamlet's first, and perhaps we may find it correct to
+say _only_ outbreak of self-accusation. He charges himself with lack of
+feeling, spirit, and courage, in that he has not yet taken vengeance on
+his uncle. But unless we are prepared to accept and justify to the full
+his own hardest words against himself, and grant him a muddy-mettled,
+pigeon-livered rascal, we must examine and understand him, so as to
+account for his conduct better than he could himself. If we allow that
+perhaps he accuses himself too much, we may find on reflection that he
+accuses himself altogether wrongfully. If a man is content to think the
+worst of Hamlet, I care to hold no argument with that man.
+
+We must not look for _expressed_ logical sequence in a soliloquy, which
+is a vocal mind. The mind is seldom conscious of the links or
+transitions of a yet perfectly logical process developed in it. This
+remark, however, is more necessary in regard to the famous soliloquy to
+follow.
+
+In Hamlet, misery has partly choked even vengeance; and although sure in
+his heart that his uncle is guilty, in his brain he is not sure.
+Bitterly accusing himself in an access of wretchedness and rage and
+credence, he forgets the doubt that has restrained him, with all besides
+which he might so well urge in righteous defence, not excuse, of his
+delay. But ungenerous criticism has, by all but universal consent,
+accepted his own verdict against himself. So in common life there are
+thousands on thousands who, upon the sad confession of a man
+immeasurably greater than themselves, and showing his greatness in the
+humility whose absence makes admission impossible to them, immediately
+pounce upon him with vituperation, as if he were one of the vile, and
+they infinitely better. Such should be indignant with St. Paul and
+say--if he was the chief of sinners, what insolence to lecture _them_!
+and certainly the more justified publican would never by them have been
+allowed to touch the robe of the less justified Pharisee. Such critics
+surely take little or no pains to understand the object of their
+contempt: because Hamlet is troubled and blames himself, they without
+hesitation condemn him--and there where he is most commendable. It is
+the righteous man who is most ready to accuse himself; the unrighteous
+is least ready. Who is able when in deep trouble, rightly to analyze his
+feelings? Delay in action is not necessarily abandonment of duty; in
+Hamlet's case it is a due recognition of duty, which condemns
+precipitancy--and action in the face of doubt, so long as it is nowise
+compelled, is precipitancy. The first thing is _to be sure_: Hamlet has
+never been sure; he spies at length a chance of making himself sure; he
+seizes upon it; and while his sudden resolve to make use of the players,
+like the equally sudden resolve to shroud himself in pretended madness,
+manifests him fertile in expedient, the carrying out of both manifests
+him right capable and diligent in execution--_a man of action in every
+true sense of the word_.
+
+The self-accusation of Hamlet has its ground in the lapse of weeks
+during which nothing has been done towards punishing the king. Suddenly
+roused to a keen sense of the fact, he feels as if surely he might have
+done something. The first act ends with a burning vow of righteous
+vengeance; the second shows him wandering about the palace in
+profoundest melancholy--such as makes it more than easy for him to
+assume the forms of madness the moment he marks any curious eye bent
+upon him. Let him who has never loved and revered a mother, call such
+melancholy weakness. He has indeed done nothing towards the fulfilment
+of his vow; but the way in which he made the vow, the terms in which he
+exacted from his companions their promise of silence, and his scheme for
+eluding suspicion, combine to show that from the first he perceived its
+fulfilment would be hard, saw the obstacles in his way, and knew it
+would require both time and caution. That even in the first rush of his
+wrath he should thus be aware of difficulty, indicates moral symmetry;
+but the full weight of what lay in his path could appear to him only
+upon reflection. Partly in the light of passages yet to come, I will
+imagine the further course of his thoughts, which the closing couplet of
+the first act shows as having already begun to apale 'the native hue of
+resolution.'
+
+'But how shall I take vengeance on my uncle? Shall I publicly accuse
+him, or slay him at once? In the one case what answer can I make to his
+denial? in the other, what justification can I offer? If I say the
+spirit of my father accuses him, what proof can I bring? My companions
+only saw the apparition--heard no word from him; and my uncle's party
+will assert, with absolute likelihood to the minds of those who do not
+know me--and who here knows me but my mother!--that charge is a mere
+coinage of jealous disappointment, working upon the melancholy I have
+not cared to hide. (174-6.) When I act, it must be to kill him, and to
+what misconstruction shall I not expose myself! (272) If the thing must
+so be, I must brave all; but I could never present myself thereafter as
+successor to the crown of one whom I had first slain and then vilified
+on the accusation of an apparition whom no one heard but myself! I must
+find _proof_--such proof as will satisfy others as well as myself. My
+immediate duty is _evidence_, not vengeance.'
+
+We have seen besides, that, when informed of the haunting presence of
+the Ghost, he expected the apparition with not a little doubt as to its
+authenticity--a doubt which, even when he saw it, did not immediately
+vanish: is it any wonder that when the apparition was gone, the doubt
+should return? Return it did, in accordance with the reaction which
+waits upon all high-strung experience. If he did not believe in the
+person who performed it, would any man long believe in any miracle?
+Hamlet soon begins to question whether he can with confidence accept the
+appearance for that which it appeared and asserted itself to be. He
+steps over to the stand-point of his judges, and doubts the only
+testimony he has to produce. Far more:--was he not bound in common
+humanity, not to say _filialness_, to doubt it? To doubt the Ghost, was
+to doubt a testimony which to accept was to believe his father in
+horrible suffering, his uncle a murderer, his mother at least an
+adulteress; to kill his uncle was to set his seal to the whole, and,
+besides, to bring his mother into frightful suspicion of complicity in
+his father's murder. Ought not the faintest shadow of a doubt, assuaging
+ever so little the glare of the hell-sun of such crime, to be welcome to
+the tortured heart? Wretched wife and woman as his mother had shown
+herself, the Ghost would have him think her far worse--perhaps, even
+accessory to her husband's murder! For action he _must_ have proof!
+
+At the same time, what every one knew of his mother, coupled now with
+the mere idea of the Ghost's accusation, wrought in him such misery,
+roused in him so many torturing and unanswerable questions, so blotted
+the face of the universe and withered the heart of hope, that he could
+not but doubt whether, in such a world of rogues and false women, it was
+worth his while to slay one villain out of the swarm.
+
+Ophelia's behaviour to him, in obedience to her father, of which she
+gives him no explanation, has added 'the pangs of disprized love,' and
+increased his doubts of woman-kind. 120.
+
+But when his imagination, presenting afresh the awful interview, brings
+him more immediately under the influence of the apparition and its
+behest, he is for the moment delivered both from the stunning effect of
+its communication and his doubt of its truth; forgetting then the
+considerations that have wrought in him, he accuses himself of
+remissness, blames himself grievously for his delay. Soon, however, his
+senses resume their influence, and he doubts again. So goes the
+mill-round of his thoughts, with the revolving of many wheels.
+
+His whole conscious nature is frightfully shaken: he would be the poor
+creature most of his critics would make of him, were it otherwise; it is
+because of his greatness that he suffers so terribly, and doubts so
+much. A mother's crime is far more paralyzing than a father's murder is
+stimulating; and either he has not set himself in thorough earnest to
+find the proof he needs, or he has as yet been unable to think of any
+serviceable means to the end, when the half real, half simulated emotion
+of the Player yet again rouses in him the sense of remissness, leads him
+to accuse himself of forgotten obligation and heartlessness, and
+simultaneously suggests a device for putting the Ghost and his words to
+the test. Instantly he seizes the chance: when a thing has to be done,
+and can be done, Hamlet is _never_ wanting--shows himself the very
+promptest of men.
+
+In the last passage of this act I do not take it that he is expressing
+an idea then first occurring to him: that the whole thing may be a snare
+of the devil is a doubt with which during weeks he has been familiar.
+
+The delay through which, in utter failure to comprehend his character,
+he has been so miserably misjudged, falls really between the first and
+second acts, although it seems in the regard of most readers to underlie
+and protract the whole play. Its duration is measured by the journey of
+the ambassadors to and from the neighbouring kingdom of Norway.
+
+It is notably odd, by the way, that those who accuse Hamlet of inaction,
+are mostly the same who believe his madness a reality! In truth,
+however, his affected madness is one of the strongest signs of his
+activity, and his delay one of the strongest proofs of his sanity.
+
+This second act, the third act, and a part always given to the fourth,
+but which really belongs to the third, occupy in all only one day.
+
+[Footnote 1: Here follows in _1st Q._
+
+                        confest a murder
+    Committed long before.
+    This spirit that I haue seene may be the Diuell,
+    And out of my weakenesse and my melancholy,
+    As he is very potent with such men,
+    Doth seeke to damne me, I will haue sounder proofes,
+    The play's the thing, &c.]
+
+[Footnote 2:
+
+    'Stones have been known to move, and trees to speak;' &c.
+
+    _Macbeth_, iii. 4.]
+
+[Footnote 3: In the _1st Q._ Hamlet, speaking to Horatio (l 37), says,
+
+    And if he doe not bleach, and change at that,--
+
+_Bleach_ is radically the same word as _blench_:--to bleach, to blanch,
+to blench--_to grow white_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Emphasis on _May_, as resuming previous doubtful thought
+and suspicion.]
+
+[Footnote 5: --caused from the first by his mother's behaviour, not
+constitutional.]
+
+[Footnote 6: --'such conditions of the spirits'.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Here is one element in the very existence of the preceding
+act: doubt as to the facts of the case has been throughout operating to
+restrain him; and here first he reveals, perhaps first recognizes its
+influence. Subject to change of feeling with the wavering of conviction,
+he now for a moment regards his uncertainty as involving unnatural
+distrust of a being in whose presence he cannot help _feeling_ him his
+father. He was familiar with the lore of the supernatural, and knew the
+doubt he expresses to be not without support.--His companions as well
+had all been in suspense as to the identity of the apparition with the
+late king.]
+
+[Page 116]
+
+_Enter King, Queene, Polonius, Ophelia, Rosincrance,
+Guildenstern, and Lords._[1]           [Sidenote: Guyldensterne, Lords.]
+
+[Sidenote: 72] _King._ And can you by no drift of circumstance
+                                      [Sidenote: An can | of conference]
+Get from him why he puts on[2] this Confusion:
+Grating so harshly all his dayes of quiet
+With turbulent and dangerous Lunacy.
+
+_Rosin._ He does confesse he feeles himselfe distracted,
+[Sidenote: 92] But from what cause he will by no meanes speake.
+                                                      [Sidenote: a will]
+
+_Guil._ Nor do we finde him forward to be sounded,
+But with a crafty Madnesse[3] keepes aloofe:
+When we would bring him on to some Confession
+Of his true state.
+
+_Qu._ Did he receiue you well?
+
+_Rosin._ Most like a Gentleman.
+
+_Guild._ But with much forcing of his disposition.[4]
+
+_Rosin._ Niggard of question, but of our demands
+Most free in his reply.[5]
+
+_Qu._ Did you assay him to any pastime?
+
+_Rosin._ Madam, it so fell out, that certaine Players
+We ore-wrought on the way: of these we told him,
+                                               [Sidenote: ore-raught[6]]
+And there did seeme in him a kinde of ioy
+To heare of it: They are about the Court,    [Sidenote: are heere about]
+And (as I thinke) they haue already order
+This night to play before him.
+
+_Pol._ 'Tis most true;
+And he beseech'd me to intreate your Majesties
+To heare, and see the matter.
+
+_King._ With all my heart, and it doth much content me
+To heare him so inclin'd. Good Gentlemen,
+
+[Footnote 1: This may be regarded as the commencement of the Third Act.]
+
+[Footnote 2: The phrase seems to imply a doubt of the genuineness of the
+lunacy.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _Nominative pronoun omitted here._]
+
+[Footnote 4: He has noted, without understanding them, the signs of
+Hamlet's suspicion of themselves.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Compare the seemingly opposite statements of the two:
+Hamlet had bewildered them.]
+
+[Foonote 6: _over-reached_--came up with, caught up, overtook.]
+
+[Page 118]
+
+Giue him a further edge,[1] and driue his purpose on
+                                          [Sidenote: purpose into these]
+To these delights.
+
+_Rosin._ We shall my Lord. _Exeunt._
+                                       [Sidenote: _Exeunt Ros. & Guyl._]
+
+_King._ Sweet Gertrude leaue vs too,          [Sidenote: Gertrard | two]
+For we haue closely sent for _Hamlet_ hither,
+[Sidenote: 84] That he, as 'twere by accident, may there
+                                                       [Sidenote: heere]
+Affront[2] _Ophelia_.  Her Father, and my selfe[3] (lawful espials)[4]
+Will so bestow our selues, that seeing vnseene
+We may of their encounter frankely iudge,
+And gather by him, as he is behaued,
+If't be th'affliction of his loue, or no,
+That thus he suffers for.
+
+_Qu._ I shall obey you,
+And for your part _Ophelia_,[5] I do wish
+That your good Beauties be the happy cause
+Of _Hamlets_ wildenesse: so shall I hope your Vertues
+[Sidenote: 240] Will bring him to his wonted way againe,
+To both your Honors.[6]
+
+_Ophe._ Madam, I wish it may.
+
+_Pol. Ophelia_, walke you heere.  Gracious so please ye[7]
+                                                        [Sidenote: you,]
+We will bestow our selues: Reade on this booke,[8]
+That shew of such an exercise may colour
+Your lonelinesse.[9] We are oft too blame in this,[10]
+                                                   [Sidenote: lowlines:]
+'Tis too much prou'd, that with Deuotions visage,
+And pious Action, we do surge o're                     [Sidenote: sugar]
+The diuell himselfe.
+
+[Sidenote: 161]  _King._ Oh 'tis true:          [Sidenote: tis too true]
+How smart a lash that speech doth giue my Conscience?
+The Harlots Cheeke beautied with plaist'ring Art
+Is not more vgly to the thing that helpes it,[11]
+Then is my deede, to my most painted word.[12]
+Oh heauie burthen![13]
+
+[Footnote 1: '_edge_ him on'--somehow corrupted into _egg_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _confront_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _Clause in parenthesis not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 4: --apologetic to the queen.]
+
+[Footnote 5: --_going up to Ophelia_--I would say, who stands at a
+little distance, and has not heard what has been passing between them.]
+
+[Footnote 6: The queen encourages Ophelia in hoping to marry Hamlet, and
+may so have a share in causing a certain turn her madness takes.]
+
+[Footnote 7: --_aside to the king_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: --_to Ophelia:_ her prayer-book. 122.]
+
+[Footnote 9: _1st Q._
+
+    And here _Ofelia_, reade you on this booke,
+    And walke aloofe, the King shal be vnseene.]
+
+[Footnote 10: --_aside to the king._ I insert these _asides_, and
+suggest the queen's going up to Ophelia, to show how we may easily hold
+Ophelia ignorant of their plot. Poor creature as she was, I would
+believe Shakspere did not mean her to lie to Hamlet. This may be why he
+omitted that part of her father's speech in the _1st Q._ given in the
+note immediately above, telling her the king is going to hide. Still, it
+would be excuse enough for _her_, that she thought his madness justified
+the deception.]
+
+[Footnote 11: --ugly to the paint that helps by hiding it--to which it
+lies so close, and from which it has no secrets. Or, 'ugly to' may mean,
+'ugly _compared with_.']
+
+[Footnote 12: 'most painted'--_very much painted_. His painted word is
+the paint to the deed. _Painted_ may be taken for _full of paint_.]
+
+[Footnote 13: This speech of the king is the first _assurance_ we have
+of his guilt.]
+
+[Page 120]
+
+_Pol._ I heare him comming, let's withdraw my Lord.
+                                          [Sidenote: comming, with-draw]
+                                     _Exeunt._[1]
+
+_Enter Hamlet._[2]
+
+_Ham._ To be, or not to be, that is the Question:
+Whether 'tis Nobler in the minde to suffer
+The Slings and Arrowes of outragious Fortune,
+[Sidenote: 200,250] Or to take Armes against a Sea of troubles,[3]
+And by opposing end them:[4] to dye, to sleepe
+No more; and by a sleepe, to say we end
+The Heart-ake, and the thousand Naturall shockes
+That Flesh is heyre too? 'Tis a consummation
+Deuoutly to be wish'd.[5] To dye to sleepe,
+To sleepe, perchance to Dreame;[6] I, there's the rub,
+For in that sleepe of death, what[7] dreames may come,[8]
+When we haue shuffle'd off this mortall coile,
+[Sidenote: 186] Must giue vs pawse.[9] There's the respect
+That makes Calamity of so long life:[10]
+For who would beare the Whips and Scornes of time,
+The Oppressors wrong, the poore mans Contumely,
+                                                 [Sidenote: proude mans]
+[Sidenote: 114] The pangs of dispriz'd Loue,[11] the Lawes delay,
+                                                    [Sidenote: despiz'd]
+The insolence of Office, and the Spurnes
+That patient merit of the vnworthy takes,                [Sidenote: th']
+When he himselfe might his _Quietus_ make
+[Sidenote: 194,252-3] With a bare Bodkin?[12] Who would these Fardles
+    beare[13]                                  [Sidenote: would fardels]
+To grunt and sweat vnder a weary life,
+[Sidenote: 194] But that the dread of something after death,[14]
+The vndiscouered Countrey, from whose Borne
+No Traueller returnes,[15] Puzels the will,
+And makes vs rather beare those illes we haue,
+Then flye to others that we know not of.
+Thus Conscience does make Cowards of vs all,[16]
+[Sidenote: 30] And thus the Natiue hew of Resolution[17]
+Is sicklied o're, with the pale cast of Thought,[18]
+                                                     [Sidenote: sickled]
+
+[Footnote 1: _Not in Q._--They go behind the tapestry, where it hangs
+over the recess of the doorway. Ophelia thinks they have left the room.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _In Q. before last speech._]
+
+[Footnote 3: Perhaps to a Danish or Dutch critic, or one from the
+eastern coast of England, this simile would not seem so unfit as it does
+to some.]
+
+[Footnote 4: To print this so as I would have it read, I would complete
+this line from here with points, and commence the next with points. At
+the other breaks of the soliloquy, as indicated below, I would do the
+same--thus:
+
+    And by opposing end them....
+                       ....To die--to sleep,]
+
+[Footnote 5: _Break_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _Break_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Emphasis on _what_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Such dreams as the poor Ghost's.]
+
+[Footnote 9: _Break._ --'_pawse_' is the noun, and from its use at page
+186, we may judge it means here 'pause for reflection.']
+
+[Footnote 10: 'makes calamity so long-lived.']
+
+[Footnote 11: --not necessarily disprized by the _lady_; the disprizer
+in Hamlet's case was the worldly and suspicious father--and that in
+part, and seemingly to Hamlet altogether, for the king's sake.]
+
+[Footnote 12: _small sword_. If there be here any allusion to suicide,
+it is on the general question, and with no special application to
+himself. 24. But it is the king and the bare bodkin his thought
+associates. How could he even glance at the things he has just
+mentioned, as each, a reason for suicide? It were a cowardly country
+indeed where the question might be asked, 'Who would not commit suicide
+because of any one of these things, except on account of what may follow
+after death?'! One might well, however, be tempted to destroy an
+oppressor, _and risk his life in that._]
+
+[Footnote 13: _Fardel_, burden: the old French for _fardeau_, I am
+informed.]
+
+[Footnote 14: --a dread caused by conscience.]
+
+[Footnote 15: The Ghost could not be imagined as having _returned_.]
+
+[Footnote 16: 'of us all' _not in Q._ It is not the fear of evil that
+makes us cowards, but the fear of _deserved_ evil. The Poet may intend
+that conscience alone is the cause of fear in man. '_Coward_' does not
+here involve contempt: it should be spoken with a grim smile. But Hamlet
+would hardly call turning from _suicide_ cowardice in any sense. 24.]
+
+[Footnote 17: --such as was his when he vowed vengeance.]
+
+[Footnote 18: --such as immediately followed on that The _native_ hue of
+resolution--that which is natural to man till interruption comes--is
+ruddy; the hue of thought is pale. I suspect the '_pale cast_' of an
+allusion to whitening with _rough-cast_.]
+
+[Page 122]
+
+And enterprizes of great pith and moment,[1]       [Sidenote: pitch [1]]
+With this regard their Currants turne away,             [Sidenote: awry]
+And loose the name of Action.[2] Soft you now,
+[Sidenote: 119] The faire _Ophelia_? Nimph, in thy Orizons[3]
+Be all my sinnes remembred.[4]
+
+_Ophe._ Good my Lord,
+How does your Honor for this many a day?
+
+_Ham._ I humbly thanke you: well, well, well.[5]
+
+_Ophe._ My Lord, I haue Remembrances of yours,
+That I haue longed long to re-deliuer.
+I pray you now, receiue them.
+
+_Ham._ No, no, I neuer gaue you ought.[6]
+                                          [Sidenote: No, not I, I never]
+
+_Ophe._ My honor'd Lord, I know right well you did,
+                                                    [Sidenote: you know]
+And with them words of so sweet breath compos'd,
+As made the things more rich, then perfume left:
+                    [Sidenote: these things | their perfume lost.[7]]
+Take these againe, for to the Noble minde
+Rich gifts wax poore, when giuers proue vnkinde.
+There my Lord.[8]
+
+_Ham._ Ha, ha: Are you honest?[9]
+
+_Ophe._ My Lord.
+
+_Ham._ Are you faire?
+
+_Ophe._ What meanes your Lordship?
+
+_Ham._ That if you be honest and faire, your
+                                     [Sidenote: faire, you should admit]
+Honesty[10] should admit no discourse to your Beautie.
+
+_Ophe._ Could Beautie my Lord, haue better
+Comerce[11] then your Honestie?[12]
+                                     [Sidenote: Then with honestie?[11]]
+
+_Ham._ I trulie: for the power of Beautie, will
+sooner transforme Honestie from what it is, to a
+Bawd, then the force of Honestie can translate
+Beautie into his likenesse. This was sometime a
+Paradox, but now the time giues it proofe. I did
+loue you once.[13]
+
+_Ophe._ Indeed my Lord, you made me beleeue so.
+
+[Footnote 1: How could _suicide_ be styled _an enterprise of great
+pith_? Yet less could it be called _of great pitch_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: I allow this to be a general reflection, but surely it
+serves to show that _conscience_ must at least be one of Hamlet's
+restraints.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --by way of intercession.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Note the entire change of mood from that of the last
+soliloquy. The right understanding of this soliloquy is indispensable to
+the right understanding of Hamlet. But we are terribly trammelled and
+hindered, as in the understanding of Hamlet throughout, so here in the
+understanding of his meditation, by traditional assumption. I was roused
+to think in the right direction concerning it, by the honoured friend
+and relative to whom I have feebly acknowledged my obligation by
+dedicating to him this book. I could not at first see it as he saw it:
+'Think about it, and you will,' he said. I did think, and by
+degrees--not very quickly--my prejudgments thinned, faded, and almost
+vanished. I trust I see it now as a whole, and in its true relations,
+internal and external--its relations to itself, to the play, and to the
+Hamlet, of Shakspere.
+
+Neither in its first verse, then, nor in it anywhere else, do I find
+even an allusion to suicide. What Hamlet is referring to in the said
+first verse, it is not possible with certainty to determine, for it is
+but the vanishing ripple of a preceding ocean of thought, from which he
+is just stepping out upon the shore of the articulate. He may have been
+plunged in some profound depth of the metaphysics of existence, or he
+may have been occupied with the one practical question, that of the
+slaying of his uncle, which has, now in one form, now in another,
+haunted his spirit for weeks. Perhaps, from the message he has just
+received, he expects to meet the king, and conscience, confronting
+temptation, has been urging the necessity of proof; perhaps a righteous
+consideration of consequences, which sometimes have share in the primary
+duty, has been making him shrink afresh from the shedding of blood, for
+every thoughtful mind recoils from the irrevocable, and that is an awful
+form of the irrevocable. But whatever thought, general or special, this
+first verse may be dismissing, we come at once thereafter into the light
+of a definite question: 'Which is nobler--to endure evil fortune, or to
+oppose it _ŕ outrance_; to bear in passivity, or to resist where
+resistance is hopeless--resist to the last--to the death which is its
+unavoidable end?'
+
+Then comes a pause, during which he is thinking--we will not say 'too
+precisely on the event,' but taking his account with consequences: the
+result appears in the uttered conviction that the extreme possible
+consequence, death, is a good and not an evil. Throughout, observe, how
+here, as always, he generalizes, himself being to himself but the type
+of his race.
+
+Then follows another pause, during which he seems prosecuting the
+thought, for he has already commenced further remark in similar strain,
+when suddenly a new and awful element introduces itself:
+
+                       ....To die--to sleep.--
+    --To _sleep_! perchance to _dream_!
+
+He had been thinking of death only as the passing away of the present
+with its troubles; here comes the recollection that death has its own
+troubles--its own thoughts, its own consciousness: if it be a sleep, it
+has its dreams. '_What dreams may come_' means, 'the sort of dreams that
+may come'; the emphasis is on the _what_, not on the _may_; there is no
+question whether dreams will come, but there is question of the
+character of the dreams. This consideration is what makes calamity so
+long-lived! 'For who would bear the multiform ills of life'--he alludes
+to his own wrongs, but mingles, in his generalizing way, others of those
+most common to humanity, and refers to the special cure for some of his
+own which was close to his hand--'who would bear these things if he
+could, as I can, make his quietus with a bare bodkin'--that is, by
+slaying his enemy--'who would then bear them, but that he fears the
+future, and the divine judgment upon his life and actions--that
+conscience makes a coward of him!'[14]
+
+To run, not the risk of death, but the risks that attend upon and follow
+death, Hamlet must be certain of what he is about; he must be sure it is
+a right thing he does, or he will leave it undone. Compare his speech,
+250, 'Does it not, &c.':--by the time he speaks this speech, he has had
+perfect proof, and asserts the righteousness of taking vengeance in
+almost an agony of appeal to Horatio.
+
+The more continuous and the more formally logical a soliloquy, the less
+natural it is. The logic should be all there, but latent; the bones of
+it should not show: they do not show here.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _One_ 'well' _only in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 6: He does not want to take them back, and so sever even that
+weak bond between them. He has not given her up.]
+
+[Footnote 7: The _Q._ reading seems best. The perfume of his gifts was
+the sweet words with which they were given; those words having lost
+their savour, the mere gifts were worth nothing.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Released from the commands her father had laid upon her,
+and emboldened by the queen's approval of more than the old relation
+between them, she would timidly draw Hamlet back to the past--to love
+and a sound mind.]
+
+[Footnote 9: I do not here suppose a noise or movement of the arras, or
+think that the talk from this point bears the mark of the madness he
+would have assumed on the least suspicion of espial. His distrust of
+Ophelia comes from a far deeper source--suspicion of all women, grown
+doubtful to him through his mother. Hopeless for her, he would give his
+life to know that Ophelia was not like her. Hence the cruel things he
+says to her here and elsewhere; they are the brood of a heart haunted
+with horrible, alas! too excusable phantoms of distrust. A man wretched
+as Hamlet must be forgiven for being rude; it is love suppressed, love
+that can neither breathe nor burn, that makes him rude. His horrid
+insinuations are a hungry challenge to indignant rejection. He would
+sting Ophelia to defence of herself and her sex. But, either from her
+love, or from gentleness to his supposed madness, as afterwards in the
+play-scene, or from the poverty and weakness of a nature so fathered and
+so brothered, she hears, and says nothing. 139.]
+
+[Footnote 10: Honesty is here figured as a porter,--just after, as a
+porter that may be corrupted.]
+
+[Footnote 11: If the _Folio_ reading is right, _commerce_ means
+_companionship_; if the _Quarto_ reading, then it means _intercourse_.
+Note _then_ constantly for our _than_.]
+
+[Footnote 12: I imagine Ophelia here giving Hamlet a loving look--which
+hardens him. But I do not think she lays emphasis on _your_; the word is
+here, I take it, used (as so often then) impersonally.]
+
+[Footnote 13: '--proof in you and me: _I_ loved _you_ once, but my
+honesty did not translate your beauty into its likeness.']
+
+[Footnote 14: That the Great Judgement was here in Shakspere's thought,
+will be plain to those who take light from the corresponding passage in
+the _1st Quarto_. As it makes an excellent specimen of that issue in the
+character I am most inclined to attribute to it--that of original sketch
+and continuous line of notes, with more or less finished passages in
+place among the notes--I will here quote it, recommending it to my
+student's attention. If it be what I suggest, it is clear that Shakspere
+had not at first altogether determined how he would carry the
+soliloquy--what line he was going to follow in it: here hope and fear
+contend for the place of motive to patience. The changes from it in the
+text are well worth noting: the religion is lessened: the hope
+disappears: were they too much of pearls to cast before 'barren
+spectators'? The manuscript could never have been meant for any eye but
+his own, seeing it was possible to print from it such a chaos--over
+which yet broods the presence of the formative spirit of the Poet.
+
+    _Ham._ To be, or not to be, I there's the point,
+    To Die, to sleepe, is that all? I all:
+    No, to sleepe, to dreame, I mary there it goes,
+    For in that dreame of death, when wee awake,
+    [Sidenote: 24, 247, 260] And borne before an euerlasting Iudge,
+    From whence no passenger euer retur'nd,
+    The vndiscouered country, at whose sight
+    The happy smile, and the accursed damn'd.
+    But for this, the ioyfull hope of this,
+    Whol'd beare the scornes and flattery of the world,
+    Scorned by the right rich, the rich curssed of the poore?
+    The widow being oppressed, the orphan wrong'd,
+    The taste of hunger, or a tirants raigne,
+    And thousand more calamities besides,
+    To grunt and sweate vnder this weary life,
+    When that he may his full _Quietus_ make,
+    With a bare bodkin, who would this indure,
+    But for a hope of something after death?
+    Which pulses the braine, and doth confound the sence,
+    Which makes vs rather beare those euilles we haue,
+    Than flie to others that we know not of.
+    I that, O this conscience makes cowardes of vs all,
+    Lady in thy orizons, be all my sinnes remembred.]
+
+[Page 126]
+
+_Ham._ You should not haue beleeued me. For
+vertue cannot so innocculate[1] our old stocke,[2] but
+we shall rellish of it.[3] I loued you not.[4]
+
+_Ophe._ I was the more deceiued.
+
+_Ham._ Get thee to a Nunnerie. Why would'st           [Sidenote: thee a]
+thou be a breeder of Sinners? I am my selfe indifferent[5]
+[Sidenote: 132] honest, but yet I could accuse me of
+such things,[6] that it were better my Mother had
+[Sidenote: 62] not borne me,[7] I am very prowd, reuengefull,
+Ambitious, with more offences at my becke, then I
+haue thoughts to put them in imagination, to giue
+them shape, or time to acte them in. What should
+such Fellowes as I do, crawling betweene Heauen
+                                            [Sidenote: earth and heauen]
+and Earth.[8] We are arrant Knaues all[10], beleeue
+none of vs.[9] Goe thy wayes to a Nunnery.
+Where's your Father?[11]
+
+_Ophe._ At home, my Lord.[12]
+
+_Ham._ Let the doores be shut vpon him, that
+he may play the Foole no way, but in's owne house.[13]
+                                                [Sidenote: no where but]
+Farewell.[14]
+
+_Ophe._ O helpe him, you sweet Heauens.
+
+_Ham._[15] If thou doest Marry, Ile giue thee this
+Plague for thy Dowrie. Be thou as chast as Ice,
+as pure as Snow, thou shalt not escape Calumny.[16]
+Get thee to a Nunnery. Go,[17] Farewell.[18] Or if
+thou wilt needs Marry, marry a fool: for Wise men
+know well enough, what monsters[19] you make of
+them. To a Nunnery go, and quickly too. Farwell.[20]
+
+_Ophe._ O[21] heauenly Powers, restore him.
+
+_Ham._[22] I haue heard of your pratlings[23] too wel
+                                         [Sidenote: your paintings well]
+enough. God has giuen you one pace,[23] and you
+                                            [Sidenote: hath | one face,]
+make your selfe another: you gidge, you amble,
+                             [Sidenote: selfes | you gig and amble, and]
+and you lispe, and nickname Gods creatures, and
+                                       [Sidenote: you list you nickname]
+make your Wantonnesse, your[24] Ignorance.[25] Go
+
+[Footnote 1: 'inoculate'--_bud_, in the horticultural use.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _trunk_ or _stem_ of the family tree.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Emphasis on _relish_--'keep something of the old flavour of
+the stock.']
+
+[Footnote 4: He tries her now with denying his love--perhaps moved in
+part by a feeling, taught by his mother's, of how imperfect it was.]
+
+[Footnote 5: tolerably.]
+
+[Footnote 6: He turns from baiting woman in her to condemn himself. Is
+it not the case with every noble nature, that the knowledge of wrong in
+another arouses in it the consciousness of its own faults and sins, of
+its own evil possibilities? Hurled from the heights of ideal humanity,
+Hamlet not only recognizes in himself every evil tendency of his race,
+but almost feels himself individually guilty of every transgression.
+'God, God, forgive us all!' exclaims the doctor who has just witnessed
+the misery of Lady Macbeth, unveiling her guilt.
+
+This whole speech of Hamlet is profoundly sane--looking therefore
+altogether insane to the shallow mind, on which the impression of its
+insanity is deepened by its coming from him so freely. The common nature
+disappointed rails at humanity; Hamlet, his earthly ideal destroyed,
+would tear his individual human self to pieces.]
+
+[Footnote 7: This we may suppose uttered with an expression as startling
+to Ophelia as impenetrable.]
+
+[Footnote 8: He is disgusted with himself, with his own nature and
+consciousness--]
+
+[Footnote 9: --and this reacts on his kind.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'all' _not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 11: Here, perhaps, he grows suspicious--asks himself why he is
+allowed this prolonged _tęte ŕ tęte_.]
+
+[Footnote 12: I am willing to believe she thinks so.]
+
+[Footnote 13: Whether he trusts Ophelia or not, he does not take her
+statement for correct, and says this in the hope that Polonius is not
+too far off to hear it. The speech is for him, not for Ophelia, and will
+seem to her to come only from his madness.]
+
+[Footnote 14: _Exit_.]
+
+[Footnote 15: (_re-entering_)]
+
+[Footnote 16: 'So many are bad, that your virtue will not be believed
+in.']
+
+[Footnote 17: 'Go' _not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 18: _Exit, and re-enter._]
+
+[Footnote 19: _Cornuti._]
+
+[Footnote 20: _Exit._]
+
+[Footnote 21: 'O' _not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 22: (_re-entering_)]
+
+[Footnote 23: I suspect _pratlings_ to be a corruption, not of the
+printed _paintings_, but of some word substituted for it by the Poet,
+perhaps _prancings_, and _pace_ to be correct.]
+
+[Footnote 24: 'your' _not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 25: As the present type to him of womankind, he assails her
+with such charges of lightness as are commonly brought against women. He
+does not go farther: she is not his mother, and he hopes she is
+innocent. But he cannot make her speak!]
+
+[Page 128]
+
+too, Ile no more on't, it hath made me mad. I say,
+we will haue no more Marriages.[1] Those that are
+                                             [Sidenote: no mo marriage,]
+married already,[2] all but one shall liue, the rest
+shall keep as they are. To a Nunnery, go.
+
+                         _Exit Hamlet_.               [Sidenote: _Exit_]
+
+[3]_Ophe._ O what a Noble minde is heere o're-throwne?
+The Courtiers, Soldiers, Schollers: Eye, tongue, sword,
+Th'expectansie and Rose[4] of the faire State,
+                                            [Sidenote: Th' expectation,]
+The glasse of Fashion,[5] and the mould of Forme,[6]
+Th'obseru'd of all Obseruers, quite, quite downe.
+Haue I of Ladies most deiect and wretched,          [Sidenote: And I of]
+That suck'd the Honie of his Musicke Vowes:          [Sidenote: musickt]
+Now see that Noble, and most Soueraigne Reason,     [Sidenote: see what]
+Like sweet Bels iangled out of tune, and harsh,[7]
+                                                 [Sidenote: out of time]
+That vnmatch'd Forme and Feature of blowne youth,[8]
+                                              [Sidenote: and stature of]
+Blasted with extasie.[9] Oh woe is me,
+T'haue scene what I haue scene: see what I see.[10]
+                                                     [Sidenote: _Exit_.]
+
+_Enter King, and Polonius_.
+
+_King_. Loue? His affections do not that way tend,
+Nor what he spake, though it lack'd Forme a little,      [Sidenote: Not]
+Was not like Madnesse.[11] There's something in his soule?
+O're which his Melancholly sits on brood,
+And I do doubt the hatch, and the disclose[12]
+Will be some danger,[11] which to preuent       [Sidenote: which for to]
+I haue in quicke determination
+[Sidenote: 138, 180] Thus set it downe. He shall with speed to England
+For the demand of our neglected Tribute:
+Haply the Seas and Countries different
+
+[Footnote 1: 'The thing must be put a stop to! the world must cease! it
+is not fit to go on.']
+
+[Footnote 2: 'already--(_aside_) all but one--shall live.']
+
+[Footnote 3: _1st Q_.
+
+    _Ofe._ Great God of heauen, what a quicke change is this?
+    The Courtier, Scholler, Souldier, all in him,
+    All dasht and splinterd thence, O woe is me,
+    To a seene what I haue seene, see what I see. _Exit_.
+
+To his cruel words Ophelia is impenetrable--from the conviction that not
+he but his madness speaks.
+
+The moment he leaves her, she breaks out in such phrase as a young girl
+would hardly have used had she known that the king and her father were
+listening. I grant, however, the speech may be taken as a soliloquy
+audible to the spectators only, who to the persons of a play are _but_
+the spiritual presences.]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'The hope and flower'--The _rose_ is not unfrequently used
+in English literature as the type of perfection.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'he by whom Fashion dressed herself'--_he who set the
+fashion_. His great and small virtues taken together, Hamlet makes us
+think of Sir Philip Sidney--ten years older than Shakspere, and dead
+sixteen years before _Hamlet_ was written.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'he after whose ways, or modes of behaviour, men shaped
+theirs'--therefore the mould in which their forms were cast;--_the
+object of universal imitation_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: I do not know whether this means--the peal rung without
+regard to tune or time--or--the single bell so handled that the tongue
+checks and jars the vibration. In some country places, I understand,
+they go about ringing a set of hand-bells.]
+
+[Footnote 8: youth in full blossom.]
+
+[Footnote 9: madness 177.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'to see now such a change from what I saw then.']
+
+[Footnote 11: The king's conscience makes him keen. He is, all through,
+doubtful of the madness.]
+
+[Footnote 12: --of the fact- or fancy-egg on which his melancholy sits
+brooding]
+
+[Page 130]
+
+With variable Obiects, shall expell
+This something setled matter[1] in his heart
+Whereon his Braines still beating, puts him thus
+From[2] fashion of himselfe. What thinke you on't?
+
+_Pol_. It shall do well. But yet do I beleeue
+The Origin and Commencement of this greefe       [Sidenote: his greefe,]
+Sprung from neglected loue.[3] How now _Ophelia_?
+You neede not tell vs, what Lord _Hamlet_ saide,
+We heard it all.[4] My Lord, do as you please,
+But if you hold it fit after the Play,
+Let his Queene Mother all alone intreat him
+To shew his Greefes: let her be round with him,      [Sidenote: griefe,]
+And Ile be plac'd so, please you in the eare
+Of all their Conference. If she finde him not,[5]
+To England send him: Or confine him where
+Your wisedome best shall thinke.
+
+_King_. It shall be so:
+Madnesse in great Ones, must not vnwatch'd go.[6]
+                                                   [Sidenote: unmatched]
+                                       _Exeunt_.
+
+_Enter Hamlet, and two or three of the Players_.
+                                                 [Sidenote: _and three_]
+
+_Ham_.[7] Speake the Speech I pray you, as I
+pronounc'd it to you trippingly[8] on the Tongue:
+But if you mouth it, as many of your Players do,
+                                              [Sidenote: of our Players]
+I had as liue[9] the Town-Cryer had spoke my     [Sidenote: cryer spoke]
+Lines:[10] Nor do not saw the Ayre too much your   [Sidenote: much with]
+hand thus, but vse all gently; for in the verie
+Torrent, Tempest, and (as I may say) the Whirlewinde
+                                              [Sidenote: say, whirlwind]
+of Passion, you must acquire and beget a             [Sidenote: of your]
+Temperance that may giue it Smoothnesse.[11] O it
+offends mee to the Soule, to see a robustious Perywig-pated
+                                                  [Sidenote: to heare a]
+Fellow, teare a Passion to tatters, to              [Sidenote: totters,]
+verie ragges, to split the eares of the Groundlings:[12]
+                                                      [Sidenote: spleet]
+who (for the most part) are capeable[13] of nothing,
+but inexplicable dumbe shewes,[14] and noise:[15] I
+could haue such a Fellow whipt for o're-doing          [Sidenote: would]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'something of settled matter'--_idée fixe_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: '_away from_ his own true likeness'; 'makes him so unlike
+himself.']
+
+[Footnote 3: Polonius is crestfallen, but positive.]
+
+[Footnote 4: This supports the notion of Ophelia's ignorance of the
+espial. Polonius thinks she is about to disclose what has passed, and
+_informs_ her of its needlessness. But it _might_ well enough be taken
+as only an assurance of the success of their listening--that they had
+heard without difficulty.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'If she do not find him out': a comparable phrase, common
+at the time, was, _Take me with you_, meaning, _Let me understand you_.
+
+Polonius, for his daughter's sake, and his own in her, begs for him
+another chance.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'in the insignificant, madness may roam the country, but in
+the great it must be watched.' The _unmatcht_ of the _Quarto_ might bear
+the meaning of _countermatched_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: I should suggest this exhortation to the Players introduced
+with the express purpose of showing how absolutely sane Hamlet was,
+could I believe that Shakspere saw the least danger of Hamlet's pretence
+being mistaken for reality.]
+
+[Footnote 8: He would have neither blundering nor emphasis such as might
+rouse too soon the king's suspicion, or turn it into certainty.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'liue'--_lief_]
+
+[Footnote 10: 1st Q.:--
+
+    I'de rather heare a towne bull bellow,
+    Then such a fellow speake my lines.
+
+_Lines_ is a player-word still.]
+
+[Footnote 11: --smoothness such as belongs to the domain of Art, and
+will both save from absurdity, and allow the relations with surroundings
+to manifest themselves;--harmoniousness, which is the possibility of
+co-existence.]
+
+[Footnote 12: those on the ground--that is, in the pit; there was no
+gallery then.]
+
+[Footnote 13: _receptive_.]
+
+[Footnote 14: --gestures extravagant and unintelligible as those of a
+dumb show that could not by the beholder be interpreted; gestures
+incorrespondent to the words.
+
+A _dumb show_ was a stage-action without words.]
+
+[Footnote 15: Speech that is little but rant, and scarce related to the
+sense, is hardly better than a noise; it might, for the purposes of art,
+as well be a sound inarticulate.]
+
+[Page 132]
+
+Termagant[1]: it out-Herod's Herod[2] Pray you
+auoid it.
+
+_Player._ I warrant your Honor.
+
+_Ham._ Be not too tame neyther: but let your
+owne Discretion be your Tutor. Sute the Action
+to the Word, the Word to the Action, with this
+speciall obseruance: That you ore-stop not the    [Sidenote: ore-steppe]
+modestie of Nature; for any thing so ouer-done,     [Sidenote ore-doone]
+is fro[3] the purpose of Playing, whose end both at
+the first and now, was and is, to hold as 'twer the
+Mirrour vp to Nature; to shew Vertue her owne   [Sidenote: her feature;]
+Feature, Scorne[4] her owne Image, and the verie
+Age and Bodie of the Time, his forme and pressure.[5]
+Now, this ouer-done, or come tardie off,[6] though it
+make the vnskilfull laugh, cannot but make the      [Sidenote: it makes]
+Iudicious greeue; The censure of the which One,[7]
+                                                [Sidenote: of which one]
+must in your allowance[8] o're-way a whole Theater
+of Others. Oh, there bee Players that I haue
+scene Play, and heard others praise, and that highly
+                                                     [Sidenote: praysd,]
+(not to speake it prophanely) that neyther hauing
+the accent of Christians, nor the gate of Christian,
+Pagan, or Norman, haue so strutted and bellowed,
+                                        [Sidenote: Pagan, nor man, haue]
+that I haue thought some of Natures Iouerney-men
+had made men, and not made them well, they
+imitated Humanity so abhominably.[9]
+
+[Sidenote: 126] _Play._ I hope we haue reform'd that indifferently[10]
+with vs, Sir.
+
+_Ham._ O reforme it altogether. And let those
+that play your Clownes, speake no more then is set
+downe for them.[12] For there be of them, that will
+themselues laugh, to set on some quantitie of
+barren Spectators to laugh too, though in the
+meane time, some necessary Question of the Play
+be then to be considered:[12] that's Villanous, and
+shewes a most pittifull Ambition in the Fool that
+vses it.[13] Go make you readie.    _Exit Players_
+
+[Footnote 1: 'An imaginary God of the Mahometans, represented as a most
+violent character in the old Miracle-plays and Moralities.'--_Sh. Lex._]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'represented as a swaggering tyrant in the old dramatic
+performances.'--_Sh. Lex._]
+
+[Footnote 3: _away from_: inconsistent with.]
+
+[Footnote 4: --that which is deserving of scorn.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _impression_, as on wax. Some would persuade us that
+Shakspere's own plays do not do this; but such critics take the
+_accidents_ or circumstances of a time for the _body_ of it--the clothes
+for the person. _Human_ nature is 'Nature,' however _dressed_.
+
+There should be a comma after 'Age.']
+
+[Footnote 6: 'laggingly represented'--A word belonging to _time_ is
+substituted for a word belonging to _space_:--'this over-done, or
+inadequately effected'; 'this over-done, or under-done.']
+
+[Footnote 7: 'and the judgment of such a one.' '_the which_' seems
+equivalent to _and--such_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'must, you will grant.']
+
+[Footnote 9: Shakspere may here be playing with a false derivation, as I
+was myself when the true was pointed out to me--fancying _abominable_
+derived from _ab_ and _homo_. If so, then he means by the phrase: 'they
+imitated humanity so from the nature of man, so _inhumanly_.']
+
+[Footnote 10: tolerably.]
+
+[Footnote 11: 'Sir' _not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 12: Shakspere must have himself suffered from such clowns:
+Coleridge thinks some of their _gag_ has crept into his print.]
+
+[Footnote 13: Here follow in the _1st Q._ several specimens of such a
+clown's foolish jests and behaviour.]
+
+[Page 134]
+
+_Enter Polonius, Rosincrance, and Guildensterne_.[1]
+                              [Sidenote: _Guyldensterne, & Rosencraus_.]
+
+How now my Lord,
+Will the King heare this peece of Worke?
+
+_Pol_. And the Queene too, and that presently.[2]
+
+_Ham_. Bid the Players make hast.
+
+                              _Exit Polonius_.[3]
+
+Will you two helpe to hasten them?[4]
+
+_Both_. We will my Lord.        _Exeunt_.
+                        [Sidenote: _Ros_. I my Lord. _Exeunt they two_.]
+
+_Enter Horatio_[5]
+
+_Ham_. What hoa, _Horatio_?                       [Sidenote: What howe,]
+
+_Hora_. Heere sweet Lord, at your Seruice.
+
+[Sidenote: 26] _Ham_.[7] _Horatio_, thou art eene as iust a man
+As ere my Conversation coap'd withall.
+
+_Hora_. O my deere Lord.[6]
+
+_Ham_.[7] Nay do not thinke I flatter:
+For what aduancement may I hope from thee,[8]
+That no Reuennew hast, but thy good spirits
+To feed and cloath thee. Why shold the poor be flatter'd?
+No, let the Candied[9] tongue, like absurd pompe,      [Sidenote: licke]
+And crooke the pregnant Hindges of the knee,[10]
+Where thrift may follow faining? Dost thou heare,
+                                                    [Sidenote: fauning;]
+Since my deere Soule was Mistris of my choyse;[11]
+                                                 [Sidenote: her choice,]
+And could of men distinguish, her election
+Hath seal'd thee for her selfe. For thou hast bene
+                                                [Sidenote: S'hath seald]
+[Sidenote: 272] As one in suffering all, that suffers nothing.
+A man that Fortunes buffets, and Rewards
+Hath 'tane with equall Thankes. And blest are those,    [Sidenote: Hast]
+Whose Blood and Iudgement are so well co-mingled,
+                                               [Sidenote: comedled,[12]]
+[Sidenote: 26] That they are not a Pipe for Fortunes finger,
+To sound what stop she please.[13] Giue me that man,
+That is not Passions Slaue,[14] and I will weare him
+In my hearts Core: I, in my Heart of heart,[15]
+As I do thee. Something too much of this.[16]
+
+[Footnote 1: _In Q. at end of speech._]
+
+[Footnote 2: He humours Hamlet as if he were a child.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 4: He has sent for Horatio, and is expecting him.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _In Q. after next speech._]
+
+[Footnote 6: --repudiating the praise.]
+
+[Footnote 7: To know a man, there is scarce a readier way than to hear
+him talk of his friend--why he loves, admires, chooses him. The Poet
+here gives us a wide window into Hamlet. So genuine is his respect for
+_being_, so indifferent is he to _having_, that he does not shrink, in
+argument for his own truth, from reminding his friend to his face that,
+being a poor man, nothing is to be gained from him--nay, from telling
+him that it is through his poverty he has learned to admire him, as a
+man of courage, temper, contentment, and independence, with nothing but
+his good spirits for an income--a man whose manhood is dominant both
+over his senses and over his fortune--a true Stoic. He describes an
+ideal man, then clasps the ideal to his bosom as his own, in the person
+of his friend. Only a great man could so worship another, choosing him
+for such qualities; and hereby Shakspere shows us his Hamlet--a brave,
+noble, wise, pure man, beset by circumstances the most adverse
+conceivable. That Hamlet had not misapprehended Horatio becomes evident
+in the last scene of all. 272.]
+
+[Footnote 8: The mother of flattery is self-advantage.]
+
+[Footnote 9: _sugared_. _1st Q._:
+
+    Let flattery sit on those time-pleasing tongs;
+    To glose with them that loues to heare their praise;
+    And not with such as thou _Horatio_.
+    There is a play to night, &c.]
+
+[Footnote 10: A pregnant figure and phrase, requiring thought.]
+
+[Footnote 11: 'since my real self asserted its dominion, and began to
+rule my choice,' making it pure, and withdrawing it from the tyranny of
+impulse and liking.]
+
+[Footnote 12: The old word _medle_ is synonymous with _mingle._]
+
+[Footnote 13: To Hamlet, the lordship of man over himself, despite of
+circumstance, is a truth, and therefore a duty.]
+
+[Footnote 14: The man who has chosen his friend thus, is hardly himself
+one to act without sufficing reason, or take vengeance without certain
+proof of guilt.]
+
+[Footnote 15: He justifies the phrase, repeating it.]
+
+[Footnote 16: --apologetic for having praised him to his face.]
+
+[Page 136]
+
+There is a Play to night before the King,
+One Scoene of it comes neere the Circumstance
+Which I haue told thee, of my Fathers death.
+I prythee, when thou see'st that Acte a-foot,[1]
+Euen with the verie Comment of my[2] Soule      [Sidenote: thy[2] soule]
+Obserue mine Vnkle: If his occulted guilt,         [Sidenote: my Vncle,]
+Do not it selfe vnkennell in one speech,
+[Sidenote: 58] It is a damned Ghost that we haue seene:[3]
+And my Imaginations are as foule
+As Vulcans Stythe.[4] Giue him needfull note,
+                                          [Sidenote: stithy; | heedfull]
+For I mine eyes will riuet to his Face:
+And after we will both our iudgements ioyne,[5]
+To censure of his seeming.[6]                     [Sidenote: in censure]
+
+_Hora._ Well my Lord.
+If he steale ought the whil'st this Play is Playing.    [Sidenote: if a]
+And scape detecting, I will pay the Theft.[1]      [Sidenote: detected,]
+
+_Enter King, Queene, Polonius, Ophelia, Rosincrance,
+Guildensterne, and other Lords attendant with
+his Guard carrying Torches. Danish March.
+Sound a Flourish._
+            [Sidenote: _Enter Trumpets and Kettle Drummes, King, Queene,
+                                                    Polonius, Ophelia._]
+
+_Ham._ They are comming to the Play: I must
+[Sidenote: 60, 156, 178] be idle.[7] Get you a place.
+
+_King._ How fares our Cosin _Hamlet_?
+
+_Ham._ Excellent Ifaith, of the Camelions dish:
+[Sidenote: 154] I eate the Ayre promise-cramm'd,[8] you cannot feed
+Capons so.[9]
+
+_King._ I haue nothing with this answer _Hamlet_,
+these words are not mine.[10]
+
+_Ham._ No, nor mine. Now[11] my Lord, you
+plaid once i'th'Vniuersity, you say?
+
+_Polon._ That I did my Lord, and was accounted         [Sidenote: did I]
+a good Actor.
+
+[Footnote 1: Here follows in _1st Q._
+
+    Marke thou the King, doe but obserue his lookes,
+    For I mine eies will riuet to his face:
+    [Sidenote: 112] And if he doe not bleach, and change at that,
+    It is a damned ghost that we haue seene.
+    _Horatio_, haue a care, obserue him well.
+
+    _Hor_. My lord, mine eies shall still be on his face,
+    And not the smallest alteration
+    That shall appeare in him, but I shall note it.]
+
+[Footnote 2: I take 'my' to be right: 'watch my uncle with the
+comment--the discriminating judgment, that is--of _my_ soul, more intent
+than thine.']
+
+[Footnote 3: He has then, ere this, taken Horatio into his
+confidence--so far at least as the Ghost's communication concerning the
+murder.]
+
+[Footnote 4: a dissyllable: _stithy_, _anvil_; Scotch, _studdy_.
+
+Hamlet's doubt is here very evident: he hopes he may find it a false
+ghost: what good man, what good son would not? He has clear cause and
+reason--it is his duty to delay. That the cause and reason and duty are
+not invariably clear to Hamlet himself--not clear in every mood, is
+another thing. Wavering conviction, doubt of evidence, the corollaries
+of assurance, the oppression of misery, a sense of the worthlessness of
+the world's whole economy--each demanding delay, might yet well, all
+together, affect the man's feeling as mere causes of rather than reasons
+for hesitation. The conscientiousness of Hamlet stands out the clearer
+that, throughout, his dislike to his uncle, predisposing him to believe
+any ill of him, is more than evident. By his incompetent or prejudiced
+judges, Hamlet's accusations and justifications of himself are equally
+placed to the _discredit_ of his account. They seem to think a man could
+never accuse himself except he were in the wrong; therefore if ever he
+excuses himself, he is the more certainly in the wrong: whatever point
+may tell on the other side, it is to be disregarded.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'bring our two judgments together for comparison.']
+
+[Footnote 6: 'in order to judge of the significance of his looks and
+behaviour.']
+
+[Footnote 7: Does he mean _foolish_, that is, _lunatic_? or
+_insouciant_, and _unpreoccupied_?]
+
+[Footnote 8: The king asks Hamlet how he _fares_--that is, how he gets
+on; Hamlet pretends to think he has asked him about his diet. His talk
+has at once become wild; ere the king enters he has donned his cloak of
+madness. Here he confesses to ambition--will favour any notion
+concerning himself rather than give ground for suspecting the real state
+of his mind and feeling.
+
+In the _1st Q._ 'the Camelions dish' almost appears to mean the play,
+not the king's promises.]
+
+[Footnote 9: In some places they push food down the throats of the
+poultry they want to fatten, which is technically, I believe, called
+_cramming_ them.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'You have not taken me with you; I have not laid hold of
+your meaning; I have nothing by your answer.' 'Your words have not
+become my property; they have not given themselves to me in their
+meaning.']
+
+[Footnote 11: _Point thus_: 'No, nor mine now.--My Lord,' &c. '--not
+mine, now I have uttered them, for so I have given them away.' Or does
+he mean to disclaim their purport?]
+
+[Page 138]
+
+_Ham._ And[1] what did you enact?
+
+_Pol._ I did enact _Iulius Caesar_, I was kill'd
+i'th'Capitol: _Brutus_ kill'd me.
+
+_Ham._ It was a bruite part of him, to kill so
+Capitall a Calfe there.[2] Be the Players ready?
+
+_Rosin._ I my Lord, they stay vpon your patience.
+
+_Qu._ Come hither my good _Hamlet_, sit by me.      [Sidenote: my deere]
+
+_Ham._ No good Mother, here's Mettle more attractiue.[3]
+
+_Pol._ Oh ho, do you marke that?[4]
+
+_Ham._ Ladie, shall I lye in your Lap?
+
+_Ophe._ No my Lord.
+
+_Ham._ I meane, my Head vpon your Lap?[5]
+
+_Ophe._ I my Lord.[6]
+
+_Ham._ Do you thinke I meant Country[7] matters?
+
+_Ophe._ I thinke nothing, my Lord.
+
+_Ham._ That's a faire thought to ly between
+Maids legs.
+
+_Ophe._ What is my Lord?
+
+_Ham._ Nothing.
+
+_Ophe._ You are merrie, my Lord?
+
+_Ham._ Who I?
+
+_Ophe._ I my Lord.[8]
+
+_Ham._ Oh God, your onely Iigge-maker[9]: what
+should a man do, but be merrie. For looke you
+how cheerefully my Mother lookes, and my Father
+dyed within's two Houres.
+
+[Sidenote: 65] _Ophe._ Nay, 'tis twice two moneths, my Lord.[10]
+
+_Ham._ So long? Nay then let the Diuel weare
+[Sidenote: 32] blacke, for Ile haue a suite of Sables.[11] Oh
+Heauens! dye two moneths ago, and not forgotten
+yet?[12] Then there's hope, a great mans Memorie,
+may out-liue his life halfe a yeare: But byrlady  [Sidenote: ber Lady a]
+he must builde Churches then: or else shall he       [Sidenote: shall a]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'And ' _not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 2: Emphasis on _there_. 'There' is not in _1st Q._ Hamlet
+means it was a desecration of the Capitol.]
+
+[Footnote 3: He cannot be familiar with his mother, so avoids her--will
+not sit by her, cannot, indeed, bear to be near her. But he loves and
+hopes in Ophelia still.]
+
+[Footnote 4: '--Did I not tell you so?']
+
+[Footnote 5: This speech and the next are not in the _Q._, but are
+shadowed in the _1st Q._]
+
+[Footnote 6: _--consenting_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: In _1st Quarto_, 'contrary.'
+
+Hamlet hints, probing her character--hoping her unable to understand. It
+is the festering soreness of his feeling concerning his mother, making
+him doubt with the haunting agony of a loathed possibility, that
+prompts, urges, forces from him his ugly speeches--nowise to be
+justified, only to be largely excused in his sickening consciousness of
+his mother's presence. Such pain as Hamlet's, the ferment of subverted
+love and reverence, may lightly bear the blame of hideous manners,
+seeing, they spring from no wantonness, but from the writhing of
+tortured and helpless Purity. Good manners may be as impossible as out
+of place in the presence of shameless evil.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Ophelia bears with him for his own and his madness' sake,
+and is less uneasy because of the presence of his mother. To account
+_satisfactorily_ for Hamlet's speeches to her, is not easy. The freer
+custom of the age, freer to an extent hardly credible in this, will not
+_satisfy_ the lovers of Hamlet, although it must have _some_ weight. The
+necessity for talking madly, because he is in the presence of his uncle,
+and perhaps, to that end, for uttering whatever comes to him, without
+pause for choice, might give us another hair's-weight. Also he may be
+supposed confident that Ophelia would not understand him, while his
+uncle would naturally set such worse than improprieties down to wildest
+madness. But I suspect that here as before (123), Shakepere would show
+Hamlet's soul full of bitterest, passionate loathing; his mother has
+compelled him to think of horrors and women together, so turning their
+preciousness into a disgust; and this feeling, his assumed madhess
+allows him to indulge and partly relieve by utterance. Could he have
+provoked Ophelia to rebuke him with the severity he courted, such rebuke
+would have been joy to him. Perhaps yet a small addition of weight to
+the scale of his excuse may be found in his excitement about his play,
+and the necessity for keeping down that excitement. Suggestion is easier
+than judgment.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'here's for the jig-maker! he's the right man!' Or perhaps
+he is claiming the part as his own: 'I am your only jig-maker!']
+
+[Footnote 10: This needs not be taken for the exact time. The statement
+notwithstanding suggests something like two months between the first and
+second acts, for in the first, Hamlet says his father has not been dead
+two months. 24. We are not bound to take it for more than a rough
+approximation; Ophelia would make the best of things for the queen, who
+is very kind to her.]
+
+[Footnote 11: the fur of the sable.]
+
+[Footnote 12: _1st Q._
+
+                nay then there's some
+    Likelyhood, a gentlemans death may outliue memorie,
+    But by my faith &c.]
+
+[Page 140]
+
+suffer not thinking on, with the Hoby-horsse,
+whose Epitaph is, For o, For o, the Hoby-horse
+is forgot.
+
+_Hoboyes play. The dumbe shew enters._
+                 [Sidenote: _The Trumpets sounds. Dumbe show followes._]
+
+_Enter a King and Queene, very louingly; the Queene
+                                   [Sidenote: _and a Queene, the queen_]
+embracing him. She kneeles, and makes shew of
+   [Sidenote: _embracing him, and he her, he takes her up, and_]
+Protestation vnto him. He takes her vp, and
+declines his head vpon her neck. Layes him downe
+                                            [Sidenote: _necke, he lyes_]
+vpon a Banke of Flowers.  She seeing him
+a-sleepe, leaues him. Anon comes in a Fellow,
+                                [Sidenote: _anon come in an other man_,]
+takes off his Crowne, kisses it, and powres poyson
+                                                 [Sidenote: _it, pours_]
+in the Kings eares, and Exits. The Queene returnes,
+                       [Sidenote: _the sleepers eares, and leaues him:_]
+findes the King dead, and makes passionate       [Sidenote: dead, makes]
+Action. The Poysoner, with some two or
+                   [Sidenote: _some three or foure come in againe, seeme
+                                                            to condole_]
+three Mutes comes in againe, seeming to lament
+with her. The dead body is carried away: The
+                                             [Sidenote: _with her, the_]
+Poysoner Wooes the Queene with Gifts, she
+[Sidenote: 54] seemes loath and vnwilling awhile, but in the end,
+                                      [Sidenote: _seemes harsh awhile_,]
+accepts his loue.[1]   _Exeunt[2]_           [Sidenote: _accepts loue._]
+
+_Ophe._ What meanes this, my Lord?
+
+_Ham._ Marry this is Miching _Malicho_[3] that
+                                     [Sidenote: this munching _Mallico_]
+meanes Mischeefe.
+
+_Ophe._ Belike this shew imports the Argument
+of the Play?
+
+_Ham._ We shall know by these Fellowes:
+                               [Sidenote: this fellow, _Enter Prologue_]
+the Players cannot keepe counsell, they'l tell
+                                              [Sidenote: keepe, they'le]
+all.[4]
+
+_Ophe._ Will they tell vs what this shew meant?  [Sidenote: Will a tell]
+
+_Ham._ I, or any shew that you'l shew him. Bee      [Sidenote: you will]
+not you asham'd to shew, hee'l not shame to tell
+you what it meanes.
+
+_Ophe._ You are naught,[5] you are naught, Ile
+marke the Play.
+
+[Footnote 1: The king, not the queen, is aimed at. Hamlet does not
+forget the injunction of the Ghost to spare his mother. 54.
+
+The king should be represented throughout as struggling not to betray
+himself.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 3: _skulking mischief_: the latter word is Spanish, To _mich_
+is to _play truant_.
+
+    How tenderly her tender hands betweene
+    In yvorie cage she did the micher bind.
+
+_The Countess of Pembroke's Arcadia_, page 84.
+
+My _Reader_ tells me the word is still in use among printers, with the
+pronunciation _mike_, and the meaning _to skulk_ or _idle_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: --their part being speech, that of the others only dumb
+show.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _naughty_: persons who do not behave well are treated as if
+they were not--are made nought of--are set at nought; hence our word
+naughty.
+
+'Be naught awhile' (_As You Like It_, i. 1)--'take yourself away;' 'be
+nobody;' 'put yourself in the corner.']
+
+[Page 142]
+
+_Enter[1] Prologue._
+
+_For vs, and for our Tragedie,
+Heere stooping to your Clemencie:
+We begge your hearing Patientlie._
+
+_Ham._ Is this a Prologue, or the Poesie[2] of a       [Sidenote: posie]
+Ring?
+
+_Ophe._ 'Tis[3] briefe my Lord.
+
+_Ham._ As Womans loue.
+
+[4] _Enter King and his Queene._                [Sidenote: _and Queene_]
+
+[Sidenote: 234] _King._ Full thirtie times[5] hath Phoebus Cart gon
+round,
+Neptunes salt Wash, and _Tellus_ Orbed ground:     [Sidenote: orb'd the]
+And thirtie dozen Moones with borrowed sheene,
+About the World haue times twelue thirties beene,
+Since loue our hearts, and _Hymen_ did our hands
+Vnite comutuall, in most sacred Bands.[6]
+
+_Bap._ So many iournies may the Sunne and Moone      [Sidenote: _Quee._]
+Make vs againe count o're, ere loue be done.
+But woe is me, you are so sicke of late,
+So farre from cheere, and from your forme state,
+                                      [Sidenote: from our former state,]
+That I distrust you: yet though I distrust,
+Discomfort you (my Lord) it nothing must:
+[A]
+For womens Feare and Loue, holds quantitie,  [Sidenote: And womens hold]
+In neither ought, or in extremity:[7]
+                                     [Sidenote: Eyther none, in neither]
+Now what my loue is, proofe hath made you know,
+                                           [Sidenote: my Lord is proofe]
+And as my Loue is siz'd, my Feare is so.              [Sidenote: ciz'd,]
+[B]
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+    For women feare too much, euen as they loue,]
+
+[Footnote B: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+    Where loue is great, the litlest doubts are feare,
+    Where little feares grow great, great loue growes there.]
+
+[Footnote 1: _Enter_ not in _Q._]
+
+[Footnote 2: Commonly _posy_: a little sentence engraved inside a
+ring--perhaps originally a tiny couplet, therefore _poesy_, _1st Q._, 'a
+poesie for a ring?']
+
+[Footnote 3: Emphasis on ''Tis.']
+
+[Footnote 4: Very little blank verse of any kind was written before
+Shakspere's; the usual form of dramatic verse was long, irregular, rimed
+lines: the Poet here uses the heroic couplet, which gives a resemblance
+to the older plays by its rimes, while also by its stately and
+monotonous movement the play-play is differenced from the play into
+which it is introduced, and caused to _look_ intrinsically like a play
+in relation to the rest of the play of which it is part. In other words,
+it stands off from the surrounding play, slightly elevated both by form
+and formality. 103.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _1st Q._
+
+    _Duke._ Full fortie yeares are past, their date is gone,
+    Since happy time ioyn'd both our hearts as one:
+    And now the blood that fill'd my youthfull veines,
+    Ruunes weakely in their pipes, and all the straines
+    Of musicke, which whilome pleasde mine eare,
+    Is now a burthen that Age cannot beare:
+    And therefore sweete Nature must pay his due,
+    To heauen must I, and leaue the earth with you.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Here Hamlet gives the time his father and mother had been
+married, and Shakspere points at Hamlet's age. 234. The Poet takes
+pains to show his hero's years.]
+
+[Footnote 7: This line, whose form in the _Quarto_ is very careless,
+seems but a careless correction, leaving the sense as well as the
+construction obscure: 'Women's fear and love keep the scales level; in
+_neither_ is there ought, or in _both_ there is fulness;' or: 'there is
+no moderation in their fear and their love; either they have _none_ of
+either, or they have _excess_ of both.' Perhaps he tried to express both
+ideas at once. But compression is always in danger of confusion.]
+
+[Page 144]
+
+_King._ Faith I must leaue thee Loue, and shortly too:
+My operant Powers my Functions leaue to do:  [Sidenote: their functions]
+And thou shall liue in this faire world behinde,
+Honour'd, belou'd, and haply, one as kinde.
+For Husband shalt thou----
+
+_Bap._ Oh confound the rest:                         [Sidenote: _Quee._]
+Such Loue, must needs be Treason in my brest:
+In second Husband, let me be accurst,
+None wed the second, but who kill'd the first.[1]
+
+_Ham._ Wormwood, Wormwood.         [Sidenote: _Ham_. That's wormwood[2]]
+
+_Bapt._ The instances[3] that second Marriage moue,
+Are base respects of Thrift,[4] but none of Loue.
+A second time, I kill my Husband dead,
+When second Husband kisses me in Bed.
+
+_King._ I do beleeue you. Think what now you speak:
+But what we do determine, oft we breake:
+Purpose is but the slaue to Memorie,[5]
+Of violent Birth, but poore validitie:[6]
+Which now like Fruite vnripe stickes on the Tree,
+                                              [Sidenote: now the fruite]
+But fall vnshaken, when they mellow bee.[7]
+Most necessary[8] 'tis, that we forget
+To pay our selues, what to our selues is debt:
+What to our selues in passion we propose,
+The passion ending, doth the purpose lose.
+The violence of other Greefe or Ioy,                 [Sidenote: eyther,]
+Their owne ennactors with themselues destroy:     [Sidenote: ennactures]
+Where Ioy most Reuels, Greefe doth most lament;
+Greefe ioyes, Ioy greeues on slender accident.[9]
+                                      [Sidenote: Greefe ioy ioy griefes]
+This world is not for aye, nor 'tis not strange
+That euen our Loues should with our Fortunes change.
+For 'tis a question left vs yet to proue,
+Whether Loue lead Fortune, or else Fortune Loue.
+
+[Footnote 1: Is this to be supposed in the original play, or inserted by
+Hamlet, embodying an unuttered and yet more fearful doubt with regard to
+his mother?]
+
+[Footnote 2: This speech is on the margin in the _Quarto_, and the
+Queene's speech runs on without break.]
+
+[Footnote 3: the urgencies; the motives.]
+
+[Footnote 4: worldly advantage.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'Purpose holds but while Memory holds.']
+
+[Footnote 6: 'Purpose is born in haste, but is of poor strength to
+live.']
+
+[Footnote 7: Here again there is carelessness of construction, as if the
+Poet had not thought it worth his while to correct this subsidiary
+portion of the drama. I do not see how to lay the blame on the
+printer.--'Purpose is a mere fruit, which holds on or falls only as it
+must. The element of persistency is not in it.']
+
+[Footnote 8: unavoidable--coming of necessity.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'Grief turns into joy, and joy into grief, on a slight
+chance.']
+
+[Page 146]
+
+The great man downe, you marke his fauourites flies,
+                                                   [Sidenote: fauourite]
+The poore aduanc'd, makes Friends of Enemies:
+And hitherto doth Loue on Fortune tend,
+For who not needs, shall neuer lacke a Frend:
+And who in want a hollow Friend doth try,
+Directly seasons him his Enemie.[1]
+But orderly to end, where I begun,
+Our Willes and Fates do so contrary run,
+That our Deuices still are ouerthrowne,
+Our thoughts are ours, their ends none of our owne.[2]
+[Sidenote: 246] So thinke thou wilt no second Husband wed.
+But die thy thoughts, when thy first Lord is dead.
+
+_Bap._ Nor Earth to giue me food, nor Heauen light,  [Sidenote: _Quee._]
+Sport and repose locke from me day and night:[3]
+[A]
+Each opposite that blankes the face of ioy,
+Meet what I would haue well, and it destroy:
+Both heere, and hence, pursue me lasting strife,[4]
+If once a Widdow, euer I be Wife.[5] [Sidenote: once I be a | be a wife]
+
+_Ham._ If she should breake it now.[6]
+
+_King._ 'Tis deepely sworne:
+Sweet, leaue me heere a while,
+My spirits grow dull, and faine I would beguile
+The tedious day with sleepe.
+
+_Qu._ Sleepe rocke thy Braine,                    [Sidenote: Sleepes[7]]
+And neuer come mischance betweene vs twaine,
+                              _Exit_               [Sidenote: _Exeunt._]
+
+_Ham._ Madam, how like you this Play?
+
+_Qu._ The Lady protests to much me thinkes,     [Sidenote: doth protest]
+
+_Ham._ Oh but shee'l keepe her word.
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto:_--
+
+    To desperation turne my trust and hope,[8]
+    And Anchors[9] cheere in prison be my scope]
+
+[Footnote 1: All that is wanted to make a real enemy of an unreal friend
+is the seasoning of a requested favour.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'Our thoughts are ours, but what will come of them we
+cannot tell.']
+
+[Footnote 3: 'May Day and Night lock from me sport and repose.']
+
+[Footnote 4: 'May strife pursue me in the world and out of it.']
+
+[Footnote 5: In all this, there is nothing to reflect on his mother
+beyond what everybody knew.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _This speech is in the margin of the Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 7: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'May my trust and hope turn to despair.']
+
+[Footnote 9: an anchoret's.]
+
+[Page 148]
+
+_King_. Haue you heard the Argument, is there
+no Offence in't?[1]
+
+_Ham_. No, no, they do but iest, poyson in iest,
+no Offence i'th'world.[2]
+
+_King_. What do you call the Play?
+
+_Ham._ The Mouse-trap: Marry how? Tropically:[3]
+This Play is the Image of a murder done
+in _Vienna: Gonzago_ is the Dukes name, his wife
+_Baptista_: you shall see anon: 'tis a knauish peece
+of worke: But what o'that? Your Maiestie, and       [Sidenote: of that?]
+wee that haue free soules, it touches vs not: let the
+gall'd iade winch: our withers are vnrung.[4]
+
+_Enter Lucianus._[5]
+
+This is one _Lucianus_ nephew to the King.
+
+_Ophe_. You are a good Chorus, my Lord.
+                                     [Sidenote: are as good as a Chorus]
+
+_Ham_. I could interpret betweene you and your
+loue: if I could see the Puppets dallying.[6]
+
+_Ophe_. You are keene my Lord, you are keene.
+
+_Ham_. It would cost you a groaning, to take off my edge.
+                                                        [Sidenote: mine]
+
+_Ophe_. Still better and worse.
+
+_Ham_. So you mistake Husbands.[7]              [Sidenote: mistake your]
+Begin Murderer. Pox, leaue thy damnable Faces,
+                                            [Sidenote: murtherer, leave]
+and begin. Come, the croaking Rauen doth bellow
+for Reuenge.[8]
+
+_Lucian_. Thoughts blacke, hands apt,
+Drugges fit, and Time agreeing:
+Confederate season, else, no Creature seeing:[9]  [Sidenote: Considerat]
+Thou mixture ranke, of Midnight Weeds collected,
+With Hecats Ban, thrice blasted, thrice infected,   [Sidenote: invected]
+Thy naturall Magicke, and dire propertie,
+On wholsome life, vsurpe immediately.                 [Sidenote: vsurps]
+
+_Powres the poyson in his eares_.[10]
+
+_Ham_. He poysons him i'th Garden for's estate:
+                                         [Sidenote: A poysons | for his]
+
+[Footnote 1: --said, perhaps, to Polonius. Is there a lapse here in the
+king's self-possession? or is this speech only an outcome of its
+completeness--a pretence of fearing the play may glance at the queen for
+marrying him?]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'It is but jest; don't be afraid: there is no reality in
+it'--as one might say to a child seeing a play.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Figuratively: from _trope_. In the _1st Q._ the passage
+stands thus:
+
+    _Ham_. Mouse-trap: mary how trapically: this play is
+    The image of a murder done in _guyana_,]
+
+[Footnote 4: Here Hamlet endangers himself to force the king to
+self-betrayal.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _In Q. after next line._]
+
+[Footnote 6: In a puppet-play, if she and her love were the puppets, he
+could supply the speeches.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Is this a misprint for 'so you _must take_ husbands'--for
+better and worse, namely? or is it a thrust at his mother--'So you
+mis-take husbands, going from the better to a worse'? In _1st Q._: 'So
+you must take your husband, begin.']
+
+[Footnote 8: Probably a mocking parody or burlesque of some well-known
+exaggeration--such as not a few of Marlowe's lines.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'none beholding save the accomplice hour:'.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Page 150]
+
+His name's _Gonzago_: the Story is extant and writ
+                                                 [Sidenote: and written]
+in choyce Italian. You shall see anon how the
+                                              [Sidenote: in very choice]
+Murtherer gets the loue of _Gonzago's_ wife.
+
+_Ophe_. The King rises.[1]
+
+_Ham_. What, frighted with false fire.[2]
+
+_Qu_. How fares my Lord?
+
+_Pol_. Giue o're the Play.
+
+_King_. Giue me some Light. Away.[3]
+
+_All_. Lights, Lights, Lights.      _Exeunt_
+                     [Sidenote: _Pol. | Exeunt all but Ham. & Horatio._]
+
+_Manet Hamlet & Horatio._
+
+_Ham_.[4] Why let the strucken Deere go weepe,
+The Hart vngalled play:
+For some must watch, while some must sleepe;
+So runnes the world away.
+Would not this[5] Sir, and a Forrest of Feathers, if
+the rest of my Fortunes turne Turke with me; with
+two Prouinciall Roses[6] on my rac'd[7] Shooes, get me
+                                    [Sidenote: with prouinciall | raz'd]
+a Fellowship[8] in a crie[9] of Players sir.        [Sidenote: Players?]
+
+_Hor_. Halfe a share.
+
+_Ham_. A whole one I,[10]
+[11] For thou dost know: Oh Damon deere,
+This Realme dismantled was of Loue himselfe,
+And now reignes heere.
+A verie verie Paiocke.[12]
+
+_Hora_. You might haue Rim'd.[13]
+
+_Ham_. Oh good _Horatio_, Ile take the Ghosts
+word for a thousand pound. Did'st perceiue?
+
+_Hora_. Verie well my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Vpon the talke of the poysoning?
+
+_Hora_. I did verie well note him.
+
+_Enter Rosincrance and Guildensterne_.[14]
+
+_Ham_. Oh, ha? Come some Musick.[15] Come the Recorders:
+                                                      [Sidenote: Ah ha,]
+
+[Footnote 1: --in ill suppressed agitation.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _This speech is not in the Quarto_.--Is the 'false fire'
+what we now call _stage-fire_?--'What! frighted at a mere play?']
+
+[Footnote 3: The stage--the stage-stage, that is--alone is lighted. Does
+the king stagger out blindly, madly, shaking them from him? I think
+not--but as if he were taken suddenly ill.]
+
+[Footnote 4: --_singing_--that he may hide his agitation, restrain
+himself, and be regarded as careless-mad, until all are safely gone.]
+
+[Footnote 5: --his success with the play.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'Roses of Provins,' we are told--probably artificial.]
+
+[Footnote 7: The meaning is very doubtful. But for the _raz'd_ of the
+_Quarto_, I should suggest _lac'd_. Could it mean _cut low_?]
+
+[Footnote 8: _a share_, as immediately below.]
+
+[Footnote 9: A _cry_ of hounds is a pack. So in _King Lear_, act v. sc.
+3, 'packs and sects of great ones.']
+
+[Footnote 10: _I_ for _ay_--that is, _yes_!--He insists on a whole
+share.]
+
+[Footnote 11: Again he takes refuge in singing.]
+
+[Footnote 12: The lines are properly measured in the _Quarto_:
+
+    For thou doost know oh Damon deere
+    This Realme dismantled was
+    Of _Ioue_ himselfe, and now raignes heere
+    A very very paiock.
+
+By _Jove_, he of course intends _his father_. 170. What 'Paiocke' means,
+whether _pagan_, or _peacock_, or _bajocco_, matters nothing, since it
+is intended for nonsense.]
+
+[Footnote 13: To rime with _was_, Horatio naturally expected _ass_ to
+follow as the end of the last line: in the wanton humour of his
+excitement, Hamlet disappointed him.]
+
+[Footnote 14: _In Q. after next speech_.]
+
+[Footnote 15: He hears Rosincrance and Guildensterne coming, and changes
+his behaviour--calling for music to end the play with. Either he wants,
+under its cover, to finish his talk with Horatio in what is for the
+moment the safest place, or he would mask himself before his two false
+friends. Since the departure of the king--I would suggest--he has borne
+himself with evident apprehension, every now and then glancing about
+him, as fearful of what may follow his uncle's recognition of the intent
+of the play. Three times he has burst out singing.
+
+Or might not his whole carriage, with the call for music, be the outcome
+of a grimly merry satisfaction at the success of his scheme?]
+
+[Page 152]
+
+For if the King like not the Comedie,
+Why then belike he likes it not perdie.[1]
+Come some Musicke.
+
+_Guild._ Good my Lord, vouchsafe me a word
+with you.
+
+_Ham._ Sir, a whole History.
+
+_Guild._ The King, sir.
+
+_Ham._ I sir, what of him?
+
+_Guild._ Is in his retyrement, maruellous distemper'd.
+
+_Ham._ With drinke Sir?
+
+_Guild._ No my Lord, rather with choller.[2]      [Sidenote: Lord, with]
+
+_Ham._ Your wisedome should shew it selfe more
+richer, to signifie this to his Doctor: for me to
+                                                 [Sidenote: the Doctor,]
+put him to his Purgation, would perhaps plundge
+him into farre more Choller.[2]                    [Sidenote: into more]
+
+_Guild._ Good my Lord put your discourse into
+some frame,[3] and start not so wildely from my        [Sidenote: stare]
+affayre.
+
+_Ham._ I am tame Sir, pronounce.
+
+_Guild._ The Queene your Mother, in most great
+affliction of spirit, hath sent me to you.
+
+_Ham._ You are welcome.[4]
+
+_Guild._ Nay, good my Lord, this courtesie is
+not of the right breed. If it shall please you to
+make me a wholsome answer, I will doe your
+Mothers command'ment: if not, your pardon, and
+my returne shall bee the end of my Businesse.    [Sidenote: of busines.]
+
+_Ham._ Sir, I cannot.
+
+_Guild._ What, my Lord?
+
+_Ham._ Make you a wholsome answere: my wits
+diseas'd. But sir, such answers as I can make, you   [Sidenote: answere]
+shal command: or rather you say, my Mother:    [Sidenote: rather as you]
+therfore no more but to the matter. My Mother
+you say.
+
+[Footnote 1: These two lines he may be supposed to sing.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Choler means bile, and thence anger. Hamlet in his answer
+plays on the two meanings:--'to give him the kind of medicine I think
+fit for him, would perhaps much increase his displeasure.']
+
+[Footnote 3: some logical consistency.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _--with an exaggeration of courtesy_.]
+
+[Page 154]
+
+_Rosin._ Then thus she sayes: your behauior
+hath stroke her into amazement, and admiration.[1]
+
+_Ham._ Oh wonderfull Sonne, that can so astonish     [Sidenote: stonish]
+a Mother. But is there no sequell at the heeles
+of this Mothers admiration?              [Sidenote: admiration, impart.]
+
+_Rosin._ She desires to speake with you in her
+Closset, ere you go to bed.
+
+_Ham._ We shall obey, were she ten times our
+Mother. Haue you any further Trade with vs?
+
+_Rosin._ My Lord, you once did loue me.
+
+_Ham._ So I do still, by these pickers and     [Sidenote: And doe still]
+stealers.[2]
+
+_Rosin._ Good my Lord, what is your cause of
+distemper? You do freely barre the doore of your
+                             [Sidenote: surely barre the door vpon your]
+owne Libertie, if you deny your greefes to your your
+Friend.
+
+_Ham._ Sir I lacke Aduancement.
+
+_Rosin._ How can that be, when you haue the
+[Sidenote: 136] voyce of the King himselfe, for your Succession in
+Denmarke?
+
+[3]
+
+_Ham._ I, but while the grasse growes,[4] the         [Sidenote: I sir,]
+Prouerbe is something musty.
+
+_Enter one with a Recorder._[5]
+
+O the Recorder. Let me see, to withdraw with,
+                        [Sidenote: ô the Recorders, let mee see one, to]
+you,[6] why do you go about to recouer the winde of
+mee,[7] as if you would driue me into a toyle?[8]
+
+_Guild._ O my Lord, if my Dutie be too bold,
+my loue is too vnmannerly.[9]
+
+_Ham._ I do not well vnderstand that.[10] Will you,
+play vpon this Pipe?
+
+_Guild._ My Lord, I cannot.
+
+_Ham._ I pray you.
+
+_Guild._ Beleeue me, I cannot.
+
+_Ham._ I do beseech you.
+
+[Footnote 1: wonder, astonishment.]
+
+[Footnote 2: He swears an oath that will not hold, being by the hand of
+a thief.
+
+In the Catechism: 'Keep my hands from picking and stealing.']
+
+[Footnote 3: Here in Quarto, _Enter the Players with Recorders._]
+
+[Footnote 4: '... the colt starves.']
+
+[Footnote 5: _Not in Q._ The stage-direction of the _Folio_ seems
+doubtful. Hamlet has called for the orchestra: we may either suppose one
+to precede the others, or that the rest are already scattered; but the
+_Quarto_ direction and reading seem better.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _--taking Guildensterne aside_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'to get to windward of me.']
+
+[Footnote 8: 'Why do you seek to get the advantage of me, as if you
+would drive me to betray myself?'--Hunters, by sending on the wind their
+scent to the game, drive it into their toils.]
+
+[Footnote 9: Guildensterne tries euphuism, but hardly succeeds. He
+intends to plead that any fault in his approach must be laid to the
+charge of his love. _Duty_ here means _homage_--so used still by the
+common people.]
+
+[Footnote 10: --said with a smile of gentle contempt.]
+
+[Page 156]
+
+_Guild_. I know no touch of it, my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Tis as easie as lying: gouerne these            [Sidenote: It is]
+Ventiges with your finger and thumbe, giue it
+                                  [Sidenote: fingers, & the vmber, giue]
+breath with your mouth, and it will discourse most
+                                               [Sidenote: most eloquent]
+excellent Musicke.  Looke you, these are the
+stoppes.
+
+_Guild_. But these cannot I command to any
+vtterance of hermony, I haue not the skill.
+
+_Ham_. Why looke you now, how vnworthy a
+thing you make of me: you would play vpon mee;
+you would seeme to know my stops: you would
+pluck out the heart of my Mysterie; you would
+sound mee from my lowest Note, to the top of my
+                                         [Sidenote: note to my compasse]
+Compasse: and there is much Musicke, excellent
+Voice, in this little Organe, yet cannot you make
+                            [Sidenote: it speak, s'hloud do you think I]
+it. Why do you thinke, that I am easier to bee
+plaid on, then a Pipe? Call me what Instrument
+you will, though you can fret[1] me, you cannot
+                                            [Sidenote: you fret me not,]
+[Sidenote: 184] play vpon me. God blesse you Sir.[2]
+
+_Enter Polonius_.
+
+_Polon_. My Lord; the Queene would speak
+with you, and presently.
+
+_Ham_. Do you see that Clowd? that's almost in  [Sidenote: yonder clowd]
+shape like a Camell.                              [Sidenote: shape of a]
+
+_Polon_. By'th'Misse, and it's like a Camell  [Sidenote: masse and tis,]
+indeed.
+
+_Ham_. Me thinkes it is like a Weazell.
+
+_Polon_. It is back'd like a Weazell.
+
+_Ham_. Or like a Whale?[3]
+
+_Polon_. Verie like a Whale.[4]
+
+_Ham_. Then will I come to my Mother, by and by:      [Sidenote: I will]
+[Sidenote: 60, 136, 178] They foole me to the top of my bent.[5]
+I will come by and by.
+
+[Footnote 1: --with allusion to the _frets_ or _stop-marks_ of a
+stringed instrument.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --_to Polonius_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: There is nothing insanely arbitrary in these suggestions of
+likeness; a cloud might very well be like every one of the three; the
+camel has a hump, the weasel humps himself, and the whale is a hump.]
+
+[Footnote 4: He humours him in everything, as he would a madman.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Hamlet's cleverness in simulating madness is dwelt upon in
+the old story. See '_Hystorie of Hamblet, prince of Denmarke_.']
+
+[Page 158]
+
+_Polon_.[1] I will say so.        _Exit_.[1]
+
+_Ham_.[1] By and by, is easily said. Leaue me Friends:
+'Tis now the verie witching time of night,
+When Churchyards yawne, and Hell it selfe breaths out
+                                                   [Sidenote: brakes[2]]
+Contagion to this world.[3] Now could I drink hot blood,
+And do such bitter businesse as the day
+                              [Sidenote: such busines as the bitter day]
+Would quake to looke on.[4] Soft now, to my Mother:
+Oh Heart, loose not thy Nature;[5] let not euer
+The Soule of _Nero_[6] enter this firme bosome:
+Let me be cruell, not vnnaturall.
+[Sidenote: 172] I will speake Daggers[7] to her, but vse none:
+                                                      [Sidenote: dagger]
+My Tongue and Soule in this be Hypocrites.[8]
+How in my words someuer she be shent,[9]
+To giue them Seales,[10] neuer my Soule consent.[4]
+                                                     [Sidenote: _Exit._]
+
+_Enter King, Rosincrance, and Guildensterne_.
+
+_King_. I like him not, nor stands it safe with vs,
+To let his madnesse range.[11] Therefore prepare you,
+[Sidenote: 167] I your Commission will forthwith dispatch,[12]
+[Sidenote: 180] And he to England shall along with you:
+The termes of our estate, may not endure[13]
+Hazard so dangerous as doth hourely grow        [Sidenote: so neer's as]
+Out of his Lunacies.                             [Sidenote: his browes.]
+
+_Guild_. We will our selues prouide:
+Most holie and Religious feare it is[14]
+To keepe those many many bodies safe
+That liue and feede vpon your Maiestie.[15]
+
+_Rosin_. The single
+And peculiar[16] life is bound
+With all the strength and Armour of the minde,
+
+[Footnote 1: The _Quarto_, not having _Polon., Exit, or Ham._, and
+arranging differently, reads thus:--
+
+    They foole me to the top of my bent, I will come by and by,
+    Leaue me friends.
+    I will, say so. By and by is easily said,
+    Tis now the very &c.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _belches_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --thinking of what the Ghost had told him, perhaps: it was
+the time when awful secrets wander about the world. Compare _Macbeth_,
+act ii. sc. 1; also act iii. sc. 2.]
+
+[Footnote 4: The assurance of his uncle's guilt, gained through the
+effect of the play upon him, and the corroboration of his mother's guilt
+by this partial confirmation of the Ghost's assertion, have once more
+stirred in Hamlet the fierceness of vengeance. But here afresh comes
+out the balanced nature of the man--say rather, the supremacy in him of
+reason and will. His dear soul, having once become mistress of his
+choice, remains mistress for ever. He _could_ drink hot blood, he
+_could_ do bitter business, but he will carry himself as a son, and the
+son of his father, _ought_ to carry himself towards a guilty
+mother--_mother_ although guilty.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Thus he girds himself for the harrowing interview. Aware of
+the danger he is in of forgetting his duty to his mother, he strengthens
+himself in filial righteousness, dreading to what word or deed a burst
+of indignation might drive him. One of his troubles now is the way he
+feels towards his mother.]
+
+[Footnote 6: --who killed his mother.]
+
+[Footnote 7: His words should be as daggers.]
+
+[Footnote 8: _Pretenders_.]
+
+[Footnote 9: _reproached_ or _rebuked_--though oftener _scolded_.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'to seal them with actions'--Actions are the seals to
+words, and make them irrevocable.]
+
+[Footnote 11: _walk at liberty_.]
+
+[Footnote 12: _get ready_.]
+
+[Footnote 13: He had, it would appear, taken them into his confidence in
+the business; they knew what was to be in their commission, and were
+thorough traitors to Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 14: --holy and religious precaution for the sake of the many
+depending on him.]
+
+[Footnote 15: Is there not unconscious irony of their own parasitism
+here intended?]
+
+[Footnote 16: _private individual_.]
+
+[Page 160]
+
+To keepe it selfe from noyance:[1] but much more,
+That Spirit, vpon whose spirit depends and rests
+                                         [Sidenote: whose weale depends]
+The lives of many, the cease of Maiestie               [Sidenote: cesse]
+Dies not alone;[2] but like a Gulfe doth draw
+What's neere it, with it. It is a massie wheele
+                                           [Sidenote: with it, or it is]
+Fixt on the Somnet of the highest Mount,
+To whose huge Spoakes, ten thousand lesser things
+                                                [Sidenote: hough spokes]
+Are mortiz'd and adioyn'd: which when it falles,
+Each small annexment, pettie consequence
+Attends the boystrous Ruine. Neuer alone              [Sidenote: raine,]
+Did the King sighe, but with a generall grone.      [Sidenote: but a[3]]
+
+_King._[4] Arme you,[5] I pray you to this speedie Voyage;
+                                                      [Sidenote: viage,]
+For we will Fetters put vpon this feare,[6]   [Sidenote: put about this]
+Which now goes too free-footed.
+
+_Both._ We will haste vs.     _Exeunt Gent_
+
+_Enter Polonius._
+
+Pol. My Lord, he's going to his Mothers Closset:
+Behinde the Arras Ile conuey my selfe
+To heare the Processe. Ile warrant shee'l tax him home,
+And as you said, and wisely was it said,
+'Tis meete that some more audience then a Mother,
+Since Nature makes them partiall, should o're-heare
+The speech of vantage.[7] Fare you well my Liege,
+Ile call vpon you ere you go to bed,
+And tell you what I know.                              [Sidenote: Exit.]
+
+_King._ Thankes deere my Lord.
+Oh my offence is ranke, it smels to heauen,
+It hath the primall eldest curse vpon't,
+A Brothers murther.[8] Pray can I not,
+Though inclination be as sharpe as will:
+My stronger guilt,[9] defeats my strong intent,
+
+[Footnote 1: The philosophy of which self is the centre. The speeches of
+both justify the king in proceeding to extremes against Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 2: The same as to say: 'The passing, ceasing, or ending of
+majesty dies not--is not finished or accomplished, without that of
+others;' 'the dying ends or ceases not,' &c.]
+
+[Footnote 3: The _but_ of the _Quarto_ is better, only the line halts.
+It is the preposition, meaning _without_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _heedless of their flattery_. It is hardly applicable
+enough to interest him.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'Provide yourselves.']
+
+[Footnote 6: fear active; cause of fear; thing to be afraid of; the noun
+of the verb _fear_, to _frighten_:
+
+    Or in the night, imagining some fear,
+    How easy is a bush supposed a bear!
+
+_A Midsummer Night's Dream_, act v. sc. i.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Schmidt (_Sh. Lex._) says _of vantage_ means _to boot_. I
+do not think he is right. Perhaps Polonius means 'from a position of
+advantage.' Or perhaps 'The speech of vantage' is to be understood as
+implying that Hamlet, finding himself in a position of vantage, that is,
+alone with his mother, will probably utter himself with little
+restraint.]
+
+[Footnote 8: This is the first proof positive of his guilt accorded even
+to the spectator of the play: here Claudius confesses not merely guilt
+(118), but the very deed. Thoughtless critics are so ready to judge
+another as if he knew all they know, that it is desirable here to remind
+the student that only he, not Hamlet, hears this soliloquy. The
+falseness of half the judgments in the world comes from our not taking
+care and pains first to know accurately the actions, and then to
+understand the mental and moral condition, of those we judge.]
+
+[Footnote 9: --his present guilty indulgence--stronger than his strong
+intent to pray.]
+
+[Page 162]
+
+And like a man to double businesse bound,[1]
+I stand in pause where I shall first begin,
+And both[2] neglect; what if this cursed hand
+Were thicker then it selfe with Brothers blood,
+Is there not Raine enough in the sweet Heauens
+To wash it white as Snow? Whereto serues mercy,
+But to confront the visage of Offence?
+And what's in Prayer, but this two-fold force,
+To be fore-stalled ere we come to fall,
+Or pardon'd being downe? Then Ile looke vp,           [Sidenote: pardon]
+My fault is past. But oh, what forme of Prayer
+Can serue my turne? Forgiue me my foule Murther:
+That cannot be, since I am still possest
+Of those effects for which I did the Murther.[3]
+My Crowne, mine owne Ambition, and my Queene:
+May one be pardon'd, and retaine th'offence?
+In the corrupted currants of this world,
+Offences gilded hand may shoue by Iustice              [Sidenote: showe]
+And oft 'tis seene, the wicked prize it selfe
+Buyes out the Law; but 'tis not so aboue,
+There is no shuffling, there the Action lyes
+In his true Nature, and we our selues compell'd
+Euen to the teeth and forehead of our faults,
+To giue in euidence. What then? What rests?
+Try what Repentance can. What can it not?
+Yet what can it, when one cannot repent?[4]
+Oh wretched state! Oh bosome, blacke as death!
+Oh limed[5] soule, that strugling to be free,
+Art more ingag'd[6]: Helpe Angels, make assay:[7]
+Bow stubborne knees, and heart with strings of Steele,
+Be soft as sinewes of the new-borne Babe,
+All may be well.
+
+[Footnote 1: Referring to his double guilt--the one crime past, the
+other in continuance.
+
+Here is the corresponding passage in the _1st Q._, with the adultery
+plainly confessed:--
+
+    _Enter the King._
+
+    _King_. O that this wet that falles vpon my face
+    Would wash the crime cleere from my conscience!
+    When I looke vp to heauen, I see my trespasse,
+    The earth doth still crie out vpon my fact,
+    Pay me the murder of a brother and a king,
+    And the adulterous fault I haue committed:
+    O these are sinnes that are vnpardonable:
+    Why say thy sinnes were blacker then is ieat,
+    Yet may contrition make them as white as snowe:
+    I but still to perseuer in a sinne,
+    It is an act gainst the vniuersall power,
+    Most wretched man, stoope, bend thee to thy prayer,
+    Aske grace of heauen to keepe thee from despaire.]
+
+[Footnote 2: both crimes.]
+
+[Footnote 3: He could repent of and pray forgiveness for the murder, if
+he could repent of the adultery and incest, and give up the queen. It is
+not the sins they have done, but the sins they will not leave, that damn
+men. 'This is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and
+men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.'
+The murder deeply troubled him; the adultery not so much; the incest and
+usurpation mainly as interfering with the forgiveness of the murder.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Even hatred of crime committed is not repentance:
+repentance is the turning away from wrong doing: 'Cease to do evil;
+learn to do well.']
+
+[Footnote 5: --caught and held by crime, as a bird by bird-lime.]
+
+[Footnote 6: entangled.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _said to his knees_. Point thus:--'Helpe Angels! Make
+assay--bow, stubborne knees!']
+
+[Page 164]
+
+_Enter Hamlet_.
+
+_Ham_.[1] Now might I do it pat, now he is praying,
+                             [Sidenote: doe it, but now a is a praying,]
+And now Ile doo't, and so he goes to Heauen,       [Sidenote: so a goes]
+And so am I reueng'd: that would be scann'd,       [Sidenote: reuendge,]
+A Villaine killes my Father, and for that
+I his foule Sonne, do this same Villaine send     [Sidenote: sole sonne]
+To heauen. Oh this is hyre and Sallery, not Reuenge.
+                 [Sidenote: To heauen. Why, this is base and silly, not]
+He tooke my Father grossely, full of bread,          [Sidenote: A tooke]
+[Sidenote: 54, 262] With all his Crimes broad blowne, as fresh as May,
+                                                 [Sidenote: as flush as]
+And how his Audit stands, who knowes, saue Heauen:[2]
+But in our circumstance and course of thought
+'Tis heauie with him: and am I then reueng'd,
+To take him in the purging of his Soule,
+When he is fit and season'd for his passage? No.
+Vp Sword, and know thou a more horrid hent[3]
+When he is drunke asleepe: or in his Rage,
+Or in th'incestuous pleasure of his bed,
+At gaming, swearing, or about some acte  [Sidenote: At game a swearing,]
+That ha's no rellish of Saluation in't,
+Then trip him,[4] that his heeles may kicke at Heauen,
+And that his Soule may be as damn'd and blacke
+As Hell, whereto it goes.[5] My Mother stayes,[6]
+This Physicke but prolongs thy sickly dayes.[7]
+                                          _Exit_.
+
+_King_. My words flye vp, my thoughts remain below,
+Words without thoughts, neuer to Heauen go.[8]
+                                          _Exit_.
+
+_Enter Queene and Polonius_.            [Sidenote: _Enter Gertrard and_]
+
+_Pol_. He will come straight:                         [Sidenote: A will]
+Looke you lay home to him
+
+[Footnote 1: In the _1st Q._ this speech commences with, 'I so, come
+forth and worke thy last,' evidently addressed to his sword; afterwards,
+having changed his purpose, he says, 'no, get thee vp agen.']
+
+[Footnote 2: This indicates doubt of the Ghost still. He is unwilling to
+believe in him.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _grasp_. This is the only instance I know of _hent_ as a
+noun. The verb _to hent, to lay hold of_, is not so rare. 'Wait till
+thou be aware of a grasp with a more horrid purpose in it.']
+
+[Footnote 4: --still addressed to his sword.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Are we to take Hamlet's own presentment of his reasons as
+exhaustive? Doubtless to kill him at his prayers, whereupon, after the
+notions of the time, he would go to heaven, would be anything but
+justice--the murdered man in hell--the murderer in heaven! But it is
+easy to suppose Hamlet finding it impossible to slay a man on his
+knees--and that from behind: thus in the unseen Presence, he was in
+sanctuary, and the avenger might well seek reason or excuse for not
+_then_, not _there_ executing the decree.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'waits for me.']
+
+[Footnote 7: He seems now to have made up his mind, and to await only
+fit time and opportunity; but he is yet to receive confirmation strong
+as holy writ.
+
+This is the first chance Hamlet has had--within the play--of killing the
+king, and any imputation of faulty irresolution therein is simply silly.
+It shows the soundness of Hamlet's reason, and the steadiness of his
+will, that he refuses to be carried away by passion, or the temptation
+of opportunity. The sight of the man on his knees might well start fresh
+doubt of his guilt, or even wake the thought of sparing a repentant
+sinner. He knows also that in taking vengeance on her husband he could
+not avoid compromising his mother. Besides, a man like Hamlet could not
+fail to perceive how the killing of his uncle, and in such an attitude,
+would look to others.
+
+It may be judged, however, that the reason he gives to himself for not
+slaying the king, was only an excuse, that his soul revolted from the
+idea of assassination, and was calmed in a measure by the doubt whether
+a man could thus pray--in supposed privacy, we must remember--and be a
+murderer. Not even yet had he proof _positive_, absolute, conclusive:
+the king might well take offence at the play, even were he innocent; and
+in any case Hamlet would desire _presentable_ proof: he had positively
+none to show the people in justification of vengeance.
+
+As in excitement a man's moods may be opalescent in their changes, and
+as the most contrary feelings may coexist in varying degrees, all might
+be in a mind, which I have suggested as present in that of Hamlet.
+
+To have been capable of the kind of action most of his critics would
+demand of a man, Hamlet must have been the weakling they imagine him.
+When at length, after a righteous delay, partly willed, partly
+inevitable, he holds documents in the king's handwriting as proofs of
+his treachery--_proofs which can be shown_--giving him both right and
+power over the life of the traitor, then, and only then, is he in cool
+blood absolutely satisfied as to his duty--which conviction, working
+with opportunity, and that opportunity plainly the last, brings the end;
+the righteous deed is done, and done righteously, the doer blameless in
+the doing of it. The Poet is not careful of what is called poetic
+justice in his play, though therein is no failure; what he is careful of
+is personal rightness in the hero of it.]
+
+[Footnote 8: _1st Q_.
+
+    _King_ My wordes fly vp, my sinnes remaine below.
+    No King on earth is safe, if Gods his foe. _Exit King_.
+
+So he goes to make himself safe by more crime! His repentance is mainly
+fear.]
+
+[Page 166]
+
+Tell him his prankes haue been too broad to beare with,
+And that your Grace hath scree'nd, and stoode betweene
+Much heate, and him. Ile silence me e'ene heere:
+                                                 [Sidenote: euen heere,]
+Pray you be round[1] with him.[2]            [Sidenote: _Enter Hamlet_.]
+
+_Ham. within_. Mother, mother, mother.[3]
+
+_Qu_. Ile warrant you, feare me not.    [Sidenote: _Ger_. Ile wait you,]
+Withdraw, I heare him comming.
+
+_Enter Hamlet_.[4]
+
+_Ham_.[5] Now Mother, what's the matter?
+
+_Qu_. _Hamlet_, thou hast thy Father much offended.   [Sidenote: _Ger_.]
+
+_Ham_. Mother, you haue my Father much offended.
+
+_Qu_. Come, come, you answer with an idle tongue.     [Sidenote: _Ger_.]
+
+_Ham._ Go, go, you question with an idle tongue.
+                                       [Sidenote: with a wicked tongue.]
+
+_Qu_. Why how now _Hamlet_?[6]                        [Sidenote: _Ger_.]
+
+_Ham_. Whats the matter now?
+
+_Qu_. Haue you forgot me?[7]                          [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+
+_Ham_. No by the Rood, not so:
+You are the Queene, your Husbands Brothers wife,
+But would you were not so. You are my Mother.[8]
+                                           [Sidenote: And would it were]
+
+_Qu_. Nay, then Ile set those to you that can speake.[9]
+                                                      [Sidenote: _Ger_.]
+
+_Ham_. Come, come, and sit you downe, you shall not boudge:
+You go not till I set you vp a glasse,
+Where you may see the inmost part of you?      [Sidenote: the most part]
+
+_Qu_. What wilt thou do? thou wilt not murther        [Sidenote: _Ger_.]
+me?[10] Helpe, helpe, hoa.                        [Sidenote: Helpe how.]
+
+_Pol_. What hoa, helpe, helpe, helpe.        [Sidenote: What how helpe.]
+
+_Ham_. How now, a Rat? dead for a Ducate, dead.[11]
+
+[Footnote 1: _The Quarto has not_ 'with him.']
+
+[Footnote 2: _He goes behind the arras._]
+
+[Footnote 3: _The Quarto has not this speech._]
+
+[Footnote 4: _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 5: _1st Q._
+
+    _Ham_. Mother, mother, O are you here?
+    How i'st with you mother?
+
+    _Queene_ How i'st with you?
+
+    _Ham_, I'le tell you, but first weele make all safe.
+
+Here, evidently, he bolts the doors.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _1st Q._
+
+    _Queene_ How now boy?
+
+    _Ham_. How now mother! come here, sit downe, for you
+    shall heare me speake.]
+
+[Footnote 7: --'that you speak to me in such fashion?']
+
+[Footnote 8: _Point thus_: 'so: you'--'would you were not so, for you
+are _my_ mother.'--_with emphasis on_ 'my.' The whole is spoken sadly.]
+
+[Footnote 9: --'speak so that you must mind them.']
+
+[Footnote 10: The apprehension comes from the combined action of her
+conscience and the notion of his madness.]
+
+[Footnote 11: There is no precipitancy here--only instant resolve and
+execution. It is another outcome and embodiment of Hamlet's rare faculty
+for action, showing his delay the more admirable. There is here neither
+time nor call for delay. Whoever the man behind the arras might be, he
+had, by spying upon him in the privacy of his mother's room, forfeited
+to Hamlet his right to live; he had heard what he had said to his
+mother, and his death was necessary; for, if he left the room, Hamlet's
+last chance of fulfilling his vow to the Ghost was gone: if the play had
+not sealed, what he had now spoken must seal his doom. But the decree
+had in fact already gone forth against his life. 158.]
+
+[Page 168]
+
+_Pol._ Oh I am slaine. [1]_Killes Polonius._[2]
+
+_Qu._ Oh me, what hast thou done?                     [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+
+_Ham._ Nay I know not, is it the King?[3]
+
+_Qu._ Oh what a rash, and bloody deed is this?        [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+
+_Ham._ A bloody deed, almost as bad good Mother,
+[Sidenote: 56] As kill a King,[4] and marrie with his Brother.
+
+_Qu._ As kill a King?                                 [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+
+_Ham._ I Lady, 'twas my word.[5]                      [Sidenote: it was]
+Thou wretched, rash, intruding foole farewell,
+I tooke thee for thy Betters,[3] take thy Fortune,   [Sidenote: better,]
+Thou find'st to be too busie, is some danger,
+Leaue wringing of your hands, peace, sit you downe,
+And let me wring your heart, for so I shall
+If it be made of penetrable stuffe;
+If damned Custome haue not braz'd it so,
+That it is proofe and bulwarke against Sense.          [Sidenote: it be]
+
+_Qu._ What haue I done, that thou dar'st wag thy tong,
+                                                      [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+In noise so rude against me?[6]
+
+_Ham._ Such an Act
+That blurres the grace and blush of Modestie,[7]
+Calls Vertue Hypocrite, takes off the Rose
+From the faire forehead of an innocent loue,
+And makes a blister there.[8] Makes marriage vowes
+                                                  [Sidenote: And sets a]
+As false as Dicers Oathes. Oh such a deed,
+As from the body of Contraction[9] pluckes
+The very soule, and sweete Religion makes
+A rapsidie of words. Heauens face doth glow,           [Sidenote: dooes]
+Yea this solidity and compound masse,               [Sidenote: Ore this]
+With tristfull visage as against the doome,
+                                         [Sidenote: with heated visage,]
+Is thought-sicke at the act.[10]                [Sidenote: thought sick]
+
+_Qu._ Aye me; what act,[11] that roares so lowd,[12]
+and thunders in the Index.[13]
+
+[Footnote 1: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 2: --_through the arras_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Hamlet takes him for, hopes it is the king, and thinks here
+to conclude: he is not praying now! and there is not a moment to be
+lost, for he has betrayed his presence and called for help. As often as
+immediate action is demanded of Hamlet, he is immediate with his
+response--never hesitates, never blunders. There is no blunder here:
+being where he was, the death of Polonius was necessary now to the death
+of the king. Hamlet's resolve is instant, and the act simultaneous with
+the resolve. The weak man is sure to be found wanting when immediate
+action is necessary; Hamlet never is. Doubtless those who blame him as
+dilatory, here blame him as precipitate, for they judge according to
+appearance and consequence.
+
+All his delay after this is plainly compelled, although I grant he was
+not sorry to have to await such _more presentable_ evidence as at last
+he procured, so long as he did not lose the final possibility of
+vengeance.]
+
+[Footnote 4: This is the sole reference in the interview to the murder.
+I take it for tentative, and that Hamlet is satisfied by his mother's
+utterance, carriage, and expression, that she is innocent of any
+knowledge of that crime. Neither does he allude to the adultery: there
+is enough in what she cannot deny, and that only which can be remedied
+needs be taken up; while to break with the king would open the door of
+repentance for all that had preceded.]
+
+[Footnote 5: He says nothing of the Ghost to his mother.]
+
+[Footnote 6: She still holds up and holds out.]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'makes Modesty itself suspected.']
+
+[Footnote 8: 'makes Innocence ashamed of the love it cherishes.']
+
+[Footnote 9: 'plucks the spirit out of all forms of contracting or
+agreeing.' We have lost the social and kept only the physical meaning of
+the noun.]
+
+[Footnote 10: I cannot help thinking the _Quarto_ reading of this
+passage the more intelligible, as well as much the more powerful. We may
+imagine a red aurora, by no means a very unusual phenomenon, over the
+expanse of the sky:--
+
+            Heaven's face doth glow (_blush_)
+    O'er this solidity and compound mass,
+
+(_the earth, solid, material, composite, a corporeal mass in
+confrontment with the spirit-like etherial, simple, uncompounded heaven
+leaning over it_)
+
+    With tristful (_or_ heated, _as the reader may choose_)
+          visage: as against the doom,
+
+(_as in the presence, or in anticipation of the revealing judgment_)
+
+    Is thought sick at the act.
+
+(_thought is sick at the act of the queen_)
+
+My difficulties as to the _Folio_ reading are--why the earth should be
+so described without immediate contrast with the sky; and--how the earth
+could be showing a tristful visage, and the sickness of its thought. I
+think, if the Poet indeed made the alterations and they are not mere
+blunders, he must have made them hurriedly, and without due attention. I
+would not forget, however, that there may be something present but too
+good for me to find, which would make the passage plain as it stands.
+
+Compare _As you like it_, act i. sc. 3.
+
+    For, by this heaven, now at our sorrows pale,
+    Say what thou canst, I'll go along with thee.]
+
+[Footnote 11: In Q. the rest of this speech is Hamlet's; his long speech
+begins here, taking up the queen's word.]
+
+[Footnote 12: She still stands out.]
+
+[Footnote 13: 'thunders in the very indication or mention of it.' But by
+'the Index' may be intended the influx or table of contents of a book,
+at the beginning of it.]
+
+[Page 170]
+
+_Ham._ Looke heere vpon this Picture, and on this,
+The counterfet presentment of two Brothers:[1]
+See what a grace was seated on his Brow,             [Sidenote: on this]
+[Sidenote: 151] _Hyperions_ curies, the front of Ioue himselfe,
+An eye like Mars, to threaten or command        [Sidenote: threaten and]
+A Station, like the Herald Mercurie
+New lighted on a heauen kissing hill:  [Sidenote: on a heaue, a kissing]
+A Combination, and a forme indeed,
+Where euery God did seeme to set his Seale,
+To giue the world assurance of a man.[2]
+This was your Husband. Looke you now what followes.
+Heere is your Husband, like a Mildew'd eare
+Blasting his wholsom breath. Haue you eyes?
+                                           [Sidenote: wholsome brother,]
+Could you on this faire Mountaine leaue to feed,
+And batten on this Moore?[3] Ha? Haue you eyes?
+You cannot call it Loue: For at your age,
+The hey-day[4] in the blood is tame, it's humble,
+And waites vpon the Judgement: and what Iudgement
+Would step from this, to this? [A] What diuell was't,
+That thus hath cousend you at hoodman-blinde?[5]      [Sidenote: hodman]
+[B]
+O Shame! where is thy Blush? Rebellious Hell,
+If thou canst mutine in a Matrons bones,
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+                            sence sure youe haue
+Els could you not haue motion, but sure that sence
+Is appoplext, for madnesse would not erre
+Nor sence to extacie[6] was nere so thral'd
+But it reseru'd some quantity of choise[7]
+To serue in such[8] a difference,]
+
+[Footnote B: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+Eyes without feeling, feeling without sight.
+Eares without hands, or eyes, smelling sance[9] all,
+Or but a sickly part of one true sence
+Could not so mope:[10]]
+
+[Footnote 1: He points to the portraits of the two brothers, side by
+side on the wall.]
+
+[Footnote 2: See _Julius Caesar_, act v. sc. 5,--speech of _Antony_ at
+the end.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --perhaps an allusion as well to the complexion of
+Claudius, both moral and physical.]
+
+[Footnote 4: --perhaps allied to the German _heida_, and possibly the
+English _hoyden_ and _hoity-toity_. Or is it merely
+_high-day--noontide_?]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'played tricks with you while hooded in the game of
+_blind-man's-bluff_?' The omitted passage of the _Quarto_ enlarges the
+figure.
+
+_1st Q._ 'hob-man blinde.']
+
+[Footnote 6: madness.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Attributing soul to sense, he calls its distinguishment
+_choice_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: --emphasis on _such_.]
+
+[Footnote 9: This spelling seems to show how the English word _sans_
+should be pronounced.]
+
+[Footnote 10: --'be so dull.']
+
+[Page 172]
+
+To flaming youth, let Vertue be as waxe,
+And melt in her owne fire. Proclaime no shame,
+When the compulsiue Ardure giues the charge,
+Since Frost it selfe,[1] as actiuely doth burne,
+As Reason panders Will.             [Sidenote: And reason pardons will.]
+
+_Qu._ O Hamlet, speake no more.[2]                    [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+Thou turn'st mine eyes into my very soule,
+                                 [Sidenote: my very eyes into my soule,]
+And there I see such blacke and grained[3] spots,
+                                               [Sidenote: greeued spots]
+As will not leaue their Tinct.[4]     [Sidenote: will leaue there their]
+
+_Ham._ Nay, but to liue[5]
+In the ranke sweat of an enseamed bed,              [Sidenote: inseemed]
+Stew'd in Corruption; honying and making loue
+[Sidenote: 34] Ouer the nasty Stye.[6]
+
+_Qu._ Oh speake to me, no more,                       [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+[Sidenote: 158] These words like Daggers enter in mine eares.
+                                                          [Sidenote: my]
+No more sweet _Hamlet_.
+
+_Ham._ A Murderer, and a Villaine:
+A Slaue, that is not twentieth part the tythe  [Sidenote: part the kyth]
+Of your precedent Lord. A vice[7] of Kings,
+A Cutpurse of the Empire and the Rule.
+That from a shelfe, the precious Diadem stole,
+And put it in his Pocket.
+
+_Qu._ No more.[8]                                     [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+
+_Enter Ghost._[9]
+
+_Ham._ A King of shreds and patches.
+[Sidenote: 44] Saue me; and houer o're me with your wings[10]
+You heauenly Guards. What would you gracious figure?
+                                               [Sidenote: your gracious]
+
+_Qu._ Alas he's mad.[11]                              [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+
+_Ham._ Do you not come your tardy Sonne to chide,
+That laps't in Time and Passion, lets go by[12]
+Th'important acting of your dread command? Oh say.[13]
+
+[Footnote 1: --his mother's matronly age.]
+
+[Footnote 2: She gives way at last.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --spots whose blackness has sunk into the grain, or final
+particles of the substance.]
+
+[Footnote 4: --transition form of tint:--'will never give up their
+colour;' 'will never be cleansed.']
+
+[Footnote 5: He persists.]
+
+[Footnote 6: --Claudius himself--his body no 'temple of the Holy Ghost,'
+but a pig-sty. 3.]
+
+[Footnote 7: The clown of the old Moral Play.]
+
+[Footnote 8: She seems neither surprised nor indignant at any point in
+the accusation: her consciousness of her own guiit has overwhelmed her.]
+
+[Footnote 9: The _1st Q._ has _Enter the ghost in his night gowne_. It
+was then from the first intended that he should not at this point appear
+in armour--in which, indeed, the epithet _gracious figure_ could hardly
+be applied to him, though it might well enough in one of the costumes in
+which Hamlet was accustomed to see him--as this dressing-gown of the
+_1st Q._ A ghost would appear in the costume in which he naturally
+imagined himself, and in his wife's room would not show himself clothed
+as when walking among the fortifications of the castle. But by the words
+lower down (174)--
+
+    My Father in his habite, as he liued,
+
+the Poet indicates, not his dressing-gown, but his usual habit, _i.e._
+attire.]
+
+[Footnote 10: --almost the same invocation as when first he saw the
+apparition.]
+
+[Footnote 11: The queen cannot see the Ghost. Her conduct has built such
+a wall between her and her husband that I doubt whether, were she a
+ghost also, she could see him. Her heart had left him, so they are no
+more together in the sphere of mutual vision. Neither does the Ghost
+wish to show himself to her. As his presence is not corporeal, a ghost
+may be present to but one of a company.]
+
+[Footnote 12: 1. 'Who, lapsed (_fallen, guilty_), lets action slip in
+delay and suffering.' 2. 'Who, lapsed in (_fallen in, overwhelmed by_)
+delay and suffering, omits' &c. 3. 'lapsed in respect of time, and
+because of passion'--the meaning of the preposition _in_, common to
+both, reacted upon by the word it governs. 4. 'faulty both in delaying,
+and in yielding to suffering, when action is required.' 5. 'lapsed
+through having too much time and great suffering.' 6. 'allowing himself
+to be swept along by time and grief.'
+
+Surely there is not another writer whose words would so often admit of
+such multiform and varied interpretation--each form good, and true, and
+suitable to the context! He seems to see at once all the relations of a
+thing, and to try to convey them at once, in an utterance single as the
+thing itself. He would condense the infinite soul of the meaning into
+the trembling, overtaxed body of the phrase!]
+
+[Footnote 13: In the renewed presence of the Ghost, all its former
+influence and all the former conviction of its truth, return upon him.
+He knows also how his behaviour must appear to the Ghost, and sees
+himself as the Ghost sees him. Confronted with the gracious figure, how
+should he think of self-justification! So far from being able to explain
+things, he even forgets the doubt that had held him back--it has
+vanished from the noble presence! He is now in the world of belief; the
+world of doubt is nowhere!--Note the masterly opposition of moods.]
+
+[Page 174]
+
+_Ghost._ Do not forget: this Visitation
+Is but to whet thy almost blunted purpose.[1]
+But looke, Amazement on thy Mother sits;[2]
+[Sidenote: 30, 54] O step betweene her, and her fighting Soule,[3]
+[Sidenote: 198] Conceit[4] in weakest bodies, strongest workes.
+Speake to her _Hamlet_.[5]
+
+_Ham._ How is it with you Lady?[6]
+
+_Qu._ Alas, how is't with you?                        [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+That you bend your eye on vacancie,              [Sidenote: you do bend]
+And with their corporall ayre do hold discourse.
+                                    [Sidenote: with th'incorporall ayre]
+Forth at your eyes, your spirits wildely peepe,
+And as the sleeping Soldiours in th'Alarme,
+Your bedded haire, like life in excrements,[7]
+Start vp, and stand an end.[8] Oh gentle Sonne,
+Vpon the heate and flame of thy distemper
+Sprinkle coole patience. Whereon do you looke?[9]
+
+_Ham._ On him, on him: look you how pale he glares,
+His forme and cause conioyn'd, preaching to stones,
+Would make them capeable.[10] Do not looke vpon me,[11]
+Least with this pitteous action you conuert
+My sterne effects: then what I haue to do,[12]
+[Sidenote: 111] Will want true colour; teares perchance for blood.[13]
+
+_Qu._ To who do you speake this?              [Sidenote: _Ger._ To whom]
+
+_Ham._ Do you see nothing there?
+
+_Qu._ Nothing at all, yet all that is I see.[14]      [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+
+_Ham._ Nor did you nothing heare?
+
+_Qu._ No, nothing but our selues.                     [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+
+_Ham._ Why look you there: looke how it steals away:
+[Sidenote: 173] My Father in his habite, as he liued,
+Looke where he goes euen now out at the Portall.
+                        _Exit._                [Sidenote: _Exit Ghost._]
+
+[Sidenote: 114] _Qu._ This is the very coynage of your Braine,
+                                                      [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+
+[Footnote 1: The Ghost here judges, as alone is possible to him, from
+what he knows--from the fact that his brother Claudius has not yet made
+his appearance in the ghost-world. Not understanding Hamlet's
+difficulties, he mistakes Hamlet himself.]
+
+[Footnote 2: He mistakes also, through his tenderness, the condition of
+his wife--imagining, it would seem, that she feels his presence, though
+she cannot see him, or recognize the source of the influence which he
+supposes to be moving her conscience: she is only perturbed by Hamlet's
+behaviour.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --fighting within itself, as the sea in a storm may be said
+to fight.
+
+He is careful as ever over the wife he had loved and loves still;
+careful no less of the behaviour of the son to his mother.
+
+In the _1st Q._ we have:--
+
+    But I perceiue by thy distracted lookes,
+    Thy mother's fearefull, and she stands amazde:
+    Speake to her Hamlet, for her sex is weake,
+    Comfort thy mother, Hamlet, thinke on me.]
+
+[Footnote 4: --not used here for bare _imagination_, but imagination
+with its concomitant feeling:--_conception_. 198.]
+
+[Footnote 5: His last word ere he vanishes utterly, concerns his queen;
+he is tender and gracious still to her who sent him to hell. This
+attitude of the Ghost towards his faithless wife, is one of the
+profoundest things in the play. All the time she is not thinking of him
+any more than seeing him--for 'is he not dead!'--is looking straight at
+where he stands, but is all unaware of him.]
+
+[Footnote 6: I understand him to speak this with a kind of lost,
+mechanical obedience. The description his mother gives of him makes it
+seem as if the Ghost were drawing his ghost out to himself, and turning
+his body thereby half dead.]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'as if there were life in excrements.' The nails and hair
+were 'excrements'--things _growing out_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Note the form _an end_--not _on end_. 51, 71.]
+
+[Footnote 9: --all spoken coaxingly, as to one in a mad fit. She regards
+his perturbation as a sudden assault of his ever present malady. One who
+sees what others cannot see they are always ready to count mad.]
+
+[Footnote 10: able to _take_, that is, to _understand_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: --_to the Ghost_.]
+
+[Footnote 12: 'what is in my power to do.']
+
+[Footnote 13: Note antithesis here: '_your piteous action_;' '_my stern
+effects_'--the things, that is, 'which I have to effect.' 'Lest your
+piteous show convert--change--my stern doing; then what I do will lack
+true colour; the result may be tears instead of blood; I shall weep
+instead of striking.']
+
+[Footnote 14: It is one of the constantly recurring delusions of
+humanity that we see all there is.]
+
+[Page 176]
+
+[Sidenote: 114] This bodilesse Creation extasie[1] is very cunning
+in.[2]
+
+_Ham._ Extasie?[3]
+My Pulse as yours doth temperately keepe time,
+And makes as healthfull Musicke.[4] It is not madnesse
+That I haue vttered; bring me to the Test
+And I the matter will re-word: which madnesse        [Sidenote: And the]
+Would gamboll from. Mother, for loue of Grace,
+Lay not a flattering Vnction to your soule,
+                                         [Sidenote: not that flattering]
+That not your trespasse, but my madnesse speakes:
+[Sidenote: 182] It will but skin and filme the Vlcerous place,
+Whil'st ranke Corruption mining all within,           [Sidenote: whiles]
+Infects vnseene, Confesse your selfe to Heauen,
+Repent what's past, auoyd what is to come,
+And do not spred the Compost or the Weedes,   [Sidenote: compost on the]
+To make them ranke. Forgiue me this my Vertue,       [Sidenote: ranker,]
+For in the fatnesse of this pursie[5] times,           [Sidenote: these]
+Vertue it selfe, of Vice must pardon begge,
+Yea courb,[6] and woe, for leaue to do him good.
+                                              [Sidenote: curbe and wooe]
+
+_Qu._ Oh Hamlet,                                      [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+Thou hast cleft my heart in twaine.
+
+_Ham._ O throw away the worser part of it,
+And Liue the purer with the other halfe.       [Sidenote: And leaue the]
+Good night, but go not to mine Vnkles bed,                [Sidenote: my]
+Assume a Vertue, if you haue it not,[7][A] refraine to night
+                                 [Sidenote: Assune | to refraine night,]
+And that shall lend a kinde of easinesse
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+[8]That monster custome, who all sence doth eate
+Of habits deuill,[9] is angell yet in this
+That to the vse of actions faire and good,
+He likewise giues a frock or Liuery
+That aptly is put on]
+
+[Footnote 1: madness 129.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Here is the correspondent speech in the _1st Q._ I give it
+because of the queen's denial of complicity in the murder.
+
+    _Queene_ Alas, it is the weakenesse of thy braine.
+    Which makes thy tongue to blazon thy hearts griefe:
+    But as I haue a soule, I sweare by heauen,
+    I neuer knew of this most horride murder:
+    But Hamlet, this is onely fantasie,
+    And for my loue forget these idle fits.
+
+    _Ham_. Idle, no mother, my pulse doth beate like yours,
+    It is not madnesse that possesseth Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 4: --_time_ being a great part of music. Shakspere more than
+once or twice employs _music_ as a symbol with reference to corporeal
+condition: see, for instance, _As you like it_, act i. sc. 2, 'But is
+there any else longs to see this broken music in his sides? is there yet
+another dotes upon rib-breaking?' where the _broken music_ may be
+regarded as the antithesis of the _healthful music_ here.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _swoln, pampered_: an allusion to the _purse_ itself,
+whether intended or not, is suggested.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _bend, bow_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: To _assume_ is to take to one: by _assume a virtue_, Hamlet
+does not mean _pretend_--but the very opposite: _to pretend_ is _to hold
+forth, to show_; what he means is, 'Adopt a virtue'--that of
+_abstinence_--'and act upon it, order your behaviour by it, although you
+may not _feel_ it. Choose the virtue--take it, make it yours.']
+
+[Footnote 8: This omitted passage is obscure with the special
+Shaksperean obscurity that comes of over-condensation. He omitted it, I
+think, because of its obscurity. Its general meaning is plain
+enough--that custom helps the man who tries to assume a virtue, as well
+as renders it more and more difficult for him who indulges in vice to
+leave it. I will paraphrase: 'That monster, Custom, who eats away all
+sense, the devil of habits, is angel yet in this, that, for the exercise
+of fair and good actions, he also provides a habit, a suitable frock or
+livery, that is easily put on.' The play with the two senses of the word
+_habit_ is more easily seen than set forth. To paraphrase more freely:
+'That devil of habits, Custom, who eats away all sense of wrong-doing,
+has yet an angel-side to him, in that he gives a man a mental dress, a
+habit, helpful to the doing of the right thing.' The idea of hypocrisy
+does not come in at all. The advice of Hamlet is: 'Be virtuous in your
+actions, even if you cannot in your feelings; do not do the wrong thing
+you would like to do, and custom will render the abstinence easy.']
+
+[Footnote 9: I suspect it should be '_Of habits evil_'--the antithesis
+to _angel_ being _monster_.]
+
+[Page 178]
+
+To the next abstinence. [A] Once more goodnight,
+And when you are desirous to be blest,
+Ile blessing begge of you.[1] For this same Lord,
+I do repent: but heauen hath pleas'd it so,[2]
+To punish me with this, and this with me,
+That I must be their[3] Scourge and Minister.
+I will bestow him,[4] and will answer well
+The death I gaue him:[5] so againe, good night.
+I must be cruell, onely to be kinde;[6]
+Thus bad begins,[7] and worse remaines behinde.[8]  [Sidenote: This bad]
+
+[B]
+
+_Qu_. What shall I do?                                [Sidenote: _Ger_.]
+
+_Ham_. Not this by no meanes that I bid you do:
+Let the blunt King tempt you againe to bed,   [Sidenote: the blowt King]
+Pinch Wanton on your cheeke, call you his Mouse,
+And let him for a paire of reechie[9] kisses,
+Or padling in your necke with his damn'd Fingers,
+Make you to rauell all this matter out,               [Sidenote: rouell]
+[Sidenote: 60, 136, 156] That I essentially am not in madnesse.
+But made in craft.[10] 'Twere good you let him know,     [Sidenote: mad]
+For who that's but a Queene, faire, sober, wise,
+Would from a Paddocke,[11] from a Bat, a Gibbe,[12]
+Such deere concernings hide, Who would do so,
+No in despight of Sense and Secrecie,
+Vnpegge the Basket on the houses top:
+Let the Birds flye, and like the famous Ape
+To try Conclusions[13] in the Basket, creepe
+And breake your owne necke downe.[14]
+
+_Qu_. Be thou assur'd, if words be made of breath,    [Sidenote: _Ger_.]
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto;_--
+
+                     the next more easie:[15]
+For vse almost can change the stamp of nature,
+And either[16] the deuill, or throwe him out
+With wonderous potency:]
+
+[Footnote B: _Here in the Quarto:_--
+
+One word more good Lady.[17]]
+
+[Footnote 1: In bidding his mother good night, he would naturally, after
+the custom of the time, have sought her blessing: it would be a farce
+now: when she seeks the blessing of God, he will beg hers; now, a plain
+_good night_ must serve.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Note the curious inverted use of _pleased_. It is here a
+transitive, not an impersonal verb. The construction of the sentence is,
+'pleased it so, _in order to_ punish us, that I must' &c.]
+
+[Footnote 3: The noun to which _their_ is the pronoun is _heaven_--as if
+he had written _the gods_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'take him to a place fit for him to lie in.']
+
+[Footnote 5: 'hold my face to it, and justify it.']
+
+[Footnote 6: --omitting or refusing to embrace her.]
+
+[Footnote 7: --looking at Polonius.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Does this mean for himself to do, or for Polonius to
+endure?]
+
+[Footnote 9: reeky, smoky, fumy.]
+
+[Footnote 10: Hamlet considers his madness the same that he so
+deliberately assumed. But his idea of himself goes for nothing where the
+experts conclude him mad! His absolute clarity where he has no occasion
+to act madness, goes for as little, for 'all madmen have their sane
+moments'!]
+
+[Footnote 11: _a toad_; in Scotland, _a frog_.]
+
+[Footnote 12: an old cat.]
+
+[Footnote 13: _Experiments_, Steevens says: is it not rather _results_?]
+
+[Footnote 14: I fancy the story, which so far as I know has not been
+traced, goes on to say that the basket was emptied from the house-top to
+send the pigeons flying, and so the ape got his neck broken. The phrase
+'breake your owne necke _downe_' seems strange: it could hardly have
+been written _neck-bone_!]
+
+[Footnote 15: This passage would fall in better with the preceding with
+which it is vitally one--for it would more evenly continue its form--if
+the preceding _devil_ were, as I propose above, changed to _evil_. But,
+precious as is every word in them, both passages are well omitted.]
+
+[Footnote 16: Plainly there is a word left out, if not lost here. There
+is no authority for the supplied _master_. I am inclined to propose a
+pause and a gesture, with perhaps an _inarticulation_.]
+
+[Footnote 17: --interrogatively perhaps, Hamlet noting her about to
+speak; but I would prefer it thus: 'One word more:--good lady--' Here
+he pauses so long that she speaks. Or we _might_ read it thus:
+
+    _Qu._ One word more.
+    _Ham._ Good lady?
+    _Qu._ What shall I do?]
+
+[Page 180]
+
+And breath of life: I haue no life to breath
+What thou hast saide to me.[1]
+
+[Sidenote: 128, 158] _Ham._ I must to England, you know that?[2]
+
+_Qu._ Alacke I had forgot: Tis so concluded on.       [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+
+_Ham._ [A] This man shall set me packing:[3]
+Ile lugge the Guts into the Neighbor roome,[4]
+Mother goodnight. Indeede this Counsellor [Sidenote: night indeed, this]
+Is now most still, most secret, and most graue,
+[Sidenote: 84] Who was in life, a foolish prating Knaue.
+                                              [Sidenote: a most foolish]
+Come sir, to draw toward an end with you.[5]
+Good night Mother.
+
+_Exit Hamlet tugging in Polonius._[6]                [Sidenote: _Exit._]
+
+[7]
+
+_Enter King._                    [Sidenote: Enter King, and Queene, with
+                                          Rosencraus and Guyldensterne.]
+
+_King._ There's matters in these sighes.
+These profound heaues
+You must translate; Tis fit we vnderstand them.
+Where is your Sonne?[8]
+
+_Qu._ [B] Ah my good Lord, what haue I seene to night?
+                                 [Sidenote: _Ger._ | Ah mine owne Lord,]
+
+_King._ What _Gertrude_? How do's _Hamlet_?
+
+_Qu._ Mad as the Seas, and winde, when both contend
+                                            [Sidenote: _Ger._ | sea and]
+Which is the Mightier, in his lawlesse fit[9]
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+[10]Ther's letters seald, and my two Schoolefellowes,
+Whom I will trust as I will Adders fang'd,
+They beare the mandat, they must sweep my way
+And marshall me to knauery[11]: let it worke,
+For tis the sport to haue the enginer
+Hoist[12] with his owne petar,[13] an't shall goe hard
+But I will delue one yard belowe their mines,
+And blowe them at the Moone: ô tis most sweete
+When in one line two crafts directly meete,]
+
+[Footnote B: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+Bestow this place on vs a little while.[14]]
+
+[Footnote 1: _1st Q._
+
+    O mother, if euer you did my deare father loue,
+    Forbeare the adulterous bed to night,
+    And win your selfe by little as you may,
+    In time it may be you wil lothe him quite:
+    And mother, but assist mee in reuenge,
+    And in his death your infamy shall die.
+
+    _Queene. Hamlet_, I vow by that maiesty,
+    That knowes our thoughts, and lookes into our hearts,
+    I will conceale, consent, and doe my best,
+    What stratagem soe're thou shalt deuise.]
+
+[Footnote 2: The king had spoken of it both before and after the play:
+Horatio might have heard of it and told Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'My banishment will be laid to this deed of mine.']
+
+[Footnote 4: --to rid his mother of it.]
+
+[Footnote 5: It may cross him, as he says this, dragging the body out by
+one end of it, and toward the end of its history, that he is himself
+drawing toward an end along with Polonius.]
+
+[Footnote 6: --_and weeping_. 182. See _note_ 5, 183.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Here, according to the editors, comes 'Act IV.' For this
+there is no authority, and the point of division seems to me very
+objectionable. The scene remains the same, as noted from Capell in _Cam.
+Sh._, and the entrance of the king follows immediately on the exit of
+Hamlet. He finds his wife greatly perturbed; she has not had time to
+compose herself.
+
+From the beginning of Act II., on to where I would place the end of Act
+III., there is continuity.]
+
+[Footnote 8: I would have this speech uttered with pauses and growing
+urgency, mingled at length with displeasure.]
+
+[Footnote 9: She is faithful to her son, declaring him mad, and
+attributing the death of 'the unseen' Polonius to his madness.]
+
+[Footnote 10: This passage, like the rest, I hold to be omitted by
+Shakspere himself. It represents Hamlet as divining the plot with whose
+execution his false friends were entrusted. The Poet had at first
+intended Hamlet to go on board the vessel with a design formed upon this
+for the out-witting of his companions, and to work out that design.
+Afterwards, however, he alters his plan, and represents his escape as
+more plainly providential: probably he did not see how to manage it by
+any scheme of Hamlet so well as by the attack of a pirate; possibly he
+wished to write the passage (246) in which Hamlet, so consistently with
+his character, attributes his return to the divine shaping of the end
+rough-hewn by himself. He had designs--'dear plots'--but they were other
+than fell out--a rough-hewing that was shaped to a different end. The
+discomfiture of his enemies was not such as he had designed: it was
+brought about by no previous plot, but through a discovery. At the same
+time his deliverance was not effected by the fingering of the packet,
+but by the attack of the pirate: even the re-writing of the commission
+did nothing towards his deliverance, resulted only in the punishment of
+his traitorous companions. In revising the Quarto, the Poet sees that
+the passage before us, in which is expressed the strongest suspicion of
+his companions, with a determination to outwit and punish them, is
+inconsistent with the representation Hamlet gives afterwards of a
+restlessness and suspicion newly come upon him, which he attributes to
+the Divinity.
+
+Neither was it likely he would say so much to his mother while so little
+sure of her as to warn her, on the ground of danger to herself, against
+revealing his sanity to the king. As to this, however, the portion
+omitted might, I grant, be regarded as an _aside_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: --to be done _to_ him.]
+
+[Footnote 12: _Hoised_, from verb _hoise_--still used in Scotland.]
+
+[Footnote 13: a kind of explosive shell, which was fixed to the object
+meant to be destroyed. Note once more Hamlet's delight in action.]
+
+[Footnote 14: --_said to Ros. and Guild._: in plain speech, 'Leave us a
+little while.']
+
+[Page 182]
+
+Behinde the Arras, hearing something stirre,
+He whips his Rapier out, and cries a Rat, a Rat,
+                               [Sidenote: Whyps out his Rapier, cryes a]
+And in his brainish apprehension killes              [Sidenote: in this]
+The vnseene good old man.
+
+_King._ Oh heauy deed:
+It had bin so with vs[1] had we beene there:
+His Liberty is full of threats to all,[2]
+To you your selfe, to vs, to euery one.
+Alas, how shall this bloody deede be answered?
+It will be laide to vs, whose prouidence
+Should haue kept short, restrain'd, and out of haunt,
+This mad yong man.[2] But so much was our loue,
+We would not vnderstand what was most fit,
+But like the Owner of a foule disease,
+[Sidenote: 176] To keepe it from divulging, let's it feede
+                                                      [Sidenote: let it]
+Euen on the pith of life. Where is he gone?
+
+_Qu._ To draw apart the body he hath kild,              [Sidenote: Ger.]
+O're whom his very madnesse[3] like some Oare
+Among a Minerall of Mettels base
+[Sidenote: 181] Shewes it selfe pure.[4] He weepes for what is done.[5]
+                                             [Sidenote: pure, a weeepes]
+
+_King:_ Oh _Gertrude_, come away:
+The Sun no sooner shall the Mountaines touch,
+But we will ship him hence, and this vilde deed,
+We must with all our Maiesty and Skill
+[Sidenote: 200] Both countenance, and excuse.[6]
+                       _Enter Ros. & Guild_.[7]
+Ho _Guildenstern_:
+Friends both go ioyne you with some further ayde:
+_Hamlet_ in madnesse hath Polonius slaine,
+And from his Mother Clossets hath he drag'd him.
+                                             [Sidenote: closet | dreg'd]
+Go seeke him out, speake faire, and bring the body
+Into the Chappell. I pray you hast in this.
+                             _Exit Gent_[8]
+Come _Gertrude_, wee'l call vp our wisest friends,
+To let them know both what we meane to do,           [Sidenote: And let]
+
+[Footnote 1: the royal plural.]
+
+[Footnote 2: He knows the thrust was meant for him. But he would not
+have it so understood; he too lays it to his madness, though he too
+knows better.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'he, although mad'; 'his nature, in spite of his madness.']
+
+[Footnote 4: by his weeping, in the midst of much to give a different
+impression.]
+
+[Footnote 5: We have no reason to think the queen inventing here: what
+could she gain by it? the point indeed was rather against Hamlet, as
+showing it was not Polonius he had thought to kill. He was more than
+ever annoyed with the contemptible old man, who had by his
+meddlesomeness brought his death to his door; but he was very sorry
+nevertheless over Ophelia's father: those rough words in his last speech
+are spoken with the tears running down his face. We have seen the
+strange, almost discordant mingling in him of horror and humour, after
+the first appearance of the Ghost, 58, 60: something of the same may be
+supposed when he finds he has killed Polonius: in the highstrung nervous
+condition that must have followed such a talk with his mother, it would
+be nowise strange that he should weep heartily even in the midst of
+contemptuous anger. Or perhaps a sudden breakdown from attempted show of
+indifference, would not be amiss in the representation.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'both countenance with all our majesty, and excuse with all
+our skill.']
+
+[Footnote 7: In the _Quarto_ a line back.]
+
+[Footnote 8: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Page 184]
+
+And what's vntimely[1] done. [A] Oh come away,        [Sidenote: doone,]
+My soule is full of discord and dismay.   _Exeunt._
+
+_Enter Hamlet._            [Sidenote: _Hamlet, Rosencrans, and others._]
+
+_Ham._ Safely stowed.[2]       [Sidenote: stowed, but soft, what noyse,]
+
+_Gentlemen within._ _Hamlet_. Lord _Hamlet_?
+
+_Ham._ What noise? Who cals on _Hamlet_?
+Oh heere they come.
+
+_Enter Ros. and Guildensterne._[4]
+
+_Ro._ What haue you done my Lord with the dead body?
+
+_Ham._ Compounded it with dust, whereto 'tis Kinne.[5]
+                                                 [Sidenote: Compound it]
+
+_Rosin._ Tell vs where 'tis, that we may take it thence,
+And beare it to the Chappell.
+
+_Ham._ Do not beleeue it.[6]
+
+_Rosin._ Beleeue what?
+
+[Sidenote: 156] _Ham._ That I can keepe your counsell, and not
+mine owne. Besides, to be demanded of a Spundge,
+what replication should be made by the Sonne of
+a King.[7]
+
+_Rosin._ Take you me for a Spundge, my Lord?
+
+_Ham._ I sir, that sokes vp the Kings Countenance,
+his Rewards, his Authorities, but such Officers
+do the King best seruice in the end. He keepes
+them like an Ape in the corner of his iaw,[8] first
+                                            [Sidenote: like an apple in]
+mouth'd to be last swallowed, when he needes what
+you haue glean'd, it is but squeezing you, and
+Spundge you shall be dry againe.
+
+_Rosin._ I vnderstand you not my Lord.
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+Whose whisper ore the worlds dyameter,[9]
+[Sidenote: 206] As leuell as the Cannon to his blanck,[10]
+Transports his poysned shot, may miffe[11] our Name,
+And hit the woundlesse ayre.]
+
+[Footnote 1: unhappily.]
+
+[Footnote 2: He has hid the body--to make the whole look the work of a
+mad fit.]
+
+[Footnote 3: This line is not in the _Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _Not in Q. See margin above._]
+
+[Footnote 5: He has put it in a place which, little visited, is very
+dusty.]
+
+[Footnote 6: He is mad to them--sane only to his mother and Horatio.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _euphuistic_: 'asked a question by a sponge, what answer
+should a prince make?']
+
+[Footnote 8: _1st Q._:
+
+    For hee doth keep you as an Ape doth nuttes,
+    In the corner of his Iaw, first mouthes you,
+    Then swallowes you:]
+
+[Footnote 9: Here most modern editors insert, '_so, haply, slander_'.
+But, although I think the Poet left out this obscure passage merely from
+dissatisfaction with it, I believe it renders a worthy sense as it
+stands. The antecedent to _whose_ is _friends_: _cannon_ is nominative
+to _transports_; and the only difficulty is the epithet _poysned_
+applied to _shot_, which seems transposed from the idea of an
+_unfriendly_ whisper. Perhaps Shakspere wrote _poysed shot_. But taking
+this as it stands, the passage might be paraphrased thus: 'Whose
+(favourable) whisper over the world's diameter (_from one side of the
+world to the other_), as level (_as truly aimed_) as the cannon (of an
+evil whisper) transports its poisoned shot to his blank (_the white
+centre of the target_), may shoot past our name (so keeping us clear),
+and hit only the invulnerable air.' ('_the intrenchant air_': _Macbeth_,
+act v. sc. 8). This interpretation rests on the idea of
+over-condensation with its tendency to seeming confusion--the only fault
+I know in the Poet--a grand fault, peculiarly his own, born of the
+beating of his wings against the impossible. It is much as if, able to
+think two thoughts at once, he would compel his phrase to utter them at
+once.]
+
+[Footnote 10:
+
+                    for the harlot king
+    Is quite beyond mine arm, out of the blank
+    And level of my brain, plot-proof;
+
+    _The Winter's Tale_, act ii. sc. 3.
+
+    My life stands in the level of your dreams,
+
+    _Ibid_, act iii. sc. 2.]
+
+[Footnote 11: two _ff_ for two long _ss_.]
+
+[Page 186]
+
+_Ham._ I am glad of it: a knavish speech
+sleepes in a foolish eare.
+
+_Rosin._ My Lord, you must tell us where the
+body is, and go with us to the King.
+
+_Ham._ The body is with the King, but the King
+is not with the body.[1] The King, is a thing----
+
+_Guild._ A thing my Lord?
+
+_Ham._ Of nothing[2]: bring me to him, hide
+Fox, and all after.[3]              _Exeunt_[4]
+
+_Enter King._                      [Sidenote: _King, and two or three._]
+
+_King._ I have sent to seeke him, and to find the bodie:
+How dangerous is it that this man goes loose:[5]
+Yet must not we put the strong Law on him:
+[Sidenote: 212] Hee's loved of the distracted multitude,[6]
+Who like not in their iudgement, but their eyes:
+And where 'tis so, th'Offenders scourge is weigh'd
+But neerer the offence: to beare all smooth, and euen,
+                                                   [Sidenote: neuer the]
+This sodaine sending him away, must seeme
+[Sidenote: 120] Deliberate pause,[7] diseases desperate growne,
+By desperate appliance are releeved,
+Or not at all.       _Enter Rosincrane._
+                              [Sidenote: _Rosencraus and all the rest._]
+How now? What hath befalne?
+
+_Rosin._ Where the dead body is bestow'd my Lord,
+We cannot get from him.
+
+_King._ But where is he?[8]
+
+_Rosin._ Without my Lord, guarded[9] to know your pleasure.
+
+_King._ Bring him before us.
+
+_Rosin._ Hoa, Guildensterne? Bring in my Lord.
+                [Sidenote: _Ros._ How, bring in the Lord. _They enter._]
+
+_Enter Hamlet and Guildensterne_[10]
+
+_King._ Now _Hamlet_, where's _Polonius?_
+
+[Footnote 1: 'The body is in the king's house, therefore with the king;
+but the king knows not where, therefore the king is not with the body.']
+
+[Footnote 2: 'A thing of nothing' seems to have been a common phrase.]
+
+[Footnote 3: The _Quarto_ has not 'hide Fox, and all after.']
+
+[Footnote 4: Hamlet darts out, with the others after him, as in a hunt.
+Possibly there was a game called _Hide fox, and all after_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: He is a hypocrite even to himself.]
+
+[Footnote 6: This had all along helped to Hamlet's safety.]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'must be made to look the result of deliberate reflection.'
+Claudius fears the people may imagine Hamlet treacherously used, driven
+to self-defence, and hurried out of sight to be disposed of.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Emphasis on _he_; the point of importance with the king, is
+_where he is_, not where the body is.]
+
+[Footnote 9: Henceforward he is guarded, or at least closely watched,
+according to the _Folio_--left much to himself according to the
+_Quarto_. 192.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Page 188]
+
+_Ham._ At Supper.
+
+_King._ At Supper? Where?
+
+_Ham._ Not where he eats, but where he is eaten,
+                                                  [Sidenote: where a is]
+a certaine conuocation of wormes are e'ne at him.
+                                      [Sidenote: of politique wormes[1]]
+Your worm is your onely Emperor for diet. We
+fat all creatures else to fat vs, and we fat our selfe
+                                                   [Sidenote: ourselves]
+for Magots.  Your fat King, and your leane
+Begger is but variable seruice to dishes, but to one
+                                                  [Sidenote: two dishes]
+Table that's the end.
+
+[A]
+
+_King._ What dost thou meane by this?[2]
+
+_Ham._  Nothing but to shew you how a King
+may go a Progresse[3] through the guts of a Begger.[4]
+
+_King._ Where is _Polonius_.
+
+_Ham._ In heauen, send thither to see. If your
+Messenger finde him not there, seeke him i'th other
+place your selfe: but indeed, if you finde him not
+                  [Sidenote: but if indeed you find him not within this]
+this moneth, you shall nose him as you go vp the
+staires into the Lobby.
+
+_King._ Go seeke him there.
+
+_Ham._ He will stay till ye come.
+                                        [Sidenote: A will stay till you]
+
+_K._ _Hamlet_, this deed of thine, for thine especial safety
+                              [Sidenote: this deede for thine especiall]
+Which we do tender, as we deerely greeue
+For that which thou hast done,[5] must send thee hence
+With fierie Quicknesse.[6] Therefore prepare thy selfe,
+The Barke is readie, and the winde at helpe,[7]
+Th'Associates tend,[8] and euery thing at bent       [Sidenote: is bent]
+For England.
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto:_--
+
+_King_ Alas, alas.[9]
+
+_Ham._ A man may fish with the worme that hath eate of a King, and eate
+of the fish that hath fedde of that worme.]
+
+[Footnote 1: --such as Rosincrance and Guildensterne!]
+
+[Footnote 2: I suspect this and the following speech ought by the
+printers to have been omitted also: without the preceding two speeches
+of the Quarto they are not accounted for.]
+
+[Footnote 3: a royal progress.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Hamlet's philosophy deals much now with the worthlessness
+of all human distinctions and affairs.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'and we care for your safety as much as we grieve for the
+death of Polonius.']
+
+[Footnote 6: 'With fierie Quicknesse.' _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 7: fair--ready to help.]
+
+[Footnote 8: attend, wait.]
+
+[Footnote 9: pretending despair over his madness.]
+
+[Page 190]
+
+_Ham._ For England?
+
+_King._ I _Hamlet_.
+
+_Ham._ Good.
+
+_King._ So is it, if thou knew'st our purposes.
+
+_Ham._ I see a Cherube that see's him: but        [Sidenote: sees them,]
+come, for England. Farewell deere Mother.
+
+_King._ Thy louing Father _Hamlet_.
+
+_Hamlet._ My Mother: Father and Mother is
+man and wife: man and wife is one flesh, and so [Sidenote: flesh, so my]
+my mother.[1] Come, for England.     _Exit_
+
+[Sidenote: 195] _King._ Follow him at foote,[2]
+Tempt him with speed aboord:
+Delay it not, He haue him hence to night.
+Away, for euery thing is Seal'd and done
+That else leanes on[3] th'Affaire pray you make hast.
+And England, if my loue thou holdst at ought,
+As my great power thereof may giue thee sense,
+Since yet thy Cicatrice lookes raw and red[4]
+After the Danish Sword, and thy free awe
+Payes homage to vs[5]; thou maist not coldly set[6]
+Our Soueraigne Processe,[7] which imports at full
+By Letters conjuring to that effect                [Sidenote: congruing]
+The present death of _Hamlet_. Do it England,
+For like the Hecticke[8] in my blood he rages,
+And thou must cure me: Till I know 'tis done,
+How ere my happes,[9] my ioyes were ne're begun.[10]
+                                      [Sidenote: ioyes will nere begin.]
+                                       _Exit_[11]
+
+[Sidenote: 274]  [12]_Enter Fortinbras with an Armie._
+                               [Sidenote: with his Army ouer the stage.]
+
+_For._ Go Captaine, from me greet the Danish King,
+Tell him that by his license, _Fortinbras_
+[Sidenote: 78] Claimes the conueyance[13] of a promis'd March
+                                                  [Sidenote: Craues the]
+Ouer his Kingdome. You know the Rendeuous:[14]
+
+[Footnote 1: He will not touch the hand of his father's murderer.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'at his heels.']
+
+[Footnote 3: 'belongs to.']
+
+[Footnote 4: 'as my great power may give thee feeling of its value,
+seeing the scar of my vengeance has hardly yet had time to heal.']
+
+[Footnote 5: 'and thy fear uncompelled by our presence, pays homage to
+us.']
+
+[Footnote 6: 'set down to cool'; 'set in the cold.']
+
+[Footnote 7: _mandate_: 'Where's Fulvia's process?' _Ant. and Cl._, act
+i. sc. 1. _Shakespeare Lexicon_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: _hectic fever--habitual_ or constant fever.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'whatever my fortunes.']
+
+[Footnote 10: The original, the _Quarto_ reading--'_my ioyes will nere
+begin_' seems to me in itself better, and the cause of the change to be
+as follows.
+
+In the _Quarto_ the next scene stands as in our modern editions, ending
+with the rime,
+
+                  ô from this time forth,
+    My thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth.   _Exit_.
+
+This was the act-pause, the natural end of act iii.
+
+But when the author struck out all but the commencement of the scene,
+leaving only the three little speeches of Fortinbras and his captain,
+then plainly the act-pause must fall at the end of the preceding scene.
+He therefore altered the end of the last verse to make it rime with the
+foregoing, in accordance with his frequent way of using a rime before an
+important pause.
+
+It perplexes us to think how on his way to the vessel, Hamlet could fall
+in with the Norwegian captain. This may have been one of Shakspere's
+reasons for striking the whole scene out--but he had other and more
+pregnant reasons.]
+
+[Footnote 11: Here is now the proper close of the _Third Act_.]
+
+[Footnote 12: _Commencement of the Fourth Act._
+
+Between the third and the fourth passes the time Hamlet is away; for the
+latter, in which he returns, and whose scenes are _contiguous_, needs no
+more than one day.]
+
+[Footnote 13: 'claims a convoy in fulfilment of the king's promise to
+allow him to march over his kingdom.' The meaning is made plainer by the
+correspondent passage in the _1st Quarto_:
+
+    Tell him that _Fortenbrasse_ nephew to old _Norway_,
+    Craues a free passe and conduct ouer his land,
+    According to the Articles agreed on:]
+
+[Footnote 14: 'where to rejoin us.']
+
+[Page 192]
+
+If that his Maiesty would ought with vs,
+We shall expresse our dutie in his eye,[1]
+And let[2] him know so.
+
+_Cap._ I will doo't, my Lord.
+
+_For._ Go safely[3] on.      _Exit._                  [Sidenote: softly]
+
+[A]
+
+[4] _Enter Queene and Horatio_.
+                 [Sidenote: _Enter Horatio, Gertrard, and a Gentleman_.]
+
+_Qu._ I will not speake with her.
+
+_Hor._[5] She is importunate, indeed distract, her   [Sidenote: _Gent_.]
+moode will needs be pittied.
+
+_Qu_. What would she haue?
+
+_Hor_. She speakes much of her Father; saies she heares
+                                                     [Sidenote: _Gent_.]
+
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+_Enter Hamlet, Rosencraus, &c._
+
+_Ham_. Good sir whose powers are these?
+
+_Cap_. They are of _Norway_ sir.
+
+_Ham_. How purposd sir I pray you?
+
+_Cap_. Against some part of _Poland_.
+
+_Ham_. Who commaunds them sir?
+
+_Cap_. The Nephew to old _Norway, Fortenbrasse_.
+
+_Ham_. Goes it against the maine of _Poland_ sir,
+Or for some frontire?
+
+_Cap_. Truly to speake, and with no addition,[6]
+We goe to gaine a little patch of ground[7]
+That hath in it no profit but the name
+To pay fiue duckets, fiue I would not farme it;
+Nor will it yeeld to _Norway_ or the _Pole_
+A rancker rate, should it be sold in fee.
+
+_Ham_. Why then the Pollacke neuer will defend it.
+
+_Cap_. Yes, it is already garisond.
+
+_Ham_. Two thousand soules, and twenty thousand duckets
+Will not debate the question of this straw
+This is th'Impostume of much wealth and peace,
+That inward breakes, and showes no cause without
+Why the man dies.[8] I humbly thanke you sir.
+
+_Cap_. God buy you sir.
+
+_Ros_. Wil't please you goe my Lord?
+
+[Sidenote: 187, 195] _Ham_. Ile be with you straight, goe a little
+before.[9]
+[10]How all occasions[11] doe informe against me,
+
+[Continued on next text page.]]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'we shall pay our respects, waiting upon his person.']
+
+[Footnote 2: 'let,' _imperative mood_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'with proper precaution,' _said to his attendant
+officers._]
+
+[Footnote 4: This was originally intended, I repeat, for the
+commencement of the act. But when the greater part of the foregoing
+scene was omitted, and the third act made to end with the scene before
+that, then the small part left of the all-but-cancelled scene must open
+the fourth act.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Hamlet absent, we find his friend looking after Ophelia.
+Gertrude seems less friendly towards her.]
+
+[Footnote 6: exaggeration.]
+
+[Footnote 7: --probably a small outlying island or coast-fortress, _not
+far off_, else why should Norway care about it at all? If the word
+_frontier_ has the meaning, as the _Shakespeare Lexicon_ says, of 'an
+outwork in fortification,' its use two lines back would, taken
+figuratively, tend to support this.]
+
+[Footnote 8: The meaning may be as in the following paraphrase: 'This
+quarrelling about nothing is (the breaking of) the abscess caused by
+wealth and peace--which breaking inward (in general corruption), would
+show no outward sore in sign of why death came.' Or it might be _forced_
+thus:--
+
+    This is the imposthume of much wealth and peace.
+    That (which) inward breaks, and shows no cause without--
+    Why, the man dies!
+
+But it may mean:--'The war is an imposthume, which will break within,
+and cause much affliction to the people that make the war.' On the other
+hand, Hamlet seems to regard it as a process for, almost a sign of
+health.]
+
+[Footnote 9: Note his freedom.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _See_ 'examples grosse as earth' _below_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: While every word that Shakspere wrote we may well take
+pains to grasp thoroughly, my endeavour to cast light on this passage is
+made with the distinct understanding in my own mind that the author
+himself disapproved of and omitted it, and that good reason is not
+wanting why he should have done so. At the same time, if my student, for
+this book is for those who would have help and will take pains to the
+true understanding of the play, would yet retain the passage, I protest
+against the acceptance of Hamlet's judgment of himself, except as
+revealing the simplicity and humility of his nature and character. That
+as often as a vivid memory of either interview with the Ghost came back
+upon him, he should feel rebuked and ashamed, and vexed with himself,
+is, in the morally, intellectually, and emotionally troubled state of
+his mind, nowise the less natural that he had the best of reasons for
+the delay because of which he _here_ so unmercifully abuses himself. A
+man of self-satisfied temperament would never in similar circumstances
+have done so. But Hamlet was, by nature and education, far from such
+self-satisfaction; and there is in him besides such a strife and turmoil
+of opposing passions and feelings and apparent duties, as can but rarely
+rise in a human soul. With which he ought to side, his conscience is not
+sure--sides therefore now with one, now with another. At the same time
+it is by no means the long delay the critics imagine of which he is
+accusing himself--it is only that the thing _is not done_.
+
+In certain moods the action a man dislikes will _therefore_ look to him
+the more like a duty; and this helps to prevent Hamlet from knowing
+always how great a part conscience bears in the omission because of
+which he condemns and even contemns himself. The conscience does not
+naturally examine itself--is not necessarily self-conscious. In any
+soliloquy, a man must speak from his present mood: we who are not
+suffering, and who have many of his moods before us, ought to understand
+Hamlet better than he understands himself. To himself, sitting in
+judgment on himself, it would hardly appear a decent cause of, not to
+say reason for, a moment's delay in punishing his uncle, that he was so
+weighed down with misery because of his mother and Ophelia, that it
+seemed of no use to kill one villain out of the villainous world; it
+would seem but 'bestial oblivion'; and, although his reputation as a
+prince was deeply concerned, _any_ reflection on the consequences to
+himself would at times appear but a 'craven scruple'; while at times
+even the whispers of conscience might seem a 'thinking too precisely on
+the event.' A conscientious man of changeful mood wilt be very ready in
+either mood to condemn the other. The best and rightest men will
+sometimes accuse themselves in a manner that seems to those who know
+them best, unfounded, unreasonable, almost absurd. We must not, I say,
+take the hero's judgment of himself as the author's judgment of him. The
+two judgments, that of a man upon himself from within, and that of his
+beholder upon him from without, are not congeneric. They are different
+in origin and in kind, and cannot be adopted either of them into the
+source of the other without most serious and dangerous mistake. So
+adopted, each becomes another thing altogether. It is to me probable
+that, although it involves other unfitnesses, the Poet omitted the
+passage chiefly from coming to see the danger of its giving occasion, or
+at least support, to an altogether mistaken and unjust idea of his
+Hamlet.]
+
+[Page 194]
+
+There's trickes i'th'world, and hems, and beats her heart,
+Spurnes enuiously at Strawes,[1] speakes things in doubt,[2]
+That carry but halfe sense: Her speech is nothing,[3]
+Yet the vnshaped vse of it[4] doth moue
+The hearers to Collection[5]; they ayme[6] at it,
+                                               [Sidenote: they yawne at]
+And botch the words[7] vp fit to their owne thoughts
+
+
+[_Continuation of quote from Quarto from previous text page_:--
+
+And spur my dull reuenge. [8]What is a man
+If his chiefe good and market of his time
+Be but to sleepe and feede, a beast, no more;
+Sure he that made vs with such large discourse[9]
+Looking before and after, gaue vs not
+That capabilitie and god-like reason
+To fust in vs vnvsd,[8] now whether it be
+[Sidenote: 52, 120] Bestiall obliuion,[10] or some crauen scruple
+Of thinking too precisely on th'euent,[11]
+A thought which quarterd hath but one part wisedom,
+And euer three parts coward, I doe not know
+Why yet I liue to say this thing's to doe,
+Sith I haue cause, and will, and strength, and meanes
+To doo't;[12] examples grosse as earth exhort me,
+Witnes this Army of such masse and charge,
+[Sidenote: 235] Led by a delicate and tender Prince,
+Whose spirit with diuine ambition puft,
+Makes mouthes at the invisible euent,
+[Sidenote: 120] Exposing what is mortall, and vnsure,
+To all that fortune, death, and danger dare,[13]
+Euen for an Egge-shell. Rightly to be great,
+Is not to stirre without great argument,
+But greatly to find quarrell in a straw
+When honour's at the stake, how stand I then
+That haue a father kild, a mother staind,
+Excytements of my reason, and my blood,
+And let all sleepe,[14] while to my shame I see
+The iminent death of twenty thousand men,
+That for a fantasie and tricke[15] of fame
+Goe to their graues like beds, fight for a plot
+Whereon the numbers cannot try the cause,[16]
+Which is not tombe enough and continent[17]
+To hide the slaine,[18] ô from this time forth,
+My thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth.[19]    _Exit._]
+
+[Footnote 1: trifles.]
+
+[Footnote 2: doubtfully.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'there is nothing in her speech.']
+
+[Footnote 4: 'the formless mode of it.']
+
+[Footnote 5: 'to gathering things and putting them together.']
+
+[Footnote 6: guess.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Ophelia's words.]
+
+[Footnote 8: I am in doubt whether this passage from 'What is a man'
+down to 'unused,' does not refer to the king, and whether Hamlet is not
+persuading himself that it can be no such objectionable thing to kill
+one hardly above a beast. At all events it is far more applicable to the
+king: it was not one of Hamlet's faults, in any case, to fail of using
+his reason. But he may just as well accuse himself of that too! At the
+same time the worst neglect of reason lies in not carrying out its
+conclusions, and if we cannot justify Hamlet in his delay, the passage
+is of good application to him. 'Bestiall oblivion' does seem to connect
+himself with the reflection; but how thoroughly is the thing intended by
+such a phrase alien from the character of Hamlet!]
+
+[Footnote 9: --the mental faculty of running hither and thither: 'We
+look before and after.' _Shelley: To a Skylark_.]
+
+[Footnote 10: --the forgetfulness of such a beast as he has just
+mentioned.]
+
+[Footnote 11: --the _consequences_. The scruples that come of thinking
+of the event, Hamlet certainly had: that they were _craven_ scruples,
+that his thinking was too precise, I deny to the face of the noble
+self-accuser. Is that a craven scruple which, seeing no good to result
+from the horrid deed, shrinks from its irretrievableness, and demands at
+least absolute assurance of guilt? or that 'a thinking too precisely on
+the event,' to desire, as the prince of his people, to leave an un
+wounded name behind him?]
+
+[Footnote 12: This passage is the strongest there is on the side of the
+ordinary misconception of the character of Hamlet. It comes from
+himself; and it is as ungenerous as it is common and unfair to use such
+a weapon against a man. Does any but St. Paul himself say he was the
+chief of sinners? Consider Hamlet's condition, tormented on all sides,
+within and without, and think whether this outbreak against himself be
+not as unfair as it is natural. Lest it should be accepted against him,
+Shakspere did well to leave it out. In bitter disappointment, both
+because of what is and what is not, both because of what he has done and
+what he has failed to do, having for the time lost all chance, with the
+last vision of the Ghost still haunting his eyes, his last reproachful
+words yet ringing in his ears, are we bound to take his judgment of
+himself because it is against himself? Are we _bound_ to take any man's
+judgment because it is against himself? I answer, 'No more than if it
+were for himself.' A good man's judgment, where he is at all perplexed,
+especially if his motive comes within his own question, is ready to be
+against himself, as a bad man's is sure to be for himself. Or because he
+is a philosopher, does it follow that throughout he understands himself?
+Were such a man in cool, untroubled conditions, we might feel compelled
+to take his judgment, but surely not here! A philosopher in such state
+as Hamlet's would understand the quality of his spiritual operations
+with no more certainty than another man. In his present mood, Hamlet
+forgets the cogency of the reasons that swayed him in the other; forgets
+that his uppermost feeling then was doubt, as horror, indignation, and
+conviction are uppermost now. Things were never so clear to Hamlet as to
+us.
+
+But how can he say he has strength and means--in the position in which
+he now finds himself? I am glad to be able to believe, let my defence of
+Hamlet against himself be right or wrong, that Shakspere intended the
+omission of the passage. I lay nothing on the great lack of logic
+throughout the speech, for that would not make it unfit for Hamlet in
+such mood, while it makes its omission from the play of less consequence
+to my general argument.]
+
+[Footnote 13: _threaten_. This supports my argument as to the great
+soliloquy--that it was death as the result of his slaying the king, or
+attempting to do so, not death by suicide, he was thinking of: he
+expected to die himself in the punishing of his uncle.]
+
+[Footnote 14: He had had no chance but that when the king was on his
+knees.]
+
+[Footnote 15: 'a fancy and illusion.']
+
+[Footnote 16: 'which is too small for those engaged to find room to
+fight on it.']
+
+[Footnote 17: 'continent,' _containing space_.]
+
+[Footnote 18: This soliloquy is antithetic to the other. Here is no
+thought of the 'something after death.']
+
+[Footnote 19: If, with this speech in his mouth, Hamlet goes coolly on
+board the vessel, _not being compelled thereto_ (190, 192, 216), and
+possessing means to his vengeance, as here he says, and goes merely in
+order to hoist Rosincrance and Guildensterne with their own petard--that
+is, if we must keep the omitted passages, then the author exposes his
+hero to a more depreciatory judgment than any from which I would justify
+him, and a conception of his character entirely inconsistent with the
+rest of the play. He did not observe the risk at the time he wrote the
+passage, but discovering it afterwards, rectified the oversight--to the
+dissatisfaction of his critics, who have agreed in restoring what he
+cancelled.]
+
+[Page 196]
+
+Which as her winkes, and nods, and gestures yeeld[1] them,
+Indeed would make one thinke there would[2] be thought,
+                                           [Sidenote: there might[2] be]
+Though nothing sure, yet much vnhappily.
+
+_Qu_. 'Twere good she were spoken with,[3]           [Sidenote: _Hora_.]
+For she may strew dangerous coniectures
+In ill breeding minds.[4] Let her come in.  [Sidenote: _Enter Ophelia_.]
+To my sicke soule (as sinnes true Nature is)
+                                           [Sidenote: _Quee_. 'To my[5]]
+Each toy seemes Prologue, to some great amisse,        [Sidenote: 'Each]
+So full of Artlesse iealousie is guilt,                  [Sidenote: 'So]
+It spill's it selfe, in fearing to be spilt.[6]          [Sidenote: 'It]
+
+_Enter Ophelia distracted_.[7]
+
+_Ophe_. Where is the beauteous Maiesty of
+Denmark.
+
+_Qu_. How now _Ophelia_?                       [Sidenote: _shee sings_.]
+
+_Ophe. How should I your true loue know from another one?
+By his Cockle hat and staffe, and his Sandal shoone._
+
+_Qu_. Alas sweet Lady: what imports this Song?
+
+_Ophe_. Say you? Nay pray you marke.
+_He is dead and gone Lady, he is dead and gone,
+At his head a grasse-greene Turfe, at his heeles a stone._
+                                                       [Sidenote: O ho.]
+
+_Enter King_.
+
+_Qu_. Nay but _Ophelia_.
+
+_Ophe_. Pray you marke.
+_White his Shrow'd as the Mountaine Snow._     [Sidenote: _Enter King_.]
+
+_Qu_. Alas looke heere my Lord,
+
+[Sidenote: 246] _Ophe. Larded[8] with sweet flowers_:
+                                             [Sidenote: Larded all with]
+_Which bewept to the graue did not go_,     [Sidenote: ground | _Song_.]
+_With true-loue showres_,
+
+[Footnote 1: 'present them,'--her words, that is--giving significance or
+interpretation to them.]
+
+[Footnote 2: If this _would_, and not the _might_ of the _Quarto_, be
+the correct reading, it means that Ophelia would have something thought
+so and so.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --changing her mind on Horatio's representation. At first
+she would not speak with her.]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'minds that breed evil.']
+
+[Footnote 5: --as a quotation.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Instance, the history of Macbeth.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _1st Q. Enter Ofelia playing on a Lute, and her haire downe
+singing._
+
+Hamlet's apparent madness would seem to pass into real madness in
+Ophelia. King Lear's growing perturbation becomes insanity the moment he
+sees the pretended madman Edgar.
+
+The forms of Ophelia's madness show it was not her father's death that
+drove her mad, but his death by the hand of Hamlet, which, with Hamlet's
+banishment, destroyed all the hope the queen had been fostering in her
+of marrying him some day.]
+
+[Footnote 8: This expression is, as Dr. Johnson says, taken from
+cookery; but it is so used elsewhere by Shakspere that we cannot regard
+it here as a scintillation of Ophelia's insanity.]
+
+[Page 198]
+
+_King_. How do ye, pretty Lady?                          [Sidenote: you]
+
+_Ophe_. Well, God dil'd you.[1] They say the
+                                           [Sidenote: good dild you,[1]]
+Owle was a Bakers daughter.[2] Lord, wee know
+what we are, but know not what we may be. God
+be at your Table.
+
+[Sidenote: 174] _King_. Conceit[3] vpon her Father.
+
+_Ophe_. Pray you let's haue no words of this:      [Sidenote: Pray lets]
+but when they aske you what it meanes, say you
+this:
+
+[4] _To morrow is S. Valentines day, all in the morning betime,
+And I a Maid at your Window to be your Valentine.
+Then vp he rose, and don'd[5] his clothes, and dupt[5] the chamber dore,
+Let in the Maid, that out a Maid, neuer departed more._
+
+_King_. Pretty _Ophelia._
+
+_Ophe_. Indeed la? without an oath Ile make an
+                                             [Sidenote: Indeede without]
+end ont.[6]
+
+_By gis, and by S. Charity,
+Alacke, and fie for shame:
+Yong men wil doo't, if they come too't,
+By Cocke they are too blame.
+Quoth she before you tumbled me,
+You promis'd me to Wed:
+So would I ha done by yonder Sunne_,  [Sidenote: (He answers,) So would]
+_And thou hadst not come to my bed._
+
+_King_. How long hath she bin this?              [Sidenote: beene thus?]
+
+_Ophe_. I hope all will be well. We must bee
+patient, but I cannot choose but weepe, to thinke
+they should lay him i'th'cold ground: My brother
+                                              [Sidenote: they wouid lay]
+shall knowe of it, and so I thanke you for your
+good counsell. Come, my Coach: Goodnight
+Ladies: Goodnight sweet Ladies: Goodnight,
+goodnight.                       _Exit_[7]
+
+[Footnote 1: _1st Q_. 'God yeeld you,' that is, _reward you_. Here we
+have a blunder for the contraction, 'God 'ild you'--perhaps a common
+blunder.]
+
+[Footnote 2: For the silly legend, see Douce's note in _Johnson and
+Steevens_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: imaginative brooding.]
+
+[Footnote 4: We dare no judgment on madness in life: we need not in
+art.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Preterites of _don_ and _dup_, contracted from _do on_ and
+_do up_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: --disclaiming false modesty.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _Not in Q_.]
+
+[Page 200]
+
+_King_. Follow her close,
+Giue her good watch I pray you:
+Oh this is the poyson of deepe greefe, it springs
+All from her Fathers death. Oh _Gertrude, Gertrude_,
+      [Sidenote: death, and now behold, ô _Gertrard, Gertrard_,]
+When sorrowes comes, they come not single spies,[1]
+                                               [Sidenote: sorrowes come]
+But in Battaliaes. First, her Father slaine,     [Sidenote: battalians:]
+Next your Sonne gone, and he most violent Author
+Of his owne iust remoue: the people muddied,[2]
+Thicke and vnwholsome in their thoughts, and whispers
+                                                 [Sidenote: in thoughts]
+For[3] good _Polonius_ death; and we haue done but greenly
+[Sidenote: 182] In hugger mugger[4] to interre him. Poore _Ophelia_
+Diuided from her selfe,[5] and her faire Iudgement,
+Without the which we are Pictures, or meere Beasts.
+Last, and as much containing as all these,
+Her Brother is in secret come from France,
+Keepes on his wonder,[6] keepes himselfe in clouds,
+                                            [Sidenote: Feeds on this[6]]
+And wants not Buzzers to infect his eare                [Sidenote: care]
+With pestilent Speeches of his Fathers death,
+Where in necessitie of matter Beggard,     [Sidenote: Wherein necessity]
+Will nothing sticke our persons to Arraigne           [Sidenote: person]
+In eare and eare.[7] O my deere _Gertrude_, this,
+Like to a murdering Peece[8] in many places,
+Giues me superfluous death.          _A Noise within_.
+
+_Enter a Messenger_.
+
+_Qu_. Alacke, what noyse is this?[9]
+
+_King_. Where are my _Switzers_?[10]
+                       [Sidenote: _King_. Attend, where is my Swissers,]
+Let them guard the doore. What is the matter?
+
+_Mes_. Saue your selfe, my Lord.
+[Sidenote: 120] The Ocean (ouer-peering of his List[11])
+Eates not the Flats with more impittious[12] haste
+
+[Footnote 1: --each alone, like scouts.]
+
+[Footnote 2: stirred up like pools--with similar result.]
+
+[Footnote 3: because of.]
+
+[Footnote 4: The king wished to avoid giving the people any pretext or
+cause for interfering: he dreaded whatever might lead to enquiry--to the
+queen of course pretending it was to avoid exposing Hamlet to the
+popular indignation. _Hugger mugger--secretly: Steevens and Malone._]
+
+[Footnote 5: The phrase has the same _visual_ root as _beside
+herself_--both signifying '_not at one_ with herself.']
+
+[Footnote 6: If the _Quarto_ reading is right, 'this wonder' means the
+hurried and suspicious funeral of his father. But the _Folio_ reading is
+quite Shaksperean: 'He keeps on (as a garment) the wonder of the people
+at him'; _keeps his behaviour such that the people go on wondering about
+him_: the phrase is explained by the next clause. Compare:
+
+    By being seldom seen, I could not stir
+    But, like a comet, I was wondered at.
+
+_K. Henry IV. P. I_. act iii. sc. 1.]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'wherein Necessity, beggared of material, will not scruple
+to whisper invented accusations against us.']
+
+[Footnote 8: --the name given to a certain small cannon--perhaps charged
+with various missiles, hence the better figuring the number and variety
+of 'sorrows' he has just recounted.]
+
+[Footnote 9: _This line not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 10: Note that the king is well guarded, and Hamlet had to lay
+his account with great risk in the act of killing him.]
+
+[Footnote 11: _border, as of cloth_: the mounds thrown up to keep the sea out.
+The figure here specially fits a Dane.]
+
+[Footnote 12: I do not know whether this word means _pitiless_, or
+stands for _impetuous_. The _Quarto_ has one _t_.]
+
+[Page 202]
+
+Then young _Laertes_, in a Riotous head,[1]
+Ore-beares your Officers, the rabble call him Lord,
+And as the world were now but to begin,
+Antiquity forgot, Custome not knowne,
+The Ratifiers and props of euery word,[2]
+[Sidenote: 62] They cry choose we? _Laertes_ shall be King,[3]
+                                                     [Sidenote: The cry]
+Caps, hands, and tongues, applaud it to the clouds,
+_Laertes_ shall be King, _Laertes_ King.
+
+_Qu_. How cheerefully on the false Traile they cry,
+                                           [Sidenote: _A noise within_.]
+Oh this is Counter you false Danish Dogges.[4]
+
+_Noise within.  Enter Laertes_[5].    [Sidenote: _Laertes with others_.]
+
+_King_. The doores are broke.
+
+_Laer_. Where is the King, sirs? Stand you all without.
+                                       [Sidenote: this King? sirs stand]
+
+_All_. No, let's come in.
+
+_Laer_. I pray you giue me leaue.[6]
+
+_All_. We will, we will.
+
+_Laer_. I thanke you: Keepe the doore.
+Oh thou vilde King, giue me my Father.
+
+_Qu_. Calmely good _Laertes_.
+
+_Laer_. That drop of blood, that calmes[7]       [Sidenote: thats calme]
+Proclaimes me Bastard:
+Cries Cuckold to my Father, brands the Harlot
+Euen heere betweene the chaste vnsmirched brow
+Of my true Mother.[8]
+
+_Kin_. What is the cause _Laertes_,
+That thy Rebellion lookes so Gyant-like?
+Let him go _Gertrude_: Do not feare[9] our person:
+There's such Diuinity doth hedge a King,[10]
+That Treason can but peepe to what it would,
+Acts little of his will.[11] Tell me _Laertes_,
+
+[Footnote 1: _Head_ is a rising or gathering of people--generally
+rebellious, I think.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Antiquity and Custom.]
+
+[Footnote 3: This refers to the election of Claudius--evidently not a
+popular election, but effected by intrigue with the aristocracy and the
+army: 'They cry, Let us choose: Laertes shall be king!'
+
+We may suppose the attempt of Claudius to have been favoured by the
+lingering influence of the old Norse custom of succession, by which not
+the son but the brother inherited. 16, _bis._]
+
+[Footnote 4: To hunt counter is to 'hunt the game by the heel or track.'
+The queen therefore accuses them of not using their scent or judgment,
+but following appearances.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Now at length re-appears Laertes, who has during the
+interim been ripening in Paris for villainy. He is wanted for the
+catastrophe, and requires but the last process of a few hours in the
+hell-oven of a king's instigation.]
+
+[Footnote 6: The customary and polite way of saying _leave me_: 'grant
+me your absence.' 85, 89.]
+
+[Footnote 7: grows calm.]
+
+[Footnote 8: In taking vengeance Hamlet must acknowledge his mother such
+as Laertes says inaction on his part would proclaim his mother.
+
+The actress should here let a shadow cross the queen's face: though too
+weak to break with the king, she has begun to repent.]
+
+[Footnote 9: fear _for_.]
+
+[Footnote 10: The consummate hypocrite claims the protection of the
+sacred hedge through which he had himself broken--or crept rather, like
+a snake, to kill. He can act innocence the better that his conscience is
+clear as to Polonius.]
+
+[Footnote 11: 'can only peep through the hedge to its desire--acts
+little of its will.']
+
+[Page 204]
+
+Why thou art thus Incenst? Let him go _Gertrude_.
+Speake man.
+
+_Laer_. Where's my Father?                             [Sidenote: is my]
+
+_King_. Dead.
+
+_Qu_. But not by him.
+
+_King_. Let him demand his fill.
+
+_Laer_. How came he dead? Ile not be Iuggel'd with.
+To hell Allegeance: Vowes, to the blackest diuell.
+Conscience and Grace, to the profoundest Pit
+I dare Damnation: to this point I stand,
+That both the worlds I giue to negligence,
+Let come what comes: onely Ile be reueng'd
+Most throughly for my Father.
+
+_King_. Who shall stay you?[1]
+
+_Laer_. My Will, not all the world,[1]               [Sidenote: worlds:]
+And for my meanes, Ile husband them so well,
+They shall go farre with little.
+
+_King_. Good _Laertes_:
+If you desire to know the certaintie
+Of your deere Fathers death, if writ in your reuenge,
+                                           [Sidenote: Father, i'st writ]
+That Soop-stake[2] you will draw both Friend and Foe,
+Winner and Looser.[3]
+
+_Laer_. None but his Enemies.
+
+_King_. Will you know them then.
+
+_La_. To his good Friends, thus wide Ile ope my Armes:
+And like the kinde Life-rend'ring Politician,[4]
+                                      [Sidenote: life-rendring Pelican,]
+Repast them with my blood.[5]
+
+_King_. Why now you speake
+Like a good Childe,[6] and a true Gentleman.
+That I am guiltlesse of your Fathers death,
+And am most sensible in greefe for it,[7]           [Sidenote: sencibly]
+
+[Footnote 1:
+
+    'Who shall _prevent_ you?'
+    'My own will only--not all the world,'
+
+or,
+
+    'Who will _support_ you?'
+    'My will. Not all the world shall prevent me,'--
+
+so playing on the two meanings of the word _stay._ Or it _might_ mean:
+'Not all the world shall stay my will.']
+
+[Footnote 2: swoop-stake--_sweepstakes_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'and be loser as well as winner--' If the _Folio's_ is
+the right reading, then the sentence is unfinished, and should have a
+dash, not a period.]
+
+[Footnote 4: A curious misprint: may we not suspect a somewhat dull
+joker among the compositors?]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'a true son to your father.']
+
+[Footnote 7: 'feel much grief for it.']
+
+[Footnote 5: Laertes is a ranter--false everywhere.
+
+Plainly he is introduced as the foil from which Hamlet 'shall stick
+fiery off.' In this speech he shows his moral condition directly the
+opposite of Hamlet's: he has no principle but revenge. His conduct ought
+to be quite satisfactory to Hamlet's critics; there is action enough in
+it of the very kind they would have of Hamlet; and doubtless it would be
+satisfactory to them but for the treachery that follows. The one, dearly
+loving a father who deserves immeasurably better of him than Polonius of
+Laertes, will not for the sake of revenge disregard either conscience,
+justice, or grace; the other will not delay even to inquire into the
+facts of his father's fate, but will act at once on hearsay, rushing to
+a blind satisfaction that cannot even be called retaliation, caring for
+neither right nor wrong, cursing conscience and the will of God, and
+daring damnation. He slights assurance as to the hand by which his
+father fell, dismisses all reflection that might interfere with a stupid
+revenge. To make up one's mind at once, and act without ground, is
+weakness, not strength: this Laertes does--and is therefore just the man
+to be the villainous, not the innocent, tool of villainy. He who has
+sufficing ground and refuses to act is weak; but the ground that will
+satisfy the populace, of which the commonplace critic is the fair type,
+will not satisfy either the man of conscience or of wisdom. The mass of
+world-bepraised action owes its existence to the pressure of
+circumstance, not to the will and conscience of the man. Hamlet waits
+for light, even with his heart accusing him; Laertes rushes into the
+dark, dagger in hand, like a mad Malay: so he kill, he cares not whom.
+Such a man is easily tempted to the vilest treachery, for the light that
+is in him is darkness; he is not a true man; he is false in himself.
+This is what comes of his father's maxim:
+
+    To thine own self be true;
+    And it must follow, _as the night the day_ (!)
+    Thou canst not then be false to any man.
+
+Like the aphorism 'Honesty is the best policy,' it reveals the
+difference between a fact and a truth. Both sayings are correct as
+facts, but as guides of conduct devilishly false, leading to dishonesty
+and treachery. To be true to the divine self in us, is indeed to be true
+to all; but it is only by being true to all, against the ever present
+and urging false self, that at length we shall see the divine self rise
+above the chaotic waters of our selfishness, and know it so as to be
+true to it.
+
+Of Laertes we must note also that it is not all for love of his father
+that he is ready to cast allegiance to hell, and kill the king: he has
+the voice of the people to succeed him.]
+
+[Page 206]
+
+[Sidenote: 184] It shall as leuell to your Iudgement pierce
+                                                      [Sidenote: peare']
+As day do's to your eye.[1]
+
+_A noise within. [2]Let her come in._
+
+_Enter Ophelia[3]_
+
+_Laer_. How now? what noise is that?[4]
+                           [Sidenote: _Laer_. Let her come in. How now,]
+Oh heate drie vp my Braines, teares seuen times salt,
+Burne out the Sence and Vertue of mine eye.
+By Heauen, thy madnesse shall be payed by waight,
+                                                 [Sidenote: with weight]
+Till our Scale turnes the beame. Oh Rose of May,       [Sidenote: turne]
+Deere Maid, kinde Sister, sweet _Ophelia_:
+Oh Heauens, is't possible, a yong Maids wits,
+Should be as mortall as an old mans life?[5]    [Sidenote: a poore mans]
+Nature is fine[6] in Loue, and where 'tis fine,
+It sends some precious instance of it selfe
+After the thing it loues.[7]
+
+_Ophe. They bore him bare fac'd on the Beer._
+                              [Sidenote: _Song_.] [Sidenote: bare-faste]
+_Hey non nony, nony, hey nony:[8]
+And on his graue raines many a teare_,
+                                     [Sidenote: And in his graue rain'd]
+_Fare you well my Doue._
+
+_Laer_. Had'st thou thy wits, and did'st perswade
+Reuenge, it could not moue thus.
+
+_Ophe_. You must sing downe a-downe, and
+                                   [Sidenote: sing a downe a downe, And]
+you call him[9] a-downe-a. Oh, how the wheele[10]
+becomes it? It is the false Steward that stole his
+masters daughter.[11]
+
+_Laer_. This nothings more then matter.[12]
+
+_Ophe_. There's Rosemary,[13] that's for Remembraunce.
+Pray loue remember: and there is             [Sidenote: , pray you loue]
+Paconcies, that's for Thoughts.                  [Sidenote: Pancies[14]]
+
+_Laer_. A document[15] in madnesse, thoughts and
+remembrance fitted.
+
+_Ophe_. There's Fennell[16] for you, and Columbines[16]:
+ther's Rew[17] for you, and heere's some for
+
+[Footnote 1: 'pierce as _directly_ to your judgment.'
+
+But the simile of the _day_ seems to favour the reading of the
+_Q._--'peare,' for _appear_. In the word _level_ would then be indicated
+the _rising_ sun.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 3: _1st Q. 'Enter Ofelia as before_.']
+
+[Footnote 4: To render it credible that Laertes could entertain the vile
+proposal the king is about to make, it is needful that all possible
+influences should be represented as combining to swell the commotion of
+his spirit, and overwhelm what poor judgment and yet poorer conscience
+he had. Altogether unprepared, he learns Ophelia's pitiful condition by
+the sudden sight of the harrowing change in her--and not till after that
+hears who killed his father and brought madness on his sister.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _1st Q._
+
+    I'st possible a yong maides life,
+    Should be as mortall as an olde mans sawe?]
+
+[Footnote 6: delicate, exquisite.]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'where 'tis fine': I suggest that the _it_ here may be
+impersonal: 'where _things_, where _all_ is fine,' that is, 'in a fine
+soul'; then the meaning would be, 'Nature is fine always in love, and
+where the soul also is fine, she sends from it' &c. But the _where_ may
+be equal, perhaps, to _whereas_. I can hardly think the phrase means
+merely '_and where it is in love_.' It might intend--'and where Love is
+fine, it sends' &c. The 'precious instance of itself,' that is,
+'something that is a part and specimen of itself,' is here the 'young
+maid's wits': they are sent after the 'old man's life.'--These three
+lines are not in the Quarto. It is not disputed that they are from
+Shakspere's hand: if the insertion of these be his, why should the
+omission of others not be his also?]
+
+[Footnote 8: _This line is not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 9: '_if_ you call him': I think this is not a part of the
+song, but is spoken of her father.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _the burden of the song_: Steevens.]
+
+[Footnote 11: The subject of the ballad.]
+
+[Footnote 12: 'more than sense'--in incitation to revenge.]
+
+[Footnote 13: --an evergreen, and carried at funerals: _Johnson_.
+
+    For you there's rosemary and rue; these keep
+    Seeming and savour ail the winter long:
+    Grace and remembrance be to you both.
+
+_The Winter's Tale_, act iv. sc. 3.]
+
+[Footnote 14: _penseés_.]
+
+[Footnote 15: _a teaching, a lesson_--the fitting of thoughts and
+remembrance, namely--which he applies to his intent of revenge. Or may
+it not rather be meant that the putting of these two flowers together
+was a happy hit of her madness, presenting the fantastic emblem of a
+document or writing--the very idea of which is the keeping of thoughts
+in remembrance?]
+
+[Footnote 16: --said to mean _flattery_ and _thanklessness_--perhaps
+given to the king.]
+
+[Footnote 17: _Repentance_--given to the queen. Another name of the
+plant was _Herb-Grace_, as below, in allusion, doubtless, to its common
+name--_rue_ or _repentance_ being both the gift of God, and an act of
+grace.]
+
+[Page 208]
+
+me. Wee may call it Herbe-Grace a Sundaies:
+                    [Sidenote: herbe of Grace a Sondaies, you may weare]
+Oh you must weare your Rew with a difference.[1]
+There's a Daysie,[2] I would giue you some Violets,[3]
+but they wither'd all when my Father dyed: They
+say, he made a good end;                          [Sidenote: say a made]
+
+_For bonny sweet Robin is all my ioy._
+
+_Laer_. Thought, and Affliction, Passion, Hell it selfe:
+                                                [Sidenote: afflictions,]
+She turnes to Fauour, and to prettinesse.
+
+                                                      [Sidenote:_Song._]
+
+_Ophe. And will he not come againe_,              [Sidenote: will a not]
+_And will he not come againe_:                    [Sidenote: will a not]
+_No, no, he is dead, go to thy Death-bed,
+He neuer wil come againe.
+His Beard as white as Snow_,                    [Sidenote: beard was as]
+_All[4] Flaxen was his Pole:
+He is gone, he is gone, and we cast away mone,
+Gramercy[5] on his Soule._                    [Sidenote: God a mercy on]
+And of all Christian Soules, I pray God.[6]
+                                          [Sidenote: Christians soules,]
+God buy ye.[7]          _Exeunt Ophelia_[8]             [Sidenote: you.]
+
+_Laer_. Do you see this, you Gods?       [Sidenote: Doe you this ô God.]
+
+_King. Laertes_, I must common[9] with your greefe,  [Sidenote: commune]
+Or you deny me right: go but apart,
+Make choice of whom your wisest Friends you will,
+And they shall heare and iudge 'twixt you and me;
+If by direct or by Colaterall hand
+They finde vs touch'd,[10] we will our Kingdome giue,
+Our Crowne, our Life, and all that we call Ours
+To you in satisfaction. But if not,
+Be you content to lend your patience to vs,[11]
+And we shall ioyntly labour with your soule
+To giue it due content.
+
+_Laer_. Let this be so:[12]
+His meanes of death,[13] his obscure buriall;      [Sidenote: funerall,]
+No Trophee, Sword, nor Hatchment o're his bones,[14]
+
+[Footnote 1: --perhaps the heraldic term. The Poet, not Ophelia, intends
+the special fitness of the speech. Ophelia means only that the rue of
+the matron must differ from the rue of the girl.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'the dissembling daisy': _Greene_--quoted by _Henley_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --standing for _faithfulness: Malone_, from an old song.]
+
+[Footnote 4: '_All' not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 5: Wherever else Shakspere uses the word, it is in the sense
+of _grand merci--great thanks (Skeat's Etym. Dict.)_; here it is surely
+a corruption, whether Ophelia's or the printer's, of the _Quarto_
+reading, '_God a mercy_' which, spoken quickly, sounds very near
+_gramercy_. The _1st Quarto_ also has 'God a mercy.']
+
+[Footnote 6: 'I pray God.' _not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'God b' wi' ye': _good bye._]
+
+[Footnote 8: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'I must have a share in your grief.' The word does mean
+_commune_, but here is more pregnant, as evidenced in the next phrase,
+'Or you deny me right:'--'do not give me justice.']
+
+[Footnote 10: 'touched with the guilt of the deed, either as having done
+it with our own hand, or caused it to be done by the hand of one at our
+side.']
+
+[Footnote 11: We may paraphrase thus: 'Be pleased to grant us a loan of
+your patience,' that is, _be patient for a while at our request_, 'and
+we will work along with your soul to gain for it (your soul) just
+satisfaction.']
+
+[Footnote 12: He consents--but immediately _re-sums_ the grounds of his
+wrathful suspicion.]
+
+[Footnote 13: --the way in which he met his death.]
+
+[Footnote 14: --customary honours to the noble dead. _A trophy_ was an
+arrangement of the armour and arms of the dead in a set decoration. The
+origin of the word _hatchment_ shows its intent: it is a corruption of
+_achievement_.]
+
+[Page 210]
+
+No Noble rite, nor formall ostentation,[1]
+Cry to be heard, as 'twere from Heauen to Earth,
+That I must call in question.[2]                   [Sidenote: call't in]
+
+_King_. So you shall:
+And where th'offence is, let the great Axe fall.
+I pray you go with me.[3]                _Exeunt_
+
+_Enter Horatio, with an Attendant_.    [Sidenote: _Horatio and others_.]
+
+_Hora_. What are they that would speake with
+me?
+
+_Ser_. Saylors sir, they say they haue Letters
+                                           [_Gent_. Sea-faring men sir,]
+for you.
+
+_Hor_. Let them come in,[4]
+I do not know from what part of the world
+I should be greeted, if not from Lord _Hamlet_.
+
+_Enter Saylor_.                                   [Sidenote: _Saylers_.]
+
+_Say_. God blesse you Sir.
+
+_Hor_. Let him blesse thee too.
+
+_Say_. Hee shall Sir, and't[5] please him. There's
+                                      [Sidenote: A shall sir and please]
+a Letter for you Sir: It comes from th'Ambassadours
+                                  [Sidenote: it came frő th' Embassador]
+that was bound for England, if your name
+be _Horatio_, as I am let to know[6] it is.
+
+_Reads the Letter_[7]
+
+Horatio, _When thou shalt haue ouerlook'd this_,
+                                         [Sidenote: _Hor. Horatio_ when]
+_giue these Fellowes some meanes to the King: They
+haue Letters for him. Ere we were two dayes[8] old
+at Sea, a Pyrate of very Warlicke appointment gaue
+vs Chace. Finding our selues too slow of Saile, we
+put on a compelled Valour. In the Grapple, I boarded_
+                                          [Sidenote: valour, and in the]
+_them: On the instant they got cleare of our Shippe,
+so I alone became their Prisoner.[9] They haue dealt
+with mee, like Theeues of Mercy, but they knew what
+they did. I am to doe a good turne for them. Let_
+                                                     [Sidenote: a turne]
+_the King have the Letters I haue sent, and repaire
+thou to me with as much hast as thou wouldest flye_
+                                              [Sidenote: much speede as]
+_death[10] I haue words to speake in your eare, will_
+                                               [Sidenote: in thine eare]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'formal ostentation'--show or publication of honour
+according to form or rule.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'so that I must call in question'--institute inquiry; or
+'--_that_ (these things) I must call in question.']
+
+[Footnote 3: Note such a half line frequently after the not uncommon
+closing couplet--as if to take off the formality of the couplet, and
+lead back, through the more speech-like, to greater verisimilitude.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Here the servant goes, and the rest of the speech Horatio
+speaks _solus_. He had expected to hear from Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'and it please'--_if it please_. _An_ for _if_ is merely
+_and_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'I am told.']
+
+[Footnote 7: _Not in Q_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: This gives an approximate clue to the time between the
+second and third acts: it needs not have been a week.]
+
+[Footnote 9: Note once more the unfailing readiness of Hamlet where
+there was no question as to the fitness of the action seemingly
+required. This is the man who by too much thinking, forsooth, has
+rendered himself incapable of action!--so far ahead of the foremost
+behind him, that, when the pirate, not liking such close quarters, 'on
+the instant got clear,' he is the only one on her deck! There was no
+question here as to what ought to be done: the pirate grappled them; he
+boarded her. Thereafter, with his prompt faculty for dealing with men,
+he soon comes to an understanding with his captors, and they agree, upon
+some certain condition, to put him on shore.
+
+He writes in unusual spirits; for he has now gained full, presentable,
+and indisputable proof of the treachery which before he scarcely
+doubted, but could not demonstrate. The present instance of it has to do
+with himself, not his father, but in itself would justify the slaying of
+his uncle, whose plausible way had possibly perplexed him so that he
+could not thoroughly believe him the villain he was: bad as he must be,
+could he actually have killed his own brother, and _such_ a brother? A
+better man than Laertes might have acted more promptly than Hamlet, and
+so happened to _do_ right; but he would not have _been_ right, for the
+proof was _not_ sufficient.]
+
+[Footnote 10: The value Hamlet sets on his discovery, evident in his
+joyous urgency to share it with his friend, is explicable only on the
+ground of the relief it is to his mind to be now at length quite certain
+of his duty.]
+
+[Page 212]
+
+_make thee dumbe, yet are they much too light for the
+bore of the Matter.[1] These good Fellowes will bring_
+                                                 [Sidenote: the bord of]
+_thee where I am. Rosincrance and Guildensterne,
+hold their course for England. Of them I haue
+much to tell thee, Farewell.
+                       He that thou knowest thine._
+                        [Sidenote: _So that thou knowest thine Hamlet._]
+                                    Hamlet.
+
+Come, I will giue you way for these your Letters,
+                                  [Sidenote: _Hor_. Come I will you way]
+And do't the speedier, that you may direct me
+To him from whom you brought them.      _Exit_.    [Sidenote: _Exeunt._]
+
+_Enter King and Laertes._[2]
+
+_King_. Now must your conscience my acquittance seal,
+And you must put me in your heart for Friend,
+Sith you haue heard, and with a knowing eare,[3]
+That he which hath your Noble Father slaine,
+Pursued my life.[4]
+
+_Laer_. It well appeares. But tell me,
+Why you proceeded not against these feates,[5]      [Sidenote: proceede]
+So crimefull, and so Capitall in Nature,[6]        [Sidenote: criminall]
+As by your Safety, Wisedome, all things else,
+                                 [Sidenote: safetie, greatnes, wisdome,]
+You mainly[7] were stirr'd vp?
+
+_King_. O for two speciall Reasons,
+Which may to you (perhaps) seeme much vnsinnowed,[8]
+And yet to me they are strong. The Queen his Mother,
+                                      [Sidenote: But yet | tha'r strong]
+Liues almost by his lookes: and for my selfe,
+My Vertue or my Plague, be it either which,[9]
+She's so coniunctiue to my life and soule;
+                                          [Sidenote: she is so concliue]
+That as the Starre moues not but in his Sphere,[10]
+I could not but by her. The other Motiue,
+Why to a publike count I might not go,
+[Sidenote: 186] Is the great loue the generall gender[11] beare him,
+Who dipping all his Faults in their affection,
+
+[Footnote 1: Note here also Hamlet's feeling of the importance of what
+has passed since he parted with his friend. 'The bullet of my words,
+though it will strike thee dumb, is much too small for the bore of the
+reality (the facts) whence it will issue.']
+
+[Footnote 2: While we have been present at the interview between Horatio
+and the sailors, the king has been persuading Laertes.]
+
+[Footnote 3: an ear of judgment.]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'thought then to have killed me.']
+
+[Footnote 5: _faits_, deeds.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'deeds so deserving of death, not merely in the eye of the
+law, but in their own nature.']
+
+[Footnote 7: powerfully.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'unsinewed.']
+
+[Footnote 9: 'either-which.']
+
+[Footnote 10: 'moves not but in the moving of his sphere,'--The stars
+were popularly supposed to be fixed in a solid crystalline sphere, and
+moved in its motion only. The queen, Claudius implies, is his sphere; he
+could not move but by her.]
+
+[Footnote 11: Here used in the sense of the Fr. _'genre'--sort_. It is
+not the only instance of the word so used by Shakspere.
+
+The king would rouse in Laertes jealousy of Hamlet.]
+
+[Page 214]
+
+Would like the Spring that turneth Wood to Stone, [Sidenote: Worke like]
+Conuert his Gyues to Graces.[1] So that my Arrowes
+Too slightly timbred for so loud a Winde,
+                                       [Sidenote: for so loued Arm'd[2]]
+Would haue reuerted to my Bow againe,
+And not where I had arm'd them.[2]
+                                  [Sidenote: But not | have aym'd them.]
+
+_Laer_. And so haue I a Noble Father lost,
+A Sister driuen into desperate tearmes,[3]
+Who was (if praises may go backe againe)     [Sidenote: whose worth, if]
+Stood Challenger on mount of all the Age
+For her perfections. But my reuenge will come.
+
+_King_. Breake not your sleepes for that,
+You must not thinke
+That we are made of stuffe, so flat, and dull,
+That we can let our Beard be shooke with danger,[4]
+And thinke it pastime. You shortly shall heare more,[5]
+I lou'd your Father, and we loue our Selfe,
+And that I hope will teach you to imagine----[6]
+
+_Enter a Messenger_.                         [Sidenote: _with letters._]
+
+How now? What Newes?
+
+_Mes._ Letters my Lord from _Hamlet_.[7] This to
+                                          [Sidenote: _Messen_. These to]
+your Maiesty: this to the Queene.
+
+_King_. From _Hamlet_? Who brought them?
+
+_Mes_. Saylors my Lord they say, I saw them not:
+They were giuen me by _Claudio_, he recciu'd them.[8]
+                              [Sidenote: them Of him that brought them.]
+
+_King. Laertes_ you shall heare them:[9]
+Leaue vs.                 _Exit Messenger_[10]
+
+_High and Mighty, you shall know I am set
+naked on your Kingdome. To morrow shall I begge
+leaue to see your Kingly Eyes[11] When I shall (first
+asking your Pardon thereunto) recount th'Occasions_
+                        [Sidenote: the occasion of my suddaine returne.]
+_of my sodaine, and more strange returne._[12]
+                                        Hamlet.[13]
+What should this meane? Are all the rest come backe?
+                                                [Sidenote: _King_. What]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'would convert his fetters--if I imprisoned him--to graces,
+commending him yet more to their regard.']
+
+[Footnote 2: _arm'd_ is certainly the right, and a true Shaksperean
+word:--it was no fault in the aim, but in the force of the flight--no
+matter of the eye, but of the arm, which could not give momentum enough
+to such slightly timbered arrows. The fault in the construction of the
+last line, I need not remark upon.
+
+I think there is a hint of this the genuine meaning even in the
+blundered and partly unintelligible reading of the _Quarto_. If we leave
+out 'for so loued,' we have this: 'So that my arrows, too slightly
+timbered, would have reverted armed to my bow again, but not (_would not
+have gone_) where I have aimed them,'--implying that his arrows would
+have turned their armed heads against himself.
+
+What the king says here is true, but far from _the_ truth: he feared
+driving Hamlet, and giving him at the same time opportunity, to speak in
+his own defence and render his reasons.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _extremes_? or _conditions_?]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'With many a tempest hadde his berd ben
+schake.'--_Chaucer_, of the Schipman, in _The Prologue_ to _The
+Canterbury Tales_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: --hear of Hamlet's death in England, he means.
+
+At this point in the _1st Q._ comes a scene between Horatio and the
+queen, in which he informs her of a letter he had just received from
+Hamlet,
+
+    Whereas he writes how he escap't the danger,
+    And subtle treason that the king had plotted,
+    Being crossed by the contention of the windes,
+    He found the Packet &c.
+
+Horatio does not mention the pirates, but speaks of Hamlet 'being set
+ashore,' and of _Gilderstone_ and _Rossencraft_ going on to their fate.
+The queen assures Horatio that she is but temporizing with the king, and
+shows herself anxious for the success of her son's design against his
+life. The Poet's intent was not yet clear to himself.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Here his crow cracks.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _From_ 'How now' _to_ 'Hamlet' is _not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 8: Horatio has given the sailors' letters to Claudio, he to
+another.]
+
+[Footnote 9: He wants to show him that he has nothing behind--that he is
+open with him: he will read without having pre-read.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 11: He makes this request for an interview with the intent of
+killing him. The king takes care he does not have it.]
+
+[Footnote 12: '_more strange than sudden_.']
+
+[Footnote 13: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Page 216]
+
+Or is it some abuse?[1] Or no such thing?[2]
+                                            [Sidenote: abuse, and no[2]]
+
+_Laer_. Know you the hand?[3]
+
+_Kin_. 'Tis _Hamlets_ Character, naked and in a
+Postscript here he sayes alone:[4] Can you aduise [Sidenote: deuise me?]
+me?[5]
+
+_Laer_. I'm lost in it my Lord; but let him come,       [Sidenote: I am]
+It warmes the very sicknesse in my heart,
+That I shall liue and tell him to his teeth; [Sidenote: That I liue and]
+Thus diddest thou.                                     [Sidenote: didst]
+
+_Kin_. If it be so _Laertes_, as how should it be so:[6]
+How otherwise will you be rul'd by me?
+
+_Laer_. If so[7] you'l not o'rerule me to a peace.
+                                  [Sidenote: I my Lord, so you will not]
+
+_Kin_. To thine owne peace: if he be now return'd,
+[Sidenote: 195] As checking[8] at his Voyage, and that he meanes
+                                       [Sidenote: As the King[8] at his]
+No more to vndertake it; I will worke him
+To an exployt now ripe in my Deuice,                 [Sidenote: deuise,]
+Vnder the which he shall not choose but fall;
+And for his death no winde of blame shall breath,
+[Sidenote: 221] But euen his Mother shall vncharge the practice,[9]
+And call it accident: [A] Some two Monthes hence[10]
+                                            [Sidenote: two months since]
+Here was a Gentleman of _Normandy_,
+I'ue seene my selfe, and seru'd against the French,   [Sidenote: I haue]
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+_Laer_. My Lord I will be rul'd,
+The rather if you could deuise it so
+That I might be the organ.
+
+_King_. It falls right,
+You haue beene talkt of since your trauaile[11] much,
+And that in _Hamlets_ hearing, for a qualitie
+Wherein they say you shine, your summe of parts[12]
+Did not together plucke such enuie from him
+As did that one, and that in my regard
+Of the vnworthiest siedge.[13]
+
+_Laer_. What part is that my Lord?
+
+_King_. A very ribaud[14] in the cap of youth,
+Yet needfull to, for youth no lesse becomes[15]
+The light and carelesse liuery that it weares
+Then setled age, his sables, and his weedes[16]
+Importing health[17] and grauenes;]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'some trick played on me?' Compare _K. Lear_, act v. sc. 7:
+'I am mightily abused.']
+
+[Footnote 2: I incline to the _Q._ reading here: 'or is it some trick,
+and no reality in it?']
+
+[Footnote 3: --following the king's suggestion.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _Point thus_: 'Tis _Hamlets_ Character. 'Naked'!--And, in a
+Postscript here, he sayes 'alone'! Can &c.
+
+'_Alone_'--to allay suspicion of his having brought assistance with
+him.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Fine flattery--preparing the way for the instigation he is
+about to commence.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _Point thus_: '--as how should it be so? how
+otherwise?--will' &c. The king cannot tell what to think--either how it
+can be, or how it might be otherwise--for here is Hamlet's own hand!]
+
+[Footnote 7: provided.]
+
+[Footnote 8: A hawk was said _to check_ when it forsook its proper game
+for some other bird that crossed its flight. The blunder in the _Quarto_
+is odd, plainly from manuscript copy, and is not likely to have been set
+right by any but the author.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'shall not give the _practice'--artifice, cunning attempt,
+chicane_, or _trick_--but a word not necessarily offensive--'the name it
+deserves, but call it _accident_:' 221.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'Some' _not in Q.--Hence_ may be either _backwards_ or
+_forwards_; now it is used only _forwards_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: travels.]
+
+[Footnote 12: 'all your excellencies together.']
+
+[Footnote 13: seat, place, grade, position, merit.]
+
+[Footnote 14: 'A very riband'--a mere trifling accomplishment: the _u_
+of the text can but be a misprint for _n_.]
+
+[Footnote 15: _youth_ obj., _livery_ nom. to _becomes_.]
+
+[Footnote 16: 'than his furs and his robes become settled age.']
+
+[Footnote 17: Warburton thinks the word ought to be _wealth_, but I
+doubt it; _health_, in its sense of wholeness, general soundness, in
+affairs as well as person, I should prefer.]
+
+[Page 218]
+
+And they ran[1] well on Horsebacke; but this Gallant
+                                            [Sidenote: they can well[1]]
+Had witchcraft in't[2]; he grew into his Seat,   [Sidenote: vnto his]
+And to such wondrous doing brought his Horse,
+As had he beene encorps't and demy-Natur'd
+With the braue Beast,[3] so farre he past my thought,
+                                      [Sidenote: he topt me thought,[4]]
+That I in forgery[5] of shapes and trickes,
+Come short of what he did.[6]
+
+_Laer_. A Norman was't?
+
+_Kin_. A Norman.
+
+_Laer_. Vpon my life _Lamound_.                    [Sidenote: _Lamord_.]
+
+_Kin_. The very same.
+
+_Laer_. I know him well, he is the Brooch indeed,
+And Iemme of all our Nation,                 [Sidenote: all the Nation.]
+
+_Kin_. Hee mad confession of you,
+And gaue you such a Masterly report,
+For Art and exercise in your defence;
+And for your Rapier most especially,              [Sidenote: especiall,]
+That he cryed out, t'would be a sight indeed,[7]
+If one could match you [A] Sir. This report of his
+                                                  [Sidenote: ; sir this]
+[Sidenote: 120, 264] Did _Hamlet_ so envenom with his Enuy,[8]
+That he could nothing doe but wish and begge,
+Your sodaine comming ore to play with him;[9]       [Sidenote: with you]
+Now out of this.[10]
+
+_Laer_. Why out of this, my Lord?                   [Sidenote: What out]
+
+_Kin. Laertes_ was your Father deare to you?
+Or are you like the painting[11] of a sorrow,
+A face without a heart?
+
+_Laer_. Why aske you this?
+
+_Kin_. Not that I thinke you did not loue your Father,
+But that I know Loue is begun by Time[12]:
+
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto:--_
+
+                      ; the Scrimures[13] of their nation
+He swore had neither motion, guard nor eye,
+If you opposd them;]
+
+[Footnote 1: I think the _can_ of the _Quarto_ is the true word.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --in his horsemanship.]
+
+[Footnote 3: There is no mistake in the order 'had he beene'; the
+transposition is equivalent to _if_: 'as if he had been unbodied with,
+and shared half the nature of the brave beast.'
+
+These two lines, from _As_ to _thought_, must be taken parenthetically;
+or else there must be supposed a dash after _Beast_, and a fresh start
+made.
+
+'But he (as if Centaur-like he had been one piece with the horse) was no
+more moved than one with the going of his own legs:'
+
+'it seemed, as he borrowed the horse's body, so he lent the horse his
+mind:'--Sir Philip Sidney. _Arcadia_, B. ii. p. 115.]
+
+[Footnote 4: '--surpassed, I thought.']
+
+[Footnote 5: 'in invention of.']
+
+[Footnote 6: Emphasis on _did_, as antithetic to _forgery_: 'my
+inventing came short of his doing.']
+
+[Footnote 7: 'it would be a sight indeed to see you matched with an
+equal.' The king would strengthen Laertes' confidence in his
+proficiency.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'made him so spiteful by stirring up his habitual envy.']
+
+[Footnote 9: All invention.]
+
+[Footnote 10: Here should be a dash: the king pauses. He is approaching
+dangerous ground--is about to propose a thing abominable, and therefore
+to the influence of flattered vanity and roused emulation, would add the
+fiercest heat of stimulated love and hatred--to which end he proceeds to
+cast doubt on the quality of Laertes' love for his father.]
+
+[Footnote 11: the picture.]
+
+[Footnote 12: 'through habit.']
+
+[Footnote 13: French _escrimeurs_: fencers.]
+
+[Page 220]
+
+And that I see in passages of proofe,[1]
+Time qualifies the sparke and fire of it:[2]
+[A]
+_Hamlet_ comes backe: what would you vndertake,
+To show your selfe your Fathers sonne indeed,
+                            [Sidenote: selfe indeede your fathers sonne]
+More then in words?
+
+_Laer_. To cut his throat i'th'Church.[3]
+
+_Kin_. No place indeed should murder Sancturize;
+Reuenge should haue no bounds: but good _Laertes_
+Will you doe this, keepe close within your Chamber,
+_Hamlet_ return'd, shall know you are come home:
+Wee'l put on those shall praise your excellence,
+And set a double varnish on the fame
+The Frenchman gaue you, bring you in fine together,
+And wager on your heads, he being remisse,[4]       [Sidenote: ore your]
+[Sidenote: 218] Most generous, and free from all contriuing,
+Will not peruse[5] the Foiles? So that with ease,
+Or with a little shuffling, you may choose
+A Sword vnbaited,[6] and in a passe of practice,[7]  [Sidenote: pace of]
+Requit him for your Father.
+
+_Laer_. I will doo't,
+And for that purpose Ile annoint my Sword:[8]   [Sidenote: for purpose,]
+I bought an Vnction of a Mountebanke
+So mortall, I but dipt a knife in it,[9]
+                                   [Sidenote: mortall, that but dippe a]
+Where it drawes blood, no Cataplasme so rare,
+Collected from all Simples that haue Vertue
+
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+There liues within the very flame of loue
+A kind of weeke or snufe that will abate it,[10]
+And nothing is at a like goodnes still,[11]
+For goodnes growing to a plurisie,[12]
+Dies in his owne too much, that we would doe
+We should doe when we would: for this would change,[13]
+And hath abatements and delayes as many,
+As there are tongues, are hands, are accedents,
+And then this should is like a spend thrifts sigh,
+That hurts by easing;[14] but to the quick of th'vlcer,]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'passages of proofe,'--_trials_. 'I see when it is put to
+the test.']
+
+[Footnote 2: 'time modifies it.']
+
+[Footnote 3: Contrast him here with Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 4: careless.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _examine_--the word being of general application then.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _unblunted_. Some foils seem to have been made with a
+button that could be taken--probably _screwed_ off.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Whether _practice_ here means exercise or cunning, I cannot
+determine. Possibly the king uses the word as once before 216--to be
+taken as Laertes may please.]
+
+[Footnote 8: In the _1st Q._ this proposal also is made by the king.]
+
+[Footnote 9:
+
+    'So mortal, yes, a knife being but dipt in it,' or,
+    'So mortal, did I but dip a knife in it.']
+
+[Footnote 10: To understand this figure, one must be familiar with the
+behaviour of the wick of a common lamp or tallow candle.]
+
+[Footnote 11: 'nothing keeps always at the same degree of goodness.']
+
+[Footnote 12: A _plurisie_ is just a _too-muchness_, from _plus,
+pluris--a plethora_, not our word _pleurisy_, from [Greek: pleura]. See
+notes in _Johnson and Steevens_.]
+
+[Footnote 13: The sense here requires an _s_, and the space in the
+_Quarto_ between the _e_ and the comma gives the probability that a
+letter has dropt out.]
+
+[Footnote 14: Modern editors seem agreed to substitute the adjective
+_spendthrift_: our sole authority has _spendthrifts_, and by it I hold.
+The meaning seems this: 'the _would_ changes, the thing is not done, and
+then the _should_, the mere acknowledgment of duty, is like the sigh of
+a spendthrift, who regrets consequences but does not change his way: it
+eases his conscience for a moment, and so injures him.' There would at
+the same time be allusion to what was believed concerning sighs: Dr.
+Johnson says, 'It is a notion very prevalent, that _sighs_ impair the
+strength, and wear out the animal powers.']
+
+[Page 222]
+
+Vnder the Moone, can saue the thing from death,
+That is but scratcht withall: Ile touch my point,
+With this contagion, that if I gall him slightly,[1]
+It may be death.
+
+_Kin_. Let's further thinke of this,
+Weigh what conuenience[2] both of time and meanes
+May fit vs to our shape,[3] if this should faile;
+And that our drift looke through our bad performance,
+'Twere better not assaid; therefore this Proiect
+Should haue a backe or second, that might hold,
+If this should blast in proofe:[4] Soft, let me see[5]
+                                                   [Sidenote: did blast]
+Wee'l make a solemne wager on your commings,[6]  [Sidenote: cunnings[6]]
+I ha't: when in your motion you are hot and dry,  [Sidenote: hate, when]
+As[7] make your bowts more violent to the end,[8]
+                                                [Sidenote: to that end,]
+And that he cals for drinke; Ile haue prepar'd him
+                                                 [Sidenote: prefard him]
+[Sidenote: 268] A Challice for the nonce[9]; whereon but sipping,
+If he by chance escape your venom'd stuck,[10]
+Our purpose may[11] hold there: how sweet Queene.
+                                [Sidenote: there: but stay, what noyse?]
+
+_Enter Queene_.
+
+_Queen_. One woe doth tread vpon anothers heele,
+So fast they'l follow[12]: your Sister's drown'd _Laertes_.
+                                                [Sidenote: they follow;]
+
+_Laer_. Drown'd! O where?[13]
+
+_Queen_. There is a Willow[14] growes aslant a Brooke,
+                                          [Sidenote: ascaunt the Brooke]
+That shewes his hore leaues in the glassie streame:
+                                                [Sidenote: horry leaues]
+There with fantasticke Garlands did she come,[15]
+                                        [Sidenote: Therewith | she make]
+Of Crow-flowers,[16] Nettles, Daysies, and long Purples,
+That liberall Shepheards giue a grosser name;
+But our cold Maids doe Dead Mens Fingers call them:
+                                               [Sidenote: our cull-cold]
+There on the pendant[17] boughes, her Coronet weeds[18]
+Clambring to hang;[19] an enuious sliuer broke,[20]
+When downe the weedy Trophies,[19] and her selfe,  [Sidenote: her weedy]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'that though I should gall him but slightly,' or, 'that if
+I gall him ever so slightly.']
+
+[Footnote 2: proper arrangement.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'fit us exactly, like a garment cut to our shape,' or
+perhaps 'shape' is used for _intent, purpose. Point thus_: 'shape. If
+this should faile, And' &c.]
+
+[Footnote 4: This seems to allude to the assay of a firearm, and to mean
+'_burst on the trial_.' Note 'assaid' two lines back.]
+
+[Footnote 5: There should be a pause here, and a longer pause after
+_commings_: the king is contriving. 'I ha't' should have a line to
+itself, with again a pause, but a shorter one.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _Veney, venue_, is a term of fencing: a bout, a
+thrust--from _venir, to come_--whence 'commings.' (259) But _cunnings_,
+meaning _skills_, may be the word.]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'As' is here equivalent to 'and so.']
+
+[Footnote 8: --to the end of making Hamlet hot and dry.]
+
+[Footnote 9: for the special occasion.]
+
+[Footnote 10: thrust. _Twelfth Night_, act iii. sc. 4. 'he gives me the
+stuck in with such a mortal motion.' _Stocco_ in Italian is a long
+rapier; and _stoccata_ a thrust. _Rom. and Jul_., act iii. sc. 1. See
+_Shakespeare-Lexicon_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: 'may' does not here express _doubt_, but _intention_.]
+
+[Footnote 12: If this be the right reading, it means, 'so fast they
+insist on following.']
+
+[Footnote 13: He speaks it as about to rush to her.]
+
+[Footnote 14: --the choice of Ophelia's fantastic madness, as being the
+tree of lamenting lovers.]
+
+[Footnote 15: --always busy with flowers.]
+
+[Footnote 16: Ranunculus: _Sh. Lex._]
+
+[Footnote 17: --specially descriptive of the willow.]
+
+[Footnote 18: her wild flowers made into a garland.]
+
+[Footnote 19: The intention would seem, that she imagined herself
+decorating a monument to her father. Hence her _Coronet weeds_ and the
+Poet's _weedy Trophies_.]
+
+[Footnote 20: _Sliver_, I suspect, called so after the fact, because
+_slivered_ or torn off. In _Macbeth_ we have:
+
+    slips of yew
+    Slivered in the moon's eclipse.
+
+But it may be that _sliver_ was used for a _twig_, such as could be torn
+off.
+
+_Slip_ and _sliver_ must be of the same root.]
+
+[Page 224]
+
+Fell in the weeping Brooke, her cloathes spred wide,
+And Mermaid-like, a while they bore her vp,
+Which time she chaunted snatches of old tunes,[1]
+                                              [Sidenote: old laudes,[1]]
+As one incapable of[2] her owne distresse,
+Or like a creature Natiue, and indued[3]
+Vnto that Element: but long it could not be,
+Till that her garments, heauy with her drinke,  [Sidenote: theyr drinke]
+Pul'd the poore wretch from her melodious buy,[4]
+                                               [Sidenote: melodious lay]
+To muddy death.[5]
+
+_Laer_. Alas then, is she drown'd?                    [Sidenote: she is]
+
+_Queen_. Drown'd, drown'd.
+
+_Laer_. Too much of water hast thou poore _Ophelia_,
+And therefore I forbid my teares: but yet
+It is our tricke,[6] Nature her custome holds,
+Let shame say what it will; when these are gone
+The woman will be out:[7] Adue my Lord,
+I haue a speech of fire, that faine would blaze,
+                                               [Sidenote: speech a fire]
+But that this folly doubts[8] it.     _Exit._ [Sidenote: drownes it.[8]]
+
+_Kin_. Let's follow, _Gertrude_:
+How much I had to doe to calme his rage?
+Now feare I this will giue it start againe;
+Therefore let's follow.                _Exeunt_.[9]
+
+[10]_Enter two Clownes._
+
+_Clown_. Is she to bee buried in Christian buriall,
+                                  [Sidenote: buriall, when she wilfully]
+that wilfully seekes her owne saluation?[11]
+
+_Other_. I tell thee she is, and therefore make her
+                                               [Sidenote: is, therefore]
+Graue straight,[12] the Crowner hath sate on her, and
+finds it Christian buriall.
+
+_Clo_. How can that be, vnlesse she drowned her
+selfe in her owne defence?
+
+_Other_. Why 'tis found so.[13]
+
+_Clo_. It must be _Se offendendo_,[14] it cannot bee else:
+                                          [Sidenote: be so offended, it]
+
+[Footnote 1: They were not lauds she was in the habit of singing, to
+judge by the snatches given.]
+
+[Footnote 2: not able to take in, not understanding, not conscious of.]
+
+[Footnote 3: clothed, endowed, fitted for. See _Sh. Lex._]
+
+[Footnote 4: _Could_ the word be for _buoy_--'her clothes spread wide,'
+on which she floated singing--therefore her melodious buoy or float?]
+
+[Footnote 5: How could the queen know all this, when there was no one
+near enough to rescue her? Does not the Poet intend the mode of her
+death given here for an invention of the queen, to hide the girl's
+suicide, and by circumstance beguile the sorrow-rage of Laertes?]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'I cannot help it.']
+
+[Footnote 7: 'when these few tears are spent, all the woman will be out
+of me: I shall be a man again.']
+
+[Footnote 8: _douts_: 'this foolish water of tears puts it out.' _See Q.
+reading._]
+
+[Footnote 9: Here ends the Fourth Act, between which and the Fifth may
+intervene a day or two.]
+
+[Footnote 10: Act V. This act _requires_ only part of a day; the funeral
+and the catastrophe might be on the same.]
+
+[Footnote 11: Has this a confused connection with the fancy that
+salvation is getting to heaven?]
+
+[Footnote 12: Whether this means _straightway_, or _not crooked_, I
+cannot tell.]
+
+[Footnote 13: 'the coroner has settled it.']
+
+[Footnote 14: The Clown's blunder for _defendendo_.]
+
+[Page 226]
+
+for heere lies the point; If I drowne my selfe
+wittingly, it argues an Act: and an Act hath three
+branches. It is an Act to doe and to performe;
+              [Sidenote: it is to act, to doe, to performe, or all: she]
+argall[1] she drown'd her selfe wittingly.
+
+_Other_. Nay but heare you Goodman Deluer.  [Sidenote: good man deluer.]
+
+_Clown_. Giue me leaue; heere lies the water;
+good: heere stands the man; good: If the man
+goe to this water and drowne himsele; it is will
+he nill he, he goes; marke you that? But if the
+water come to him and drowne him; hee drownes
+not himselfe. Argall, hee that is not guilty of his
+owne death, shortens not his owne life.
+
+_Other_. But is this law?
+
+_Clo_. I marry is't, Crowners Quest Law.
+
+_Other_. Will you ha the truth on't: if this had  [Sidenote: truth an't]
+not beene a Gentlewoman, shee should haue beene
+buried out of[2] Christian Buriall.                    [Sidenote: out a]
+
+_Clo_. Why there thou say'st. And the more
+pitty that great folke should haue countenance in
+this world to drowne or hang themselues, more then
+their euen[3] Christian. Come, my Spade; there is
+no ancient Gentlemen, but Gardiners, Ditchers and
+Graue-makers; they hold vp _Adams_ Profession.
+
+_Other_. Was he a Gentleman?
+
+_Clo_. He was the first that euer bore Armes.          [Sidenote: A was]
+
+[4]_Other_. Why he had none.
+
+_Clo_. What, ar't a Heathen? how dost thou vnderstand
+the Scripture? the Scripture sayes _Adam_
+dig'd; could hee digge without Armes?[4] Ile put
+another question to thee; if thou answerest me not
+to the purpose, confesse thy selfe----
+
+_Other_. Go too.
+
+_Clo_. What is he that builds stronger then either
+the Mason, the Shipwright, or the Carpenter?
+
+_Other_. The Gallowes-maker; for that Frame
+outliues a thousand Tenants.                   [Sidenote: that outliues]
+
+[Footnote 1: _ergo_, therefore.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _without_. The pleasure the speeches of the Clown give us,
+lies partly in the undercurrent of sense, so disguised by stupidity in
+the utterance; and partly in the wit which mainly succeeds in its end by
+the failure of its means.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _equal_, that is _fellow_ Christian.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _From 'Other' to_ 'Armes' _not in Quarto._]
+
+[Page 228]
+
+_Clo_. I like thy wit well in good faith, the
+Gallowes does well; but how does it well? it does
+well to those that doe ill: now, thou dost ill to say
+the Gallowes is built stronger then the Church:
+Argall, the Gallowes may doe well to thee. Too't
+againe, Come.
+
+_Other_. Who builds stronger then a Mason, a
+Shipwright, or a Carpenter?
+
+_Clo_. I, tell me that, and vnyoake.[1]
+
+_Other_. Marry, now I can tell.
+
+_Clo_. Too't.
+
+_Other_. Masse, I cannot tell.
+
+_Enter Hamlet and Horatio a farre off._[2]
+
+_Clo_. Cudgell thy braines no more about it; for
+your dull Asse will not mend his pace with beating,
+and when you are ask't this question next, say
+a Graue-maker: the Houses that he makes, lasts
+                                            [Sidenote: houses hee makes]
+till Doomesday: go, get thee to _Yaughan_,[3] fetch
+                           [Sidenote: thee in, and fetch mee a soope of]
+me a stoupe of Liquor.
+
+_Sings._[4]
+
+_In youth when I did loue, did loue_,                [Sidenote: _Song._]
+  _me thought it was very sweete:
+To contract O the time for a my behoue,
+  O me thought there was nothing meete[5]_
+                                 [Sidenote: there a was nothing a meet.]
+
+                            [Sidenote: _Enter Hamlet & Horatio_]
+
+_Ham_. Ha's this fellow no feeling of his businesse,
+                           [Sidenote: busines? a sings in graue-making.]
+that he sings at Graue-making?[6]
+
+_Hor_. Custome hath made it in him a property[7]
+of easinesse.
+
+_Ham_. 'Tis ee'n so; the hand of little Imployment
+hath the daintier sense.
+
+_Clowne sings._[8]
+
+_But Age with his stealing steps_               [Sidenote _Clow. Song._]
+_hath caught me in his clutch_:               [Sidenote: hath clawed me]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'unyoke your team'--as having earned his rest.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 3: Whether this is the name of a place, or the name of an
+innkeeper, or is merely an inexplicable corruption--some take it for a
+stage-direction to yawn--I cannot tell. See _Q._ reading.
+
+It is said to have been discovered that a foreigner named Johan sold ale
+next door to the Globe.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 5: A song ascribed to Lord Vaux is in this and the following
+stanzas made nonsense of.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Note Hamlet's mood throughout what follows. He has entered
+the shadow of death.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _Property_ is what specially belongs to the individual;
+here it is his _peculiar work_, or _personal calling_: 'custom has made
+it with him an easy duty.']
+
+[Footnote 8: _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Page 230]
+
+_And hath shipped me intill the Land_,                  [Sidenote: into]
+  _as if I had neuer beene such_.
+
+_Ham_. That Scull had a tongue in it, and could
+sing once: how the knaue iowles it to th' grownd,        [Sidenote: the]
+as if it were _Caines_ Iaw-bone, that did the first    [Sidenote: twere]
+murther: It might be the Pate of a Polititian which
+                                          [Sidenote: murder, this might]
+this Asse o're Offices: one that could circumuent
+                        [Sidenote: asse now ore-reaches; one that would]
+God, might it not?
+
+_Hor_. It might, my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Or of a Courtier, which could say, Good
+Morrow sweet Lord: how dost thou, good Lord?
+                                            [Sidenote: thou sweet lord?]
+this might be my Lord such a one, that prais'd my
+Lord such a ones Horse, when he meant to begge
+                                              [Sidenote: when a went to]
+it; might it not?[1]
+
+_Hor_. I, my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Why ee'n so: and now my Lady
+Wormes,[2] Chaplesse,[3] and knockt about the Mazard[4]
+                                  [Sidenote: Choples | the massene with]
+with a Sextons Spade; heere's fine Reuolution, if
+                                                  [Sidenote: and we had]
+wee had the tricke to see't. Did these bones cost
+no more the breeding, but to play at Loggets[5] with
+'em? mine ake to thinke on't.                           [Sidenote: them]
+
+_Clowne sings._[6]
+
+_A Pickhaxe and a Spade, a Spade_,             [Sidenote: _Clow. Song._]
+  _for and a shrowding-Sheete:
+O a Pit of Clay for to be made,
+  for such a Guest is meete_.
+
+_Ham_. There's another: why might not that
+bee the Scull of of a Lawyer? where be his        [Sidenote: skull of a]
+Quiddits[7] now? his Quillets[7]? his Cases? his  [Sidenote: quiddities]
+Tenures, and his Tricks? why doe's he suffer this
+rude knaue now to knocke him about the Sconce[8]
+                                            [Sidenote: this madde knaue]
+with a dirty Shouell, and will not tell him of his
+Action of Battery? hum. This fellow might be
+in's time a great buyer of Land, with his
+Statutes, his Recognizances, his Fines, his double
+
+[Footnote 1: To feel the full force of this, we must call up the
+expression on the face of 'such a one' as he begged the horse--probably
+imitated by Hamlet--and contrast it with the look on the face of the
+skull.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'now the property of my Lady Worm.']
+
+[Footnote 3: the lower jaw gone.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _the upper jaw_, I think--not _the head_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: a game in which pins of wood, called loggats, nearly two
+feet long, were half thrown, half slid, towards a bowl. _Blount_:
+Johnson and Steevens.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 7: a lawyer's quirks and quibbles. See _Johnson and Steevens_.
+
+_1st Q._
+
+                    now where is your
+    Quirkes and quillets now,]
+
+[Footnote 8: Humorous, or slang word for _the head_. 'A fort--a
+head-piece--the head': _Webster's Dict_.]
+
+[Page 232]
+
+Vouchers, his Recoueries: [1] Is this the fine[2] of his
+Fines, and the recouery[3] of his Recoueries,[1] to haue
+his fine[4] Pate full of fine[4] Dirt? will his Vouchers
+                                               [Sidenote: will vouchers]
+vouch him no more of his Purchases, and double
+                                    [Sidenote: purchases & doubles then]
+ones too, then the length and breadth of a paire of
+Indentures? the very Conueyances of his Lands
+will hardly lye in this Boxe[5]; and must the Inheritor
+                                         [Sidenote: scarcely iye; | th']
+himselfe haue no more?[6] ha?
+
+_Hor_. Not a iot more, my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Is not Parchment made of Sheep-skinnes?
+
+_Hor_. I my Lord, and of Calue-skinnes too.
+                                           [Sidenote: Calues-skinnes to]
+
+_Ham_. They are Sheepe and Calues that seek       [Sidenote: which seek]
+out assurance in that. I will speake to this fellow:
+whose Graue's this Sir?                          [Sidenote: this sirra?]
+
+_Clo_. Mine Sir:                  [Sidenote: _Clow_. Mine sir, or a pit]
+
+_O a Pit of Clay for to be made,
+for such a Guest is meete._[7]
+
+_Ham_. I thinke it be thine indeed: for thou
+liest in't.
+
+_Clo_. You lye out on't Sir, and therefore it is not     [Sidenote: tis]
+yours: for my part, I doe not lye in't; and yet it [Sidenote: in't, yet]
+is mine.
+
+_Ham_. Thou dost lye in't, to be in't and say 'tis     [Sidenote: it is]
+thine: 'tis for the dead, not for the quicke, therefore
+thou lyest.
+
+_Clo_. Tis a quicke lye Sir, 'twill away againe
+from me to you.[8]
+
+_Ham_. What man dost thou digge it for?
+
+_Clo_. For no man Sir.
+
+_Ham_. What woman then?
+
+_Clo_. For none neither.
+
+_Ham_. Who is to be buried in't?
+
+_Clo_. One that was a woman Sir; but rest her
+Soule, shee's dead.
+
+[Footnote 1: _From_ 'Is' _to_ 'Recoueries' _not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 2: the end.]
+
+[Footnote 3: the property regained by his Recoveries.]
+
+[Footnote 4: third and fourth meanings of the word _fine_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: the skull.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'must the heir have no more either?'
+
+_1st Q_.
+
+                                     and must
+    The honor (_owner?_) lie there?]
+
+[Footnote 7: _This line not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 8: He _gives_ the lie.]
+
+[Page 234]
+
+_Ham_. How absolute[1] the knaue is? wee must
+[Sidenote: 256] speake by the Carde,[2] or equiuocation will vndoe
+vs: by the Lord _Horatio_, these three yeares[3] I haue
+                                                  [Sidenote: this three]
+taken note of it, the Age is growne so picked,[4]      [Sidenote: tooke]
+that the toe of the Pesant comes so neere the
+heeles of our Courtier, hee galls his Kibe.[5] How
+                                            [Sidenote: the heele of the]
+long hast thou been a Graue-maker?         [Sidenote: been Graue-maker?]
+
+_Clo_. Of all the dayes i'th'yeare, I came too't
+                                                [Sidenote: Of the dayes]
+that day[6] that our last King _Hamlet_ o'recame    [Sidenote: ouercame]
+_Fortinbras_.
+
+_Ham_. How long is that since?
+
+_Clo_. Cannot you tell that? euery foole can tell
+[Sidenote: 143] that: It was the very day,[6] that young _Hamlet_ was
+                                               [Sidenote: was that very]
+borne,[8] hee that was mad, and sent into England,
+                                                 [Sidenote: that is mad]
+
+_Ham_. I marry, why was he sent into England?
+
+_Clo_. Why, because he was mad; hee shall recouer
+                                          [Sidenote: a was mad: a shall]
+his wits there; or if he do not, it's no great
+                                               [Sidenote: if a do | tis]
+matter there.
+
+_Ham_. Why?
+
+_Clo_. 'Twill not be scene in him, there the men
+                                            [Sidenote: him there, there]
+are as mad as he.
+
+_Ham_. How came he mad?
+
+_Clo_. Very strangely they say.
+
+_Ham_. How strangely?[7]
+
+_Clo_. Faith e'ene with loosing his wits.
+
+_Ham_. Vpon what ground?
+
+_Clo_. Why heere in Denmarke[8]: I haue bin sixeteene [Sidenote: Sexten]
+[Sidenote: 142-3] heere, man and Boy thirty yeares.[9]
+
+_Ham_. How long will a man lie 'ith' earth ere he
+rot?
+
+_Clo_. Ifaith, if he be not rotten before he die (as
+                                   [Sidenote: Fayth if a be not | a die]
+we haue many pocky Coarses now adaies, that will
+                                           [Sidenote: corses, that will]
+scarce hold the laying in) he will last you some      [Sidenote: a will]
+eight yeare, or nine yeare. A Tanner will last you
+nine yeare.
+
+[Footnote 1: 'How the knave insists on precision!']
+
+[Footnote 2: chart: _Skeat's Etym. Dict._]
+
+[Footnote 3: Can this indicate any point in the history of English
+society?]
+
+[Footnote 4: so fastidious; so given to _picking_ and choosing; so
+choice.]
+
+[Footnote 5: The word is to be found in any dictionary, but is not
+generally understood. Lord Byron, a very inaccurate writer, takes it to
+mean _heel_:
+
+    Devices quaint, and frolics ever new,
+      Tread on each others' kibes:
+
+_Childe Harold, Canto 1. St. 67._
+
+It means a _chilblain_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Then Fortinbras _could_ have been but a few months younger
+than Hamlet, and may have been older. Hamlet then, in the Quarto
+passage, could not by _tender_ mean _young_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'In what way strangely?'--_in what strange way_? Or the
+_How_ may be _how much_, in retort to the _very_; but the intent would
+be the same--a request for further information.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Hamlet has asked on what ground or provocation, that is,
+from what cause, Hamlet lost his wits; the sexton chooses to take the
+word _ground_ materially.]
+
+[Footnote 9: The Poet makes him say how long he had been sexton--but how
+naturally and informally--by a stupid joke!--in order a second time, and
+more certainly, to tell us Hamlet's age: he must have held it a point
+necessary to the understanding of Hamlet.
+
+Note Hamlet's question immediately following. It looks as if he had
+first said to himself: 'Yes--I have been thirty years above ground!' and
+_then_ said to the sexton, 'How long will a man lie i' th' earth ere he
+rot?' We might enquire even too curiously as to the connecting links.]
+
+[Page 236]
+
+_Ham_. Why he, more then another?
+
+_Clo_. Why sir, his hide is so tan'd with his Trade,
+that he will keepe out water a great while. And       [Sidenote: a will]
+your water, is a sore Decayer of your horson dead
+body. Heres a Scull now: this Scul, has laine in
+                    [Sidenote: now hath iyen you i'th earth 23. yeeres.]
+the earth three and twenty years.
+
+_Ham_. Whose was it?
+
+_Clo_. A whoreson mad Fellowes it was;
+Whose doe you thinke it was?
+
+_Ham_. Nay, I know not.
+
+_Clo_. A pestlence on him for a mad Rogue, a
+pou'rd a Flaggon of Renish on my head once.
+This same Scull Sir, this same Scull sir, was _Yoricks_
+                [Sidenote: once; this same skull sir, was sir _Yoricks_]
+Scull, the Kings Iester.
+
+_Ham_. This?
+
+_Clo_. E'ene that.
+
+_Ham_. Let me see. Alas poore _Yorick_, I knew
+                                           [Sidenote: _Ham_. Alas poore]
+him _Horatio_, a fellow of infinite Iest; of most excellent
+fancy, he hath borne me on his backe a                  [Sidenote: bore]
+thousand times: And how abhorred[1] my Imagination
+                                         [Sidenote: and now how | in my]
+is, my gorge rises at it. Heere hung those            [Sidenote: it is:]
+lipps, that I haue kist I know not how oft. Where
+be your Iibes now? Your Gambals? Your Songs?
+Your flashes of Merriment that were wont to set
+the Table on a Rore? No one[2] now to mock your      [Sidenote: not one]
+own Ieering? Quite chopfalne[3]? Now get you to
+                                              [Sidenote: owne grinning,]
+my Ladies Chamber, and tell her, let her paint an
+                                               [Sidenote: Ladies table,]
+inch thicke, to this fauour[4] she must come. Make
+her laugh at that: prythee _Horatio_ tell me one
+thing.
+
+_Hor_. What's that my Lord?
+
+_Ham_. Dost thou thinke _Alexander_ lookt o'this      [Sidenote: a this]
+fashion i'th' earth?
+
+_Hor_. E'ene so.
+
+_Ham_. And smelt so? Puh.
+
+[Footnote 1: If this be the true reading, _abhorred_ must mean
+_horrified_; but I incline to the _Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'Not one jibe, not one flash of merriment now?']
+
+[Footnote 3: --chop indeed quite fallen off!]
+
+[Footnote 4: _to this look_--that of the skull.]
+
+[Page 238]
+
+_Hor_. E'ene so, my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. To what base vses we may returne
+_Horatio_. Why may not Imagination trace the
+Noble dust of _Alexander_, till he[1] find it stopping a
+                                                      [Sidenote: a find]
+bunghole.
+
+_Hor_. 'Twere to consider: to curiously to consider
+                                     [Sidenote:  consider too curiously]
+so.
+
+_Ham_. No faith, not a iot. But to follow him
+thether with modestie[2] enough, and likeliehood to
+lead it; as thus. _Alexander_ died: _Alexander_ was
+                                        [Sidenote: lead it. _Alexander_]
+buried: _Alexander_ returneth into dust; the dust is      [Sidenote: to]
+earth; of earth we make Lome, and why of that
+Lome (whereto he was conuerted) might they not
+stopp a Beere-barrell?[3]
+
+Imperiall _Caesar_, dead and turn'd to clay,       [Sidenote: Imperious]
+Might stop a hole to keepe the winde away.
+Oh, that that earth, which kept the world in awe,
+Should patch a Wall, t'expell the winters flaw.[4]
+                                                [Sidenote: waters flaw.]
+But soft, but soft, aside; heere comes the King.
+                                     [Sidenote: , but soft awhile, here]
+
+_Enter King, Queene, Laertes, and a Coffin_,
+                        [Sidenote: _Enter K. Q. Laertes and the corse._]
+      _with Lords attendant._
+
+The Queene, the Courtiers. Who is that they follow,
+                                                   [Sidenote: this they]
+And with such maimed rites? This doth betoken,
+The Coarse they follow, did with disperate hand,
+Fore do it owne life; 'twas some Estate.[5]  [Sidenote: twas of some[5]]
+Couch[6] we a while, and mark.
+
+_Laer_. What Cerimony else?
+
+_Ham_. That is _Laertes_, a very Noble youth:[7]
+Marke.
+
+_Laer_. What Cerimony else?[8]
+
+_Priest_. Her Obsequies haue bin as farre inlarg'd,  [Sidenote: _Doct_.]
+As we haue warrantis,[9] her death was doubtfull,[10]
+                                                  [Sidenote: warrantie,]
+And but that great Command, o're-swaies the order,[11]
+
+[Footnote 1: Imagination personified.]
+
+[Footnote 2: moderation.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'Loam, Lome--grafting clay. Mortar made of Clay and Straw;
+also a sort of Plaister used by Chymists to stop up their
+Vessels.'--_Bailey's Dict._]
+
+[Footnote 4: a sudden puff or blast of wind.
+
+Hamlet here makes a solemn epigram. For the right understanding of the
+whole scene, the student must remember that Hamlet is
+philosophizing--following things out, curiously or otherwise--on the
+brink of a grave, concerning the tenant for which he has enquired--'what
+woman then?'--but received no answer.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'the corpse was of some position.']
+
+[Footnote 6: 'let us lie down'--behind a grave or stone.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Hamlet was quite in the dark as to Laertes' character; he
+had seen next to nothing of him.]
+
+[Footnote 8: The priest making no answer, Laertes repeats the question.]
+
+[Footnote 9: _warrantise_.]
+
+[Footnote 10: This casts discredit on the queen's story, 222. The
+priest believes she died by suicide, only calls her death doubtful to
+excuse their granting her so many of the rites of burial.]
+
+[Footnote 11: 'settled mode of proceeding.'--_Schmidt's Sh. Lex._--But
+is it not rather _the order_ of the church?]
+
+[Page 240]
+
+She should in ground vnsanctified haue lodg'd,
+                                    [Sidenote: vnsanctified been lodged]
+Till the last Trumpet. For charitable praier,       [Sidenote: prayers,]
+Shardes,[1] Flints, and Peebles, should be throwne on her:
+Yet heere she is allowed her Virgin Rites,
+                                           [Sidenote: virgin Crants,[2]]
+Her Maiden strewments,[3] and the bringing home
+Of Bell and Buriall.[4]
+
+_Laer_. Must there no more be done?
+
+_Priest_. No more be done:[5]                        [Sidenote: _Doct._]
+We should prophane the seruice of the dead,
+To sing sage[6] _Requiem_, and such rest to her
+                                              [Sidenote: sing a Requiem]
+As to peace-parted Soules.
+
+_Laer_. Lay her i'th' earth,
+And from her faire and vnpolluted flesh,
+May Violets spring. I tell thee (churlish Priest)
+A Ministring Angell shall my Sister be,
+When thou liest howling?
+
+_Ham_. What, the faire _Ophelia_?[7]
+
+_Queene_. Sweets, to the sweet farewell.[8]
+[Sidenote: 118] I hop'd thou should'st haue bin my _Hamlets_ wife:
+I thought thy Bride-bed to haue deckt (sweet Maid)
+And not t'haue strew'd thy Graue.                   [Sidenote: not haue]
+
+_Laer_. Oh terrible woer,[9]                    [Sidenote: O treble woe]
+Fall ten times trebble, on that cursed head  [Sidenote: times double on]
+Whose wicked deed, thy most Ingenioussence
+Depriu'd thee of. Hold off the earth a while,
+Till I haue caught her once more in mine armes:
+                          _Leaps in the graue._[10]
+Now pile your dust, vpon the quicke, and dead,
+Till of this flat a Mountaine you haue made,
+To o're top old _Pelion_, or the skyish head        [Sidenote: To'retop]
+Of blew _Olympus_.[11]
+
+_Ham_.[12] What is he, whose griefes                  [Sidenote: griefe]
+Beares such an Emphasis? whose phrase of Sorrow
+
+[Footnote 1: 'Shardes' _not in Quarto._ It means _potsherds_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: chaplet--_German_ krantz, used even for virginity itself.]
+
+[Footnote 3: strewments with _white_ flowers. (?)]
+
+[Footnote 4: the burial service.]
+
+[Footnote 5: as an exclamation, I think.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Is the word _sage_ used as representing the unfitness of a
+requiem to her state of mind? or is it only from its kindred with
+_solemn_? It was because she was not 'peace-parted' that they could not
+sing _rest_ to her.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _Everything_ here depends on the actor.]
+
+[Footnote 8: I am not sure the queen is not _apostrophizing_ the flowers
+she is throwing into or upon the coffin: 'Sweets, be my farewell to the
+sweet.']
+
+[Footnote 9: The Folio _may_ be right here:--'Oh terrible wooer!--May
+ten times treble thy misfortunes fall' &c.]
+
+[Footnote 10: This stage-direction is not in the _Quarto_.
+
+Here the _1st Quarto_ has:--
+
+    _Lear_. Forbeare the earth a while: sister farewell:
+           _Leartes leapes into the graue._
+    Now powre your earth on _Olympus_ hie,
+    And make a hill to o're top olde _Pellon_:
+           _Hamlet leapes in after Leartes_
+    Whats he that coniures so?
+
+    _Ham_. Beholde tis I, _Hamlet_ the Dane.]
+
+[Footnote 11: The whole speech is bravado--the frothy grief of a weak,
+excitable effusive nature.]
+
+[Footnote 12: He can remain apart no longer, and approaches the
+company.]
+
+[Page 242]
+
+Coniure the wandring Starres, and makes them stand   [Sidenote: Coniues]
+Like wonder-wounded hearers? This is I,
+_Hamlet_ the Dane.[1]
+
+_Laer_. The deuill take thy soule.[2]
+
+_Ham_. Thou prai'st not well,
+I prythee take thy fingers from my throat;[3]
+Sir though I am not Spleenatiue, and rash,
+                              [Sidenote: For though | spleenatiue rash,]
+Yet haue I something in me dangerous,        [Sidenote: in me something]
+Which let thy wisenesse feare. Away thy hand.
+                               [Sidenote: wisedome feare; hold off they]
+
+_King_. Pluck them asunder.
+
+_Qu. Hamlet, Hamlet_.                      [Sidenote: _All_. Gentlemen.]
+
+_Gen_. Good my Lord be quiet.                   [Sidenote: _Hora_. Good]
+
+_Ham_. Why I will fight with him vppon this Theme,
+Vntill my eielids will no longer wag.[4]
+
+_Qu_. Oh my Sonne, what Theame?
+
+_Ham_. I lou'd _Ophelia_[5]; fortie thousand Brothers
+Could not (with all there quantitie of Loue)
+Make vp my summe. What wilt thou do for her?[6]
+
+_King_. Oh he is mad _Laertes_.[7]
+
+_Qu_. For loue of God forbeare him.
+
+_Ham_. Come show me what thou'lt doe.
+                          [Sidenote: _Ham_ S'wounds shew | th'owt fight,
+                                                woo't fast, woo't teare]
+Woo't weepe? Woo't fight? Woo't teare thy selfe?
+Woo't drinke vp _Esile_, eate a Crocodile?[6]
+Ile doo't. Dost thou come heere to whine;         [Sidenote: doost come]
+To outface me with leaping in her Graue?
+Be[8] buried quicke with her, and so will I.
+And if thou prate of Mountaines; let them throw
+Millions of Akers on vs; till our ground
+Sindging his pate against the burning Zone,
+[Sidenote: 262] Make _Ossa_ like a wart. Nay, and thoul't mouth,
+Ile rant as well as thou.[9]
+
+[Footnote 1: This fine speech is yet spoken in the character of madman,
+which Hamlet puts on once more the moment he has to appear before the
+king. Its poetry and dignity belong to Hamlet's feeling; its
+extravagance to his assumed insanity. It must be remembered that death
+is a small affair to Hamlet beside his mother's life, and that the death
+of Ophelia may even be some consolation to him.
+
+In the _Folio_, a few lines back, Laertes leaps into the grave. There is
+no such direction in the _Q_. In neither is Hamlet said to leap into the
+grave; only the _1st Q._ so directs. It is a stage-business that must
+please the _common_ actor of Hamlet; but there is nothing in the text
+any more than in the margin of _Folio_ or _Quarto_ to justify it, and it
+would but for the horror of it be ludicrous. The coffin is supposed to
+be in the grave: must Laertes jump down upon it, followed by Hamlet, and
+the two fight and trample over the body?
+
+Yet I take the '_Leaps in the grave_' to be an action intended for
+Laertes by the Poet. His 'Hold off the earth a while,' does not
+necessarily imply that the body is already in the grave. He has before
+said, 'Lay her i'th' earth': then it was not in the grave. It is just
+about to be lowered, when, with that cry of 'Hold off the earth a
+while,' he jumps into the grave, and taking the corpse, on a bier at the
+side of it, in his arms, calls to the spectators to pile a mountain on
+them--in the wild speech that brings out Hamlet. The quiet dignity of
+Hamlet's speech does not comport with his jumping into the grave:
+Laertes comes out of the grave, and flies at Hamlet's throat. So, at
+least, I would have the thing acted.
+
+There is, however, nothing in the text to show that Laertes comes out of
+the grave, and if the manager insist on the traditional mode, I would
+suggest that the grave be represented much larger. In Mr. Jewitt's book
+on Grave-Mounds, I read of a 'female skeleton in a grave six feet deep,
+ten feet long, and eight feet wide.' Such a grave would give room for
+both beside the body, and dismiss the hideousness of the common
+representation.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --_springing out of the grave and flying at Hamlet_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Note the temper, self-knowledge, self-government, and
+self-distrust of Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 4: The eyelids last of all become incapable of motion.]
+
+[Footnote 5: That he loved her is the only thing to explain the
+harshness of his behaviour to her. Had he not loved her and not been
+miserable about her, he would have been as polite to her as well bred
+people would have him.]
+
+[Footnote 6: The gallants of Shakspere's day would challenge each other
+to do more disagreeable things than any of these in honour of their
+mistresses.
+
+'_Ésil._ s.m. Ancien nom du Vinaigre.' _Supplement to Academy Dict._,
+1847.--'Eisile, _vinegar_': Bosworth's _Anglo-Saxon Dict_., from
+Somner's _Saxon Dict._, 1659.--'Eisel (_Saxon), vinegar; verjuice; any
+acid_': Johnson's _Dict_.
+
+_1st Q_. 'Wilt drinke vp vessels.' The word _up_ very likely implies the
+steady emptying of a vessel specified--at a draught, and not by
+degrees.]
+
+[Footnote 7: --pretending care over Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Emphasis on _Be_, which I take for the _imperative mood_.]
+
+[Footnote 9: The moment it is uttered, he recognizes and confesses to
+the rant, ashamed of it even under the cover of his madness. It did not
+belong _altogether_ to the madness. Later he expresses to Horatio his
+regret in regard to this passage between him and Laertes, and afterwards
+apologizes to Laertes. 252, 262.
+
+Perhaps this is the speech in all the play of which it is most difficult
+to get into a sympathetic comprehension. The student must call to mind
+the elements at war in Hamlet's soul, and generating discords in his
+behaviour: to those comes now the shock of Ophelia's death; the last tie
+that bound him to life is gone--the one glimmer of hope left him for
+this world! The grave upon whose brink he has been bandying words with
+the sexton, is for _her_! Into such a consciousness comes the rant of
+Laertes. Only the forms of madness are free to him, while no form is too
+strong in which to repudiate indifference to Ophelia: for her sake, as
+well as to relieve his own heart, he casts the clear confession of his
+love into her grave. He is even jealous, over her dead body, of her
+brother's profession of love to her--as if any brother could love as he
+loved! This is foolish, no doubt, but human, and natural to a certain
+childishness in grief. 252.
+
+Add to this, that Hamlet--see later in his speeches to Osricke--had a
+lively inclination to answer a fool according to his folly (256), to
+outherod Herod if Herod would rave, out-euphuize Euphues himself if he
+would be ridiculous:--the digestion of all these things in the retort of
+meditation will result, I would fain think, in an understanding and
+artistic justification of even this speech of Hamlet: the more I
+consider it the truer it seems. If proof be necessary that real feeling
+is mingled in the madness of the utterance, it may be found in the fact
+that he is immediately ashamed of its extravagance.]
+
+[Page 244]
+
+_Kin_.[1] This is meere Madnesse:                 [Sidenote: _Quee_.[1]]
+And thus awhile the fit will worke on him:          [Sidenote: And this]
+Anon as patient as the female Doue,
+When that her golden[2] Cuplet[3] are disclos'd[4];
+                                                  [Sidenote: cuplets[3]]
+His silence will sit drooping.[5]
+
+_Ham_. Heare you Sir:[6]
+What is the reason that you vse me thus?
+I loud' you euer;[7] but it is no matter:[8]
+Let _Hercules_ himselfe doe what he may,
+The Cat will Mew, and Dogge will haue his day.[9]
+           _Exit._                [Sidenote: _Exit Hamlet and Horatio._]
+
+_Kin_. I pray you good Horatio wait vpon him,
+                                              [Sidenote: pray thee good]
+Strengthen you patience in our last nights speech,      [Sidenote: your]
+[Sidenote: 254] Wee'l put the matter to the present push:[10]
+Good _Gertrude_ set some watch ouer your Sonne,
+This Graue shall haue a liuing[11] Monument:[12]
+An houre of quiet shortly shall we see;[13]
+                                         [Sidenote: quiet thirtie shall]
+Till then, in patience our proceeding be.   _Exeunt._
+
+[Footnote 1: I hardly know which to choose as the speaker of this
+speech. It would be a fine specimen of the king's hypocrisy; and perhaps
+indeed its poetry, lovely in itself, but at such a time sentimental, is
+fitter for him than the less guilty queen.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'covered with a yellow down' _Heath_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: The singular is better: 'the pigeon lays no more than _two_
+eggs.' _Steevens_. Only, _couplets_ might be used like _twins_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: --_hatched_, the sporting term of the time.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'The pigeon never quits her nest for three days after her
+two young ones are hatched, except for a few moments to get food.'
+_Steevens_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Laertes stands eyeing him with evil looks.]
+
+[Footnote 7: I suppose here a pause: he waits in vain some response from
+Laertes.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Here he retreats into his madness.]
+
+[Footnote 9: '--but I cannot compel you to hear reason. Do what he will,
+Hercules himself cannot keep the cat from mewing, or the dog from
+following his inclination!'--said in a half humorous, half contemptuous
+despair.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'into immediate train'--_to Laertes_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: _life-like_, or _lasting_?]
+
+[Footnote 12: --_again to Laertes_.]
+
+[Footnote 13: --when Hamlet is dead.]
+
+[Page 246]
+
+_Enter Hamlet and Horatio._
+
+_Ham._ So much for this Sir; now let me see the other,[1]
+                                           [Sidenote: now shall you see]
+You doe remember all the Circumstance.[2]
+
+_Hor._ Remember it my Lord?[3]
+
+_Ham._ Sir, in my heart there was a kinde of fighting,
+That would not let me sleepe;[4] me thought I lay
+                                                  [Sidenote: my thought]
+Worse then the mutines in the Bilboes,[5] rashly,      [Sidenote: bilbo]
+(And praise be rashnesse for it)[6] let vs know,      [Sidenote: prayed]
+Our indiscretion sometimes serues vs well,          [Sidenote: sometime]
+When our deare plots do paule,[7] and that should teach vs,
+                                    [Sidenote: deepe | should learne us]
+[Sidenote: 146, 181] There's a Diuinity that shapes our ends,[8]
+Rough-hew them how we will.[9]
+
+_Hor._ That is most certaine.
+
+_Ham._ Vp from my Cabin
+My sea-gowne scarft about me in the darke,
+Grop'd I to finde out them;[10] had my desire,
+Finger'd their Packet[11], and in fine, withdrew
+To mine owne roome againe, making so bold,
+(My feares forgetting manners) to vnseale          [Sidenote: to vnfold]
+Their grand Commission, where I found _Horatio_,
+Oh royall[12] knauery: An exact command,            [Sidenote: A royall]
+[Sidenote: 196] Larded with many seuerall sorts of reason;
+                                                    [Sidenote: reasons,]
+Importing Denmarks health, and Englands too,
+With hoo, such Bugges[13] and Goblins in my life,        [Sidenote: hoe]
+That on the superuize[14] no leasure bated,[15]
+No not to stay the grinding of the Axe,
+My head shoud be struck off.
+
+_Hor._ Ist possible?
+
+_Ham._ Here's the Commission, read it at more leysure:
+
+[Footnote 1: I would suggest that the one paper, which he has just
+shown, is a commission the king gave to himself; the other, which he is
+about to show, that given to Rosincrance and Guildensterne. He is
+setting forth his proof of the king's treachery.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --of the king's words and behaviour, possibly, in giving
+him his papers, Horatio having been present; or it might mean, 'Have you
+got the things I have just told you clear in your mind?']
+
+[Footnote 3: '--as if I could forget a single particular of it!']
+
+[Footnote 4: The _Shaping Divinity_ was moving him.]
+
+[Footnote 5: The fetters called _bilboes_ fasten a couple of mutinous
+sailors together by the legs.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Does he not here check himself and begin
+afresh--remembering that the praise belongs to the Divinity?]
+
+[Footnote 7: _pall_--from the root of _pale_--'come to nothing.' He had
+had his plots from which he hoped much; the king's commission had
+rendered them futile. But he seems to have grown doubtful of his plans
+before, probably through the doubt of his companions which led him to
+seek acquaintance with their commission, and he may mean that his 'dear
+plots' had begun to pall _upon him_. Anyhow the sudden 'indiscretion' of
+searching for and unsealing the ambassadors' commission served him as
+nothing else could have served him.]
+
+[Footnote 8: --even by our indiscretion. Emphasis on _shapes_.]
+
+[Footnote 9: Here is another sign of Hamlet's religion. 24, 125, 260.
+We start to work out an idea, but the result does not correspond with
+the idea: another has been at work along with us. We rough-hew--block
+out our marble, say for a Mercury; the result is an Apollo. Hamlet had
+rough-hewn his ends--he had begun plans to certain ends, but had he been
+allowed to go on shaping them alone, the result, even had he carried out
+his plans and shaped his ends to his mind, would have been failure.
+Another mallet and chisel were busy shaping them otherwise from the
+first, and carrying them out to a true success. For _success_ is not the
+success of plans, but the success of ends.]
+
+[Footnote 10: Emphasize _I_ and _them_, as the rhythm requires, and the
+phrase becomes picturesque.]
+
+[Footnote 11: 'got my fingers on their papers.']
+
+[Footnote 12: Emphasize _royal_.]
+
+[Footnote 13: A _bug_ is any object causing terror.]
+
+[Footnote 14: immediately on the reading.]
+
+[Footnote 15: --no interval abated, taken off the immediacy of the order
+respite granted.]
+
+[Page 248]
+
+But wilt thou heare me how I did proceed?      [Sidenote: heare now how]
+
+_Hor_. I beseech you.
+
+_Ham_. Being thus benetted round with Villaines,[1]
+Ere I could make a Prologue to my braines,        [Sidenote: Or I could]
+They had begun the Play.[2] I sate me downe,
+Deuis'd a new Commission,[3] wrote it faire,
+I once did hold it as our Statists[4] doe,
+A basenesse to write faire; and laboured much
+How to forget that learning: but Sir now,
+It did me Yeomans[5] seruice: wilt thou know          [Sidenote: yemans]
+The effects[6] of what I wrote?                 [Sidenote: Th'effect[6]]
+
+_Hor_. I, good my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. An earnest Coniuration from the King,
+As England was his faithfull Tributary,
+As loue betweene them, as the Palme should flourish,
+                              [Sidenote: them like the | might florish,]
+As Peace should still her wheaten Garland weare,
+And stand a Comma 'tweene their amities,[7]
+And many such like Assis[8] of great charge,
+                                             [Sidenote: like, as sir of]
+That on the view and know of these Contents,         [Sidenote: knowing]
+Without debatement further, more or lesse,
+He should the bearers put to sodaine death,    [Sidenote: those bearers]
+Not shriuing time allowed.
+
+_Hor_. How was this seal'd?
+
+_Ham_. Why, euen in that was Heauen ordinate;      [Sidenote: ordinant,]
+I had my fathers Signet in my Purse,
+Which was the Modell of that Danish Seale:
+Folded the Writ vp in forme of the other,
+                                         [Sidenote: in the forme of th']
+Subscrib'd it, gau't th'impression, plac't it safely,
+                                               [Sidenote: Subscribe it,]
+The changeling neuer knowne: Now, the next day
+Was our Sea Fight, and what to this was sement,  [Sidenote: was sequent]
+Thou know'st already.[9]
+
+_Hor_. So _Guildensterne_ and _Rosincrance_, go too't.
+
+[Footnote 1: --the nearest, Rosincrance and Guildensterne: Hamlet was
+quite satisfied of their villainy.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'I had no need to think: the thing came to me at once.']
+
+[Footnote 3: Note Hamlet's rapid practicality--not merely in devising,
+but in carrying out.]
+
+[Footnote 4: statesmen.]
+
+[Footnote 5: '_Yeomen of the guard of the king's body_ were anciently
+two hundred and fifty men, of the best rank under gentry, and of larger
+stature than ordinary; every one being required to be six feet
+high.'--_E. Chambers' Cyclopaedia_. Hence '_yeoman's_ service' must mean
+the very best of service.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Note our common phrase: 'I wrote to this effect.']
+
+[Footnote 7: 'as he would have Peace stand between their friendships
+like a comma between two words.' Every point has in it a conjunctive, as
+well as a disjunctive element: the former seems the one regarded
+here--only that some amities require more than a comma to separate them.
+The _comma_ does not make much of a figure--is good enough for its
+position, however; if indeed the fact be not, that, instead of standing
+for _Peace_, it does not even stand for itself, but for some other word.
+I do not for my part think so.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Dr. Johnson says there is a quibble here with _asses_ as
+beasts of _charge_ or burden. It is probable enough, seeing, as Malone
+tells us, that in Warwickshire, as did Dr. Johnson himself, they
+pronounce _as_ hard. In Aberdeenshire the sound of the _s_ varies with
+the intent of the word: '_az_ he said'; '_ass_ strong _az_ a horse.']
+
+[Footnote 9: To what purpose is this half-voyage to England made part of
+the play? The action--except, as not a few would have it, the very
+action be delay--is nowise furthered by it; Hamlet merely goes and
+returns.
+
+To answer this question, let us find the real ground for Hamlet's
+reflection, 'There's a Divinity that shapes our ends.' Observe, he is
+set at liberty without being in the least indebted to the finding of the
+commission--by the attack, namely, of the pirate; and this was not the
+shaping of his ends of which he was thinking when he made the
+reflection, for it had reference to the finding of the commission. What
+then was the ground of the reflection? And what justifies the whole
+passage in relation to the Poet's object, the character of Hamlet?
+
+This, it seems to me:--
+
+Although Hamlet could not have had much doubt left with regard to his
+uncle's guilt, yet a man with a fine, delicate--what most men would
+think, because so much more exacting than theirs--fastidious conscience,
+might well desire some proof more positive yet, before he did a deed so
+repugnant to his nature, and carrying in it such a loud condemnation of
+his mother. And more: he might well wish to have something to _show_: a
+man's conviction is no proof, though it may work in others inclination
+to receive proof. Hamlet is sent to sea just to get such proof as will
+not only thoroughly satisfy himself, but be capable of being shown to
+others. He holds now in his hand--to lay before the people--the two
+contradictory commissions. By his voyage then he has gained both
+assurance of his duty, and provision against the consequence he mainly
+dreaded, that of leaving a wounded name behind him. 272. This is the
+shaping of his ends--so exactly to his needs, so different from his
+rough-hewn plans--which is the work of the Divinity. The man who desires
+to know his duty that he may _do_ it, who will not shirk it when he does
+know it, will have time allowed him and the thing made plain to him; his
+perplexity will even strengthen and purify his will. The weak man is he
+who, certain of what is required of him, fails to meet it: so never once
+fails Hamlet. Note, in all that follows, that a load seems taken off
+him: after a gracious tardiness to believe up to the point of action, he
+is at length satisfied. Hesitation belongs to the noble nature, to
+Hamlet; precipitation to the poor nature, to Laertes, the son of
+Polonius. Compare Brutus in _Julius Caesar_--a Hamlet in favourable
+circumstances, with Hamlet--a Brutus in the most unfavourable
+circumstances conceivable.]
+
+[Page 250]
+
+_Ham_. Why man, they did make loue to this imployment[1]
+They are not neere my Conscience; their debate
+                                             [Sidenote: their defeat[2]]
+Doth by their owne insinuation[3] grow:[4]             [Sidenote: Dooes]
+'Tis dangerous, when the baser nature comes
+Betweene the passe, and fell incensed points
+Of mighty opposites.[5]
+
+_Hor_. Why, what a King is this?[6]
+
+_Ham_. Does it not, thinkst thee,[7] stand me now vpon[8]
+                                    [Sidenote: not thinke thee[7] stand]
+[Sidenote: 120] He that hath kil'd my King,[9] and whor'd my Mother,
+[Sidenote: 62] Popt in betweene th'election and my hopes,
+
+[Footnote 1: _This verse not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 2: destruction.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'Their destruction they have enticed on themselves by their
+own behaviour;' or, 'they have _crept into_ their fate by their
+underhand dealings.' The _Sh. Lex._ explains _insinuation_ as
+_meddling_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: With the concern of Horatio for the fate of Rosincrance and
+Guildensterne, Hamlet shows no sympathy. It has been objected to his
+character that there is nothing in the play to show them privy to the
+contents of their commission; to this it would be answer enough, that
+Hamlet is satisfied of their worthlessness, and that their whole
+behaviour in the play shows them merest parasites; but, at the same
+time, we must note that, in changing the commission, he had no
+intention, could have had no thought, of letting them go to England
+without him: that was a pure shaping of their ends by the Divinity.
+Possibly his own 'dear plots' had in them the notion of getting help
+against his uncle from the king of England, in which case he would
+willingly of course have continued his journey; but whatever they may be
+supposed to have been, they were laid in connection with the voyage, not
+founded on the chance of its interruption. It is easy to imagine a man
+like him, averse to the shedding of blood, intending interference for
+their lives: as heir apparent, he would certainly have been listened to.
+The tone of his reply to Horatio is that of one who has been made the
+unintending cause of a deserved fate: the thing having fallen out so,
+the Divinity having so shaped their ends, there was nothing in their
+character, any more than in that of Polonius, to make him regret their
+death, or the part he had had in it.]
+
+[Footnote 5: The 'mighty opposites' here are the king and Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Perhaps, as Hamlet talked, he has been parenthetically
+glancing at the real commission. Anyhow conviction is growing stronger
+in Horatio, whom, for the occasion, we may regard as a type of the
+public.]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'thinkst thee,' in the fashion of the Friends, or 'thinke
+thee' in the sense of 'bethink thee.']
+
+[Footnote 8: 'Does it not rest now on me?--is it not now my duty?--is it
+not _incumbent on me_ (with _lie_ for _stand_)--"is't not perfect
+conscience"?']
+
+[Footnote 9: Note '_my king_' not _my father_: he had to avenge a crime
+against the state, the country, himself as a subject--not merely a
+private wrong.]
+
+[Page 252]
+
+Throwne out his Angle for my proper life,[1]
+And with such coozenage;[2] is't not perfect conscience,[3]
+                                                 [Sidenote: conscience?]
+[Sidenote: 120] To quit him with this arme?[4] And is't not to be
+damn'd[5]
+To let this Canker of our nature come
+In further euill.[6]
+
+_Hor._ It must be shortly knowne to him from England
+What is the issue of the businesse there.[7]
+
+_Ham._ It will be short,
+[Sidenote: 262] The _interim's_ mine,[8] and a mans life's no more[9]
+Then to say one:[10] but I am very sorry good _Horatio_,
+[Sidenote: 245] That to _Laertes_ I forgot my selfe;
+For by the image of my Cause, I see
+[Sidenote: 262] The Portraiture of his;[11] Ile count his fauours:[12]
+
+[Footnote 1: Here is the charge at length in full against the king--of
+quality and proof sufficient now, not merely to justify, but to compel
+action against him.]
+
+[Footnote 2: He was such a _fine_ hypocrite that Hamlet, although he
+hated and distrusted him, was perplexed as to the possibility of his
+guilt. His good acting was almost too much for Hamlet himself. This is
+his 'coozenage.'
+
+After 'coozenage' should come a dash, bringing '--is't not perfect
+conscience' (_is it not absolutely righteous_) into closest sequence,
+almost apposition, with 'Does it not stand me now upon--'.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Here comes in the _Quarto, 'Enter a Courtier_.' All from
+this point to 'Peace, who comes heere?' included, is in addition to the
+_Quarto_ text--not in the _Q._, that is.]
+
+[Footnote 4: I would here refer my student to the soliloquy--with its
+_sea of troubles_, and _the taking of arms against it_. 123, n. 4.]
+
+[Footnote 5: These three questions: 'Does it not stand me now
+upon?'--'Is't not perfect conscience?'--'Is't not to be damned?' reveal
+the whole relation between the inner and outer, the unseen and the seen,
+the thinking and the acting Hamlet. 'Is not the thing right?--Is it not
+my duty?--Would not the neglect of it deserve damnation?' He is
+satisfied.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'is it not a thing to be damned--to let &c.?' or, 'would it
+not be to be damned, (to be in a state of damnation, or, to bring
+damnation on oneself) to let this human cancer, the king, go on to
+further evil?']
+
+[Footnote 7: '--so you have not much time.']
+
+[Footnote 8: 'True, it will be short, but till then is mine, and will be
+long enough for me.' He is resolved.]
+
+[Footnote 9: Now that he is assured of what is right, the Shadow that
+waits him on the path to it, has no terror for him. He ceases to be
+anxious as to 'what dreams may come,' as to the 'something after death,'
+as to 'the undiscovered country,' the moment his conscience is
+satisfied. 120. It cannot now make a coward of him. It was never in
+regard to the past that Hamlet dreaded death, but in regard to the
+righteousness of the action which was about to occasion his death. Note
+that he expects death; at least he has long made up his mind to the
+great risk of it--the death referred to in the soliloquy--which, after
+all, was not that which did overtake him. There is nothing about suicide
+here, nor was there there.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'a man's life must soon be over anyhow.']
+
+[Footnote 11: The approach of death causes him to think of and regret
+even the small wrongs he has done; he laments his late behaviour to
+Laertes, and makes excuse for him: the similarity of their condition,
+each having lost a father by violence, ought, he says, to have taught
+him gentleness with him. The _1st Quarto_ is worth comparing here:--
+
+    _Enter Hamlet and Horatio_
+
+    _Ham_. Beleeue mee, it greeues mee much _Horatio_,
+    That to _Leartes_ I forgot my selfe:
+    For by my selfe me thinkes I feele his griefe,
+    Though there's a difference in each others wrong.]
+
+[Footnote 12: 'I will not forget,' or, 'I will call to mind, what merits
+he has,' or 'what favours he has shown me.' But I suspect the word
+'_count_' ought to be _court_.--He does court his favour when next they
+meet--in lovely fashion. He has no suspicion of his enmity.]
+
+[Page 254]
+
+[Sidenote: 242, 262] But sure the brauery[1] of his griefe did put me
+Into a Towring passion.[2]
+
+_Hor._ Peace, who comes heere?
+
+_Enter young Osricke._[3]                [Sidenote: _Enter a Courtier._]
+
+_Osr._ Your Lordship is right welcome back to        [Sidenote: _Cour._]
+Denmarke.
+
+_Ham._ I humbly thank you Sir, dost know this   [Sidenote: humble thank]
+waterflie?[4]
+
+_Hor._ No my good Lord.
+
+_Ham._ Thy state is the more gracious; for 'tis a
+vice to know him[5]: he hath much Land, and fertile;
+let a Beast be Lord of Beasts, and his Crib shall
+stand at the Kings Messe;[6] 'tis a Chowgh[7]; but
+as I saw spacious in the possession of dirt.[8]    [Sidenote: as I say,]
+
+_Osr._ Sweet Lord, if your friendship[9] were at
+                                     [Sidenote: _Cour._ | Lordshippe[?]]
+leysure, I should impart a thing to you from his
+Maiesty.
+
+_Ham._ I will receiue it with all diligence of   [Sidenote: it sir with]
+spirit; put your Bonet to his right vse, 'tis for the
+                                                [Sidenote: spirit, your]
+head.
+
+Osr. I thanke your Lordship, 'tis very hot[10]
+                                               [Sidenote: Cour. | it is]
+
+_Ham._ No, beleeue mee 'tis very cold, the winde
+is Northerly.
+
+_Osr._ It is indifferent cold[11] my Lord indeed.    [Sidenote: _Cour._]
+
+_Ham._ Mee thinkes it is very soultry, and hot
+                           [Sidenote: But yet me | sully and hot, or my]
+for my Complexion.[12]
+
+_Osr._ Exceedingly, my Lord, it is very soultry,     [Sidenote: _Cour._]
+as 'twere I cannot tell how: but my Lord,[13] his
+                                                [Sidenote: how: my Lord]
+Maiesty bad me signifie to you, that he ha's laid a
+                                                  [Sidenote: that a had]
+[Sidenote: 244] great wager on your head: Sir, this is the matter.[14]
+
+_Ham._ I beseech you remember.[15]
+
+_Osr._ Nay, in good faith, for mine ease in good
+                          [Sidenote: Cour. Nay good my Lord for my ease]
+
+[Footnote 1: the great show; bravado.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --with which fell in well the forms of his pretended
+madness. But that the passion was real, this reaction of repentance
+shows. It was not the first time his pretence had given him liberty to
+ease his heart with wild words. Jealous of the boastfulness of Laertes'
+affection, he began at once--in keeping with his assumed character of
+madman, but not the less in harmony with his feelings--to outrave him.]
+
+[Footnote 3: One of the sort that would gather to such a king--of the
+same kind as Rosincrance and Guildensterne.
+
+In the _1st Q. 'Enter a Bragart Gentleman_.']
+
+[Footnote 4: --_to Horatio_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'Thou art the more in a state of grace, for it is a vice to
+know him.']
+
+[Footnote 6: 'his manger shall stand where the king is served.' Wealth
+is always received by Rank--Mammon nowhere better worshipped than in
+kings' courts.]
+
+[Footnote 7: '_a bird of the crow-family_'--as a figure, '_always
+applied to rich and avaricious people_.' A _chuff_ is a surly _clown_.
+In Scotch a _coof_ is 'a silly, dastardly fellow.']
+
+[Footnote 8: land.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'friendship' is better than 'Lordshippe,' as euphuistic.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'I thanke your Lordship; (_puts on his hat_) 'tis very
+hot.']
+
+[Footnote 11: 'rather cold.']
+
+[Footnote 12: 'and hot--for _my_ temperament.']
+
+[Footnote 13: Not able to go on, he plunges into his message.]
+
+[Footnote 14: --_takes off his hat_.]
+
+[Footnote 15: --making a sign to him again to put on his hat.]
+
+[Page 256]
+
+faith[1]: Sir, [A] you are not ignorant of what excellence
+_Laertes_ [B] is at his weapon.[2]          [Sidenote: _Laertes_ is.[2]]
+
+_Ham_. What's his weapon?[3]
+
+_Osr_. Rapier and dagger.               [Sidenote: _Cour._]
+
+_Ham_. That's two of his weapons: but well.
+
+_Osr_. The sir King ha's wag'd with him six
+                            [Sidenote: _Cour_. The King sir hath wagerd]
+Barbary Horses, against the which he impon'd[4] as I
+                                             [Sidenote: hee has impaund]
+take it, sixe French Rapiers and Poniards, with
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+[5] here is newly com to Court _Laertes_, belieue me an absolute
+gentlemen, ful of most excellent differences,[6] of very soft
+society,[7] and great
+[Sidenote: 234] showing[8]: indeede to speake sellingly[9] of him, hee
+is the card or kalender[10] of gentry: for you shall find in him the
+continent of what part a Gentleman would see.[11]
+
+[Sidenote: 245] _Ham_.[12] Sir, his definement suffers no perdition[13]
+in you, though I know to deuide him inuentorially,[14] would dosie[15]
+th'arithmaticke of memory, and yet but yaw[16] neither in respect of
+his quick saile, but in the veritie of extolment, I take him to be a
+soule of great article,[17] & his infusion[18] of such dearth[19] and
+rarenesse, as to make true dixion of him, his semblable is his
+mirrour,[20] & who els would trace him, his vmbrage, nothing more.[21]
+
+_Cour_. Your Lordship speakes most infallibly of him.[22]
+
+_Ham_. The concernancy[23] sir, why doe we wrap the gentleman in our
+more rawer breath?[24]
+
+_Cour_. Sir.[25]
+
+_Hora_. Ist not possible to vnderstand in another tongue,[26] you will
+too't sir really.[27]
+
+_Ham_. What imports the nomination of this gentleman.
+
+_Cour_. Of _Laertes_.[28]
+
+_Hora_. His purse is empty already, all's golden words are spent.
+
+_Ham_. Of him sir.[29]
+
+_Cour_. I know you are not ignorant.[30]
+
+_Ham_. I would you did sir, yet in faith if you did, it would not
+much approoue me,[31] well sir.
+
+_Cour_.]
+
+[Footnote B: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+_Ham_. I dare not confesse that, least I should compare with him in
+excellence, but to know a man wel, were to knowe himselfe.[32]
+
+_Cour_. I meane sir for this weapon, but in the imputation laide on
+him,[33] by them in his meed, hee's vnfellowed.[34]]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'in good faith, it is not for manners, but for my comfort I
+take it off.' Perhaps the hat was intended only to be carried, and would
+not really go on his head.]
+
+[Footnote 2: The _Quarto_ has not 'at his weapon,' which is inserted to
+take the place of the passage omitted, and connect the edges of the
+gap.]
+
+[Footnote 3: So far from having envied Laertes' reputation for fencing,
+as the king asserts, Hamlet seems not even to have known which was
+Laertes' weapon.]
+
+[Footnote 4: laid down--staked.]
+
+[Footnote 5: This and the following passages seem omitted for
+curtailment, and perhaps in part because they were less amusing when the
+fashion of euphuism had passed. The good of holding up the mirror to
+folly was gone when it was no more the 'form and pressure' of 'the very
+age and body of the time.']
+
+[Footnote 6: of great variety of excellence.]
+
+[Footnote 7: gentle manners.]
+
+[Footnote 8: fine presence.]
+
+[Footnote 9: Is this a stupid attempt at wit on the part of Osricke--'to
+praise him as if you wanted to sell him'--stupid because it acknowledges
+exaggeration?]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'the chart or book of reference.' 234.]
+
+[Footnote 11: I think _part_ here should be plural; then the passage
+would paraphrase thus:--'you shall find in him the sum of what parts
+(_endowments_) a gentleman would wish to see.']
+
+[Footnote 12: Hamlet answers the fool according to his folly, but
+outdoes him, to his discomfiture.]
+
+[Footnote 13: 'his description suffers no loss in your mouth.']
+
+[Footnote 14: 'to analyze him into all and each of his qualities.']
+
+[Footnote 15: dizzy.]
+
+[Footnote 16: 'and yet _would_ but yaw neither' _Yaw_, 'the movement by
+which a ship deviates from the line of her course towards the right or
+left in steering.' Falconer's _Marine Dictionary_. The meaning seems to
+be that the inventorial description could not overtake his merits,
+because it would _yaw_--keep turning out of the direct line of their
+quick sail. But Hamlet is set on using far-fetched and absurd forms and
+phrases to the non-plussing of Osricke, nor cares much to be _correct_.]
+
+[Footnote 17: I take this use of the word _article_ to be merely for the
+occasion; it uas never surely in _use_ for _substance_.]
+
+[Footnote 18: '--the infusion of his soul into his body,' 'his soul's
+embodiment.' The _Sh. Lex._ explains _infusion_ as 'endowments,
+qualities,' and it may be right.]
+
+[Footnote 19: scarcity.]
+
+[Footnote 20: '--it alone can show his likeness.']
+
+[Footnote 21: 'whoever would follow in his footsteps--copy him--is only
+his shadow.']
+
+[Footnote 22: Here a pause, I think.]
+
+[Footnote 23: 'To the matter in hand!'--recalling the attention of
+Osricke to the purport of his visit.]
+
+[Footnote 24: 'why do we presume to talk about him with our less refined
+breath?']
+
+[Footnote 25: The Courtier is now thoroughly bewildered.]
+
+[Footnote 26: 'Can you only _speak_ in another tongue? Is it not
+possible to _understand_ in it as well?']
+
+[Footnote 27: 'It is your own fault; you _will_ court your fate! you
+_will_ go and be made a fool of!']
+
+[Footnote 28: He catches at the word he understands. The actor must here
+supply the meaning, with the baffled, disconcerted look of a fool who
+has failed in the attempt to seem knowing.]
+
+[Footnote 29:--answering the Courtier.]
+
+[Footnote 30: He pauses, looking for some out-of-the-way mode wherein to
+continue. Hamlet takes him up.]
+
+[Footnote 31: 'your witness to my knowledge would not be of much
+avail.']
+
+[Footnote 32: Paraphrase: 'for merely to know a man well, implies that
+you yourself _know_.' To know a man well, you must know his knowledge: a
+man, to judge his neighbour, must be at least his equal.]
+
+[Footnote 33: faculty attributed to him.]
+
+[Footnote 34: _Point thus_: 'laide on him by them, in his meed hee's
+unfellowed.' 'in his merit he is peerless.']
+
+[Page 258]
+
+their assignes,[1] as Girdle, Hangers or so[2]: three of
+                                              [Sidenote: hanger and so.]
+the Carriages infaith are very deare to fancy,[3] very
+responsiue[4] to the hilts, most delicate carriages
+and of very liberall conceit.[5]
+
+_Ham_. What call you the Carriages?[6]
+
+[A]
+
+_Osr_. The Carriages Sir, are the hangers.
+                                        [Sidenote: _Cour_. The carriage]
+
+_Ham_. The phrase would bee more Germaine[7] to
+the matter: If we could carry Cannon by our sides;
+                                              [Sidenote: carry a cannon]
+I would it might be Hangers till then; but on sixe
+                                   [Sidenote: it be | then, but on, six]
+Barbary Horses against sixe French Swords: their
+Assignes, and three liberall conceited Carriages,[8]
+that's the French but against the Danish; why is  [Sidenote: French bet]
+this impon'd as you call it[9]?              [Sidenote: this all you[9]]
+
+_Osr_.  The King Sir, hath laid that in a dozen
+                                    [Sidenote: _Cour_. | layd sir, that]
+passes betweene you and him, hee shall not exceed
+                                         [Sidenote: your selfe and him,]
+you three hits;[10] He hath one twelue for mine,[11]
+                               [Sidenote: hath layd on twelue for nine,]
+and that would come to imediate tryall, if your [Sidenote: and it would]
+Lordship would vouchsafe the Answere.[12]
+
+_Ham_. How if I answere no?[13]
+
+_Osr_. I meane my Lord,[14] the opposition of your   [Sidenote: _Cour_.]
+person in tryall.
+
+_Ham_. Sir, I will walke heere in the Hall; if it
+please his Maiestie, 'tis the breathing time of day    [Sidenote: it is]
+with me[15]; let the Foyles bee brought, the Gentleman
+willing, and the King hold his purpose; I will
+win for him if I can: if not, Ile gaine nothing but
+                                          [Sidenote: him and I | I will]
+my shame, and the odde hits.[16]
+
+_Osr_. Shall I redeliuer you ee'n so?[17]
+                             [Sidenote: _Cour_. Shall I deliuer you so?]
+
+_Ham_. To this effect Sir, after what flourish your
+nature will.
+
+_Osr_. I commend my duty to your Lordship.           [Sidenote: _Cour_.]
+
+_Ham_. Yours, yours [18]: hee does well to commend
+                                 [Sidenote: _Ham_. Yours doo's well[18]]
+it himselfe, there are no tongues else for's tongue,  [Sidenote: turne.]
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+_Hora_. I knew you must be edified by the margent[19] ere you had
+done.]
+
+[Footnote 1: accompaniments or belongings; things _assigned_ to them.]
+
+[Footnote 2: the thongs or chains attaching the sheath of a weapon to
+the girdle; what the weapon _hangs_ by. The '_or so_' seems to indicate
+that Osricke regrets having used the old-fashioned word, which he
+immediately changes for _carriages_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: imagination, taste, the artistic faculty.]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'corresponding to--going well with the hilts,'--in shape,
+ornament, and colour.]
+
+[Footnote 5: bold invention.]
+
+[Footnote 6: a new word, unknown to Hamlet;--court-slang, to which he
+prefers the old-fashioned, homely word.]
+
+[Footnote 7: related; 'akin to the matter.']
+
+[Footnote 8: He uses Osricke's words--with a touch of derision, I should
+say.]
+
+[Footnote 9: I do not take the _Quarto_ reading for incorrect. Hamlet
+says: 'why is this all----you call it --? --?' as if he wanted to use
+the word (_imponed_) which Osricke had used, but did not remember it: he
+asks for it, saying '_you call it_' interrogatively.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _1st Q_
+
+                  that yong Leartes in twelue venies   223
+    At Rapier and Dagger do not get three oddes of you,]
+
+[Footnote 11: In all printer's work errors are apt to come in clusters.]
+
+[Footnote 12: the response, or acceptance of the challenge.]
+
+[Footnote 13: Hamlet plays with the word, pretending to take it in its
+common meaning.]
+
+[Footnote 14: 'By _answer_, I mean, my lord, the opposition &c.']
+
+[Footnote 15: 'my time for exercise:' he treats the proposal as the
+trifle it seems--a casual affair to be settled at once--hoping perhaps
+that the king will come with like carelessness.]
+
+[Footnote 16: the _three_.]
+
+[Footnote 17: To Osricke the answer seems too direct and unadorned for
+ears royal.]
+
+[Footnote 18: I cannot help here preferring the _Q_. If we take the
+_Folio_ reading, we must take it thus: 'Yours! yours!' spoken with
+contempt;--'as if _you_ knew anything of duty!'--for we see from what
+follows that he is playing with the word _duty_. Or we might read it,
+'Yours commends yours,' with the same sense as the reading of the _Q._,
+which is, 'Yours,' that is, '_Your_ lordship--does well to commend his
+duty himself--there is no one else to do it.' This former shape is
+simpler; that of the _Folio_ is burdened with ellipsis--loaded with
+lack. And surely _turne_ is the true reading!--though we may take the
+other to mean, 'there are no tongues else on the side of his tongue.']
+
+[Footnote 19: --as of the Bible, for a second interpretative word or
+phrase.]
+
+[Page 260]
+
+_Hor_. This Lapwing runs away with the shell
+on his head.[1]
+
+[Sidenote: 98] _Ham_. He did Compile[2] with his Dugge before
+                                    [Sidenote: _Ham_. A did sir[2] with]
+hee suck't it: thus had he and mine more of the
+                                  [Sidenote: a suckt has he | many more]
+same Beauy[3] that I know the drossie age dotes  [Sidenote: same breede]
+on; only got the tune[4] of the time, and outward
+                                   [Sidenote: and out of an habit of[5]]
+habite of encounter,[5] a kinde of yesty collection,   [Sidenote: histy]
+which carries them through and through the most
+fond and winnowed opinions; and doe but blow
+                             [Sidenote: prophane and trennowed opinions]
+them to their tryalls: the Bubbles are out.[6]
+                                           [Sidenote: their triall, the]
+
+[A]
+
+_Hor_. You will lose this wager, my Lord.     [Sidenote: loose my Lord.]
+
+_Ham_. I doe not thinke so, since he went into
+France, I haue beene in continuall practice; I shall
+[Sidenote: 265] winne at the oddes:[7] but thou wouldest not thinke
+                                                   [Sidenote: ods; thou]
+how all heere about my heart:[8] but it is no matter[9]
+                                         [Sidenote: how ill all's heere]
+
+_Hor_. Nay, good my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. It is but foolery; but it is such a kinde
+of gain-giuing[10] as would perhaps trouble a woman,
+                                                  [Sidenote: gamgiuing.]
+
+_Hor_. If your minde dislike any thing, obey.[11]   [Sidenote: obay it.]
+I will forestall[12] their repaire hither, and say you
+are not fit.
+
+_Ham_. Not a whit, we defie Augury[13]; there's a
+                                           [Sidenote: there is speciall]
+[Sidenote: 24, 125, 247] speciall Prouidence in the fall of a
+sparrow.[14] If
+
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto:--_
+
+_Enter a Lord_.[15]
+
+_Lord_. My Lord, his Maiestie commended him to you by young
+Ostricke,[16] who brings backe to him that you attend him in the hall,
+he sends to know if your pleasure hold to play with _Laertes_, or that
+you will take longer time?[17]
+
+_Ham_. I am constant to my purposes, they followe the Kings pleasure,
+if his fitnes speakes, mine is ready[18]: now or whensoeuer, prouided I
+be so able as now.
+
+_Lord_. The King, and Queene, and all are comming downe.
+
+_Ham_. In happy time.[19]
+
+_Lord_. The Queene desires you to vse some gentle
+entertainment[20] _Laertes_, before you fall to play.
+
+_Ham_. Shee well instructs me.]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'Well, he _is_ a young one!']
+
+[Footnote 2: '_Com'ply_,' with accent on first syllable: _comply with_
+means _pay compliments to, compliment_. See _Q._ reading: 'A did sir
+with':--_sir_ here is a verb--_sir with_ means _say sir to_: 'he
+_sirred, complied_ with his nurse's breast before &c.' Hamlet speaks in
+mockery of the affected court-modes of speech and address, the fashion
+of euphuism--a mechanical attempt at the poetic.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _a flock of birds_--suggested by '_This Lapwing_.']
+
+[Footnote 4: 'the mere mode.']
+
+[Footnote 5: 'and external custom of intercourse.' But here too I rather
+take the _Q._ to be right: 'They have only got the fashion of the time;
+and, out of a habit of wordy conflict, (they have got) a collection of
+tricks of speech,--a yesty, frothy mass, with nothing in it, which
+carries them in triumph through the most foolish and fastidious (nice,
+choice, punctilious, whimsical) judgments.' _Yesty_ I take to be right,
+and _prophane_ (vulgar) to have been altered by the Poet to _fond_
+(foolish); of _trennowed_ I can make nothing beyond a misprint.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Hamlet had just blown Osricke to his trial in his chosen
+kind, and the bubble had burst. The braggart gentleman had no faculty to
+generate after the dominant fashion, no invention to support his
+ambition--had but a yesty collection, which failing him the moment
+something unconventional was wanted, the fool had to look a discovered
+fool.]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'I shall win by the odds allowed me; he will not exceed me
+three hits.']
+
+[Footnote 8: He has a presentiment of what is coming.]
+
+[Footnote 9: Nothing in this world is of much consequence to him now.
+Also, he believes in 'a special Providence.']
+
+[Footnote 10: 'a yielding, a sinking' at the heart? The _Sh. Lex._ says
+_misgiving_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: 'obey the warning.']
+
+[Footnote 12: 'go to them before they come here'--'_prevent_ their
+coming.']
+
+[Footnote 13: The knowledge, even, of what is to come could never, any
+more than ordinary expediency, be the _law_ of a man's conduct. St.
+Paul, informed by the prophet Agabus of the troubles that awaited him at
+Jerusalem, and entreated by his friends not to go thither, believed the
+prophet, and went on to Jerusalem to be delivered into the hands of the
+Gentiles.]
+
+[Footnote 14: One of Shakspere's many allusions to sayings of the Lord.]
+
+[Footnote 15: Osricke does not come back: he has begged off but ventures
+later, under the wing of the king.]
+
+[Footnote 16: May not this form of the name suggest that in it is
+intended the 'foolish' ostrich?]
+
+[Footnote 17: The king is making delay: he has to have his 'union'
+ready.]
+
+[Footnote 18: 'if he feels ready, I am.']
+
+[Footnote 19: 'They are _well-come_.']
+
+[Footnote 20: 'to be polite to Laertes.' The print shows where _to_ has
+slipped out.
+
+The queen is anxious; she distrusts Laertes, and the king's influence
+over him.]
+
+[Page 262]
+
+it[1] be now, 'tis not to come: if it bee not to come,
+                                                     [Sidenote: be, tis]
+it will bee now: if it be not now; yet it will come;
+                                               [Sidenote: it well come,]
+[Sidenote: 54, 164] the readinesse is all,[2] since no man ha's ought of
+                      [Sidenote: man of ought he leaues, knowes what ist
+                                              to leaue betimes, let be.]
+[Sidenote: 252] what he leaues. What is't to leaue betimes?[3]
+
+_Enter King, Queene, Laertes and Lords, with other
+Attendants with Foyles, and Gauntlets, a Table
+and Flagons of Wine on it._
+               [Sidenote: _A table prepard, Trumpets, Drums and officers
+                         with cushion,  King, Queene, and all the state,
+                                         Foiles, Daggers, and Laertes._]
+
+_Kin_. Come _Hamlet_ come, and take this hand
+from me.
+
+[Sidenote: 245] _Ham_.[4] Giue me your pardon Sir, I'ue done you
+wrong,[5]                                             [Sidenote: I haue]
+But pardon't as you are a Gentleman.
+This presence[6] knowes,
+And you must needs haue heard how I am punisht
+With sore distraction?[7] What I haue done       [Sidenote: With a sore]
+That might your nature honour, and exception
+[Sidenote: 242, 252] Roughly awake,[8] heere proclaime was madnesse:[9]
+Was't _Hamlet_ wrong'd _Laertes_? Neuer _Hamlet_.
+If _Hamlet_ from himselfe be tane away:           [Sidenote: fane away,]
+And when he's not himselfe, do's wrong _Laertes_,
+Then _Hamlet_ does it not, _Hamlet_ denies it:[10]
+Who does it then? His Madnesse? If't be so,
+_Hamlet_ is of the Faction that is wrong'd,
+His madnesse is poore _Hamlets_ Enemy.[11]
+Sir, in this Audience,[12]
+Let my disclaiming from a purpos'd euill,[13]
+Free me so farre[14] in your most generous thoughts,
+That I haue shot mine Arrow o're the house,               [Sidenote: my]
+And hurt my Mother.[15]                         [Sidenote: brother.[15]]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'it'--death, the end.]
+
+[Footnote 2: His father had been taken unready. 54.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _Point_: 'all. Since'; 'leaves, what'--'Since no man has
+anything of what he has left, those who left it late are in the same
+position as those who left it early.' Compare the common saying, 'It
+will be all the same in a hundred years.' The _Q._ reading comes much to
+the same thing--'knows of ought he leaves'--'has any knowledge of it,
+anything to do with it, in any sense possesses it.'
+
+We may find a deeper meaning in the passage, however--surely not too
+deep for Shakspere:--'Since nothing can be truly said to be possessed as
+his own which a man must at one time or another yield; since that which
+is _own_ can never be taken from the owner, but solely that which is
+lent him; since the nature of a thing that has to be left is not such
+that it _could_ be possessed, why should a man mind parting with it
+early?'--There is far more in this than merely that at the end of the
+day it will be all the same. The thing that ever was really a man's own,
+God has given, and God will not, and man cannot, take away. Note the
+unity of religion and philosophy in Hamlet: he takes the one true
+position. Note also his courage: he has a strong presentiment of death,
+but will not turn a step from his way. If Death be coming, he will
+confront him. He does not believe in chance. He is ready--that is
+willing. All that is needful is, that he should not go as one who cannot
+help it, but as one who is for God's will, who chooses that will as his
+own.
+
+There is so much behind in Shakspere's characters--so much that can only
+be hinted at! The dramatist has not the _word_-scope of the novelist;
+his art gives him little _room_; he must effect in a phrase what the
+other may take pages to. He needs good seconding by his actors as sorely
+as the composer needs good rendering of his music by the orchestra. It
+is a lesson in unity that the greatest art can least work alone; that
+the greatest _finder_ most needs the help of others to show his
+_findings_. The dramatist has live men and women for the very
+instruments of his art--who must not be mere instruments, but
+fellow-workers; and upon them he is greatly dependent for final outcome.
+
+Here the actor should show a marked calmness and elevation in Hamlet. He
+should have around him as it were a luminous cloud, the cloud of his
+coming end. A smile not all of this world should close the speech. He
+has given himself up, and is at peace.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Note in this apology the sweetness of Hamlet's nature. How
+few are alive enough, that is unselfish and true enough, to be capable
+of genuine apology! The low nature always feels, not the wrong, but the
+confession of it, degrading.]
+
+[Footnote 5: --the wrong of his rudeness at the funeral.]
+
+[Footnote 6: all present.]
+
+[Footnote 7: --true in a deeper sense than they would understand.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'that might roughly awake your nature, honour, and
+exception,':--consider the phrase--_to take exception at a thing_.]
+
+[Footnote 9: It was by cause of madness, not by cause of evil intent.
+For all purpose of excuse it was madness, if only pretended madness; it
+was there of another necessity, and excused offence like real madness.
+What he said was true, not merely expedient, to the end he meant it to
+serve. But all passion may be called madness, because therein the mind
+is absorbed with one idea; 'anger is a brief madness,' and he was in a
+'towering passion': he proclaims it madness and so abjures it.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'refuses the wrong altogether--will in his true self have
+nothing to do with it.' No evil thing comes of our true selves, and
+confession is the casting of it from us, the only true denial. He who
+will not confess a wrong, holds to the wrong.]
+
+[Footnote 11: All here depends on the expression in the utterance.]
+
+[Footnote 12: _This line not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 13: This is Hamlet's summing up of the whole--his explanation
+of the speech.]
+
+[Footnote 14: 'so far as this in your generous judgment--that you regard
+me as having shot &c.']
+
+[Footnote 15: _Brother_ is much easier to accept, though _Mother_ might
+be in the simile.
+
+To do justice to the speech we must remember that Hamlet has no quarrel
+whatever with Laertes, that he has expressed admiration of him, and that
+he is inclined to love him for Ophelia's sake. His apology has no
+reference to the fate of his father or his sister; Hamlet is not aware
+that Laertes associates him with either, and plainly the public did not
+know Hamlet killed Polonius; while Laertes could have no intention of
+alluding to the fact, seeing it would frustrate his scheme of
+treachery.]
+
+[Page 264]
+
+_Laer_. I am satisfied in Nature,[1]
+Whose motiue in this case should stirre me most
+To my Reuenge. But in my termes of Honor
+I stand aloofe, and will no reconcilement,
+Till by some elder Masters of knowne Honor,
+I haue a voyce, and president of peace
+To keepe my name vngorg'd.[2] But till that time,
+                             [Sidenote: To my name vngord: but all that]
+I do receiue your offer'd loue like loue,
+And wil not wrong it.
+
+_Ham_. I do embrace it freely,                     [Sidenote: I embrace]
+And will this Brothers wager frankely play.
+Giue vs the Foyles: Come on.[3]
+
+_Laer_. Come one for me.[4]
+
+_Ham_. Ile be your foile[5] _Laertes_, in mine ignorance,
+[Sidenote: 218] Your Skill shall like a Starre i'th'darkest night,[6]
+Sticke fiery off indeede.
+
+_Laer_. You mocke me Sir.
+
+_Ham_. No by this hand.[7]
+
+_King_. Giue them the Foyles yong _Osricke_,[8]
+                                              [Sidenote: _Ostricke_,[8]]
+Cousen _Hamlet_, you know the wager.
+
+_Ham_. Verie well my Lord,
+Your Grace hath laide the oddes a'th'weaker side,        [Sidenote: has]
+
+_King._ I do not feare it,
+I haue seene you both:[9]
+But since he is better'd, we haue therefore oddes.[10]
+                                                  [Sidenote: better, we]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'in my own feelings and person.' Laertes does not refer to
+his father or sister. He professes to be satisfied in his heart with
+Hamlet's apology for his behaviour at the funeral, but not to be sure
+whether in the opinion of others, and by the laws of honour, he can
+accept it as amends, and forbear to challenge him. But the words 'Whose
+motiue in this case should stirre me most to my Reuenge' may refer to
+his father and sister, and, if so taken, should be spoken aside. To
+accept apology for them and not for his honour would surely be too
+barefaced! The point concerning them has not been started.
+
+But why not receive the apology as quite satisfactory? That he would not
+seems to show a lingering regard to _real_ honour. A downright villain,
+like the king, would have pretended its _thorough_
+acceptance--especially as they were just going to fence like friends;
+but he, as regards his honour, will not accept it until justified in
+doing so by the opinion of 'some elder masters,' receiving from them 'a
+voice and precedent of peace'--counsel to, and justification, or example
+of peace. He keeps the door of quarrel open--will not profess to be
+_altogether_ friends with him, though he does not hint at his real
+ground of offence: that mooted, the match of skill, with its immense
+advantages for villainy, would have been impossible. He means treachery
+all the time; careful of his honour, he can, like most apes of fashion,
+let his honesty go; still, so complex is human nature, he holds his
+speech declining thorough reconciliation as a shield to shelter his
+treachery from his own contempt: he has taken care not to profess
+absolute friendship, and so left room for absolute villainy! He has had
+regard to his word! Relieved perhaps by the demoniacal quibble, he
+follows it immediately with an utterance of full-blown perfidy.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Perhaps _ungorg'd_ might mean _unthrottled_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'Come on' _is not in the Q._--I suspect this _Come on_ but
+a misplaced shadow from the '_Come one_' immediately below, and better
+omitted. Hamlet could not say '_Come on_' before Laertes was ready, and
+'_Come one_' after 'Give us the foils,' would be very awkward. But it
+may be said to the attendant courtiers.]
+
+[Footnote 4: He says this while Hamlet is still choosing, in order that
+a second bundle of foils, in which is the unbated and poisoned one, may
+be brought him. So 'generous and free from all contriving' is Hamlet,
+(220) that, even with the presentiment in his heart, he has no fear of
+treachery.]
+
+[Footnote 5: As persons of the drama, the Poet means Laertes to be foil
+to Hamlet.--With the play upon the word before us, we can hardly help
+thinking of the _third_ signification of the word _foil_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'My ignorance will be the foil of darkest night to the
+burning star of your skill.' This is no flattery; Hamlet believes
+Laertes, to whose praises he has listened (218)--though not with the
+envy his uncle attributes to him--the better fencer: he expects to win
+only 'at the odds.' 260.]
+
+[Footnote 7: --not '_by these pickers and stealers_,' his oath to his
+false friends. 154.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Plainly a favourite with the king.--He is _Ostricke_ always
+in the _Q_.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'seen you both play'--though not together.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _Point thus_:
+
+    I do not fear it--I have seen you both!
+    But since, he is bettered: we have therefore odds.
+
+'Since'--'_since the time I saw him_.']
+
+[Page 266]
+
+_Laer_. This is too heauy,
+Let me see another.[1]
+
+_Ham_. This likes me well,
+These Foyles haue all a length.[2]   _Prepare to play._[3]
+
+_Osricke_. I my good Lord.                           [Sidenote: _Ostr._]
+
+_King_. Set me the Stopes of wine vpon that Table:
+If _Hamlet_ giue the first, or second hit,
+Or quit in answer of the third exchange,[4]
+Let all the Battlements their Ordinance fire,
+[Sidenote: 268] The King shal drinke to _Hamlets_ better breath,
+And in the Cup an vnion[5] shal he throw            [Sidenote: an Vince]
+Richer then that,[6] which foure successiue Kings
+In Denmarkes Crowne haue worne.
+Giue me the Cups,
+And let the Kettle to the Trumpets speake,           [Sidenote: trumpet]
+The Trumpet to the Cannoneer without,
+The Cannons to the Heauens, the Heauen to Earth,
+Now the King drinkes to _Hamlet_. Come, begin,
+                                       [Sidenote: _Trumpets the while._]
+And you the Iudges[7] beare a wary eye.
+
+_Ham_. Come on sir.
+
+_Laer_. Come on sir.          _They play._[8]  [Sidenote: Come my Lord.]
+
+_Ham_. One.
+
+_Laer_. No.
+
+_Ham_. Iudgement.[9]
+
+_Osr_. A hit, a very palpable hit.                [Sidenote: _Ostrick._]
+
+_Laer_. Well: againe.             [Sidenote: _Drum, trumpets and a shot.
+                                            Florish, a peece goes off._]
+
+_King_. Stay, giue me drinke.
+_Hamlet_, this Pearle is thine,
+Here's to thy health. Giue him the cup,[10]
+
+             _Trumpets sound, and shot goes off._[11]
+
+_Ham_. Ile play this bout first, set by a-while.[12]
+                                                   [Sidenote: set it by]
+Come: Another hit; what say you?
+
+_Laer_. A touch, a touch, I do confesse.[13]
+                                      [Sidenote: _Laer_. | doe confest.]
+
+_King_. Our Sonne shall win.
+
+[Footnote 1: --to make it look as if he were choosing.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --asked in an offhand way. The fencers must not measure
+weapons, because how then could the unbated point escape discovery? It
+is quite like Hamlet to take even Osricke's word for their equal
+length.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'or be quits with Laertes the third bout':--in any case,
+whatever the probabilities, even if Hamlet be wounded, the king, who has
+not perfect confidence in the 'unction,' will fall back on his second
+line of ambush--in which he has more trust: he will drink to Hamlet,
+when Hamlet will be bound to drink also.]
+
+[Footnote 5: The Latin _unio_ was a large pearl. The king's _union_ I
+take to be poison made up like a pearl.]
+
+[Footnote 6: --a well-known one in the crown.]
+
+[Footnote 7: --of whom Osricke was one.]
+
+[Footnote 8: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 9: --appealing to the judges.]
+
+[Footnote 10: He throws in the _pearl_, and drinks--for it will take
+some moments to dissolve and make the wine poisonous--then sends the cup
+to Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 11: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 12: He does not refuse to drink, but puts it by, neither
+showing nor entertaining suspicion, fearing only the effect of the
+draught on his play. He is bent on winning the wager--perhaps with
+further intent.]
+
+[Footnote 13: Laertes has little interest in the match, but much in his
+own play.]
+
+[Page 268]
+
+[Sidenote: 266] _Qu_. He's fat, and scant of breath.[1]
+Heere's a Napkin, rub thy browes,
+                               [Sidenote: Heere _Hamlet_ take my napkin]
+The Queene Carowses to thy fortune, _Hamlet_.
+
+_Ham_. Good Madam.[2]
+
+_King_. _Gertrude_, do not drinke.
+
+_Qu_. I will my Lord;
+I pray you pardon me.[3]
+
+[Sidenote: 222]_King_. It is the poyson'd Cup, it is too late.[4]
+
+_Ham_. I dare not drinke yet Madam,
+By and by.[5]
+
+_Qu_. Come, let me wipe thy face.[6]
+
+_Laer_. My Lord, Ile hit him now.
+
+_King_. I do not thinke't.
+
+_Laer_. And yet 'tis almost 'gainst my conscience.[7]
+                                             [Sidenote: it is | against]
+
+_Ham_. Come for the third.
+_Laertes_, you but dally,                        [Sidenote: you doe but]
+I pray you passe with your best violence,
+I am affear'd you make a wanton of me.[8]      [Sidenote: I am sure you]
+
+_Laer_. Say you so? Come on.      _Play._
+
+_Osr_. Nothing neither way.                          [Sidenote: _Ostr._]
+
+_Laer_. Haue at you now.[9]
+
+    _In scuffling they change Rapiers._[10]
+
+_King_. Part them, they are incens'd.[11]
+
+_Ham_. Nay come, againe.[12]
+
+_Osr_. Looke to the Queene there hoa.  [Sidenote: _Ostr._ | there howe.]
+
+_Hor_. They bleed on both sides. How is't my           [Sidenote: is it]
+Lord?
+
+_Osr_. How is't _Laertes_?                           [Sidenote: _Ostr._]
+
+_Laer_. Why as a Woodcocke[13]
+To mine Sprindge, _Osricke_,   [Sidenote: mine owne sprindge _Ostrick_,]
+I am iustly kill'd with mine owne Treacherie.[14]
+
+_Ham_. How does the Queene?
+
+_King_. She sounds[15] to see them bleede.
+
+_Qu_. No, no, the drinke, the drinke[16]
+
+[Footnote 1: She is anxious about him. It may be that this speech, and
+that of the king before (266), were fitted to the person of the actor
+who first represented Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --a simple acknowledgment of her politeness: he can no more
+be familiarly loving with his mother.]
+
+[Footnote 3: She drinks, and offers the cup to Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 4: He is too much afraid of exposing his villainy to be prompt
+enough to prevent her.]
+
+[Footnote 5: This is not meant by the Poet to show suspicion: he does
+not mean Hamlet to die so.]
+
+[Footnote 6: The actor should not allow her: she approaches Hamlet; he
+recoils a little.]
+
+[Footnote 7: He has compunctions, but it needs failure to make them
+potent.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'treat me as an effeminate creature.']
+
+[Footnote 9: He makes a sudden attack, without warning of the fourth
+bout.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _Not in Q._
+
+The 1st Q. directs:--_They catch one anothers Rapiers, find both are
+wounded_, &c.
+
+The thing, as I understand it, goes thus: With the words 'Have at you
+now!' Laertes stabs Hamlet; Hamlet, apprised thus of his treachery, lays
+hold of his rapier, wrenches it from him, and stabs him with it in
+return.]
+
+[Footnote 11: 'they have lost their temper.']
+
+[Footnote 12: --said with indignation and scorn, but without suspicion
+of the worst.]
+
+[Footnote 13: --the proverbially foolish bird. The speech must be spoken
+with breaks. Its construction is broken.]
+
+[Footnote 14: His conscience starts up, awake and strong, at the
+approach of Death. As the show of the world withdraws, the realities
+assert themselves. He repents, and makes confession of his sin, seeing
+it now in its true nature, and calling it by its own name. It is a
+compensation of the weakness of some that they cannot be strong in
+wickedness. The king did not so repent, and with his strength was the
+more to blame.]
+
+[Footnote 15: _swounds, swoons_.]
+
+[Footnote 16: She is true to her son. The maternal outlasts the
+adulterous.]
+
+[Page 270]
+
+Oh my deere _Hamlet_, the drinke, the drinke,
+I am poyson'd.
+
+_Ham_. Oh Villany! How? Let the doore be lock'd.
+Treacherie, seeke it out.[1]
+
+_Laer_. It is heere _Hamlet_.[2]
+_Hamlet_,[3] thou art slaine,
+No Medicine in the world can do thee good.
+In thee, there is not halfe an houre of life;   [Sidenote: houres life,]
+The Treacherous Instrument is in thy hand,             [Sidenote: in my]
+Vnbated and envenom'd: the foule practise[4]
+Hath turn'd it selfe on me. Loe, heere I lye,
+Neuer to rise againe: Thy Mothers poyson'd:
+I can no more, the King, the King's too blame.[5]
+
+_Ham_. The point envenom'd too,
+Then venome to thy worke.[6]
+                         _Hurts the King._[7]
+
+_All_. Treason, Treason.
+
+_King_. O yet defend me Friends, I am but hurt.
+
+_Ham_. Heere thou incestuous, murdrous,
+                         [Sidenote:  Heare thou incestious damned Dane,]
+Damned Dane,
+Drinke off this Potion: Is thy Vnion heere?
+                               [Sidenote: of this | is the Onixe heere?]
+Follow my Mother.[8]           _King Dyes._[9]
+
+_Laer_. He is iustly seru'd.
+It is a poyson temp'red by himselfe:
+Exchange forgiuenesse with me, Noble _Hamlet_;
+Mine and my Fathers death come not vpon thee,
+Nor thine on me.[10]                 _Dyes._[11]
+
+_Ham_. Heauen make thee free of it,[12] I follow thee.
+I am dead _Horatio_, wretched Queene adiew.
+You that looke pale, and tremble at this chance,
+That are but Mutes[13] or audience to this acte:
+Had I but time (as this fell Sergeant death
+Is strick'd in his Arrest) oh I could tell you.       [Sidenote: strict]
+
+[Footnote 1: The thing must be ended now. The door must be locked, to
+keep all in that are in, and all out that are out. Then he can do as he
+will.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --laying his hand on his heart, I think.]
+
+[Footnote 3: In Q. _Hamlet_ only once.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _scheme, artifice, deceitful contrivance_; in modern slang,
+_dodge_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: He turns on the prompter of his sin--crowning the justice
+of the king's capital punishment.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _Point_: 'too!'
+
+_1st Q._ Then venome to thy venome, die damn'd villaine.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _Not in Quarto._
+
+The true moment, now only, has at last come. Hamlet has lived to do his
+duty with a clear conscience, and is thereupon permitted to go. The man
+who asks whether this be poetic justice or no, is unworthy of an answer.
+'The Tragedie of Hamlet' is _The Drama of Moral Perplexity_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: A grim play on the word _Union: 'follow my mother_'. It
+suggests a terrible meeting below.]
+
+[Footnote 9: _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 10: His better nature triumphs. The moment he was wounded,
+knowing he must die, he began to change. Defeat is a mighty aid to
+repentance; and processes grow rapid in the presence of Death: he
+forgives and desires forgiveness.]
+
+[Footnote 11: _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 12: Note how heartily Hamlet pardons the wrong done to
+himself--the only wrong of course which a man has to pardon.]
+
+[Footnote 13: _supernumeraries_. Note the other figures too--_audience,
+act_--all of the theatre.]
+
+[Page 272]
+
+But let it be: _Horatio_, I am dead,
+Thou liu'st, report me and my causes right     [Sidenote: cause a right]
+To the vnsatisfied.[1]
+
+_Hor_. Neuer beleeue it.
+[Sidenote: 134] I am more an Antike Roman then a Dane:
+[Sidenote: 135] Heere's yet some Liquor left.[2]
+
+_Ham_. As th'art a man, giue me the Cup.
+Let go, by Heauen Ile haue't.                          [Sidenote: hate,]
+[Sidenote: 114, 251] Oh good _Horatio_, what a wounded name,[3]
+                                            [Sidenote: O god _Horatio_,]
+(Things standing thus vnknowne) shall liue behind me.
+                                    [Sidenote: shall I leaue behind me?]
+If thou did'st euer hold me in thy heart,
+Absent thee from felicitie awhile,
+And in this harsh world draw thy breath in paine,[1]
+                                      [Sidenote: _A march a farre off._]
+To tell my Storie.[4]
+            _March afarre off, and shout within._[5]
+What warlike noyse is this?
+
+_Enter Osricke._
+
+_Osr_. Yong _Fortinbras_, with conquest come from Poland
+To th'Ambassadors of England giues this warlike volly.[6]
+
+_Ham_. O I dye _Horatio_:
+The potent poyson quite ore-crowes my spirit,
+I cannot liue to heare the Newes from England,
+[Sidenote: 62] But I do prophesie[7] th'election lights
+[Sidenote: 276] On _Fortinbras_, he ha's my dying voyce,[8]
+So tell him with the occurrents more and lesse,[9]       [Sidenote: th']
+Which haue solicited.[10] The rest is silence. O, o, o, o.[11]
+                                       _Dyes_[12]
+
+_Hora_. Now cracke a Noble heart:                   [Sidenote: cracks a]
+Goodnight sweet Prince,
+And flights of Angels sing thee to thy rest,
+Why do's the Drumme come hither?
+
+[Footnote 1: His care over his reputation with the people is princely,
+and casts a true light on his delay. No good man can be willing to seem
+bad, except the _being good_ necessitates it. A man must be willing to
+appear a villain if that is the consequence of being a true man, but he
+cannot be indifferent to that appearance. He cannot be indifferent to
+wearing the look of the thing he hates. Hamlet, that he may be
+understood by the nation, makes, with noble confidence in his
+friendship, the large demand on Horatio, to live and suffer for his
+sake.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Here first we see plainly the love of Horatio for Hamlet:
+here first is Hamlet's judgment of Horatio (134) justified.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --for having killed his uncle:--what, then, if he had slain
+him at once?]
+
+[Footnote 4: Horatio must be represented as here giving sign of assent.
+
+_1st Q._
+
+    _Ham_. Vpon my loue I charge thee let it goe,
+    O fie _Horatio_, and if thou shouldst die,
+    What a scandale wouldst thou leaue behinde?
+    What tongue should tell the story of our deaths,
+    If not from thee?]
+
+[Footnote 5: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 6: The frame is closing round the picture. 9.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Shakspere more than once or twice makes the dying
+prophesy.]
+
+[Footnote 8: His last thought is for his country; his last effort at
+utterance goes to prevent a disputed succession.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'greater and less'--as in the psalm,
+
+    'The Lord preserves all, more and less,
+      That bear to him a loving heart.']
+
+[Footnote 10: led to the necessity.]
+
+[Footnote 11: _These interjections are not in the Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 12: _Not in Q._
+
+All Shakspere's tragedies suggest that no action ever ends, only goes
+off the stage of the world on to another.]
+
+[Page 274]
+
+[Sidenote: 190] _Enter Fortinbras and English Ambassador, with_
+                 [Sidenote: _Enter Fortenbrasse, with the Embassadors._]
+  _Drumme, Colours, and Attendants._
+
+_Fortin_. Where is this sight?
+
+_Hor_. What is it ye would see;                          [Sidenote: you]
+If ought of woe, or wonder, cease your search.[1]
+
+_For_. His quarry[2] cries on hauocke.[3] Oh proud death,
+                                                 [Sidenote: This quarry]
+What feast is toward[4] in thine eternall Cell.
+That thou so many Princes, at a shoote,                 [Sidenote: shot]
+So bloodily hast strooke.[5]
+
+_Amb_. The sight is dismall,
+And our affaires from England come too late,
+The eares are senselesse that should giue vs hearing,[6]
+To tell him his command'ment is fulfill'd,
+That _Rosincrance_ and _Guildensterne_ are dead:
+Where should we haue our thankes?[7]
+
+_Hor_. Not from his mouth,[8]
+Had it[9] th'abilitie of life to thanke you:
+He neuer gaue command'ment for their death.
+[Sidenote: 6] But since so iumpe[10] vpon this bloodie question,[11]
+You from the Polake warres, and you from England
+Are heere arriued. Giue order[12] that these bodies
+High on a stage be placed to the view,
+And let me speake to th'yet vnknowing world,        [Sidenote: , to yet]
+How these things came about. So shall you heare
+Of carnall, bloudie, and vnnaturall acts,[13]
+Of accidentall Judgements,[14] casuall slaughters[15]
+Of death's put on by cunning[16] and forc'd cause,[17]
+                                   [Sidenote: deaths | and for no cause]
+And in this vpshot, purposes mistooke,[18]
+Falne on the Inuentors heads. All this can I             [Sidenote: th']
+Truly deliuer.
+
+_For_. Let vs hast to heare it,
+And call the Noblest to the Audience.
+For me, with sorrow, I embrace my Fortune,
+I haue some Rites of memory[19] in this Kingdome,
+                                               [Sidenote: rights of[19]]
+
+[Footnote 1: --for here it is.]
+
+[Footnote 2: the heap of game after a hunt.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'Havoc's victims cry out against him.']
+
+[Footnote 4: in preparation.]
+
+[Footnote 5: All the real actors in the tragedy, except Horatio, are
+dead.]
+
+[Footnote 6: This line may be taken as a parenthesis; then--'come too
+late' joins itself with 'to tell him.' Or we may connect 'hearing' with
+'to tell him':--'the ears that should give us hearing in order that we
+might tell him' etc.]
+
+[Footnote 7: They thus inquire after the successor of Claudius.]
+
+[Footnote 8: --the mouth of Claudius.]
+
+[Footnote 9: --even if it had.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'so exactly,' or 'immediately'--perhaps
+_opportunely--fittingly_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: dispute, strife.]
+
+[Footnote 12: --addressed to Fortinbras, I should say. The state is
+disrupt, the household in disorder; there is no head; Horatio turns
+therefore to Fortinbras, who, besides having a claim to the crown, and
+being favoured by Hamlet, alone has power at the moment--for his army is
+with him.]
+
+[Footnote 13: --those of Claudius.]
+
+[Footnote 14: 'just judgments brought about by accident'--as in the case
+of all slain except the king, whose judgment was not accidental, and
+Hamlet, whose death was not a judgment.]
+
+[Footnote 15: --those of the queen, Polonius, and Ophelia.]
+
+[Footnote 16: 'put on,' _indued_, 'brought on themselves'--those of
+Rosincrance, Guildensterne, and Laertes.]
+
+[Footnote 17: --those of the king and Polonius.]
+
+[Footnote 18: 'and in this result'--_pointing to the bodies_--'purposes
+which have mistaken their way, and fallen on the inventors' heads.' _I
+am mistaken_ or _mistook_, means _I have mistaken_; 'purposes
+mistooke'--_purposes in themselves mistaken_:--that of Laertes, which
+came back on himself; and that of the king in the matter of the poison,
+which, by falling on the queen, also came back on the inventor.]
+
+[Footnote 19: The _Quarto_ is correct here, I think: '_rights of the
+past_'--'claims of descent.' Or 'rights of memory' might mean--'_rights
+yet remembered_.'
+
+Fortinbras is not one to miss a chance: even in this shadowy 'person,'
+character is recognizably maintained.]
+
+[Page 276]
+
+Which are to claime,[1] my vantage doth   [Sidenote: Which now to clame]
+Inuite me,
+
+_Hor_. Of that I shall haue alwayes[2] cause to speake,
+                                          [Sidenote: haue also cause[3]]
+And from his mouth
+[Sidenote: 272] Whose voyce will draw on more:[3]
+                                              [Sidenote: drawe no more,]
+But let this same be presently perform'd,
+Euen whiles mens mindes are wilde,                     [Sidenote: while]
+Lest more mischance
+On plots, and errors happen.[4]
+
+_For_. Let foure Captaines
+Beare _Hamlet_ like a Soldier to the Stage,
+For he was likely, had he beene put on[5]
+To haue prou'd most royally:[6]                      [Sidenote: royall;]
+And for his passage,[7]
+The Souldiours Musicke, and the rites of Warre[8]   [Sidenote: right of]
+Speake[9] lowdly for him.
+Take vp the body; Such a sight as this               [Sidenote: bodies,]
+Becomes the Field, but heere shewes much amis.
+Go, bid the Souldiers shoote.[10]
+
+_Exeunt Marching: after the which, a Peale_        [Sidenote: _Exeunt._]
+_of Ordenance are shot off._
+
+
+FINIS.
+
+[Footnote 1: 'which must now be claimed'--except the _Quarto_ be right
+here also.]
+
+[Footnote 2: The _Quarto_ surely is right here.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --Hamlet's mouth. The message he entrusted to Horatio for
+Fortinbras, giving his voice, or vote, for him, was sure to 'draw on
+more' voices.]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'lest more mischance happen in like manner, through plots
+and mistakes.']
+
+[Footnote 5: 'had he been put forward'--_had occasion sent him out_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'to have proved a most royal soldier:'--A soldier gives
+here his testimony to Hamlet's likelihood in the soldier's calling. Note
+the kind of regard in which the Poet would show him held.]
+
+[Footnote 7: --the passage of his spirit to its place.]
+
+[Footnote 8: --military mourning or funeral rites.]
+
+[Footnote 9: _imperative mood_: 'let the soldier's music and the rites
+of war speak loudly for him.' 'Go, bid the souldiers shoote,' with which
+the drama closes, is a more definite initiatory order to the same
+effect.]
+
+[Footnote 10: The end is a half-line after a riming couplet--as if there
+were more to come--as there must be after every tragedy. Mere poetic
+justice will not satisfy Shakspere in a tragedy, for tragedy is _life_;
+in a comedy it may do well enough, for that deals but with
+life-surfaces--and who then more careful of it! but in tragedy something
+far higher ought to be aimed at. The end of this drama is reached when
+Hamlet, having attained the possibility of doing so, performs his work
+_in righteousness_. The common critical mind would have him left the
+fatherless, motherless, loverless, almost friendless king of a
+justifiably distrusting nation--with an eternal grief for his father
+weighing him down to the abyss; with his mother's sin blackening for him
+all womankind, and blasting the face of both heaven and earth; and with
+the knowledge in his heart that he had sent the woman he loved, with her
+father and her brother, out of the world--maniac, spy, and traitor.
+Instead of according him such 'poetic justice,' the Poet gives Hamlet
+the only true success of doing his duty to the end--for it was as much
+his duty not to act before, as it was his duty to act at last--then
+sends him after his Ophelia--into a world where true heart will find
+true way of setting right what is wrong, and of atoning for every ill,
+wittingly or unwittingly done or occasioned in this.
+
+It seems to me most admirable that Hamlet, being so great, is yet
+outwardly so like other people: the Poet never obtrudes his greatness.
+And just because he is modest, confessing weakness and perplexity, small
+people take him for yet smaller than themselves who never confess
+anything, and seldom feel anything amiss with them. Such will adduce
+even Hamlet's disparagement of himself to Ophelia when overwhelmed with
+a sense of human worthlessness (126), as proof that he was no hero!
+They call it weakness that he would not, foolishly and selfishly, make
+good his succession against the king, regardless of the law of election,
+and careless of the weal of the kingdom for which he shows himself so
+anxious even in the throes of death! To my mind he is the grandest hero
+in fiction--absolutely human--so troubled, yet so true!]
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of
+Denmark, by George MacDonald
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark
+by George MacDonald
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark
+       A Study with the Text of the Folio of 1623
+
+Author: George MacDonald
+
+Release Date: January 5, 2004 [EBook #10606]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A STUDY OF HAMLET ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Jonathan Ingram, David King, and the Online Distributed
+proofreading Team
+
+
+
+
+
+THE TRAGEDIE OF
+HAMLET,
+PRINCE OF DENMARKE
+
+A STUDY WITH THE TEXT
+OF
+THE FOLIO OF 1623
+
+BY
+GEORGE MACDONALD
+
+"What would you gracious figure?"
+
+
+
+TO
+
+MY HONOURED RELATIVE
+
+ALEXANDER STEWART MACCOLL
+
+A LITTLE _LESS_ THAN KIN, AND _MORE_ THAN KIND
+
+TO WHOM I OWE IN ESPECIAL THE TRUE UNDERSTANDING OF
+
+THE GREAT SOLILOQUY
+
+I DEDICATE
+
+WITH LOVE AND GRATITUDE
+
+THIS EFFORT TO GIVE HAMLET AND SHAKSPERE THEIR DUE
+
+GEORGE MAC DONALD
+
+BORDIGHERA
+
+_Christmas_, 1884
+
+
+               Summary:
+
+The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark:
+ a study of the text of the folio of 1623
+          By George MacDonald
+[Motto]: "What would you, gracious figure?"
+
+Dr. Greville MacDonald looks on his father's commentary as the "most
+important interpretation of the play ever written... It is his intuitive
+understanding ... rather than learned analysis--of which there is yet
+overwhelming evidence--that makes it so splendid."
+
+Reading Level: Mature youth and adults.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE
+
+
+By this edition of HAMLET I hope to help the student of Shakspere to
+understand the play--and first of all Hamlet himself, whose spiritual
+and moral nature are the real material of the tragedy, to which every
+other interest of the play is subservient. But while mainly attempting,
+from the words and behaviour Shakspere has given him, to explain the
+man, I have cast what light I could upon everything in the play,
+including the perplexities arising from extreme condensation of meaning,
+figure, and expression.
+
+As it is more than desirable that the student should know when he is
+reading the most approximate presentation accessible of what Shakspere
+uttered, and when that which modern editors have, with reason good or
+bad, often not without presumption, substituted for that which they
+received, I have given the text, letter for letter, point for point, of
+the First Folio, with the variations of the Second Quarto in the margin
+and at the foot of the page.
+
+Of HAMLET there are but two editions of authority, those called the
+Second Quarto and the First Folio; but there is another which requires
+remark.
+
+In the year 1603 came out the edition known as the First Quarto--clearly
+without the poet's permission, and doubtless as much to his displeasure:
+the following year he sent out an edition very different, and larger in
+the proportion of one hundred pages to sixty-four. Concerning the former
+my theory is--though it is not my business to enter into the question
+here--that it was printed from Shakspere's sketch for the play, written
+with matter crowding upon him too fast for expansion or development, and
+intended only for a continuous memorandum of things he would take up and
+work out afterwards. It seems almost at times as if he but marked
+certain bales of thought so as to find them again, and for the present
+threw them aside--knowing that by the marks he could recall the thoughts
+they stood for, but not intending thereby to convey them to any reader.
+I cannot, with evidence before me, incredible but through the eyes
+themselves, of the illimitable scope of printers' blundering, believe
+_all_ the confusion, unintelligibility, neglect of grammar,
+construction, continuity, sense, attributable to them. In parts it is
+more like a series of notes printed with the interlineations horribly
+jumbled; while in other parts it looks as if it had been taken down from
+the stage by an ear without a brain, and then yet more incorrectly
+printed; parts, nevertheless, in which it most differs from the
+authorized editions, are yet indubitably from the hand of Shakspere. I
+greatly doubt if any ready-writer would have dared publish some of its
+chaotic passages as taken down from the stage; nor do I believe the play
+was ever presented in anything like such an unfinished state. I rather
+think some fellow about the theatre, whether more rogue or fool we will
+pay him the thankful tribute not to enquire, chancing upon the crude
+embryonic mass in the poet's hand, traitorously pounced upon it, and
+betrayed it to the printers--therein serving the poet such an evil turn
+as if a sculptor's workman took a mould of the clay figure on which his
+master had been but a few days employed, and published casts of it as
+the sculptor's work.[1] To us not the less is the _corpus delicti_
+precious--and that unspeakably--for it enables us to see something of
+the creational development of the drama, besides serving occasionally to
+cast light upon portions of it, yielding hints of the original intention
+where the after work has less plainly presented it.
+
+[Footnote 1: Shakspere has in this matter fared even worse than Sir
+Thomas Browne, the first edition of whose _Religio Medici_, nowise
+intended for the public, was printed without his knowledge.]
+
+The Second Quarto bears on its title-page, compelled to a recognition of
+the former,--'Newly imprinted and enlarged to almost as much againe as
+it was, according to the true and perfect Coppie'; and it is in truth a
+harmonious world of which the former issue was but the chaos. It is the
+drama itself, the concluded work of the master's hand, though yet to be
+once more subjected to a little pruning, a little touching, a little
+rectifying. But the author would seem to have been as trusting over the
+work of the printers, as they were careless of his, and the result is
+sometimes pitiable. The blunders are appalling. Both in it and in the
+Folio the marginal note again and again suggests itself: 'Here the
+compositor was drunk, the press-reader asleep, the devil only aware.'
+But though the blunders elbow one another in tumultuous fashion, not
+therefore all words and phrases supposed to be such are blunders. The
+old superstition of plenary inspiration may, by its reverence for the
+very word, have saved many a meaning from the obliteration of a
+misunderstanding scribe: in all critical work it seems to me well to
+cling to the _word_ until one sinks not merely baffled, but exhausted.
+
+I come now to the relation between the Second Quarto and the Folio.
+
+My theory is--that Shakspere worked upon his own copy of the Second
+Quarto, cancelling and adding, and that, after his death, this copy
+came, along with original manuscripts, into the hands of his friends the
+editors of the Folio, who proceeded to print according to his
+alterations.
+
+These friends and editors in their preface profess thus: 'It had bene a
+thing, we confesse, worthie to haue bene wished, that the Author
+himselfe had liu'd to haue set forth, and ouerseen his owne writings;
+But since it hath bin ordain'd otherwise, and he by death departed from
+that right, we pray you do not envie his Friends, the office of their
+care, and paine, to haue collected & publish'd them, as where (before)
+you were abus'd with diuerse stolne, and surreptitious copies, maimed,
+and deformed by the frauds and stealthes of iniurious impostors, that
+expos'd them: euen those, are now offer'd to your view cur'd, and
+perfect of their limbes; and all the rest, absolute in their numbers, as
+he conceiued th[=e]. Who, as he was a happie imitator of Nature, was a
+most gentle expresser of it. His mind and hand went together: And what
+he thought, he vttered with that easinesse, that wee haue scarse
+receiued from him a blot in his papers. But it is not our prouince, who
+onely gather his works, and giue them you, to praise him. It is yours
+that reade him.'
+
+These are hardly the words of men who would take liberties, and
+liberties enormous, after ideas of their own, with the text of a friend
+thus honoured. But although they printed with intent altogether
+faithful, they did so certainly without any adequate jealousy of the
+printers--apparently without a suspicion of how they could blunder. Of
+blunders therefore in the Folio also there are many, some through mere
+following of blundered print, some in fresh corruption of the same, some
+through mistaking of the manuscript corrections, and some probably from
+the misprinting of mistakes, so that the corrections themselves are at
+times anything but correctly recorded. I assume also that the printers
+were not altogether above the mean passion, common to the day-labourers
+of Art, from Chaucer's Adam Scrivener down to the present carvers of
+marble, for modifying and improving the work of the master. The vain
+incapacity of a self-constituted critic will make him regard his poorest
+fancy as an emendation; seldom has he the insight of Touchstone to
+recognize, or his modesty to acknowledge, that although his own, it is
+none the less an ill-favoured thing.
+
+Not such, however, was the spirit of the editors; and all the changes of
+importance from the text of the Quarto I receive as Shakspere's own.
+With this belief there can be no presumption in saying that they seem to
+me not only to trim the parts immediately affected, but to render the
+play more harmonious and consistent. It is no presumption to take the
+Poet for superior to his work and capable of thinking he could better
+it--neither, so believing, to imagine one can see that he has been
+successful.
+
+A main argument for the acceptance of the Folio edition as the Poet's
+last presentment of his work, lies in the fact that there are passages
+in it which are not in the Quarto, and are very plainly from his hand.
+If we accept these, what right have we to regard the omission from the
+Folio of passages in the Quarto as not proceeding from the same hand?
+Had there been omissions only, we might well have doubted; but the
+insertions greatly tend to remove the doubt. I cannot even imagine the
+arguments which would prevail upon me to accept the latter and refuse
+the former. Omission itself shows for a master-hand: see the magnificent
+passage omitted, and rightly, by Milton from the opening of his _Comus_.
+
+'But when a man has published two forms of a thing, may we not judge
+between him and himself, and take the reading we like better?'
+Assuredly. Take either the Quarto or the Folio; both are Shakspere's.
+Take any reading from either, and defend it. But do not mix up the two,
+retaining what he omits along with what he inserts, and print them so.
+This is what the editors do--and the thing is not Shakspere's. With
+homage like this, no artist could be other than indignant. It is well to
+show every difference, even to one of spelling where it might indicate
+possibly a different word, but there ought to be no mingling of
+differences. If I prefer the reading of the Quarto to that of the Folio,
+as may sometimes well happen where blunders so abound, I say I
+_prefer_--I do not dare to substitute. My student shall owe nothing of
+his text to any but the editors of the Folio, John Heminge and Henrie
+Condell.
+
+I desire to take him with me. I intend a continuous, but ever-varying,
+while one-ended lesson. We shall follow the play step by step, avoiding
+almost nothing that suggests difficulty, and noting everything that
+seems to throw light on the character of a person of the drama. The
+pointing I consider a matter to be dealt with as any one pleases--for
+the sake of sense, of more sense, of better sense, as much as if the
+text were a Greek manuscript without any division of words. This
+position I need not argue with anyone who has given but a cursory glance
+to the original page, or knows anything of printers' pointing. I hold
+hard by the word, for that is, or may be, grain: the pointing as we have
+it is merest chaff, and more likely to be wrong than right. Here also,
+however, I change nothing in the text, only suggest in the notes. Nor do
+I remark on any of the pointing where all that is required is the
+attention of the student.
+
+Doubtless many will consider not a few of the notes unnecessary. But
+what may be unnecessary to one, may be welcome to another, and it is
+impossible to tell what a student may or may not know. At the same time
+those form a large class who imagine they know a thing when they do not
+understand it enough to see there is a difficulty in it: to such, an
+attempt at explanation must of course seem foolish.
+
+A _number_ in the margin refers to a passage of the play or in the
+notes, and is the number of the page where the passage is to be found.
+If the student finds, for instance, against a certain line upon page 8,
+the number 12, and turns to page 12, he will there find the number 8
+against a certain line: the two lines or passages are to be compared,
+and will be found in some way parallel, or mutually explanatory.
+
+Wherever I refer to the Quarto, I intend the 2nd Quarto--that is
+Shakspere's own authorized edition, published in his life-time. Where
+occasionally I refer to the surreptitious edition, the mere inchoation
+of the drama, I call it, as it is, the _1st Quarto_.
+
+Any word or phrase or stage-direction in the 2nd Quarto differing from
+that in the Folio, is placed on the margin in a line with the other:
+choice between them I generally leave to my student. Omissions are
+mainly given as footnotes. Each edition does something to correct the
+errors of the other.
+
+I beg my companion on this journey to let Hamlet reveal himself in the
+play, to observe him as he assumes individuality by the concretion of
+characteristics. I warn him that any popular notion concerning him which
+he may bring with him, will be only obstructive to a perception of the
+true idea of the grandest of all Shakspere's presentations.
+
+It will amuse this and that man to remark how often I speak of Hamlet as
+if he were a real man and not the invention of Shakspere--for indeed the
+Hamlet of the old story is no more that of Shakspere than a lump of coal
+is a diamond; but I imagine, if he tried the thing himself, he would
+find it hardly possible to avoid so speaking, and at the same time say
+what he had to say.
+
+I give hearty thanks to the press-reader, a gentleman whose name I do
+not know, not only for keen watchfulness over the printing-difficulties
+of the book, but for saving me from several blunders in derivation.
+
+BORDIGHERA: _December_, 1884.
+
+[Transcriber's Note: In the paper original, each left-facing page
+contained the text of the play, with sidenotes and footnote references,
+and the corresponding right-facing page contained the footnotes
+themselves and additional commentary. In this electronic text, the
+play-text pages are numbered (contrary to custom in electronic texts),
+to allow use of the cross-references provided in the sidenotes and
+footnotes. In the play text, sidenotes towards the left of the page are
+those marginal cross-references described earlier, and sidenotes toward
+the right of the page are the differences noted a few paragraphs later.]
+
+[Page 1]
+
+
+
+
+THE TRAGEDIE
+
+OF
+
+HAMLET
+
+PRINCE OF DENMARKE.
+
+[Page 2]
+
+
+
+
+_ACTUS PRIMUS._
+
+
+_Enter Barnardo and Francisco two Centinels_[1].
+
+_Barnardo._ Who's there?
+
+_Fran._[2] Nay answer me: Stand and vnfold yourselfe.
+
+_Bar._ Long liue the King.[3]
+
+_Fran._ _Barnardo?_
+
+_Bar._ He.
+
+_Fran._ You come most carefully vpon your houre.
+
+_Bar._ 'Tis now strook twelue, get thee to bed _Francisco_.
+
+_Fran._ For this releefe much thankes:  'Tis
+[Sidenote: 42] bitter cold,
+And I am sicke at heart.[4]
+
+_Barn._ Haue you had quiet Guard?[5]
+
+_Fran._ Not a Mouse stirring.
+
+_Barn._ Well, goodnight. If you do meet _Horatio_ and
+_Marcellus_, the Riuals[6] of my Watch, bid them make hast.
+
+_Enter Horatio and Marcellus._
+
+_Fran._ I thinke I heare them. Stand: who's there?
+                                     [Sidenote: Stand ho, who is there?]
+
+_Hor._ Friends to this ground.
+
+_Mar._ And Leige-men to the Dane.
+
+_Fran._ Giue you good night.
+
+_Mar._ O farwel honest Soldier, who hath           [Sidenote: souldiers]
+relieu'd you?
+
+[Footnote 1: --meeting. Almost dark.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --on the post, and with the right of challenge.]
+
+[Footnote 3: The watchword.]
+
+[Footnote 4: The key-note to the play--as in _Macbeth_: 'Fair is
+foul and foul is fair.' The whole nation is troubled by late events at
+court.]
+
+[Footnote 5: --thinking of the apparition.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _Companions_.]
+
+[Page 4]
+
+_Fra._ _Barnardo_ ha's my place: giue you good-night.   [Sidenote: hath]
+_Exit Fran._
+
+_Mar._ Holla _Barnardo_.
+
+_Bar._ Say, what is Horatio there?
+
+_Hor._ A peece of him.
+
+_Bar._ Welcome _Horatio_, welcome good _Marcellus_.
+
+_Mar._ What, ha's this thing appear'd againe to    [Sidenote: _Hor_.[1]]
+night.
+
+_Bar._ I haue seene nothing.
+
+_Mar._ Horatio saies, 'tis but our Fantasie,
+And will not let beleefe take hold of him
+Touching this dreaded sight, twice seene of vs,
+Therefore I haue intreated him along
+With vs, to watch the minutes of this Night,
+That if againe this Apparition come,
+[Sidenote: 6] He may approue our eyes, and speake to it.[2]
+
+_Hor._ Tush, tush, 'twill not appeare.
+
+_Bar._ Sit downe a-while,
+And let vs once againe assaile your eares,
+That are so fortified against our Story,
+What we two Nights haue seene.          [Sidenote: have two nights seen]
+
+_Hor._ Well, sit we downe,
+And let vs heare _Barnardo_ speake of this.
+
+_Barn._ Last night of all,
+When yond same Starre that's Westward from the Pole
+Had made his course t'illume that part of Heauen
+Where now it burnes, _Marcellus_ and my selfe,
+The Bell then beating one.[3]
+
+_Mar._ Peace, breake thee of: _Enter the Ghost_. [Sidenote: Enter Ghost]
+Looke where it comes againe.
+
+_Barn._ In the same figure, like the King that's dead.
+
+[Footnote 1: Better, I think; for the tone is scoffing, and Horatio is
+the incredulous one who has not seen it.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --being a scholar, and able to address it as an apparition
+ought to be addressed--Marcellus thinking, perhaps, with others, that a
+ghost required Latin.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _1st Q._ 'towling one.]
+
+[Page 6]
+
+[Sidenote: 4] _Mar._ Thou art a Scholler; speake to it _Horatio._
+
+_Barn._ Lookes it not like the King? Marke it _Horatio_.
+                                                 [Sidenote: Looks a not]
+_Hora._ Most like: It harrowes me with fear and wonder.
+                                                 [Sidenote: horrowes[1]]
+
+_Barn._ It would be spoke too.[2]
+
+_Mar._ Question it _Horatio._          [Sidenote: Speak to it _Horatio_]
+
+_Hor._ What art thou that vsurp'st this time of night,[3]
+Together with that Faire and Warlike forme[4]
+In which the Maiesty of buried Denmarke
+Did sometimes[5] march: By Heauen I charge thee speake.
+
+_Mar._ It is offended.[6]
+
+_Barn._ See, it stalkes away.
+
+_Hor._ Stay: speake; speake: I Charge thee, speake.
+               _Exit the Ghost._               [Sidenote: _Exit Ghost._]
+
+_Mar._ 'Tis gone, and will not answer.
+
+_Barn._ How now _Horatio_? You tremble and look pale:
+Is not this something more then Fantasie?
+What thinke you on't?
+
+_Hor._ Before my God, I might not this beleeue
+Without the sensible and true auouch
+Of mine owne eyes.
+
+_Mar._ Is it not like the King?
+
+_Hor._ As thou art to thy selfe,
+Such was the very Armour he had on,
+When th' Ambitious Norwey combatted: [Sidenote: when he the ambitious]
+So frown'd he once, when in an angry parle
+He smot the sledded Pollax on the Ice.[8]         [Sidenote: sleaded[7]]
+'Tis strange.
+
+[Sidenote: 274] _Mar._ Thus twice before, and iust at this dead houre,
+                                            [Sidenote: and jump at this]
+
+[Footnote 1: _1st Q_. 'horrors mee'.]
+
+[Footnote 2: A ghost could not speak, it was believed, until it was
+spoken to.]
+
+[Footnote 3: It was intruding upon the realm of the embodied.]
+
+[Footnote 4: None of them took it as certainly the late king: it was
+only clear to them that it was like him. Hence they say, 'usurp'st the
+forme.']
+
+[Footnote 5: _formerly_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: --at the word _usurp'st_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Also _1st Q_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: The usual interpretation is 'the sledged Poles'; but not to
+mention that in a parley such action would have been treacherous, there
+is another far more picturesque, and more befitting the _angry parle_,
+at the same time more characteristic and forcible: the king in his anger
+smote his loaded pole-axe on the ice. There is some uncertainty about
+the word _sledded_ or _sleaded_ (which latter suggests _lead_), but we
+have the word _sledge_ and _sledge-hammer_, the smith's heaviest, and
+the phrase, 'a sledging blow.' The quarrel on the occasion referred to
+rather seems with the Norwegians (See Schmidt's _Shakespeare-Lexicon:
+Sledded_.) than with the Poles; and there would be no doubt as to the
+latter interpretation being the right one, were it not that _the
+Polacke_, for the Pole, or nation of the Poles, does occur in the play.
+That is, however, no reason why the Dane should not have carried a
+pole-axe, or caught one from the hand of an attendant. In both our
+authorities, and in the _1st Q_. also, the word is _pollax_--as in
+Chaucer's _Knights Tale_: 'No maner schot, ne pollax, ne schort
+knyf,'--in the _Folio_ alone with a capital; whereas not once in the
+play is the similar word that stands for the Poles used in the plural.
+In the _2nd Quarto_ there is _Pollacke_ three times, _Pollack_ once,
+_Pole_ once; in the _1st Quarto_, _Polacke_ twice; in the _Folio_,
+_Poleak_ twice, _Polake_ once. The Poet seems to have avoided the plural
+form.]
+
+[Page 8]
+
+With Martiall stalke,[1] hath he gone by our Watch.
+
+_Hor_. In what particular thought to work, I know not:
+But in the grosse and scope of my Opinion,              [Sidenote: mine]
+This boades some strange erruption to our State.
+
+_Mar_. Good now sit downe, and tell me he that knowes
+[Sidenote: 16] Why this same strict and most obseruant Watch,[2]
+So nightly toyles the subiect of the Land,
+And why such dayly Cast of Brazon Cannon
+                                    [Sidenote: And with such dayly cost]
+And Forraigne Mart for Implements of warre:
+Why such impresse of Ship-wrights, whose sore Taske
+Do's not diuide the Sunday from the weeke,
+What might be toward, that this sweaty hast[3]
+Doth make the Night ioynt-Labourer with the day:
+Who is't that can informe me?
+
+_Hor._ That can I,
+At least the whisper goes so: Our last King,
+Whose Image euen but now appear'd to vs,
+Was (as you know) by _Fortinbras_ of Norway,
+(Thereto prick'd on by a most emulate Pride)[4]
+Dar'd to the Combate. In which, our Valiant _Hamlet_,
+(For so this side of our knowne world esteem'd him)[5]
+[Sidenote: 6] Did slay this _Fortinbras_: who by a Seal'd Compact,
+Well ratified by Law, and Heraldrie,                 [Sidenote: heraldy]
+Did forfeite (with his life) all those his Lands       [Sidenote: these]
+Which he stood seiz'd on,[6] to the Conqueror:    [Sidenote: seaz'd of,]
+Against the which, a Moity[7] competent
+Was gaged by our King: which had return'd        [Sidenote: had returne]
+To the Inheritance of _Fortinbras_,
+
+[Footnote 1: _1st Q_. 'Marshall stalke'.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Here is set up a frame of external relations, to inclose
+with fitting contrast, harmony, and suggestion, the coming show of
+things. 273]
+
+[Footnote 3: _1st Q_. 'sweaty march'.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Pride that leads to emulate: the ambition to excel--not
+oneself, but another.]
+
+[Footnote 5: The whole western hemisphere.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _stood possessed of_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Used by Shakspere for _a part_.]
+
+[Page 10]
+
+Had he bin Vanquisher, as by the same Cou'nant
+                                             [Sidenote: the same comart]
+And carriage of the Article designe,[1]           [Sidenote: desseigne,]
+His fell to _Hamlet_. Now sir, young _Fortinbras_,
+Of vnimproued[2] Mettle, hot and full,
+Hath in the skirts of Norway, heere and there,
+Shark'd[3] vp a List of Landlesse Resolutes,     [Sidenote: of lawlesse]
+For Foode and Diet, to some Enterprize
+That hath a stomacke in't[4]: which is no other
+(And it doth well appeare vnto our State)              [Sidenote: As it]
+But to recouer of vs by strong hand
+And termes Compulsatiue, those foresaid Lands  [Sidenote: compulsatory,]
+So by his Father lost: and this (I take it)
+Is the maine Motiue of our Preparations,
+The Sourse of this our Watch, and the cheefe head
+Of this post-hast, and Romage[5] in the Land.
+
+       [A]_Enter Ghost againe_.
+
+But soft, behold: Loe, where it comes againe:
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+_Bar._ I thinke it be no other, but enso;
+Well may it sort[6] that this portentous figure
+Comes armed through our watch so like the King
+That was and is the question of these warres.
+
+_Hora._ A moth it is to trouble the mindes eye:
+In the most high and palmy state of Rome,
+A little ere the mightiest _Iulius_ fell
+The graues stood tennatlesse, and the sheeted dead
+Did squeake and gibber in the Roman streets[7]
+As starres with traines of fier, and dewes of blood
+Disasters in the sunne; and the moist starre,
+Vpon whose influence _Neptunes_ Empier stands
+Was sicke almost to doomesday with eclipse.
+And euen the like precurse of feare euents
+As harbindgers preceading still the fates
+And prologue to the _Omen_ comming on
+Haue heauen and earth together demonstrated
+Vnto our Climatures and countrymen.[8]
+
+               _Enter Ghost_.]
+
+[Footnote 1: French designe.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _not proved_ or _tried. Improvement_, as we use the word,
+is the result of proof or trial: _upon-proof-ment_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Is _shark'd_ related to the German _scharren_? _Zusammen
+scharren--to scrape together._ The Anglo-Saxon _searwian_ is _to
+prepare, entrap, take_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Some enterprise of acquisition; one for the sake of getting
+something.]
+
+[Footnote 5: In Scotch, _remish_--the noise of confused and varied
+movements; a _row_; a _rampage_.--Associated with French _remuage_?]
+
+[Footnote 6: _suit_: so used in Scotland still, I think.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _Julius Caesar_, act i. sc. 3, and act ii. sc. 2.]
+
+[Footnote 8: The only suggestion I dare make for the rectifying of the
+confusion of this speech is, that, if the eleventh line were inserted
+between the fifth and sixth, there would be sense, and very nearly
+grammar.
+
+                              and the sheeted dead
+    Did squeake and gibber in the Roman streets,
+    As harbindgers preceading still the fates;
+    As starres with traines of fier, and dewes of blood
+(Here understand _precede_)
+    Disasters in the sunne;
+
+The tenth will close with the twelfth line well enough.
+
+But no one, any more than myself, will be _satisfied_ with the
+suggestion. The probability is, of course, that a line has dropped out
+between the fifth and sixth. Anything like this would restore the
+connection:
+
+_The labouring heavens themselves teemed dire portent_
+As starres &c.]
+
+[Page 12]
+
+Ile crosse it, though it blast me.[1] Stay Illusion:[2]
+                                  [Sidenote: _It[4] spreads his armes_.]
+If thou hast any sound, or vse of Voyce,[3]
+Speake to me. If there be any good thing to be done,
+That may to thee do ease, and grace to me; speak to me.
+If thou art priuy to thy Countries Fate
+(Which happily foreknowing may auoyd) Oh speake.
+Or, if thou hast vp-hoorded in thy life
+Extorted Treasure in the wombe of Earth,
+(For which, they say, you Spirits oft walke in death)   [Sidenote: your]
+                                          [Sidenote: _The cocke crowes_]
+Speake of it. Stay, and speake. Stop it _Marcellus_.
+
+_Mar_. Shall I strike at it with my Partizan? [Sidenote: strike it with]
+
+_Hor_. Do, if it will not stand.
+
+_Barn_. 'Tis heere.
+
+_Hor_. 'Tis heere.
+
+_Mar_. 'Tis gone.         _Exit Ghost_[5]
+We do it wrong, being so Maiesticall[6]
+To offer it the shew of Violence,
+For it is as the Ayre, invulnerable,
+And our vaine blowes, malicious Mockery.
+
+_Barn_. It was about to speake, when the Cocke crew.
+
+_Hor_. And then it started, like a guilty thing
+Vpon a fearfull Summons. I haue heard,
+The Cocke that is the Trumpet to the day,      [Sidenote: to the morne,]
+Doth with his lofty and shrill-sounding Throate[7]
+Awake the God of Day: and at his warning,
+Whether in Sea, or Fire, in Earth, or Ayre,
+Th'extrauagant,[8] and erring[9] Spirit, hyes
+To his Confine. And of the truth heerein,
+This present Obiect made probation.[10]
+
+_Mar_. It faded on the crowing of the Cocke.[11]
+
+[Footnote 1: There are various tales of the blasting power of evil
+ghosts.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Plain doubt, and strong.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'sound of voice, or use of voice': physical or mental
+faculty of speech.]
+
+[Footnote 4: I judge this _It_ a mistake for _H._, standing for
+_Horatio_: he would stop it.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'As we cannot hurt it, our blows are a mockery; and it is
+wrong to mock anything so majestic': _For_ belongs to _shew_; 'We do it
+wrong, being so majestical, to offer it what is but a _show_ of
+violence, for it is, &c.']
+
+[Footnote 7: _1st Q._ 'his earely and shrill crowing throate.']
+
+[Footnote 8: straying beyond bounds.]
+
+[Footnote 9: wandering.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'gave proof.']
+
+[Footnote 11: This line said thoughtfully--as the text of the
+observation following it. From the _eerie_ discomfort of their position,
+Marcellus takes refuge in the thought of the Saviour's birth into the
+haunted world, bringing sweet law, restraint, and health.]
+
+[Page 14]
+
+Some sayes, that euer 'gainst that Season comes          [Sidenote: say]
+Wherein our Sauiours Birth is celebrated,
+The Bird of Dawning singeth all night long:        [Sidenote: This bird]
+And then (they say) no Spirit can walke abroad,
+                                          [Sidenote: spirit dare sturre]
+The nights are wholsome, then no Planets strike,
+No Faiery talkes, nor Witch hath power to Charme:
+                                             [Sidenote: fairy takes,[1]]
+So hallow'd, and so gracious is the time.      [Sidenote: is that time.]
+
+_Hor._ So haue I heard, and do in part beleeue it.
+But looke, the Morne in Russet mantle clad,
+Walkes o're the dew of yon high Easterne Hill,   [Sidenote: Eastward[2]]
+Breake we our Watch vp, and by my aduice              [Sidenote: advise]
+Let vs impart what we haue scene to night
+Vnto yong _Hamlet_. For vpon my life,
+This Spirit dumbe to vs, will speake to him:
+Do you consent we shall acquaint him with it,
+As needfull in our Loues, fitting our Duty?
+
+[Sidenote: 30] _Mar._ Let do't I pray, and I this morning know
+Where we shall finde him most conueniently.      [Sidenote: convenient.]
+                                       _Exeunt._
+
+
+SCENA SECUNDA[3]
+
+
+_Enter Claudius King of Denmarke. Gertrude the
+Queene, Hamlet, Polonius, Laertes, and his Sister
+Ophelia, Lords Attendant._[4]
+                  [Sidenote: _Florish. Enter Claudius, King of Denmarke,
+                   Gertrad the Queene, Counsaile: as Polonius, and his
+                   sonne Laertes, Hamelt Cum Abijs._]
+
+_King._ Though yet of _Hamlet_ our deere Brothers death
+                                                    [Sidenote: _Claud._]
+The memory be greene: and that it vs befitted
+To beare our hearts in greefe, and our whole Kingdome
+To be contracted in one brow of woe:
+Yet so farre hath Discretion fought with Nature,
+That we with wisest sorrow thinke on him,
+
+[Footnote 1: Does it mean--_carries off any child, leaving a
+changeling_? or does it mean--_affect with evil_, as a disease might
+infect or _take_?]
+
+[Footnote 2: _1st Q_. 'hie mountaine top,']
+
+[Footnote 3: _In neither Q._]
+
+[Footnote 4: The first court after the marriage.]
+
+[Page 16]
+
+Together with remembrance of our selues.
+Therefore our sometimes Sister, now our Queen,
+Th'Imperiall Ioyntresse of this warlike State,       [Sidenote: to this]
+Haue we, as 'twere, with a defeated ioy,
+With one Auspicious, and one Dropping eye,
+                                         [Sidenote: an auspitious and a]
+With mirth in Funerall, and with Dirge in Marriage,
+In equall Scale weighing Delight and Dole[1]
+Taken to Wife; nor haue we heerein barr'd[2]
+Your better Wisedomes, which haue freely gone
+With this affaire along, for all our Thankes.
+[Sidenote: 8] Now followes, that you know young _Fortinbras_,[3]
+Holding a weake supposall of our worth;
+Or thinking by our late deere Brothers death,
+Our State to be disioynt, and out of Frame,
+Colleagued with the dreame of his Aduantage;[4]  [Sidenote: this dreame]
+He hath not fayl'd to pester vs with Message,
+Importing the surrender of those Lands
+Lost by his Father: with all Bonds of Law              [Sidenote: bands]
+To our most valiant Brother. So much for him.
+
+_Enter Voltemand and Cornelius._[5]
+
+Now for our selfe, and for this time of meeting
+Thus much the businesse is. We haue heere writ
+To Norway, Vncle of young _Fortinbras_,
+Who Impotent and Bedrid, scarsely heares
+Of this his Nephewes purpose, to suppresse
+His further gate[6] heerein. In that the Leuies,
+The Lists, and full proportions are all made
+Out of his subiect: and we heere dispatch
+You good _Cornelius_, and you _Voltemand_,
+For bearing of this greeting to old Norway,          [Sidenote: bearers]
+Giuing to you no further personall power
+To businesse with the King, more then the scope
+Of these dilated Articles allow:[7]               [Sidenote: delated[8]]
+Farewell and let your hast commend your duty.[9]
+
+[Footnote 1: weighing out an equal quantity of each.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Like _crossed_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'Now follows--that (_which_) you know--young
+Fortinbras:--']
+
+[Footnote 4: _Colleagued_ agrees with _supposall_. The preceding two
+lines may be regarded as somewhat parenthetical. _Dream of
+advantage_--hope of gain.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 6: _going; advance._ Note in Norway also, as well as in
+Denmark, the succession of the brother.]
+
+[Footnote 7: (_giving them papers_).]
+
+[Footnote 8: Which of these is right, I cannot tell. _Dilated_ means
+_expanded_, and would refer to _the scope; _delated_ means
+_committed_--to them, to limit them.]
+
+[Footnote 9: idea of duty.]
+
+[Page 18]
+
+_Volt._ In that, and all things, will we shew our duty.
+
+_King._ We doubt it nothing, heartily farewell.
+
+[Sidenote: 74]           [1]_Exit Voltemand and Cornelius._
+
+And now _Laertes_, what's the newes with you?
+You told vs of some suite. What is't _Laertes_?
+You cannot speake of Reason to the Dane,
+And loose your voyce. What would'st thou beg _Laertes_,
+That shall not be my Offer, not thy Asking?[2]
+The Head is not more Natiue to the Heart,
+The Hand more Instrumentall to the Mouth,
+Then is the Throne of Denmarke to thy Father.[3]
+What would'st thou haue _Laertes_?
+
+_Laer._ Dread my Lord,                              [Sidenote: My dread]
+Your leaue and fauour to returne to France,
+From whence, though willingly I came to Denmarke
+To shew my duty in your Coronation,
+Yet now I must confesse, that duty done,
+[Sidenote: 22] My thoughts and wishes bend againe towards toward
+France,[4]
+And bow them to your gracious leaue and pardon.
+
+_King._ Haue you your Fathers leaue?
+What sayes _Pollonius_?
+
+[A] _Pol._ He hath my Lord:
+I do beseech you giue him leaue to go.
+
+_King._ Take thy faire houre _Laertes_, time be thine,
+And thy best graces spend it at thy will:
+But now my Cosin _Hamlet_, and my Sonne?
+
+[Footnote A: _In the Quarto_:--
+
+_Polo._ Hath[5] my Lord wroung from me my slowe leaue
+By laboursome petition, and at last
+Vpon his will I seald my hard consent,[6]
+I doe beseech you giue him leaue to goe.]
+
+[Footnote 1: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'Before they call, I will answer; and while they are yet
+speaking, I will hear.'--_Isaiah_, lxv. 24.]
+
+[Footnote 3: The villain king courts his courtiers.]
+
+[Footnote 4: He had been educated there. Compare 23. But it would seem
+rather to the court than the university he desired to return. See his
+father's instructions, 38.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _H'ath_--a contraction for _He hath_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: A play upon the act of sealing a will with wax.]
+
+[Page 20]
+
+_Ham._ A little more then kin, and lesse then kinde.[1]
+
+_King._ How is it that the Clouds still hang on you?
+
+_Ham._ Not so my Lord, I am too much i'th'Sun.[2]
+                                [Sidenote: so much my ... in the sonne.]
+
+_Queen._ Good Hamlet cast thy nightly colour off,[4]
+                                                  [Sidenote: nighted[3]]
+And let thine eye looke like a Friend on Denmarke.
+Do not for euer with thy veyled[5] lids               [Sidenote: vailed]
+Seeke for thy Noble Father in the dust;
+Thou know'st 'tis common, all that liues must dye,
+Passing through Nature, to Eternity.
+
+_Ham._ I Madam, it is common.[6]
+
+_Queen._ If it be;
+Why seemes it so particular with thee.
+
+_Ham._ Seemes Madam? Nay, it is: I know not Seemes:[7]
+'Tis not alone my Inky Cloake (good Mother)
+                                     [Sidenote: cloake coold mother [8]]
+Nor Customary suites of solemne Blacke,
+Nor windy suspiration of forc'd breath,
+No, nor the fruitfull Riuer in the Eye,
+Nor the deiected hauiour of the Visage,
+Together with all Formes, Moods, shewes of Griefe,
+                                           [Sidenote: moodes, chapes of]
+That can denote me truly. These indeed Seeme,[9]      [Sidenote: deuote]
+For they are actions that a man might[10] play:
+But I haue that Within, which passeth show;           [Sidenote: passes]
+These, but the Trappings, and the Suites of woe.
+
+_King._ 'Tis sweet and commendable
+In your Nature _Hamlet_,
+To giue these mourning duties to your Father:[11]
+But you must know, your Father lost a Father,
+That Father lost, lost his, and the Suruiuer bound
+In filiall Obligation, for some terme
+To do obsequious[12] Sorrow. But to perseuer
+In obstinate Condolement, is a course
+
+[Footnote 1: An _aside_. Hamlet's first utterance is of dislike to his
+uncle. He is more than _kin_ through his unwelcome marriage--less than
+_kind_ by the difference in their natures. To be _kind_ is to behave as
+one _kinned_ or related. But the word here is the noun, and means
+_nature_, or sort by birth.]
+
+[Footnote 2: A word-play may be here intended between _sun_ and _son_:
+_a little more than kin--too much i' th' Son_. So George Herbert:
+
+    For when he sees my ways, I die;
+    But I have got his _Son_, and he hath none;
+
+and Dr. Donne:
+
+                at my death thy Son
+    Shall shine, as he shines now and heretofore.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'Wintred garments'--_As You Like It_, iii. 2.]
+
+[Footnote 4: He is the only one who has not for the wedding put off his
+mourning.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _lowered_, or cast down: _Fr. avaler_, to lower.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'Plainly you treat it as a common matter--a thing of no
+significance!' _I_ is constantly used for _ay_, _yes_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: He pounces on the word _seems_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Not unfrequently the type would appear to have been set up
+from dictation.]
+
+[Footnote 9: They are things of the outside, and must _seem_, for they
+are capable of being imitated; they are the natural _shows_ of grief.
+But he has that in him which cannot _show_ or _seem_, because nothing
+can represent it. These are 'the Trappings and the Suites of _woe_;'
+they fitly represent woe, but they cannot shadow forth that which is
+within him--a something different from woe, far beyond it and worse,
+passing all reach of embodiment and manifestation. What this something
+is, comes out the moment he is left by himself.]
+
+[Footnote 10: The emphasis is on _might_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: Both his uncle and his mother decline to understand him.
+They will have it he mourns the death of his father, though they must at
+least suspect another cause for his grief. Note the intellectual mastery
+of the hypocrite--which accounts for his success.]
+
+[Footnote 12: belonging to _obsequies_.]
+
+[Page 22]
+
+Of impious stubbornnesse. Tis vnmanly greefe,
+It shewes a will most incorrect to Heauen,
+A Heart vnfortified, a Minde impatient,             [Sidenote: or minde]
+An Vnderstanding simple, and vnschool'd:
+For, what we know must be, and is as common
+As any the most vulgar thing to sence,
+Why should we in our peeuish Opposition
+Take it to heart? Fye, 'tis a fault to Heauen,
+A fault against the Dead, a fault to Nature,
+To Reason most absurd, whose common Theame
+Is death of Fathers, and who still hath cried,
+From the first Coarse,[1] till he that dyed to day,   [Sidenote: course]
+This must be so. We pray you throw to earth
+This vnpreuayling woe, and thinke of vs
+As of a Father; For let the world take note,
+You are the most immediate to our Throne,[2]
+And with no lesse Nobility of Loue,
+Then that which deerest Father beares his Sonne,
+Do I impart towards you. For your intent              [Sidenote: toward]
+[Sidenote: 18] In going backe to Schoole in Wittenberg,[3]
+It is most retrograde to our desire:               [Sidenote: retrogard]
+And we beseech you, bend you to remaine
+Heere in the cheere and comfort of our eye,
+Our cheefest Courtier Cosin, and our Sonne.
+
+_Qu._ Let not thy Mother lose her Prayers _Hamlet_:    [Sidenote: loose]
+I prythee stay with vs, go not to Wittenberg.      [Sidenote: pray thee]
+
+_Ham._ I shall in all my best
+Obey you Madam.[4]
+
+_King._ Why 'tis a louing, and a faire Reply,
+Be as our selfe in Denmarke. Madam come,
+This gentle and vnforc'd accord of _Hamlet_[5]
+Sits smiling to my heart; in grace whereof,
+No iocond health that Denmarke drinkes to day,
+[Sidenote: 44] But the great Cannon to the Clowds shall tell,
+
+[Footnote 1: _Corpse_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --seeking to propitiate him with the hope that his
+succession had been but postponed by his uncle's election.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Note that Hamlet was educated in Germany--at Wittenberg,
+the university where in 1508 Luther was appointed professor of
+Philosophy. Compare 19. There was love of study as well as disgust with
+home in his desire to return to _Schoole_: this from what we know of him
+afterwards.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Emphasis on _obey_. A light on the character of Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 5: He takes it, or pretends to take it, for far more than it
+was. He desires friendly relations with Hamlet.]
+
+[Page 24]
+
+And the Kings Rouce,[1] the Heauens shall bruite againe,
+Respeaking earthly Thunder. Come away.
+     _Exeunt_              [Sidenote: _Florish. Exeunt all but Hamlet._]
+
+_Manet Hamlet._
+
+[2]_Ham._ Oh that this too too solid Flesh, would melt,
+                                            [Sidenote: sallied flesh[3]]
+Thaw, and resolue it selfe into a Dew:
+[Sidenote: 125,247,260] Or that the Euerlasting had not fixt
+[Sidenote: 121 _bis_] His Cannon 'gainst Selfe-slaughter. O God, O God!
+                                [Sidenote: seale slaughter, o God, God,]
+How weary, stale, flat, and vnprofitable                [Sidenote: wary]
+Seemes to me all the vses of this world?               [Sidenote: seeme]
+Fie on't? Oh fie, fie, 'tis an vnweeded Garden       [Sidenote: ah fie,]
+That growes to Seed: Things rank, and grosse in Nature
+Possesse it meerely. That it should come to this:
+                            [Sidenote: meerely that it should come thus]
+But two months dead[4]: Nay, not so much; not two,
+So excellent a King, that was to this
+_Hiperion_ to a Satyre: so louing to my Mother,
+That he might not beteene the windes of heauen    [Sidenote: beteeme[5]]
+Visit her face too roughly. Heauen and Earth
+Must I remember: why she would hang on him,           [Sidenote: should]
+As if encrease of Appetite had growne
+By what it fed on; and yet within a month?
+Let me not thinke on't: Frailty, thy name is woman.[6]
+A little Month, or ere those shooes were old,
+With which she followed my poore Fathers body
+Like _Niobe_, all teares. Why she, euen she.[7]
+(O Heauen! A beast that wants discourse[8] of Reason   [Sidenote: O God]
+Would haue mourn'd longer) married with mine Vnkle,       [Sidenote: my]
+
+[Footnote 1: German _Rausch_, _drunkenness_. 44, 68]
+
+[Footnote 2: A soliloquy is as the drawing called a section of a thing:
+it shows the inside of the man. Soliloquy is only rare, not unnatural,
+and in art serves to reveal more of nature. In the drama it is the
+lifting of a veil through which dialogue passes. The scene is for the
+moment shifted into the lonely spiritual world, and here we begin to
+know Hamlet. Such is his wretchedness, both in mind and circumstance,
+that he could well wish to vanish from the world. The suggestion of
+suicide, however, he dismisses at once--with a momentary regret, it is
+true--but he dismisses it--as against the will of God to whom he appeals
+in his misery. The cause of his misery is now made plain to us--his
+trouble that passes show, deprives life of its interest, and renders the
+world a disgust to him. There is no lamentation over his father's death,
+so dwelt upon by the king; for loving grief does not crush. Far less
+could his uncle's sharp practice, in scheming for his own election
+during Hamlet's absence, have wrought in a philosopher like him such an
+effect. The one makes him sorrowful, the other might well annoy him, but
+neither could render him unhappy: his misery lies at his mother's door;
+it is her conduct that has put out the light of her son's life. She who
+had been to him the type of all excellence, she whom his father had
+idolized, has within a month of his death married his uncle, and is
+living in habitual incest--for as such, a marriage of the kind was then
+unanimously regarded. To Hamlet's condition and behaviour, his mother,
+her past and her present, is the only and sufficing key. His very idea
+of unity had been rent in twain.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _1st Q_. 'too much grieu'd and sallied flesh.' _Sallied_,
+sullied: compare _sallets_, 67, 103. I have a strong suspicion that
+_sallied_ and not _solid_ is the true word. It comes nearer the depth of
+Hamlet's mood.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Two months at the present moment.]
+
+[Footnote 5: This is the word all the editors take: which is right, I do
+not know; I doubt if either is. The word in _A Midsummer Night's Dream_,
+act i. sc. 1--
+
+    Belike for want of rain; which I could well
+    Beteem them from the tempest of mine eyes--
+
+I cannot believe the same word. The latter means _produce for_, as from
+the place of origin. The word, in the sense necessary to this passage,
+is not, so far as I know, to be found anywhere else. I have no
+suggestion to make.]
+
+[Footnote 6: From his mother he generalizes to _woman_. After having
+believed in such a mother, it may well be hard for a man to believe in
+any woman.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _Q._ omits 'euen she.']
+
+[Footnote 8: the going abroad among things.]
+
+[Page 26]
+
+My Fathers Brother: but no more like my Father,
+Then I to _Hercules_. Within a Moneth?
+Ere yet the salt of most vnrighteous Teares
+Had left the flushing of her gauled eyes,             [Sidenote: in her]
+She married. O most wicked speed, to post[1]
+With such dexterity to Incestuous sheets:
+It is not, nor it cannot come to good,
+But breake my heart, for I must hold my tongue.[2]
+
+_Enter Horatio, Barnard, and Marcellus._
+                                  [Sidenote: _Marcellus, and Bernardo._]
+
+_Hor._ Haile to your Lordship.[3]
+
+_Ham._ I am glad to see you well:
+_Horatio_, or I do forget my selfe.
+
+_Hor._ The same my Lord,
+And your poore Seruant euer.
+
+[Sidenote: 134] _Ham._ [4]Sir my good friend,
+Ile change that name with you:[5]
+And what make you from Wittenberg _Horatio_?[6]
+_Marcellus._[7]
+
+_Mar._ My good Lord.
+
+_Ham._ I am very glad to see you: good euen Sir.[8]
+But what in faith make you from _Wittemberge_?
+
+_Hor._ A truant disposition, good my Lord.[9]
+
+_Ham._ I would not haue your Enemy say so;[10]     [Sidenote: not heare]
+Nor shall you doe mine eare that violence,[11]       [Sidenote: my eare]
+[Sidenote: 134] To make it truster of your owne report
+Against your selfe. I know you are no Truant:
+But what is your affaire in _Elsenour_?
+Wee'l teach you to drinke deepe, ere you depart.[12]
+                                       [Sidenote: you for to drinke ere]
+
+_Hor._ My Lord, I came to see your Fathers Funerall.
+
+_Ham._ I pray thee doe not mock me (fellow Student) [Sidenote: pre thee]
+I thinke it was to see my Mothers Wedding.         [Sidenote: was to my]
+
+[Footnote 1: I suggest the pointing:
+
+    speed! To post ... sheets!]
+
+[Footnote 2: Fit moment for the entrance of his father's messengers.]
+
+[Footnote 3: They do not seem to have been intimate before, though we
+know from Hamlet's speech (134) that he had had the greatest respect for
+Horatio. The small degree of doubt in Hamlet's recognition of his friend
+is due to the darkness, and the unexpectedness of his appearance.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _1st Q._ 'O my good friend, I change, &c.' This would leave
+it doubtful whether he wished to exchange servant or friend; but 'Sir,
+my _good friend_,' correcting Horatio, makes his intent plain.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Emphasis on _that_: 'I will exchange the name of _friend_
+with you.']
+
+[Footnote 6: 'What are you doing from--out of, _away
+from_--Wittenberg?']
+
+[Footnote 7: In recognition: the word belongs to Hamlet's speech.]
+
+[Footnote 8: _Point thus_: 'you.--Good even, sir.'--_to Barnardo, whom
+he does not know._]
+
+[Footnote 9: An ungrammatical reply. He does not wish to give the real,
+painful answer, and so replies confusedly, as if he had been asked,
+'What makes you?' instead of, 'What do you make?']
+
+[Footnote 10: '--I should know how to answer him.']
+
+[Footnote 11: Emphasis on _you_.]
+
+[Footnote 12: Said with contempt for his surroundings.]
+
+[Page 28]
+
+_Hor._ Indeed my Lord, it followed hard vpon.
+
+_Ham._ Thrift, thrift _Horatio_: the Funerall Bakt-meats
+Did coldly furnish forth the Marriage Tables;
+Would I had met my dearest foe in heauen,[1]
+Ere I had euer seerie that day _Horatio_.[2]   [Sidenote: Or ever I had]
+My father, me thinkes I see my father.
+
+_Hor._ Oh where my Lord?                            [Sidenote: Where my]
+
+_Ham._ In my minds eye (_Horatio_)[3]
+
+_Hor._ I saw him once; he was a goodly King.     [Sidenote: once, a was]
+
+_Ham._ He was a man, take him for all in all:    [Sidenote: A was a man]
+I shall not look vpon his like againe.
+
+_Hor._ My Lord, I thinke I saw him yesternight.
+
+_Ham._ Saw? Who?[4]
+
+_Hor._ My Lord, the King your Father.
+
+_Ham._ The King my Father?[5]
+
+_Hor._ Season[6] your admiration for a while
+With an attent eare;[7] till I may deliuer
+Vpon the witnesse of these Gentlemen,
+This maruell to you.
+
+_Ham._ For Heauens loue let me heare.             [Sidenote: God's love]
+
+_Hor._ Two nights together, had these Gentlemen
+(_Marcellus_ and _Barnardo_) on their Watch
+In the dead wast and middle of the night[8]
+Beene thus encountred. A figure like your Father,[9]
+Arm'd at all points exactly, _Cap a Pe_,[10]  [Sidenote: Armed at poynt]
+Appeares before them, and with sollemne march
+Goes slow and stately: By them thrice he walkt,
+                                     [Sidenote: stately by them; thrice]
+By their opprest and feare-surprized eyes,
+Within his Truncheons length; whilst they bestil'd
+                                          [Sidenote: they distill'd[11]]
+Almost to Ielly with the Act of feare,[12]
+Stand dumbe and speake not to him. This to me
+In dreadfull[13] secrecie impart they did,
+And I with them the third Night kept the Watch,
+Whereas[14] they had deliuer'd both in time,
+
+[Footnote 1: _Dear_ is not unfrequently used as an intensive; but 'my
+dearest foe' is not 'the man who hates me most,' but 'the man whom most
+I regard as my foe.']
+
+[Footnote 2: Note Hamlet's trouble: the marriage, not the death, nor the
+supplantation.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --with a little surprise at Horatio's question.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Said as if he must have misheard. Astonishment comes only
+with the next speech.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _1st Q_. 'Ha, ha, the King my father ke you.']
+
+[Footnote 6: Qualify.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _1st Q_. 'an attentiue eare,'.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Possibly, _dead vast_, as in _1st Q_.; but _waste_ as good,
+leaving also room to suppose a play in the word.]
+
+[Footnote 9: Note the careful uncertainty.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _1st Q. 'Capapea_.']
+
+[Footnote 11: Either word would do: the _distilling_ off of the animal
+spirits would leave the man a jelly; the cold of fear would _bestil_
+them and him to a jelly. _1st Q. distilled_. But I judge _bestil'd_ the
+better, as the truer to the operation of fear. Compare _The Winter's
+Tale_, act v. sc. 3:--
+
+    There's magic in thy majesty, which has
+
+    From thy admiring daughter took the spirits,
+    Standing like stone with thee.]
+
+[Footnote 12: Act: present influence.]
+
+[Footnote 13: a secrecy more than solemn.]
+
+[Footnote 14: 'Where, as'.]
+
+[Page 30]
+
+Forme of the thing; each word made true and good,
+The Apparition comes. I knew your Father:
+These hands are not more like.
+
+_Ham_. But where was this?
+
+_Mar_. My Lord, vpon the platforme where we watcht.    [Sidenote: watch]
+
+_Ham_. Did you not speake to it?
+
+_Her_. My Lord, I did;
+But answere made it none: yet once me thought
+It lifted vp it head, and did addresse
+It selfe to motion, like as it would speake:
+But euen then, the Morning Cocke crew lowd;
+And at the sound it shrunke in hast away,
+And vanisht from our sight.
+
+_Ham_. Tis very strange.
+
+_Hor_. As I doe liue my honourd Lord 'tis true;
+[Sidenote: 14] And we did thinke it writ downe in our duty
+To let you know of it.
+
+[Sidenote: 32,52] _Ham_. Indeed, indeed Sirs; but this troubles me.
+                                            [Sidenote: Indeede Sirs but]
+Hold you the watch to Night?
+
+_Both_. We doe my Lord.                               [Sidenote: _All_.]
+
+_Ham_. Arm'd, say you?
+
+_Both_. Arm'd, my Lord.                               [Sidenote: _All_.]
+
+_Ham_. From top to toe?
+
+_Both_. My Lord, from head to foote.                  [Sidenote: _All_.]
+
+_Ham_. Then saw you not his face?
+
+_Hor_. O yes, my Lord, he wore his Beauer vp.
+
+_Ham_. What, lookt he frowningly?
+
+[Sidenote: 54,174] _Hor_. A countenance more in sorrow then in anger.[1]
+
+[Sidenote: 120] _Ham_. Pale, or red?
+
+_Hor_. Nay very pale.
+
+[Footnote 1: The mood of the Ghost thus represented, remains the same
+towards his wife throughout the play.]
+
+[Page 32]
+
+_Ham._ And fixt his eyes vpon you?
+
+_Hor._ Most constantly.
+
+_Ham._ I would I had beene there.
+
+_Hor._ It would haue much amaz'd you.
+
+_Ham._ Very like, very like: staid it long? [Sidenote: Very like, stayd]
+
+_Hor._ While one with moderate hast might tell a hundred.
+                                                    [Sidenote: hundreth]
+
+_All._ Longer, longer.                               [Sidenote: _Both._]
+
+_Hor._ Not when I saw't.
+
+_Ham._ His Beard was grisly?[1] no.                 [Sidenote: grissl'd]
+
+_Hor._ It was, as I haue seene it in his life,
+[Sidenote: 138] A Sable[2] Siluer'd.
+
+_Ham._ Ile watch to Night; perchance 'twill wake againe.
+                                               [Sidenote: walke againe.]
+
+_Hor._ I warrant you it will.                     [Sidenote:  warn't it]
+
+[Sidenote: 44] _Ham._ If it assume my noble Fathers person,[3]
+Ile speake to it, though Hell it selfe should gape
+And bid me hold my peace.  I pray you all,
+If you haue hitherto conceald this sight;
+Let it bee treble[5] in your silence still: [Sidenote: be tenable in[4]]
+And whatsoeuer els shall hap to night,      [Sidenote: what someuer els]
+Giue it an vnderstanding but no tongue;
+I will requite your loues; so, fare ye well:       [Sidenote: farre you]
+Vpon the Platforme twixt eleuen and twelue,
+                                         [Sidenote: a leauen and twelfe]
+Ile visit you.
+
+_All._  Our duty to your Honour.   _Exeunt._
+
+_Ham._ Your loue, as mine to you: farewell.           [Sidenote: loves,]
+My Fathers Spirit in Armes?[6] All is not well:
+[Sidenote: 30,52] I doubt some foule play: would the Night were come;
+Till then sit still my soule; foule deeds will rise,
+                                                [Sidenote: fonde deedes]
+Though all the earth orewhelm them to mens eies.
+                                           _Exit._
+
+[Footnote 1: _grisly_--gray; _grissl'd_--turned gray;--mixed with
+white.]
+
+[Footnote 2: The colour of sable-fur, I think.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Hamlet does not _accept_ the Appearance as his father; he
+thinks it may be he, but seems to take a usurpation of his form for very
+possible.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _1st Q_. 'tenible']
+
+[Footnote 5: If _treble_ be the right word, the actor in uttering it
+must point to each of the three, with distinct yet rapid motion. The
+phrase would be a strange one, but not unlike Shakspere. Compare
+_Cymbeline_, act v. sc. 5: 'And your three motives to the battle,'
+meaning 'the motives of you three.' Perhaps, however, it is only the
+adjective for the adverb: '_having concealed it hitherto, conceal it
+trebly now_.' But _tenible_ may be the word: 'let it be a thing to be
+kept in your silence still.']
+
+[Footnote 6: Alone, he does not dispute _the idea_ of its being his
+father.]
+
+[Page 34]
+
+
+_SCENA TERTIA_[1]
+
+
+_Enter Laertes and Ophelia_.           [Sidenote: _Ophelia his Sister._]
+
+_Laer_. My necessaries are imbark't; Farewell:     [Sidenote: inbarckt,]
+And Sister, as the Winds giue Benefit,
+And Conuoy is assistant: doe not sleepe,
+                                    [Sidenote: conuay, in assistant doe]
+But let me heare from you.
+
+_Ophel_. Doe you doubt that?
+
+_Laer_. For _Hamlet_, and the trifling of his fauours,
+                                                     [Sidenote: favour,]
+Hold it a fashion and a toy in Bloud;
+A Violet in the youth of Primy Nature;
+Froward,[2] not permanent; sweet not lasting
+The suppliance of a minute? No more.[3]
+                                  [Sidenote: The perfume and suppliance]
+
+_Ophel_. No more but so.[4]
+
+_Laer_. Thinke it no more.
+For nature cressant does not grow alone,
+[Sidenote: 172] In thewes[5] and Bulke: but as his Temple waxes,[6]
+                                         [Sidenote: bulkes, but as this]
+The inward seruice of the Minde and Soule
+Growes wide withall. Perhaps he loues you now,[7]
+And now no soyle nor cautell[8] doth besmerch
+The vertue of his feare: but you must feare
+                                            [Sidenote: of his will, but]
+His greatnesse weigh'd, his will is not his owne;[9]    [Sidenote: wayd]
+For hee himselfe is subiect to his Birth:[10]
+Hee may not, as vnuallued persons doe,
+Carue for himselfe; for, on his choyce depends
+The sanctity and health of the weole State.
+                                  [Sidenote: The safty and | this whole]
+And therefore must his choyce be circumscrib'd[11]
+Vnto the voyce and yeelding[12] of that Body,
+Whereof he is the Head. Then if he sayes he loues you,
+It fits your wisedome so farre to beleeue it;
+As he in his peculiar Sect and force[13]
+                                [Sidenote: his particuler act and place]
+May giue his saying deed: which is no further,
+
+[Footnote 1: _Not in Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Same as _forward_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'No more' makes a new line in the _Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: I think this speech should end with a point of
+interrogation.]
+
+[Footnote 5: muscles.]
+
+[Footnote 6: The body is the temple, in which the mind and soul are the
+worshippers: their service grows with the temple--wide, changing and
+increasing its objects. The degraded use of the grand image is after the
+character of him who makes it.]
+
+[Footnote 7: The studied contrast between Laertes and Hamlet begins
+already to appear: the dishonest man, honestly judging after his own
+dishonesty, warns his sister against the honest man.]
+
+[Footnote 8: deceit.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'You have cause to fear when you consider his greatness:
+his will &c.' 'You must fear, his greatness being weighed; for because
+of that greatness, his will is not his own.']
+
+[Footnote 10: _This line not in Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 11: limited.]
+
+[Footnote 12: allowance.]
+
+[Footnote 13: This change from the _Quarto_ seems to me to bear the mark
+of Shakspere's hand. The meaning is the same, but the words are more
+individual and choice: the _sect_, the _head_ in relation to the body,
+is more pregnant than _place_; and _force_, that is _power_, is a fuller
+word than _act_, or even _action_, for which it plainly appears to
+stand.]
+
+[Page 36]
+
+Then the maine voyce of _Denmarke_ goes withall.
+Then weigh what losse your Honour may sustaine,
+If with too credent eare you list his Songs;
+Or lose your Heart; or your chast Treasure open     [Sidenote: Or loose]
+To his vnmastred[1] importunity.
+Feare it _Ophelia_, feare it my deare Sister,
+And keepe within the reare of your Affection;[2]
+                                            [Sidenote: keepe you in the]
+Out of the shot and danger of Desire.
+The chariest Maid is Prodigall enough,                   [Sidenote: The]
+If she vnmaske her beauty to the Moone:[3]
+Vertue it selfe scapes not calumnious stroakes,       [Sidenote: Vertue]
+The Canker Galls, the Infants of the Spring
+                                       [Sidenote: The canker gaules the]
+Too oft before the buttons[6] be disclos'd,    [Sidenote: their buttons]
+And in the Morne and liquid dew of Youth,
+Contagious blastments are most imminent.
+Be wary then, best safety lies in feare;
+Youth to it selfe rebels, though none else neere.[6]
+
+_Ophe_. I shall th'effect of this good Lesson keepe,
+As watchmen to my heart: but good my Brother        [Sidenote: watchman]
+Doe not as some vngracious Pastors doe,
+Shew me the steepe and thorny way to Heauen;
+Whilst like a puft and recklesse Libertine
+Himselfe, the Primrose path of dalliance treads,
+And reaks not his owne reade.[7][8][9]
+
+_Laer_. Oh, feare me not.[10]
+
+_Enter Polonius_.
+
+I stay too long; but here my Father comes:
+A double blessing is a double grace;
+Occasion smiles vpon a second leaue.[11]
+
+_Polon_. Yet heere _Laertes_? Aboord, aboord for shame,
+The winde sits in the shoulder of your saile,
+And you are staid for there: my blessing with you;
+                                   [Sidenote: for, there my | with thee]
+
+[Footnote 1: Without a master; lawless.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Do not go so far as inclination would lead you. Keep behind
+your liking. Do not go to the front with your impulse.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --_but_ to the moon--which can show it so little.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Opened but not closed quotations in the _Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: The French _bouton_ is also both _button_ and _bud_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'Inclination is enough to have to deal with, let alone
+added temptation.' Like his father, Laertes is wise for another--a man
+of maxims, not behaviour. His morality is in his intellect and for
+self-ends, not in his will, and for the sake of truth and
+righteousness.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _1st Q_.
+
+    But my deere brother, do not you
+    Like to a cunning Sophister,
+    Teach me the path and ready way to heauen,
+    While you forgetting what is said to me,
+    Your selfe, like to a carelesse libertine
+    Doth giue his heart, his appetite at ful,
+    And little recks how that his honour dies.
+
+    'The primrose way to the everlasting bonfire.'
+    --_Macbeth_, ii. 3:
+
+    'The flowery way that leads to the broad gate and the great fire.'
+    _All's Well_, iv. 5.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'heeds not his own counsel.']
+
+[Footnote 9: Here in Quarto, _Enter Polonius._]
+
+[Footnote 10: With the fitting arrogance and impertinence of a libertine
+brother, he has read his sister a lecture on propriety of behaviour; but
+when she gently suggests that what is good for her is good for him
+too,--'Oh, fear me not!--I stay too long.']
+
+[Footnote 11: 'A second leave-taking is a happy chance': the chance, or
+occasion, because it is happy, smiles. It does not mean that occasion
+smiles upon a second leave, but that, upon a second leave, occasion
+smiles. There should be a comma after _smiles_.]
+
+[Footnote 12: As many of Polonius' aphorismic utterances as are given in
+the 1st Quarto have there inverted commas; but whether intended as
+gleanings from books or as fruits of experience, the light they throw on
+the character of him who speaks them is the same: they show it
+altogether selfish. He is a man of the world, wise in his generation,
+his principles the best of their bad sort. Of these his son is a fit
+recipient and retailer, passing on to his sister their father's grand
+doctrine of self-protection. But, wise in maxim, Polonius is foolish in
+practice--not from senility, but from vanity.]
+
+[Page 38]
+
+And these few Precepts in thy memory,[1]
+See thou Character.[2] Giue thy thoughts no tongue,
+                                                  [Sidenote: Looke thou]
+Nor any vnproportion'd[3] thought his Act:
+Be thou familiar; but by no meanes vulgar:[4]
+The friends thou hast, and their adoption tride,[5]
+                                               [Sidenote: Those friends]
+Grapple them to thy Soule, with hoopes of Steele:       [Sidenote: unto]
+But doe not dull thy palme, with entertainment
+Of each vnhatch't, vnfledg'd Comrade.[6] Beware
+                           [Sidenote: each new hatcht unfledgd courage,]
+Of entrance to a quarrell: but being in
+Bear't that th'opposed may beware of thee.
+Giue euery man thine eare; but few thy voyce:      [Sidenote: thy eare,]
+Take each mans censure[7]; but reserue thy Judgement;
+Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy;
+But not exprest in fancie; rich, not gawdie:
+For the Apparell oft proclaimes the man.
+And they in France of the best ranck and station,
+Are of a most select and generous[8] cheff in that.[10]
+                                 [Sidenote: Or of a generous, chiefe[9]]
+Neither a borrower, nor a lender be;             [Sidenote: lender boy,]
+For lone oft loses both it selfe and friend:            [Sidenote: loue]
+And borrowing duls the edge of Husbandry.[11]
+                                                [Sidenote: dulleth edge]
+This aboue all; to thine owne selfe be true:
+And it must follow, as the Night the Day,
+Thou canst not then be false to any man.[12]
+Farewell: my Blessing season[13] this in thee.
+
+_Laer_. Most humbly doe I take my leaue, my Lord.
+
+_Polon_. The time inuites you, goe, your seruants tend.
+                                                [Sidenote: time inuests]
+
+_Laer._ Farewell _Ophelia_, and remember well
+What I haue said to you.[14]
+
+_Ophe_. Tis in my memory lockt,
+And you your selfe shall keepe the key of it,
+
+_Laer_. Farewell.        _Exit Laer_.
+
+_Polon_. What ist _Ophelia_ he hath said to you?
+
+[Footnote 1: He hurries him to go, yet immediately begins to prose.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Engrave.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Not settled into its true shape (?) or, out of proportion
+with its occasions (?)--I cannot say which.]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'Cultivate close relations, but do not lie open to common
+access.' 'Have choice intimacies, but do not be _hail, fellow! well met_
+with everybody.' What follows is an expansion of the lesson.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'The friends thou hast--and the choice of them justified by
+trial--'_equal to_: 'provided their choice be justified &c.']
+
+[Footnote 6: 'Do not make the palm hard, and dull its touch of
+discrimination, by shaking hands in welcome with every one that turns
+up.']
+
+[Footnote 7: judgment, opinion.]
+
+[Footnote 8: _Generosus_, of good breed, a gentleman.]
+
+[Footnote 9: _1st Q_. 'generall chiefe.']
+
+[Footnote 10: No doubt the omission of _of a_ gives the right number of
+syllables to the verse, and makes room for the interpretation which a
+dash between _generous_ and _chief_ renders clearer: 'Are most select
+and generous--chief in that,'--'are most choice and well-bred--chief,
+indeed--at the head or top, in the matter of dress.' But without
+_necessity_ or _authority_--one of the two, I would not throw away a
+word; and suggest therefore that Shakspere had here the French idiom _de
+son chef_ in his mind, and qualifies the noun in it with adjectives of
+his own. The Academy Dictionary gives _de son propre mouvement_ as one
+interpretation of the phrase. The meaning would be, 'they are of a most
+choice and developed instinct in dress.' _Cheff_ or _chief_ suggests the
+upper third of the heraldic shield, but I cannot persuade the suggestion
+to further development. The hypercatalectic syllables _of a_, swiftly
+spoken, matter little to the verse, especially as it is _dramatic_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: Those that borrow, having to pay, lose heart for saving.
+
+    'There's husbandry in heaven;
+    Their candles are all out.'--_Macbeth_, ii. 1.]
+
+[Footnote 12: Certainly a man cannot be true to himself without being
+true to others; neither can he be true to others without being true to
+himself; but if a man make himself the centre for the birth of action,
+it will follow, '_as the night the day_,' that he will be true neither
+to himself nor to any other man. In this regard note the history of
+Laertes, developed in the play.]
+
+[Footnote 13: --as salt, to make the counsel keep.]
+
+[Footnote 14: See _note 9, page 37_.]
+
+[Page 40]
+
+_Ophe._ So please you, somthing touching the L. _Hamlet._
+
+_Polon._ Marry, well bethought:
+Tis told me he hath very oft of late
+Giuen priuate time to you; and you your selfe
+Haue of your audience beene most free and bounteous.[1]
+If it be so, as so tis put on me;[2]
+And that in way of caution: I must tell you,
+You doe not vnderstand your selfe so cleerely,
+As it behoues my Daughter, and your Honour
+What is betweene you, giue me vp the truth?
+
+_Ophe._ He hath my Lord of late, made many tenders
+Of his affection to me.
+
+_Polon._ Affection, puh.  You speake like a greene Girle,
+Vnsifted in such perillous Circumstance.
+Doe you beleeue his tenders, as you call them?
+
+_Ophe._ I do not know, my Lord, what I should thinke.
+
+_Polon._ Marry Ile teach you; thinke your self a Baby,
+                                                      [Sidenote: I will]
+That you haue tane his tenders for true pay,      [Sidenote: tane these]
+Which are not starling. Tender your selfe more dearly;
+                                                    [Sidenote: sterling]
+Or not to crack the winde of the poore Phrase,
+                                                [Sidenote: (not ... &c.]
+Roaming it[3] thus, you'l tender me a foole.[4]
+                                               [Sidenote: Wrong it thus]
+
+_Ophe._ My Lord, he hath importun'd me with loue,
+In honourable fashion.
+
+_Polon._ I, fashion you may call it, go too, go too.
+
+_Ophe._ And hath giuen countenance to his speech,
+My Lord, with all the vowes of Heauen.
+                           [Sidenote: with almost all the holy vowes of]
+
+[Footnote 1: There had then been a good deal of intercourse between
+Hamlet and Ophelia: she had heartily encouraged him.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'as so I am informed, and that by way of caution,']
+
+[Footnote 3: --making it, 'the poor phrase' _tenders_, gallop wildly
+about--as one might _roam_ a horse; _larking it_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'you will in your own person present me a fool.']
+
+[Page 42]
+
+_Polon_. I, Springes to catch Woodcocks.[1] I doe know
+                                                     [Sidenote: springs]
+When the Bloud burnes, how Prodigall the Soule[2]
+Giues the tongue vowes: these blazes, Daughter,    [Sidenote: Lends the]
+Giuing more light then heate; extinct in both,[3]
+Euen in their promise, as it is a making;
+You must not take for fire. For this time Daughter,[4]
+                                             [Sidenote: fire, from this]
+Be somewhat scanter of your Maiden presence;       [Sidenote: something]
+Set your entreatments[5] at a higher rate,
+Then a command to parley. For Lord _Hamlet_,          [Sidenote: parle;]
+Beleeue so much in him, that he is young,
+And with a larger tether may he walke,                 [Sidenote: tider]
+Then may be giuen you. In few,[6] _Ophelia_,
+Doe not beleeue his vowes; for they are Broakers,
+Not of the eye,[7] which their Inuestments show:
+                                                 [Sidenote: of that die]
+But meere implorators of vnholy Sutes,         [Sidenote: imploratators]
+Breathing like sanctified and pious bonds,
+The better to beguile. This is for all:[8]           [Sidenote: beguide]
+I would not, in plaine tearmes, from this time forth,
+Haue you so slander any moment leisure,[9]
+[Sidenote: 70, 82] As to giue words or talke with the Lord _Hamlet_:[10]
+Looke too't, I charge you; come your wayes.
+
+_Ophe_. I shall obey my Lord.[11]     _Exeunt_.
+
+_Enter Hamlet, Horatio, Marcellus._          [Sidenote: _and Marcellus_]
+
+[Sidenote: 2] _Ham_. [12]The Ayre bites shrewdly: is it very cold?[13]
+
+_Hor_. It is a nipping and an eager ayre.
+
+_Ham_. What hower now?
+
+_Hor_. I thinke it lacks of twelue.
+
+_Mar_. No, it is strooke.
+
+_Hor_. Indeed I heard it not: then it drawes neere the season,
+                                                     [Sidenote: it then]
+Wherein the Spirit held his wont to walke.
+What does this meane my Lord? [14]
+          [Sidenote: _A flourish of trumpets and 2 peeces goes of._[14]]
+
+[Footnote 1: Woodcocks were understood to have no brains.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _1st Q_. 'How prodigall the tongue lends the heart vowes.'
+I was inclined to take _Prodigall_ for a noun, a proper name or epithet
+given to the soul, as in a moral play: _Prodigall, the soul_; but I
+conclude it only an adjective used as an adverb, and the capital P a
+blunder.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --in both light and heat.]
+
+[Footnote 4: The _Quarto_ has not 'Daughter.']
+
+[Footnote 5: _To be entreated_ is _to yield_: 'he would nowise be
+entreated:' _entreatments, yieldings_: 'you are not to see him just
+because he chooses to command a parley.']
+
+[Footnote 6: 'In few words'; in brief.]
+
+[Footnote 7: I suspect a misprint in the Folio here--that an _e_ has got
+in for a _d_, and that the change from the _Quarto_ should be _Not of
+the dye_. Then the line would mean, using the antecedent word _brokers_
+in the bad sense, 'Not themselves of the same colour as their garments
+(_investments_); his vows are clothed in innocence, but are not
+innocent; they are mere panders.' The passage is rendered yet more
+obscure to the modern sense by the accidental propinquity of _bonds,
+brokers_, and _investments_--which have nothing to do with _stocks_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'This means in sum:'.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'so slander any moment with the name of leisure as to': to
+call it leisure, if leisure stood for talk with Hamlet, would be to
+slander the time. We might say, 'so slander any man friend as to expect
+him to do this or that unworthy thing for you.']
+
+[Footnote 10: _1st Q_.
+
+    _Ofelia_, receiue none of his letters,
+    For louers lines are snares to intrap the heart;
+    [Sidenote: 82] Refuse his tokens, both of them are keyes
+    To vnlocke Chastitie vnto Desire;
+    Come in _Ofelia_; such men often proue,
+    Great in their wordes, but little in their loue.
+
+'_men often prove such_--great &c.'--Compare _Twelfth Night_, act ii.
+sc. 4, lines 120, 121, _Globe ed.]
+
+[Footnote 11: Fresh trouble for Hamlet_.]
+
+[Footnote 12: _1st Q._
+
+    The ayre bites shrewd; it is an eager and
+    An nipping winde, what houre i'st?]
+
+[Footnote 13: Again the cold.]
+
+[Footnote 14: The stage-direction of the _Q_. is necessary here.]
+
+[Page 44]
+
+[Sidenote: 22, 25] _Ham_. The King doth wake to night, and takes his
+rouse,
+Keepes wassels and the swaggering vpspring reeles,[1]
+                                         [Sidenote: wassell | up-spring]
+And as he dreines his draughts of Renish downe,
+The kettle Drum and Trumpet thus bray out
+The triumph of his Pledge.
+
+_Horat_. Is it a custome?
+
+_Ham_. I marry ist;
+And to my mind, though I am natiue heere,             [Sidenote: But to]
+And to the manner borne: It is a Custome
+More honour'd in the breach, then the obseruance.
+[A]
+
+_Enter Ghost._
+
+_Hor_. Looke my Lord, it comes.
+
+[Sidenote: 172] _Ham_. Angels and Ministers of Grace defend vs:
+[Sidenote: 32] Be thou a Spirit of health, or Goblin damn'd,
+Bring with thee ayres from Heauen, or blasts from Hell,[2]
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto:--_
+
+This heauy headed reueale east and west[3]
+Makes vs tradust, and taxed of other nations,
+They clip[4] vs drunkards, and with Swinish phrase
+Soyle our addition,[5] and indeede it takes
+From our atchieuements, though perform'd at height[6]
+The pith and marrow of our attribute,
+So oft it chaunces in particuler men,[7]
+That for some vicious mole[8] of nature in them
+As in their birth wherein they are not guilty,[8]
+(Since nature cannot choose his origin)
+By their ore-grow'th of some complextion[10]
+Oft breaking downe the pales and forts of reason
+Or by[11] some habit, that too much ore-leauens
+The forme of plausiue[12] manners, that[13] these men
+Carrying I say the stamp of one defect
+Being Natures liuery, or Fortunes starre,[14]
+His[15] vertues els[16] be they as pure as grace,
+As infinite as man may vndergoe,[17]
+Shall in the generall censure[18] take corruption
+From that particuler fault:[19] the dram of eale[20]
+Doth all the noble substance of a doubt[21]
+To his[22] owne scandle.]
+
+[Footnote 1: Does Hamlet here call his uncle an _upspring_, an
+_upstart_? or is the _upspring_ a dance, the English equivalent of 'the
+high _lavolt_' of _Troil. and Cress_. iv. 4, and governed by
+_reels_--'keeps wassels, and reels the swaggering upspring'--a dance
+that needed all the steadiness as well as agility available, if, as I
+suspect, it was that in which each gentleman lifted the lady high, and
+kissed her before setting her down? I cannot answer, I can only put the
+question. The word _swaggering_ makes me lean to the former
+interpretation.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Observe again Hamlet's uncertainty. He does not take it for
+granted that it is _his father's_ spirit, though it is plainly his
+form.]
+
+[Footnote 3: The Quarto surely came too early for this passage to have
+been suggested by the shameful habits which invaded the court through
+the example of Anne of Denmark! Perhaps Shakspere cancelled it both
+because he would not have it supposed he had meant to reflect on the
+queen, and because he came to think it too diffuse.]
+
+[Footnote 4: clepe, _call_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Same as _attribute_, two lines lower--the thing imputed to,
+or added to us--our reputation, our title or epithet.]
+
+[Footnote 6: performed to perfection.]
+
+[Footnote 7: individuals.]
+
+[Footnote 8: A mole on the body, according to the place where it
+appeared, was regarded as significant of character: in that relation, a
+_vicious mole_ would be one that indicated some special vice; but here
+the allusion is to a live mole of constitutional fault, burrowing
+within, whose presence the mole-_heap_ on the skin indicates.]
+
+[Footnote 9: The order here would be: 'for some vicious mole of nature
+in them, as by their o'er-growth, in their birth--wherein they are not
+guilty, since nature cannot choose his origin (or parentage)--their
+o'ergrowth of (their being overgrown or possessed by) some complexion,
+&c.']
+
+[Footnote 10: _Complexion_, as the exponent of the _temperament_, or
+masterful tendency of the nature, stands here for _temperament_--'oft
+breaking down &c.' Both words have in them the element of _mingling_--a
+mingling to certain results.]
+
+[Footnote 11: The connection is:
+
+    That for some vicious mole--
+    As by their o'ergrowth--
+    Or by some habit, &c.]
+
+[Footnote 12: pleasing.]
+
+[Footnote 13: Repeat from above '--so oft it chaunces,' before 'that
+these men.']
+
+[Footnote 14: 'whether the thing come by Nature or by Destiny,'
+_Fortune's star_: the mark set on a man by fortune to prove her share in
+him. 83.]
+
+[Footnote 15: A change to the singular.]
+
+[Footnote l6: 'be his virtues besides as pure &c.']
+
+[Footnote 17: _walk under; carry_.]
+
+[Footnote 18: the judgment of the many.]
+
+[Footnote 19: 'Dead flies cause the ointment of the apothecary to send
+forth a stinking savour: so doth a little folly him that is in
+reputation for wisdom and honour.' Eccles. x. 1.]
+
+[Footnote 20: Compare Quarto reading, page 112:
+
+    The spirit that I haue scene
+    May be a deale, and the deale hath power &c.
+
+If _deale_ here stand for _devil_, then _eale_ may in the same edition
+be taken to stand for _evil_. It is hardly necessary to suspect a Scotch
+printer; _evil_ is often used as a monosyllable, and _eale_ may have
+been a pronunciation of it half-way towards _ill_, which is its
+contraction.]
+
+[Footnote 21: I do not believe there is any corruption in the rest of
+the passage. 'Doth it of a doubt:' _affects it with a doubt_, brings it
+into doubt. The following from _Measure for Measure_, is like, though
+not the same.
+
+    I have on Angelo imposed the office,
+    Who may, in the ambush of my name, strike home
+    And yet my nature never in the fight
+    _To do in slander._
+
+'To do my nature in slander'; to affect it with slander; to bring it
+into slander, 'Angelo may punish in my name, but, not being present, I
+shall not be accused of cruelty, which would be to slander my nature.']
+
+[Footnote 22: _his_--the man's; see _note_ 13 above.]
+
+[Page 46]
+
+[Sidenote: 112] Be thy euents wicked or charitable,
+                                                  [Sidenote: thy intent]
+Thou com'st in such a questionable shape[1]
+That I will speake to thee. Ile call thee _Hamlet_,[2]
+King, Father, Royall Dane: Oh, oh, answer me,
+                                             [Sidenote: Dane, o answere]
+Let me not burst in Ignorance; but tell
+Why thy Canoniz'd bones Hearsed in death,[3]
+Haue burst their cerments; why the Sepulcher
+Wherein we saw thee quietly enurn'd,[4]
+                                         [Sidenote: quietly interr'd[3]]
+Hath op'd his ponderous and Marble iawes,
+To cast thee vp againe? What may this meane?
+That thou dead Coarse againe in compleat steele,
+Reuisits thus the glimpses of the Moone,
+Making Night hidious? And we fooles of Nature,[6]
+So horridly to shake our disposition,[7]
+With thoughts beyond thee; reaches of our Soules,[8]
+                                                 [Sidenote: the reaches]
+Say, why is this? wherefore? what should we doe?[9]
+
+_Ghost beckens Hamlet._
+
+_Hor._ It beckons you to goe away with it,           [Sidenote: Beckins]
+As if it some impartment did desire
+To you alone.
+
+_Mar._ Looke with what courteous action
+It wafts you to a more remoued ground:                 [Sidenote: waues]
+But doe not goe with it.
+
+_Hor._ No, by no meanes.
+
+_Ham_. It will not speake: then will I follow it.
+                                                      [Sidenote: I will]
+
+_Hor._ Doe not my Lord.
+
+_Ham._ Why, what should be the feare?
+I doe not set my life at a pins fee;
+And for my Soule, what can it doe to that?
+Being a thing immortall as it selfe:[10]
+It waues me forth againe; Ile follow it.
+
+_Hor._ What if it tempt you toward the Floud my Lord?[11]
+
+[Footnote 1: --that of his father, so moving him to question it.
+_Questionable_ does not mean _doubtful_, but _fit to be questioned_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'I'll _call_ thee'--for the nonce.]
+
+[Footnote 3: I think _hearse_ was originally the bier--French _herse_, a
+harrow--but came to be applied to the coffin: _hearsed_ in
+death--_coffined_ in death.]
+
+[Footnote 4: There is no impropriety in the use of the word _inurned_.
+It is a figure--a word once-removed in its application: the sepulchre is
+the urn, the body the ashes. _Interred_ Shakspere had concluded
+incorrect, for the body was not laid in the earth.]
+
+[Footnote 5: So in _1st Q_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'fooles of Nature'--fools in the presence of her
+knowledge--to us no knowledge--of her action, to us inexplicable. _A
+fact_ that looks unreasonable makes one feel like a fool. See Psalm
+lxxiii. 22: 'So foolish was I and ignorant, I was as a beast before
+thee.' As some men are our fools, we are all Nature's fools; we are so
+far from knowing anything as it is.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Even if Shakspere cared more about grammar than he does, a
+man in Hamlet's perturbation he might well present as making a breach in
+it; but we are not reduced even to justification. _Toschaken_ (_to_ as
+German _zu_ intensive) is a recognized English word; it means _to shake
+to pieces_. The construction of the passage is, 'What may this mean,
+that thou revisitest thus the glimpses of the moon, and that we so
+horridly to-shake our disposition?' So in _The Merry Wives_,
+
+    And fairy-like to-pinch the unclean knight.
+
+'our disposition': our _cosmic structure_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'with thoughts that are too much for them, and as an
+earthquake to them.']
+
+[Footnote 9: Like all true souls, Hamlet wants to know what he is _to
+do_. He looks out for the action required of him.]
+
+[Footnote 10: Note here Hamlet's mood--dominated by his faith. His life
+in this world his mother has ruined; he does not care for it a pin: he
+is not the less confident of a nature that is immortal. In virtue of
+this belief in life, he is indifferent to the form of it. When, later in
+the play, he seems to fear death, it is death the consequence of an
+action of whose rightness he is not convinced.]
+
+[Footnote 11: _The Quarto has dropped out_ 'Lord.']
+
+[Page 48]
+
+Or to the dreadfull Sonnet of the Cliffe,             [Sidenote: somnet]
+That beetles[1] o're his base into the Sea,          [Sidenote: bettles]
+[Sidenote: 112] And there assumes some other horrible forme,[2]
+                                                      [Sidenote: assume]
+Which might depriue your Soueraignty[3] of Reason
+And draw you into madnesse thinke of it?
+
+[A]
+
+_Ham._ It wafts me still; goe on, Ile follow thee.
+                                                       [Sidenote: waues]
+
+_Mar._ You shall not goe my Lord.
+
+_Ham._ Hold off your hand.                             [Sidenote: hands]
+
+_Hor._ Be rul'd, you shall not goe.
+
+_Ham._ My fate cries out,
+And makes each petty Artire[4] in this body,       [Sidenote: arture[4]]
+As hardy as the Nemian Lions nerue:
+Still am I cal'd? Vnhand me Gentlemen:
+By Heau'n, Ile make a Ghost of him that lets me:
+I say away, goe on, Ile follow thee.
+
+_Exeunt Ghost & Hamlet._
+
+_Hor._ He waxes desperate with imagination.[5]       [Sidenote: imagion]
+
+_Mar._ Let's follow; 'tis not fit thus to obey him.
+
+_Hor._ Haue after, to what issue will this come?
+
+_Mar._ Something is rotten in the State of Denmarke.
+
+_Hor._ Heauen will direct it.
+
+_Mar._ Nay, let's follow him.     _Exeunt._
+
+_Enter Ghost and Hamlet._
+
+_Ham._ Where wilt thou lead me? speak; Ile go no further.
+                                                     [Sidenote: Whether]
+
+_Gho._ Marke me.
+
+_Ham._ I will.
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+The very place puts toyes of desperation
+Without more motiue, into euery braine
+That lookes so many fadoms to the sea
+And heares it rore beneath.]
+
+[Footnote 1: _1st Q_. 'beckles'--perhaps for _buckles--bends_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Note the unbelief in the Ghost.]
+
+[Footnote 3: sovereignty--_soul_: so in _Romeo and Juliet_, act v. sc.
+1, l. 3:--
+
+    My bosom's lord sits lightly in his throne.]
+
+[Footnote 4: The word _artery_, invariably substituted by the editors,
+is without authority. In the first Quarto, the word is _Artiue_; in the
+second (see margin) _arture_. This latter I take to be the right
+one--corrupted into _Artire_ in the Folio. It seems to have troubled the
+printers, and possibly the editors. The third Q. has followed the
+second; the fourth has _artyre_; the fifth Q. and the fourth F. have
+_attire_; the second and third Folios follow the first. Not until the
+sixth Q. does _artery_ appear. See _Cambridge Shakespeare. Arture_ was
+to all concerned, and to the language itself, a new word. That _artery_
+was not Shakspere's intention might be concluded from its unfitness:
+what propriety could there be in _making an artery hardy_? The sole,
+imperfect justification I was able to think of for such use of the word
+arose from the fact that, before the discovery of the circulation of the
+blood (published in 1628), it was believed that the arteries (found
+empty after death) served for the movements of the animal spirits: this
+might vaguely _associate_ the arteries with _courage_. But the sight of
+the word _arture_ in the second Quarto at once relieved me.
+
+I do not know if a list has ever been gathered of the words _made_ by
+Shakspere: here is one of them--_arture_, from the same root as _artus,
+a joint--arcere, to hold together_, adjective _arctus, tight. Arture_,
+then, stands for _juncture_. This perfectly fits. In terror the weakest
+parts are the joints, for their _artures_ are not _hardy_. 'And you, my
+sinews, ... bear me stiffly up.' 55, 56.
+
+Since writing as above, a friend informs me that _arture_ is the exact
+equivalent of the [Greek: haphae] of Colossians ii. 19, as interpreted
+by Bishop Lightfoot--'the relation between contiguous limbs, not the
+parts of the limbs themselves in the neighbourhood of contact,'--for
+which relation 'there is no word in our language in common use.']
+
+[Footnote 5: 'with the things he imagines.']
+
+[Page 50]
+
+_Gho._ My hower is almost come,[1]
+When I to sulphurous and tormenting Flames
+Must render vp my selfe.
+
+_Ham._ Alas poore Ghost.
+
+_Gho._ Pitty me not, but lend thy serious hearing
+To what I shall vnfold.
+
+_Ham._ Speake, I am bound to heare.
+
+_Gho._ So art thou to reuenge, when thou shalt heare.
+
+_Ham._ What?
+
+_Gho._ I am thy Fathers Spirit,
+Doom'd for a certaine terme to walke the night;[2]
+And for the day confin'd to fast in Fiers,[3]
+Till the foule crimes done in my dayes of Nature
+Are burnt and purg'd away? But that I am forbid
+To tell the secrets of my Prison-House;
+I could a Tale vnfold, whose lightest word[4]
+Would harrow vp thy soule, freeze thy young blood,
+Make thy two eyes like Starres, start from their Spheres,
+Thy knotty and combined locks to part,               [Sidenote: knotted]
+And each particular haire to stand an end,[5]
+Like Quilles vpon the fretfull[6] Porpentine    [Sidenote: fearefull[6]]
+But this eternall blason[7] must not be
+To eares of flesh and bloud; list _Hamlet_, oh list,
+                                        [Sidenote: blood, list, o list;]
+If thou didst euer thy deare Father loue.
+
+_Ham._ Oh Heauen![8]                                     [Sidenote: God]
+
+_Gho._ Reuenge his foule and most vnnaturall Murther.[9]
+
+_Ham._ Murther?
+
+_Ghost._ Murther most foule, as in the best it is;
+But this most foule, strange, and vnnaturall.
+
+_Ham._ Hast, hast me to know it,          [Sidenote: Hast me to know't,]
+That with wings as swift
+
+[Footnote 1: The night is the Ghost's day.]
+
+[Footnote 2: To walk the night, and see how things go, without being
+able to put a finger to them, is part of his cleansing.]
+
+[Footnote 3: More horror yet for Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 4: He would have him think of life and its doings as of awful
+import. He gives his son what warning he may.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _An end_ is like _agape, an hungred_. 71, 175.]
+
+[Footnote 6: The word in the Q. suggests _fretfull_ a misprint for
+_frightful_. It is _fretfull_ in the 1st Q. as well.]
+
+[Footnote 7: To _blason_ is to read off in proper heraldic terms the
+arms blasoned upon a shield. _A blason_ is such a reading, but is here
+used for a picture in words of other objects.]
+
+[Footnote 8: --in appeal to God whether he had not loved his father.]
+
+[Footnote 9: The horror still accumulates. The knowledge of evil--not
+evil in the abstract, but evil alive, and all about him--comes darkening
+down upon Hamlet's being. Not only is his father an inhabitant of the
+nether fires, but he is there by murder.]
+
+[Page 52]
+
+As meditation, or the thoughts of Loue,
+May sweepe to my Reuenge.[1]
+
+_Ghost._ I finde thee apt,
+And duller should'st thou be then the fat weede[2]
+[Sidenote: 194] That rots it selfe in ease, on Lethe Wharfe,[4]
+                                                   [Sidenote: rootes[3]]
+Would'st thou not stirre in this. Now _Hamlet_ heare:
+It's giuen out, that sleeping in mine Orchard,          [Sidenote: 'Tis]
+A Serpent stung me: so the whole eare of Denmarke,
+Is by a forged processe of my death
+Rankly abus'd: But know thou Noble youth,
+The Serpent that did sting thy Fathers life,
+Now weares his Crowne.
+
+[Sidenote: 30,32] _Ham._ O my Propheticke soule: mine Vncle?[5]
+                                                          [Sidenote: my]
+
+_Ghost._ I that incestuous, that adulterate Beast[6]
+With witchcraft of his wits, hath Traitorous guifts.
+                                                  [Sidenote: wits, with]
+Oh wicked Wit, and Gifts, that haue the power
+So to seduce? Won to to this shamefull Lust     [Sidenote: wonne to his]
+The will of my most seeming vertuous Queene:
+Oh _Hamlet_, what a falling off was there,      [Sidenote: what failing]
+From me, whose loue was of that dignity,
+That it went hand in hand, euen with[7] the Vow
+I made to her in Marriage; and to decline
+Vpon a wretch, whose Naturall gifts were poore
+To those of mine. But Vertue, as it neuer wil be moued,
+Though Lewdnesse court it in a shape of Heauen:
+So Lust, though to a radiant Angell link'd,    [Sidenote: so but though]
+Will sate it selfe in[8] a Celestiall bed, and prey on Garbage.[9]
+                                          [Sidenote: Will sort it selfe]
+But soft, me thinkes I sent the Mornings Ayre; [Sidenote: morning ayre,]
+Briefe let me be: Sleeping within mine Orchard,           [Sidenote: my]
+My custome alwayes in the afternoone;                 [Sidenote: of the]
+Vpon my secure hower thy Vncle stole
+
+[Footnote 1: Now, _for the moment_, he has no doubt, and vengeance is
+his first thought.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Hamlet may be supposed to recall this, if we suppose him
+afterwards to accuse himself so bitterly and so unfairly as in the
+_Quarto_, 194.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Also _1st Q_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: landing-place on the bank of Lethe, the hell-river of
+oblivion.]
+
+[Footnote 5: This does not mean that he had suspected his uncle, but
+that his dislike to him was prophetic.]
+
+[Footnote 6: How can it be doubted that in this speech the Ghost accuses
+his wife and brother of adultery? Their marriage was not adultery. See
+how the ghastly revelation grows on Hamlet--his father in hell--murdered
+by his brother--dishonoured by his wife!]
+
+[Footnote 7: _parallel with; correspondent to_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: _1st Q_. 'fate itself from a'.]
+
+[Footnote 9: This passage, from 'Oh _Hamlet_,' most indubitably asserts
+the adultery of Gertrude.]
+
+[Page 54]
+
+With iuyce of cursed Hebenon[1] in a Violl,           [Sidenote: Hebona]
+And in the Porches of mine eares did poure                [Sidenote: my]
+The leaperous Distilment;[2] whose effect
+Holds such an enmity with bloud of Man,
+That swift as Quick-siluer, it courses[3] through
+The naturall Gates and Allies of the Body;
+And with a sodaine vigour it doth posset       [Sidenote: doth possesse]
+And curd, like Aygre droppings into Milke,          [Sidenote: eager[4]]
+The thin and wholsome blood: so did it mine;
+And a most instant Tetter bak'd about,       [Sidenote: barckt about[5]]
+Most Lazar-like, with vile and loathsome crust,
+All my smooth Body.
+Thus was I, sleeping, by a Brothers hand,
+Of Life, of Crowne, and Queene at once dispatcht;  [Sidenote: of Queene]
+[Sidenote: 164] Cut off euen in the Blossomes of my Sinne,
+Vnhouzzled, disappointed, vnnaneld,[6] [Sidenote: Vnhuzled, | vnanueld,]
+[Sidenote: 262] No reckoning made, but sent to my account
+With all my imperfections on my head;
+Oh horrible, Oh horrible, most horrible:
+If thou hast nature in thee beare it not;
+Let not the Royall Bed of Denmarke be
+A Couch for Luxury and damned Incest.[7]
+But howsoeuer thou pursuest this Act,
+                                     [Sidenote: howsomeuer thou pursues]
+[Sidenote: 30,174] Taint not thy mind; nor let thy Soule contriue
+[Sidenote: 140] Against thy Mother ought; leaue her to heauen,
+And to those Thornes that in her bosome lodge,
+To pricke and sting her. Fare thee well at once;
+The Glow-worme showes the Matine to be neere,
+And gins to pale his vneffectuall Fire:
+Adue, adue, _Hamlet_: remember me. _Exit_.
+                        [Sidenote: Adiew, adiew, adiew, remember me.[8]]
+
+_Ham._ Oh all you host of Heauen! Oh Earth: what els?
+And shall I couple Hell?[9] Oh fie[10]: hold my heart;
+                                               [Sidenote: hold, hold my]
+And you my sinnewes, grow not instant Old;
+
+[Footnote 1: Ebony.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _producing leprosy_--as described in result below.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _1st Q_. 'posteth'.]
+
+[Footnote 4: So also _1st Q_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: This _barckt_--meaning _cased as a bark cases its tree_--is
+used in _1st Q_. also: 'And all my smoothe body, barked, and tetterd
+ouer.' The word is so used in Scotland still.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _Husel (Anglo-Saxon)_ is _an offering, the sacrament.
+Disappointed, not appointed_: Dr. Johnson. _Unaneled, unoiled, without
+the extreme unction_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: It is on public grounds, as a king and a Dane, rather than
+as a husband and a murdered man, that he urges on his son the execution
+of justice. Note the tenderness towards his wife that follows--more
+marked, 174; here it is mingled with predominating regard to his son to
+whose filial nature he dreads injury.]
+
+[Footnote 8: _Q_. omits _Exit_.]
+
+[Footnote 9: He must: his father is there!]
+
+[Footnote 10: The interjection is addressed to _heart_ and _sinews_,
+which forget their duty.]
+
+[Page 56]
+
+But beare me stiffely vp: Remember thee?[1]       [Sidenote: swiftly vp]
+I, thou poore Ghost, while memory holds a seate       [Sidenote: whiles]
+In this distracted Globe[2]: Remember thee?
+Yea, from the Table of my Memory,[3]
+Ile wipe away all triuiall fond Records,
+All sawes[4] of Bookes, all formes, all presures past,
+That youth and obseruation coppied there;
+And thy Commandment all alone shall liue
+Within the Booke and Volume of my Braine,
+Vnmixt with baser matter; yes, yes, by Heauen:
+                                              [Sidenote: matter, yes by]
+[Sidenote: 168] Oh most pernicious woman![5]
+Oh Villaine, Villaine, smiling damned Villaine!
+My Tables, my Tables; meet it is I set it downe,[6]
+                                             [Sidenote: My tables, meet]
+That one may smile, and smile and be a Villaine;
+At least I'm sure it may be so in Denmarke;             [Sidenote: I am]
+So Vnckle there you are: now to my word;[7]
+It is; Adue, Adue, Remember me:[8] I haue sworn't.
+                              [Sidenote: _Enter Horatio, and Marcellus_]
+
+_Hor. and Mar. within_. My Lord, my Lord.         [Sidenote: _Hora._ My]
+
+_Enter Horatio and Marcellus._
+
+_Mar_. Lord _Hamlet_.
+
+_Hor_. Heauen secure him.                            [Sidenote: Heauens]
+
+_Mar_. So be it.
+
+_Hor_. Illo, ho, ho, my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Hillo, ho, ho, boy; come bird, come.[9]
+                                         [Sidenote: boy come, and come.]
+
+_Mar_. How ist't my Noble Lord?
+
+_Hor_. What newes, my Lord?
+
+_Ham_. Oh wonderfull![10]
+
+_Hor_. Good my Lord tell it.
+
+_Ham_. No you'l reueale it.                         [Sidenote: you will]
+
+_Hor_. Not I, my Lord, by Heauen.
+
+_Mar_. Nor I, my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. How say you then, would heart of man once think it?
+But you'l be secret?
+
+[Footnote 1: For the moment he has no doubt that he has seen and spoken
+with the ghost of his father.]
+
+[Footnote 2: his head.]
+
+[Footnote 3: The whole speech is that of a student, accustomed to books,
+to take notes, and to fix things in his memory. 'Table,' _tablet_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _wise sayings_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: The Ghost has revealed her adultery: Hamlet suspects her of
+complicity in the murder, 168.]
+
+[Footnote 6: It may well seem odd that Hamlet should be represented as,
+at such a moment, making a note in his tablets; but without further
+allusion to the student-habit, I would remark that, in cases where
+strongest passion is roused, the intellect has yet sometimes an
+automatic trick of working independently. For instance from Shakspere,
+see Constance in _King John_--how, in her agony over the loss of her
+son, both her fancy, playing with words, and her imagination, playing
+with forms, are busy.
+
+Note the glimpse of Hamlet's character here given: he had been something
+of an optimist; at least had known villainy only from books; at thirty
+years of age it is to him a discovery that a man may smile and be a
+villain! Then think of the shock of such discoveries as are here forced
+upon him! Villainy is no longer a mere idea, but a fact! and of all
+villainous deeds those of his own mother and uncle are the worst! But
+note also his honesty, his justice to humanity, his philosophic
+temperament, in the qualification he sets to the memorandum, '--at least
+in Denmark!']
+
+[Footnote 7: 'my word,'--the word he has to keep in mind; his cue.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Should not the actor here make a pause, with hand uplifted,
+as taking a solemn though silent oath?]
+
+[Footnote 9: --as if calling to a hawk.]
+
+[Footnote 10: Here comes the test of the actor's _possible_: here Hamlet
+himself begins to act, and will at once assume a _role_, ere yet he well
+knows what it must be. One thing only is clear to him--that the
+communication of the Ghost is not a thing to be shared--that he must
+keep it with all his power of secrecy: the honour both of father and of
+mother is at stake. In order to do so, he must begin by putting on
+himself a cloak of darkness, and hiding his feelings--first of all the
+present agitation which threatens to overpower him. His immediate
+impulse or instinctive motion is to force an air, and throw a veil of
+grimmest humour over the occurrence. The agitation of the horror at his
+heart, ever working and constantly repressed, shows through the veil,
+and gives an excited uncertainty to his words, and a wild vacillation to
+his manner and behaviour.]
+
+[Page 58]
+
+_Both_. I, by Heau'n, my Lord.[1]
+
+_Ham_. There's nere a villaine dwelling in all Denmarke
+But hee's an arrant knaue.
+
+_Hor_. There needs no Ghost my Lord, come from the
+Graue, to tell vs this.
+
+_Ham_. Why right, you are i'th'right;                 [Sidenote: in the]
+And so, without more circumstance at all,
+I hold it fit that we shake hands, and part:
+You, as your busines and desires shall point you:     [Sidenote: desire]
+For euery man ha's businesse and desire,[2]             [Sidenote: hath]
+Such as it is: and for mine owne poore part,              [Sidenote: my]
+Looke you, Ile goe pray.[4]              [Sidenote: I will goe pray.[3]]
+
+_Hor_. These are but wild and hurling words, my Lord.
+                                                 [Sidenote: whurling[5]]
+
+_Ham_. I'm sorry they offend you heartily:              [Sidenote: I am]
+Yes faith, heartily.
+
+_Hor_. There's no offence my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Yes, by Saint _Patricke_, but there is my Lord,[6]
+                                          [Sidenote: there is _Horatio_]
+And much offence too, touching this Vision heere;[7]
+[Sidenote: 136] It is an honest Ghost, that let me tell you:[8]
+For your desire to know what is betweene vs,
+O'remaster't as you may. And now good friends,
+As you are Friends, Schollers and Soldiers,
+Giue me one poore request.
+
+_Hor_. What is't my Lord? we will.
+
+_Ham_. Neuer make known what you haue seen to night.[9]
+
+_Both_. My Lord, we will not.
+
+_Ham_. Nay, but swear't.
+
+_Hor_. Infaith my Lord, not I.[10]
+
+_Mar_. Nor I my Lord: in faith.
+
+_Ham_. Vpon my sword.[11]
+
+[Footnote 1: _Q. has not_ 'my Lord.']
+
+[Footnote 2: Here shows the philosopher.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _Q. has not_ 'Looke you.']
+
+[Footnote 4: '--nothing else is left me.' This seems to me one of the
+finest touches in the revelation of Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _1st Q_. 'wherling'.]
+
+[Footnote 6: I take the change from the _Quarto_ here to be no blunder.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _Point thus_: 'too!--Touching.']
+
+[Footnote 8: The struggle to command himself is plain throughout.]
+
+[Footnote 9: He could not endure the thought of the resulting
+gossip;--which besides would interfere with, possibly frustrate, the
+carrying out of his part.]
+
+[Footnote 10: This is not a refusal to swear; it is the oath itself:
+'_In faith I will not_!']
+
+[Footnote 11: He would have them swear on the cross-hilt of his sword.]
+
+[Page 60]
+
+_Marcell._ We haue sworne my Lord already.[1]
+
+_Ham._ Indeed, vpon my sword, Indeed.
+
+_Gho._ Sweare.[2]  _Ghost cries vnder the Stage._[3]
+
+_Ham._ Ah ha boy, sayest thou so. Art thou           [Sidenote: Ha, ha,]
+there truepenny?[4] Come one you here this fellow
+                                          [Sidenote: Come on, you heare]
+in the selleredge
+Consent to sweare.
+
+_Hor._ Propose the Oath my Lord.[5]
+
+_Ham._ Neuer to speake of this that you haue seene.
+Sweare by my sword.
+
+_Gho._ Sweare.
+
+_Ham. Hic & vbique_? Then wee'l shift for grownd,  [Sidenote: shift our]
+Come hither Gentlemen,
+And lay your hands againe vpon my sword,
+Neuer to speake of this that you haue heard:[6]
+Sweare by my Sword.
+
+_Gho._ Sweare.[7]                       [Sidenote: Sweare by his sword.]
+
+_Ham._ Well said old Mole, can'st worke i'th' ground so fast?
+                                                 [Sidenote: it'h' earth]
+A worthy Pioner, once more remoue good friends.
+
+_Hor._ Oh day and night: but this is wondrous strange.
+
+_Ham._ And therefore as a stranger giue it welcome.
+There are more things in Heauen and Earth, _Horatio_,
+Then are dream't of in our Philosophy But come,      [Sidenote: in your]
+Here as before, neuer so helpe you mercy,
+How strange or odde so ere I beare my selfe;   [Sidenote: How | so mere]
+(As I perchance heereafter shall thinke meet              [Sidenote: As]
+[Sidenote: 136, 156, 178] To put an Anticke disposition on:)[8]
+                                                          [Sidenote: on]
+That you at such time seeing me, neuer shall           [Sidenote: times]
+With Armes encombred thus, or thus, head shake;
+                                                [Sidenote: or this head]
+
+[Footnote 1: He feels his honour touched.]
+
+[Footnote 2: The Ghost's interference heightens Hamlet's agitation. If
+he does not talk, laugh, jest, it will overcome him. Also he must not
+show that he believes it his father's ghost: that must be kept to
+himself--for the present at least. He shows it therefore no
+respect--treats the whole thing humorously, so avoiding, or at least
+parrying question. It is all he can do to keep the mastery of himself,
+dodging horror with half-forced, half-hysterical laughter. Yet is he all
+the time intellectually on the alert. See how, instantly active, he
+makes use of the voice from beneath to enforce his requisition of
+silence. Very speedily too he grows quiet: a glimmer of light as to the
+course of action necessary to him has begun to break upon him: it breaks
+from his own wild and disjointed behaviour in the attempt to hide the
+conflict of his feelings--which suggests to him the idea of shrouding
+himself, as did David at the court of the Philistines, in the cloak of
+madness: thereby protected from the full force of what suspicion any
+absorption of manner or outburst of feeling must occasion, he may win
+time to lay his plans. Note how, in the midst of his horror, he is yet
+able to think, plan, resolve.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _1st Q. 'The Gost under the stage.'_]
+
+[Footnote 4: While Hamlet seems to take it so coolly, the others have
+fled in terror from the spot. He goes to them. Their fear must be what,
+on the two occasions after, makes him shift to another place when the
+Ghost speaks.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Now at once he consents.]
+
+[Footnote 6: In the _Quarto_ this and the next line are transposed.]
+
+[Footnote 7: What idea is involved as the cause of the Ghost's thus
+interfering?--That he too sees what difficulties must encompass the
+carrying out of his behest, and what absolute secrecy is thereto
+essential.]
+
+[Footnote 8: This idea, hardly yet a resolve, he afterwards carries out
+so well, that he deceives not only king and queen and court, but the
+most of his critics ever since: to this day they believe him mad. Such
+must have studied in the play a phantom of their own misconception, and
+can never have seen the Hamlet of Shakspere. Thus prejudiced, they
+mistake also the effects of moral and spiritual perturbation and misery
+for further sign of intellectual disorder--even for proof of moral
+weakness, placing them in the same category with the symptoms of the
+insanity which he simulates, and by which they are deluded.]
+
+[Page 62]
+
+Or by pronouncing of some doubtfull Phrase;
+As well, we know, or we could and if we would,
+                                           [Sidenote: As well, well, we]
+Or if we list to speake; or there be and if there might,
+                                               [Sidenote: if they might]
+Or such ambiguous giuing out to note,                   [Sidenote: note]
+That you know ought of me; this not to doe:
+                                        [Sidenote: me, this doe sweare,]
+So grace and mercy at your most neede helpe you:
+Sweare.[1]
+
+_Ghost_. Sweare.[2]
+
+_Ham_. Rest, rest perturbed Spirit[3]: so Gentlemen,
+With all my loue I doe commend me to you;
+And what so poore a man as _Hamlet_ is,
+May doe t'expresse his loue and friending to you,
+God willing shall not lacke: let vs goe in together,
+And still your fingers on your lippes I pray,
+The time is out of ioynt: Oh cursed spight,[4]
+[Sidenote: 126] That euer I was borne to set it right.
+Nay, come let's goe together.         _Exeunt._[5]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+SUMMARY OF ACT I.
+
+
+This much of Hamlet we have now learned: he is a thoughtful man, a
+genuine student, little acquainted with the world save through books,
+and a lover of his kind. His university life at Wittenberg is suddenly
+interrupted by a call to the funeral of his father, whom he dearly loves
+and honours. Ere he reaches Denmark, his uncle Claudius has contrived,
+in an election (202, 250, 272) probably hastened and secretly
+influenced, to gain the voice of the representatives at least of the
+people, and ascend the throne. Hence his position must have been an
+irksome one from the first; but, within a month of his father's death,
+his mother's marriage with his uncle--a relation universally regarded as
+incestuous--plunges him in the deepest misery. The play introduces him
+at the first court held after the wedding. He is attired in the mourning
+of his father's funeral, which he had not laid aside for the wedding.
+His aspect is of absolute dejection, and he appears in a company for
+which he is so unfit only for the sake of desiring permission to leave
+the court, and go back to his studies at Wittenberg.[A] Left to himself,
+he breaks out in agonized and indignant lamentation over his mother's
+conduct, dwelling mainly on her disregard of his father's memory. Her
+conduct and his partial discovery of her character, is the sole cause of
+his misery. In such his mood, Horatio, a fellow-student, brings him word
+that his father's spirit walks at night. He watches for the Ghost, and
+receives from him a frightful report of his present condition, into
+which, he tells him, he was cast by the murderous hand of his brother,
+with whom his wife had been guilty of adultery. He enjoins him to put a
+stop to the crime in which they are now living, by taking vengeance on
+his uncle. Uncertain at the moment how to act, and dreading the
+consequences of rousing suspicion by the perturbation which he could not
+but betray, he grasps at the sudden idea of affecting madness. We have
+learned also Hamlet's relation to Ophelia, the daughter of the selfish,
+prating, busy Polonius, who, with his son Laertes, is destined to work
+out the earthly fate of Hamlet. Of Laertes, as yet, we only know that he
+prates like his father, is self-confident, and was educated at Paris,
+whither he has returned. Of Ophelia we know nothing but that she is
+gentle, and that she is fond of Hamlet, whose attentions she has
+encouraged, but with whom, upon her father's severe remonstrance, she is
+ready, outwardly at least, to break.
+
+[Footnote A: Roger Ascham, in his _Scholemaster_, if I mistake not, sets
+the age, up to which a man should be under tutors, at twenty-nine.]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'Sweare' _not in Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: They do not this time shift their ground, but swear--in
+dumb show.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --for now they had obeyed his command and sworn secrecy.]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'cursed spight'--not merely that he had been born to do
+hangman's work, but that he should have been born at all--of a mother
+whose crime against his father had brought upon him the wretched
+necessity which must proclaim her ignominy. Let the student do his best
+to realize the condition of Hamlet's heart and mind in relation to his
+mother.]
+
+[Footnote: 5 This first act occupies part of a night, a day, and part of
+the next night.]
+
+[Page 64]
+
+
+
+ACTUS SECUNDUS.[1]
+
+
+_Enter Polonius, and Reynoldo._
+                 [Sidenote: _Enter old Polonius, with his man, or two._]
+
+_Polon._ Giue him his money, and these notes _Reynoldo_.[2]
+                                                  [Sidenote: this money]
+
+_Reynol._ I will my Lord.
+
+_Polon._ You shall doe maruels wisely: good _Reynoldo_,
+                                                    [Sidenote: meruiles]
+Before you visite him you make inquiry
+                                        [Sidenote: him, to make inquire]
+Of his behauiour.[3]
+
+_Reynol._ My Lord, I did intend it.
+
+_Polon._ Marry, well said;
+Very well said. Looke you Sir,
+Enquire me first what Danskers are in Paris;
+And how, and who; what meanes; and where they keepe:
+What company, at what expence: and finding
+By this encompassement and drift of question,
+That they doe know my sonne: Come you more neerer[4]
+Then your particular demands will touch it,
+Take you as 'twere some distant knowledge of him,
+And thus I know his father and his friends,          [Sidenote: As thus]
+And in part him. Doe you marke this _Reynoldo_?
+
+_Reynol._ I, very well my Lord.
+
+_Polon._ And in part him, but you may say not well;
+But if't be hee I meane, hees very wilde;
+Addicted so and so; and there put on him
+What forgeries you please: marry, none so ranke,
+As may dishonour him; take heed of that:
+But Sir, such wanton, wild, and vsuall slips,
+As are Companions noted and most knowne
+To youth and liberty.
+
+[Footnote 1: _Not in Quarto._
+
+Between this act and the former, sufficient time has passed to allow the
+ambassadors to go to Norway and return: 74. See 138, and what Hamlet
+says of the time since his father's death, 24, by which together the
+interval _seems_ indicated as about two months, though surely so much
+time was not necessary.
+
+Cause and effect _must_ be truly presented; time and space are mere
+accidents, and of small consequence in the drama, whose very idea is
+compression for the sake of presentation. All that is necessary in
+regard to time is, that, either by the act-pause, or the intervention of
+a fresh scene, the passing of it should be indicated.
+
+This second act occupies the forenoon of one day.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _1st Q._
+
+    _Montano_, here, these letters to my sonne,
+    And this same mony with my blessing to him,
+    And bid him ply his learning good _Montano_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: The father has no confidence in the son, and rightly, for
+both are unworthy: he turns on him the cunning of the courtier, and
+sends a spy on his behaviour. The looseness of his own principles comes
+out very clear in his anxieties about his son; and, having learned the
+ideas of the father as to what becomes a gentleman, we are not surprised
+to find the son such as he afterwards shows himself. Till the end
+approaches, we hear no more of Laertes, nor is more necessary; but
+without this scene we should have been unprepared for his vileness.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _Point thus_: 'son, come you more nearer; then &c.' The
+_then_ here does not stand for _than_, and to change it to _than_ makes
+at once a contradiction. The sense is: 'Having put your general
+questions first, and been answered to your purpose, then your particular
+demands will come in, and be of service; they will reach to the
+point--_will touch it_.' The _it_ is impersonal. After it should come a
+period.]
+
+[Page 66]
+
+_Reynol._ As gaming my Lord.
+
+_Polon._ I, or drinking, fencing, swearing,
+Quarelling, drabbing. You may goe so farre.
+
+_Reynol._ My Lord that would dishonour him.
+
+_Polon._ Faith no, as you may season it in the charge;[1]
+                                                [Sidenote: Fayth as you]
+You must not put another scandall on him,
+That hee is open to Incontinencie;[2]
+That's not my meaning: but breath his faults so quaintly,
+That they may seeme the taints of liberty;
+The flash and out-breake of a fiery minde,
+A sauagenes in vnreclaim'd[3] bloud of generall assault.[4]
+
+_Reynol._ But my good Lord.[5]
+
+_Polon._ Wherefore should you doe this?[6]
+
+_Reynol._ I my Lord, I would know that.
+
+_Polon._ Marry Sir, heere's my drift,
+And I belieue it is a fetch of warrant:[7]           [Sidenote: of wit,]
+You laying these slight sulleyes[8] on my Sonne,
+                                                  [Sidenote: sallies[8]]
+As 'twere a thing a little soil'd i'th'working:
+                                        [Sidenote: soiled with working,]
+Marke you your party in conuerse; him you would sound,
+Hauing euer seene. In the prenominate crimes,   [Sidenote: seene in the]
+The youth you breath of guilty, be assur'd
+He closes with you in this consequence:
+Good sir, or so, or friend, or Gentleman.
+According to the Phrase and the Addition,[9]   [Sidenote: phrase or the]
+Of man and Country.
+
+_Reynol._ Very good my Lord.
+
+_Polon._ And then Sir does he this?
+                            [Sidenote: doos a this a doos, what was _I_]
+He does: what was I about to say?
+I was about to say somthing: where did I leaue?
+                                          [Sidenote: By the masse I was]
+
+_Reynol._ At closes in the consequence:
+At friend, or so, and Gentleman.[10]
+
+[Footnote 1: _1st Q._
+
+    I faith not a whit, no not a whit,
+
+    As you may bridle it not disparage him a iote.]
+
+[Footnote 2: This may well seem prating inconsistency, but I suppose
+means that he must not be represented as without moderation in his
+wickedness.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _Untamed_, as a hawk.]
+
+[Footnote 4: The lines are properly arranged in _Q_.
+
+    A sauagenes in vnreclamed blood,
+    Of generall assault.
+
+--that is, 'which assails all.']
+
+[Footnote 5: Here a hesitating pause.]
+
+[Footnote 6: --with the expression of, 'Is that what you would say?']
+
+[Footnote 7: 'a fetch with warrant for it'--a justifiable trick.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Compare _sallied_, 25, both Quartos; _sallets_ 67, 103; and
+see _soil'd_, next line.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'Addition,' epithet of courtesy in address.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _Q_. has not this line]
+
+[Page 68]
+
+_Polon._ At closes in the consequence, I marry,
+He closes with you thus. I know the Gentleman,
+                                             [Sidenote: He closes thus,]
+I saw him yesterday, or tother day;                 [Sidenote: th'other]
+Or then or then, with such and such; and as you say,
+                                                    [Sidenote: or such,]
+[Sidenote: 25] There was he gaming, there o'retooke in's Rouse,
+                                [Sidenote: was a gaming there, or tooke]
+There falling out at Tennis; or perchance,
+I saw him enter such a house of saile;                 [Sidenote: sale,]
+_Videlicet_, a Brothell, or so forth. See you now;
+Your bait of falshood, takes this Cape of truth;
+                                             [Sidenote: take this carpe]
+And thus doe we of wisedome and of reach[1]
+With windlesses,[2] and with assaies of Bias,
+By indirections finde directions out:
+So by my former Lecture and aduice
+Shall you my Sonne; you haue me, haue you not?
+
+_Reynol._ My Lord I haue.
+
+_Polon._ God buy you; fare you well,                 [Sidenote: ye | ye]
+
+_Reynol._ Good my Lord.
+
+_Polon._ Obserue his inclination in your selfe.[3]
+
+_Reynol._ I shall my Lord.
+
+_Polon._ And let him[4] plye his Musicke.
+
+_Reynol._ Well, my Lord.        _Exit_.
+
+_Enter Ophelia_.
+
+_Polon_. Farewell:
+How now _Ophelia_, what's the matter?
+
+_Ophe_. Alas my Lord, I haue beene so affrighted.
+                                         [Sidenote: O my Lord, my Lord,]
+
+_Polon_. With what, in the name of Heauen?
+                                           [Sidenote: i'th name of God?]
+
+_Ophe_. My Lord, as I was sowing in my Chamber,     [Sidenote: closset,]
+Lord _Hamlet_ with his doublet all vnbrac'd,[5]
+No hat vpon his head, his stockings foul'd,
+Vngartred, and downe giued[6] to his Anckle,
+Pale as his shirt, his knees knocking each other,
+And with a looke so pitious in purport,
+As if he had been loosed out of hell,
+
+[Footnote 1: of far reaching mind.]
+
+[Footnote 2: The word windlaces is explained in the dictionaries as
+_shifts, subtleties_--but apparently on the sole authority of this
+passage. There must be a figure in _windlesses_, as well as in _assaies
+of Bias_, which is a phrase plain enough to bowlers: the trying of other
+directions than that of the _jack_, in the endeavour to come at one with
+the law of the bowl's bias. I find _wanlass_ a term in hunting: it had
+to do with driving game to a given point--whether in part by getting to
+windward of it, I cannot tell. The word may come of the verb wind, from
+its meaning '_to manage by shifts or expedients_': _Barclay_. As he has
+spoken of fishing, could the _windlesses_ refer to any little instrument
+such as now used upon a fishing-rod? I do not think it. And how do the
+words _windlesses_ and _indirections_ come together? Was a windless some
+contrivance for determining how the wind blew? I bethink me that a thin
+withered straw is in Scotland called a _windlestrae_: perhaps such
+straws were thrown up to find out 'by indirection' the direction of the
+wind.
+
+The press-reader sends me two valuable quotations, through Latham's
+edition of Johnson's Dictionary, from Dr. H. Hammond (1605-1660), in
+which _windlass_ is used as a verb:--
+
+'A skilful woodsman, by windlassing, presently gets a shoot, which,
+without taking a compass, and thereby a commodious stand, he could never
+have obtained.'
+
+'She is not so much at leasure as to windlace, or use craft, to satisfy
+them.'
+
+To _windlace_ seems then to mean 'to steal along to leeward;' would it
+be absurd to suggest that, so-doing, the hunter _laces the wind_?
+Shakspere, with many another, I fancy, speaks of _threading the night_
+or _the darkness_.
+
+Johnson explains the word in the text as 'A handle by which anything is
+turned.']
+
+[Footnote 3: 'in your selfe.' may mean either 'through the insight
+afforded by your own feelings'; or 'in respect of yourself,' 'toward
+yourself.' I do not know which is intended.]
+
+[Footnote 4: 1st Q. 'And bid him'.]
+
+[Footnote 5: loose; _undone_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: His stockings, slipped down in wrinkles round his ankles,
+suggested the rings of _gyves_ or fetters. The verb _gyve_, of which the
+passive participle is here used, is rarer.]
+
+[Page 70]
+
+To speake of horrors: he comes before me.
+
+_Polon._ Mad for thy Loue?
+
+_Ophe._ My Lord, I doe not know: but truly I do feare it.[1]
+
+_Polon._ What said he?
+
+_Ophe._[2] He tooke me by the wrist, and held me hard;
+Then goes he to the length of all his arme;
+And with his other hand thus o're his brow,
+He fals to such perusall of my face,
+As he would draw it. Long staid he so,                  [Sidenote: As a]
+At last, a little shaking of mine Arme:
+And thrice his head thus wauing vp and downe;
+He rais'd a sigh, so pittious and profound,
+That it did seeme to shatter all his bulke,            [Sidenote: As it]
+And end his being. That done, he lets me goe,
+And with his head ouer his shoulders turn'd,        [Sidenote: shoulder]
+He seem'd to finde his way without his eyes,
+For out adores[3] he went without their helpe;        [Sidenote: helps,]
+And to the last, bended their light on me.
+
+_Polon._ Goe with me, I will goe seeke the King,   [Sidenote: Come, goe]
+This is the very extasie of Loue,
+Whose violent property foredoes[4] it selfe,
+And leads the will to desperate Vndertakings,
+As oft as any passion vnder Heauen,                 [Sidenote: passions]
+That does afflict our Natures. I am sorrie,
+What haue you giuen him any hard words of late?
+
+_Ophe_. No my good Lord: but as you did command,
+[Sidenote: 42, 82] I did repell his Letters, and deny'de
+His accesse to me.[5]
+
+_Pol_. That hath made him mad.
+I am sorrie that with better speed and Judgement
+                                                [Sidenote: better heede]
+[Sidenote: 83] I had not quoted[6] him. I feare he did but trifle,
+                                           [Sidenote: coted[6] | fear'd]
+And meant to wracke thee: but beshrew my iealousie:
+
+[Footnote 1: She would be glad her father should think so.]
+
+[Footnote 2: The detailed description of Hamlet and his behaviour that
+follows, must be introduced in order that the side mirror of narrative
+may aid the front mirror of drama, and between them be given a true
+notion of his condition both mental and bodily. Although weeks have
+passed since his interview with the Ghost, he is still haunted with the
+memory of it, still broods over its horrible revelation. That he had,
+probably soon, begun to feel far from certain of the truth of the
+apparition, could not make the thoughts and questions it had awaked,
+cease tormenting his whole being. The stifling smoke of his mother's
+conduct had in his mind burst into loathsome flame, and through her he
+has all but lost his faith in humanity. To know his uncle a villain, was
+to know his uncle a villain; to know his mother false, was to doubt
+women, doubt the whole world.
+
+In the meantime Ophelia, in obedience to her father, and evidently
+without reason assigned, has broken off communication with him: he reads
+her behaviour by the lurid light of his mother's. She too is false! she
+too is heartless! he can look to her for no help! She has turned against
+him to curry favour with his mother and his uncle!
+
+Can she be such as his mother! Why should she not be? His mother had
+seemed as good! He would give his life to know her honest and pure.
+Might he but believe her what he had believed her, he would yet have a
+hiding-place from the wind, a covert from the tempest! If he could but
+know the truth! Alone with her once more but for a moment, he would read
+her very soul by the might of his! He must see her! He would see her! In
+the agony of a doubt upon which seemed to hang the bliss or bale of his
+being, yet not altogether unintimidated by a sense of his intrusion, he
+walks into the house of Polonius, and into the chamber of Ophelia.
+
+Ever since the night of the apparition, the court, from the behaviour
+assumed by Hamlet, has believed his mind affected; and when he enters
+her room, Ophelia, though such is the insight of love that she is able
+to read in the face of the son the father's purgatorial sufferings, the
+picture of one 'loosed out of hell, to speak of horrors,' attributes all
+the strangeness of his appearance and demeanour, such as she describes
+them to her father, to that supposed fact. But there is, in truth, as
+little of affected as of actual madness in his behaviour in her
+presence. When he comes before her pale and trembling, speechless and
+with staring eyes, it is with no simulated insanity, but in the agonized
+hope, scarce distinguishable from despair, of finding, in the testimony
+of her visible presence, an assurance that the doubts ever tearing his
+spirit and sickening his brain, are but the offspring of his phantasy.
+There she sits!--and there he stands, vainly endeavouring through her
+eyes to read her soul! for, alas,
+
+                    there's no art
+    To find the mind's construction in the face!
+
+--until at length, finding himself utterly baffled, but unable, save by
+the removal of his person, to take his eyes from her face, he retires
+speechless as he came. Such is the man whom we are now to see wandering
+about the halls and corridors of the great castle-palace.
+
+He may by this time have begun to doubt even the reality of the sight he
+had seen. The moment the pressure of a marvellous presence is removed,
+it is in the nature of man the same moment to begin to doubt; and
+instead of having any reason to wish the apparition a true one, he had
+every reason to desire to believe it an illusion or a lying spirit.
+Great were his excuse even if he forced likelihoods, and suborned
+witnesses in the court of his own judgment. To conclude it false was to
+think his father in heaven, and his mother not an adulteress, not a
+murderess! At once to kill his uncle would be to seal these horrible
+things irrevocable, indisputable facts. Strongest reasons he had for not
+taking immediate action in vengeance; but no smallest incapacity for
+action had share in his delay. The Poet takes recurrent pains, as if he
+foresaw hasty conclusions, to show his hero a man of promptitude, with
+this truest fitness for action, that he would not make unlawful haste.
+Without sufficing assurance, he would have no part in the fate either of
+the uncle he disliked or the mother he loved.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _a doors_, like _an end_. 51, 175.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _undoes, frustrates, destroys_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: See quotation from _1st Quarto,_ 43.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _Quoted_ or _coted: observed_; Fr. _coter_, to mark the
+number. Compare 95.]
+
+[Page 72]
+
+It seemes it is as proper to our Age,        [Sidenote: By heauen it is]
+To cast beyond our selues[1] in our Opinions,
+As it is common for the yonger sort
+To lacke discretion.[2] Come, go we to the King,
+This must be knowne, which being kept close might moue
+More greefe to hide, then hate to vtter loue.[3]       [Sidenote: Come.]
+                                     _Exeunt._
+
+
+_SCENA SECUNDA._[4]
+
+
+_Enter King, Queene, Rosincrane, and Guildensterne Cum alijs.
+               [Sidenote: Florish: Enter King and Queene, Rosencraus and
+                                                      Guyldensterne.[5]]
+
+_King._ Welcome deere _Rosincrance_ and _Guildensterne_.
+Moreouer,[6] that we much did long to see you,
+The neede we haue to vse you, did prouoke
+[Sidenote: 92] Our hastie sending.[7] Something haue you heard
+Of _Hamlets_ transformation: so I call it,           [Sidenote: so call]
+Since not th'exterior, nor the inward man           [Sidenote: Sith nor]
+Resembles that it was. What it should bee
+More then his Fathers death, that thus hath put him
+So much from th'understanding of himselfe,
+I cannot deeme of.[8] I intreat you both,             [Sidenote: dreame]
+That being of so young dayes[9] brought vp with him:
+And since so Neighbour'd to[10] his youth,and humour,
+                                      [Sidenote: And sith | and hauior,]
+That you vouchsafe your rest heere in our Court
+Some little time: so by your Companies
+To draw him on to pleasures, and to gather
+[Sidenote: 116] So much as from Occasions you may gleane,
+                                                    [Sidenote: occasion]
+[A]
+That open'd lies within our remedie.[11]
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+Whether ought to vs vnknowne afflicts him thus,]
+
+[Footnote 1:
+
+    'to be overwise--to overreach ourselves'
+    'ambition, which o'erleaps itself,'
+    --_Macbeth_, act i. sc. 7.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Polonius is a man of faculty. His courtier-life, his
+self-seeking, his vanity, have made and make him the fool he is.]
+
+[Footnote 3: He hopes now to get his daughter married to the prince.
+
+We have here a curious instance of Shakspere's not unfrequently
+excessive condensation. Expanded, the clause would be like this: 'which,
+being kept close, might move more grief by the hiding of love, than to
+utter love might move hate:' the grief in the one case might be greater
+than the hate in the other would be. It verges on confusion, and may not
+be as Shakspere wrote it, though it is like his way.
+
+_1st Q._
+
+    Lets to the king, this madnesse may prooue,
+    Though wilde a while, yet more true to thy loue.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 5: _Q._ has not _Cum alijs._]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'Moreover that &c.': _moreover_ is here used as a
+preposition, with the rest of the clause for its objective.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Rosincrance and Guildensterne are, from the first and
+throughout, the creatures of the king.]
+
+[Footnote 8: The king's conscience makes him suspicious of Hamlet's
+suspicion.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'from such an early age'.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'since then so familiar with'.]
+
+[Footnote 11: 'to gather as much as you may glean from opportunities, of
+that which, when disclosed to us, will lie within our remedial power.'
+If the line of the Quarto be included, it makes plainer construction.
+The line beginning with '_So much_,' then becomes parenthetical, and _to
+gather_ will not immediately govern that line, but the rest of the
+sentence.]
+
+[Page 74]
+
+_Qu._ Good Gentlemen, he hath much talk'd of you,
+And sure I am, two men there are not liuing,    [Sidenote: there is not]
+To whom he more adheres. If it will please you
+To shew vs so much Gentrie,[1] and good will,
+As to expend your time with vs a-while,
+For the supply and profit of our Hope,[2]
+Your Visitation shall receiue such thankes
+As fits a Kings remembrance.
+
+_Rosin._ Both your Maiesties
+Might by the Soueraigne power you haue of vs,
+Put your dread pleasures, more into Command
+Then to Entreatie,
+
+_Guil._ We both[3] obey,                              [Sidenote: But we]
+And here giue vp our selues, in the full bent,[4]
+To lay our Seruices freely at your feete,            [Sidenote: seruice]
+To be commanded.
+
+_King._ Thankes _Rosincrance_, and gentle _Guildensterne_.
+
+_Qu._ Thankes _Guildensterne_ and gentle _Rosincrance_,[5]
+And I beseech you instantly to visit
+My too much changed Sonne.
+Go some of ye,                                           [Sidenote: you]
+And bring the Gentlemen where _Hamlet_ is,       [Sidenote: bring these]
+
+_Guil._ Heauens make our presence and our practises
+Pleasant and helpfull to him.          _Exit_[6]
+
+_Queene._ Amen.               [Sidenote: Amen. _Exeunt Ros. and Guyld._]
+
+_Enter Polonius._
+
+[Sidenote: 18] _Pol._ Th'Ambassadors from Norwey, my good Lord,
+Are ioyfully return'd.
+
+[Footnote 1: gentleness, grace, favour.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Their hope in Hamlet, as their son and heir.]
+
+[Footnote 3: both majesties.]
+
+[Footnote 4: If we put a comma after _bent_, the phrase will mean 'in
+the full _purpose_ or _design_ to lay our services &c.' Without the
+comma, the content of the phrase would be general:--'in the devoted
+force of our faculty.' The latter is more like Shakspere.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Is there not tact intended in the queen's reversal of her
+husband's arrangement of the two names--that each might have precedence,
+and neither take offence?]
+
+[Footnote 6: _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Page 76]
+
+_King._ Thou still hast bin the Father of good Newes.
+
+_Pol._ Haue I, my Lord?[1] Assure you, my good Liege,
+                                                 [Sidenote: I assure my]
+I hold my dutie, as I hold my Soule,
+Both to my God, one to my gracious King:[2]   [Sidenote: God, and to[2]]
+And I do thinke, or else this braine of mine
+Hunts not the traile of Policie, so sure
+As I haue vs'd to do: that I haue found          [Sidenote: it hath vsd]
+The very cause of _Hamlets_ Lunacie.
+
+_King._ Oh speake of that, that I do long to heare.
+                                                  [Sidenote: doe I long]
+
+_Pol._ Giue first admittance to th'Ambassadors,
+My Newes shall be the Newes to that great Feast,
+                                          [Sidenote: the fruite to that]
+
+_King._ Thy selfe do grace to them, and bring them in.
+He tels me my sweet Queene, that he hath found
+                                        [Sidenote: my deere Gertrard he]
+The head[3] and sourse of all your Sonnes distemper.
+
+_Qu._ I doubt it is no other, but the maine,
+His Fathers death, and our o're-hasty Marriage.[4]
+                                                  [Sidenote: our hastie]
+
+_Enter Polonius, Voltumand, and Cornelius._
+                                        [Sidenote: _Enter_ Embassadors.]
+
+_King._ Well, we shall sift him. Welcome good Frends:
+                                                     [Sidenote: my good]
+Say _Voltumand_, what from our Brother Norwey?
+
+_Volt._ Most faire returne of Greetings, and Desires.
+Vpon our first,[5] he sent out to suppresse
+His Nephewes Leuies, which to him appear'd
+To be a preparation 'gainst the Poleak:            [Sidenote: Pollacke,]
+But better look'd into, he truly found
+It was against your Highnesse, whereat greeued,
+That so his Sicknesse, Age, and Impotence
+Was falsely borne in hand,[6] sends[7] out Arrests
+On _Fortinbras_, which he (in breefe) obeyes,
+
+[Footnote 1: To be spoken triumphantly, but in the peculiar tone of one
+thinking, 'You little know what better news I have behind!']
+
+[Footnote 2: I cannot tell which is the right reading; if the _Q.'s_, it
+means, '_I hold my duty precious as my soul, whether to my God or my
+king_'; if the _F.'s_, it is a little confused by the attempt of
+Polonius to make a fine euphuistic speech:--'_I hold my duty as I hold
+my soul,--both at the command of my God, one at the command of my
+king_.']
+
+[Footnote 3: the spring; the river-head
+
+    'The spring, the head, the fountain of your blood'
+
+    _Macbeth,_ act ii. sc. 3.]
+
+[Footnote 4: She goes a step farther than the king in accounting for
+Hamlet's misery--knows there is more cause of it yet, but hopes he does
+not know so much cause for misery as he might know.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Either 'first' stands for _first desire_, or it is a noun,
+and the meaning of the phrase is, 'The instant we mentioned the
+matter'.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'borne in hand'--played with, taken advantage of.
+
+    'How you were borne in hand, how cross'd,'
+
+    _Macbeth,_ act iii. sc. 1.]
+
+[Footnote 7: The nominative pronoun was not _quite_ indispensable to the
+verb in Shakspere's time.]
+
+[Page 78]
+
+Receiues rebuke from Norwey: and in fine,
+Makes Vow before his Vnkle, neuer more
+To giue th'assay of Armes against your Maiestie.
+Whereon old Norwey, ouercome with ioy,
+Giues him three thousand Crownes in Annuall Fee,
+                                         [Sidenote: threescore thousand]
+And his Commission to imploy those Soldiers
+So leuied as before, against the Poleak:           [Sidenote: Pollacke,]
+With an intreaty heerein further shewne,
+[Sidenote: 190] That it might please you to giue quiet passe
+Through your Dominions, for his Enterprize,         [Sidenote: for this]
+On such regards of safety and allowance,
+As therein are set downe.
+
+_King_. It likes vs well:
+And at our more consider'd[1] time wee'l read,
+Answer, and thinke vpon this Businesse.
+Meane time we thanke you, for your well-tooke Labour.
+Go to your rest, at night wee'l Feast together.[2]
+Most welcome home.       _Exit Ambass_.
+                                          [Sidenote: Exeunt Embassadors]
+
+_Pol_. This businesse is very well ended.[3]         [Sidenote: is well]
+My Liege, and Madam, to expostulate[4]
+What Maiestie should be, what Dutie is,[5]
+Why day is day; night, night; and time is time,
+Were nothing but to waste Night, Day and Time.
+Therefore, since Breuitie is the Soule of Wit,
+                                          [Sidenote: Therefore breuitie]
+And tediousnesse, the limbes and outward flourishes,[6]
+I will be breefe. Your Noble Sonne is mad:
+Mad call I it; for to define true Madnesse,
+What is't, but to be nothing else but mad.[7]
+But let that go.
+
+_Qu_. More matter, with lesse Art.[8]
+
+_Pol_. Madam, I sweare I vse no Art at all:
+That he is mad, 'tis true: 'Tis true 'tis pittie,  [Sidenote: hee's mad]
+And pittie it is true; A foolish figure,[9]
+                                         [Sidenote: pitty tis tis true,]
+
+[Footnote 1: time given up to, or filled with consideration; _or,
+perhaps_, time chosen for a purpose.]
+
+[Footnote 2: He is always feasting.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Now for _his_ turn! He sets to work at once with his
+rhetoric.]
+
+[Footnote 4: to lay down beforehand as postulates.]
+
+[Footnote 5: We may suppose a dash and pause after '_Dutie is_'. The
+meaning is plain enough, though logical form is wanting.]
+
+[Footnote 6: As there is no imagination in Polonius, we cannot look for
+great aptitude in figure.]
+
+[Footnote 7: The nature of madness also is a postulate.]
+
+[Footnote 8: She is impatient, but wraps her rebuke in a compliment.
+Art, so-called, in speech, was much favoured in the time of Elizabeth.
+And as a compliment Polonius takes the form in which she expresses her
+dislike of his tediousness, and her anxiety after his news: pretending
+to wave it off, he yet, in his gratification, coming on the top of his
+excitement with the importance of his fancied discovery, plunges
+immediately into a very slough of _art_, and becomes absolutely silly.]
+
+[Footnote 9: It is no figure at all. It is hardly even a play with the
+words.]
+
+[Page 80]
+
+But farewell it: for I will vse no Art.
+Mad let vs grant him then: and now remaines
+That we finde out the cause of this effect,
+Or rather say, the cause of this defect;
+For this effect defectiue, comes by cause,
+Thus it remaines, and the remainder thus. Perpend,
+I haue a daughter: haue, whil'st she is mine,          [Sidenote: while]
+Who in her Dutie and Obedience, marke,
+Hath giuen me this: now gather, and surmise.
+
+                   _The Letter_.[1]
+_To the Celestiall, and my Soules Idoll, the most
+                   beautified Ophelia_.
+That's an ill Phrase, a vilde Phrase, beautified
+is a vilde Phrase: but you shall heare these in her thus in her
+excellent white bosome, these.[2]                  [Sidenote: these, &c]
+
+_Qu_. Came this from _Hamlet_ to her.
+
+_Pol_. Good Madam stay awhile, I will be faithfull.
+_Doubt thou, the Starres are fire_,                 [Sidenote: _Letter_]
+_Doubt, that the Sunne doth moue;
+Doubt Truth to be a Lier,
+But neuer Doubt, I loue.[3]
+O deere Ophelia, I am ill at these Numbers: I
+haue not Art to reckon my grones; but that I loue
+thee best, oh most Best beleeue it. Adieu.
+          Thine euermore most deere Lady, whilst this
+                  Machine is to him_, Hamlet.
+This in Obedience hath my daughter shew'd me:
+                                          [Sidenote: _Pol_. This showne]
+And more aboue hath his soliciting,   [Sidenote: more about solicitings]
+As they fell out by Time, by Meanes, and Place,
+All giuen to mine eare.
+
+_King_. But how hath she receiu'd his Loue?
+
+_Pol_. What do you thinke of me?
+
+_King_. As of a man, faithfull and Honourable.
+
+_Pol_. I wold faine proue so. But what might you think?
+
+[Footnote 1: _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 2: _Point thus_: 'but you shall heare. _These, in her
+excellent white bosom, these_:'
+
+Ladies, we are informed, wore a small pocket in front of the
+bodice;--but to accept the fact as an explanation of this passage, is to
+cast the passage away. Hamlet _addresses_ his letter, not to Ophelia's
+pocket, but to Ophelia herself, at her house--that is, in the palace of
+her bosom, excellent in whiteness. In like manner, signing himself, he
+makes mention of his body as a machine of which he has the use for a
+time. So earnest is Hamlet that when he makes love, he is the more a
+philosopher. But he is more than a philosopher: he is a man of the
+Universe, not a man of this world only.
+
+We must not allow the fashion of the time in which the play was written,
+to cause doubt as to the genuine heartiness of Hamlet's love-making.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _1st Q._
+
+    Doubt that in earth is fire,
+    Doubt that the starres doe moue,
+    Doubt trueth to be a liar,
+    But doe not doubt I loue.]
+
+[Page 82]
+
+When I had seene this hot loue on the wing,
+As I perceiued it, I must tell you that
+Before my Daughter told me, what might you
+Or my deere Maiestie your Queene heere, think,
+If I had playd the Deske or Table-booke,[1]
+Or giuen my heart a winking, mute and dumbe,         [Sidenote: working]
+Or look'd vpon this Loue, with idle sight,[2]
+What might you thinke? No, I went round to worke,
+And (my yong Mistris) thus I did bespeake[3]
+Lord _Hamlet_ is a Prince out of thy Starre,[4]
+This must not be:[5] and then, I Precepts gaue her,
+                                                [Sidenote: I prescripts]
+That she should locke her selfe from his Resort,    [Sidenote: from her]
+[Sidenote: 42[6], 43, 70] Admit no Messengers, receiue no Tokens:
+Which done, she tooke the Fruites of my Aduice,[7]
+And he repulsed. A short Tale to make,           [Sidenote: repell'd, a]
+Fell into a Sadnesse, then into a Fast,[8]
+Thence to a Watch, thence into a Weaknesse,       [Sidenote: to a wath,]
+Thence to a Lightnesse, and by this declension   [Sidenote: to lightnes]
+Into the Madnesse whereon now he raues,              [Sidenote: wherein]
+And all we waile for.[9]                          [Sidenote: mourne for]
+
+_King_. Do you thinke 'tis this?[10]            [Sidenote: thinke this?]
+
+_Qu_. It may be very likely.                            [Sidenote: like]
+
+_Pol_. Hath there bene such a time, I'de fain know that,
+                                                     [Sidenote: I would]
+That I haue possitiuely said, 'tis so,
+When it prou'd otherwise?
+
+_King_. Not that I know.
+
+_Pol_. Take this from this[11]; if this be otherwise,
+If Circumstances leade me, I will finde
+Where truth is hid, though it were hid indeede
+Within the Center.
+
+_King_. How may we try it further?
+
+[Footnote 1: --behaved like a piece of furniture.]
+
+[Footnote 2: The love of talk makes a man use many idle words, foolish
+expressions, and useless repetitions.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Notwithstanding the parenthesis, I take 'Mistris' to be the
+objective to 'bespeake'--that is, _address_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _Star_, mark of sort or quality; brand (45). The _1st Q_.
+goes on--
+
+    An'd one that is vnequall for your loue:
+
+But it may mean, as suggested by my _Reader_, 'outside thy destiny,'--as
+ruled by the star of nativity--and I think it does.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Here is a change from the impression conveyed in the first
+act: he attributes his interference to his care for what befitted
+royalty; whereas, talking to Ophelia (40, 72), he attributes it entirely
+to his care for her;--so partly in the speech correspondent to the
+present in _1st Q_.:--
+
+    Now since which time, seeing his loue thus cross'd,
+    Which I tooke to be idle, and but sport,
+    He straitway grew into a melancholy,]
+
+[Footnote 6: See also passage in note from _1st Q_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: She obeyed him. The 'fruits' of his advice were her
+conformed actions.]
+
+[Footnote 8: When the appetite goes, and the sleep follows, doubtless
+the man is on the steep slope of madness. But as to Hamlet, and how
+matters were with him, what Polonius says is worth nothing.]
+
+[Footnote 9: '_wherein_ now he raves, and _wherefor_ all we wail.']
+
+[Footnote 10: _To the queen_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: head from shoulders.]
+
+[Page 84]
+
+_Pol_. You know sometimes
+He walkes foure houres together, heere[1]
+In the Lobby.
+
+_Qu_. So he ha's indeed.                    [Sidenote: he dooes indeede]
+
+[Sidenote: 118] _Pol_. At such a time Ile loose my Daughter to him,
+Be you and I behinde an Arras then,
+Marke the encounter: If he loue her not,
+And be not from his reason falne thereon;
+Let me be no Assistant for a State,
+And keepe a Farme and Carters.                     [Sidenote: But keepe]
+
+_King_. We will try it.
+
+_Enter Hamlet reading on a Booke._[2]
+
+_Qu_. But looke where sadly the poore wretch
+Comes reading.[3]
+
+_Pol_. Away I do beseech you, both away,
+He boord[4] him presently.        _Exit King & Queen_[5]
+Oh giue me leaue.[6] How does my good Lord _Hamlet_?
+
+_Ham_. Well, God-a-mercy.
+
+_Pol_. Do you know me, my Lord?
+
+[Sidenote: 180] _Ham_. Excellent, excellent well: y'are a
+Fish-monger.[7]                      [Sidenote: Excellent well, you are]
+
+_Pol_. Not I my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Then I would you were so honest a man.
+
+_Pol_. Honest, my Lord?
+
+_Ham_. I sir, to be honest as this world goes, is
+to bee one man pick'd out of two thousand.
+                                           [Sidenote: tenne thousand[8]]
+
+_Pol_. That's very true, my Lord.
+
+_Ham_.[9] For if the Sun breed Magots in a dead
+dogge, being a good kissing Carrion--[10]      [Sidenote: carrion. Have]
+Haue you a daughter?[11]
+
+_Pol_. I haue my Lord.
+
+[Footnote 1: _1st Q_.
+
+    The Princes walke is here in the galery,
+    There let _Ofelia_, walke vntill hee comes:
+    Your selfe and I will stand close in the study,]
+
+[Footnote 2: _Not in Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _1st Q_.--
+
+    _King_. See where hee comes poring vppon a booke.]
+
+[Footnote 4: The same as accost, both meaning originally _go to the side
+of_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _A line back in the Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'Please you to go away.' 89, 203. Here should come the
+preceding stage-direction.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Now first the Play shows us Hamlet in his affected madness.
+He has a great dislike to the selfish, time-serving courtier, who, like
+his mother, has forsaken the memory of his father--and a great distrust
+of him as well. The two men are moral antipodes. Each is given to
+moralizing--but compare their reflections: those of Polonius reveal a
+lover of himself, those of Hamlet a lover of his kind; Polonius is
+interested in success; Hamlet in humanity.]
+
+[Footnote 8: So also in _1st Q_.]
+
+[Footnote 9: --reading, or pretending to read, the words from the book
+he carries.]
+
+[Footnote 10: When the passion for emendation takes possession of a man,
+his opportunities are endless--so many seeming emendations offer
+themselves which are in themselves not bad, letters and words affording
+as much play as the keys of a piano. 'Being a god kissing carrion,' is
+in itself good enough; but Shakspere meant what stands in both Quarto
+and Folio: _the dead dog being a carrion good at kissing_. The arbitrary
+changes of the editors are amazing.]
+
+[Footnote 11: He cannot help his mind constantly turning upon women; and
+if his thoughts of them are often cruelly false, it is not Hamlet but
+his mother who is to blame: her conduct has hurled him from the peak of
+optimism into the bottomless pool of pessimistic doubt, above the foul
+waters of which he keeps struggling to lift his head.]
+
+[Page 86]
+
+_Ham_. Let her not walke i'th'Sunne: Conception[1]
+is a blessing, but not as your daughter may      [Sidenote: but as your]
+conceiue. Friend looke too't.
+
+[Sidenote: 100] _Pol_.[2] How say you by that? Still harping on
+my daughter: yet he knew me not at first; he said   [Sidenote: a sayd I]
+I was a Fishmonger: he is farre gone, farre gone:
+                      [Sidenote: Fishmonger, a is farre gone, and truly]
+and truly in my youth, I suffred much extreamity and truly
+for loue: very neere this.  Ile speake to him
+againe.
+
+What do you read my Lord?
+
+_Ham_. Words, words, words.
+
+_Pol_. What is the matter, my Lord?
+
+_Ham_. Betweene who?[3]
+
+_Pol_. I meane the matter you meane, my
+                                    [Sidenote: matter that you reade my]
+Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Slanders Sir: for the Satyricall slaue
+                                      [Sidenote: satericall rogue sayes]
+saies here, that old men haue gray Beards; that
+their faces are wrinkled; their eyes purging thicke
+Amber, or Plum-Tree Gumme: and that they haue     [Sidenote: Amber, and]
+a plentifull locke of Wit, together with weake
+                                     [Sidenote: lacke | with most weake]
+Hammes. All which Sir, though I most powerfully,
+and potently beleeue; yet I holde it not
+Honestie[4] to haue it thus set downe: For you
+                  [Sidenote: for your selfe sir shall grow old as I am:]
+your selfe Sir, should be old as I am, if like a Crab
+you could go backward.
+
+_Pol_.[5] Though this be madnesse,
+Yet there is Method in't: will you walke
+Out of the ayre[6] my Lord?
+
+_Ham_. Into my Graue?
+
+_Pol_. Indeed that is out o'th'Ayre:
+                                     [Sidenote: that's out of the ayre;]
+How pregnant (sometimes) his Replies are?
+A happinesse,
+That often Madnesse hits on,
+Which Reason and Sanitie could not                  [Sidenote: sanctity]
+So prosperously be deliuer'd of.
+
+[Footnote 1: One of the meanings of the word, and more in use then than
+now, is _understanding_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: (_aside_).]
+
+[Footnote 3: --pretending to take him to mean by _matter_, the _point of
+quarrel_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Propriety.]
+
+[Footnote 5: (_aside_).]
+
+[Footnote 6: the draught.]
+
+[Page 88]
+
+[A] I will leaue him,
+And sodainely contriue the meanes of meeting
+Betweene him,[1] and my daughter.
+My Honourable Lord, I will most humbly
+Take my leaue of you.
+
+_Ham_. You cannot Sir take from[2] me any thing,
+that I will more willingly part withall, except my
+                          [Sidenote: will not more | my life, except my]
+life, my life.[3]
+                      [Sidenote: _Enter Guyldersterne, and Rosencrans_.]
+
+_Polon_. Fare you well my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. These tedious old fooles.
+
+_Polon_. You goe to seeke my Lord _Hamlet_;         [Sidenote: the Lord]
+there hee is.
+
+_Enter Rosincran and Guildensterne_.[4]
+
+_Rosin_. God saue you Sir.
+
+_Guild_. Mine honour'd Lord?
+
+_Rosin_. My most deare Lord?
+
+_Ham_. My excellent good friends? How do'st   [Sidenote: My extent good]
+thou _Guildensterne_? Oh, _Rosincrane_; good Lads:
+                                                [Sidenote: A Rosencraus]
+How doe ye both?                                         [Sidenote: you]
+
+_Rosin_. As the indifferent Children of the earth.
+
+_Guild_. Happy, in that we are not ouer-happy: [Sidenote: euer happy on]
+on Fortunes Cap, we are not the very Button.  [Sidenote:  Fortunes lap,]
+
+_Ham_. Nor the Soales of her Shoo?
+
+_Rosin_. Neither my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Then you liue about her waste, or in the
+middle of her fauour?                                [Sidenote: fauors.]
+
+_Guil_. Faith, her priuates, we.
+
+_Ham_. In the secret parts of Fortune? Oh,
+most true: she is a Strumpet.[5] What's the newes?
+                                                 [Sidenote: What newes?]
+
+_Rosin_. None my Lord; but that the World's          [Sidenote: but the]
+growne honest.
+
+_Ham_. Then is Doomesday neere: But your
+
+[Footnote A: _In the Quarto, the speech ends thus_:--I will leaue him
+and my daughter.[6] My Lord, I will take my leaue of you.]
+
+[Footnote 1: From 'And sodainely' _to_ 'betweene him,' _not in Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: It is well here to recall the modes of the word _leave_:
+'_Give me leave_,' Polonius says with proper politeness to the king and
+queen when he wants _them_ to go--that is, 'Grant me your _departure_';
+but he would, going himself, _take_ his leave, his departure, _of_ or
+_from_ them--by their permission to go. Hamlet means, 'You cannot take
+from me anything I will more willingly part with than your leave, or, my
+permission to you to go.' 85, 203. See the play on the two meanings of
+the word in _Twelfth Night_, act ii. sc. 4:
+
+    _Duke_. Give me now leave to leave thee;
+
+though I suspect it ought to be--
+
+    _Duke_. Give me now leave.
+
+    _Clown_. To leave thee!--Now, the melancholy &c.]
+
+[Footnote 3: It is a relief to him to speak the truth under the cloak of
+madness--ravingly. He has no one to whom to open his heart: what lies
+there he feels too terrible for even the eye of Horatio. He has not
+apparently told him as yet more than the tale of his father's murder.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _Above, in Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: In this and all like utterances of Hamlet, we see what worm
+it is that lies gnawing at his heart.]
+
+[Footnote 6: This is a slip in the _Quarto_--rectified in the _Folio_:
+his daughter was not present.]
+
+[Page 90]
+
+newes is not true.[1] [2] Let me question more in particular:
+what haue you my good friends, deserued
+at the hands of Fortune, that she sends you to
+Prison hither?
+
+_Guil_. Prison, my Lord?
+
+_Ham_. Denmark's a Prison.
+
+_Rosin_. Then is the World one.
+
+_Ham_. A goodly one, in which there are many
+Confines, Wards, and Dungeons; _Denmarke_ being
+one o'th'worst.
+
+_Rosin_. We thinke not so my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Why then 'tis none to you; for there is
+nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it
+so[3]: to me it is a prison.
+
+_Rosin_. Why then your Ambition makes it one:
+'tis too narrow for your minde.[4]
+
+_Ham_. O God, I could be bounded in a nutshell,
+and count my selfe a King of infinite space; were
+it not that I haue bad dreames.
+
+_Guil_. Which dreames indeed are Ambition:
+for the very substance[5] of the Ambitious, is meerely
+the shadow of a Dreame.
+
+_Ham_. A dreame it selfe is but a shadow.
+
+_Rosin_. Truely, and I hold Ambition of so ayry
+and light a quality, that it is but a shadowes shadow.
+
+_Ham_. Then are our Beggers bodies; and our
+Monarchs and out-stretcht Heroes the Beggers
+Shadowes: shall wee to th'Court: for, by my fey[6]
+I cannot reason?[7]
+
+_Both_. Wee'l wait vpon you.
+
+_Ham_. No such matter.[8] I will not sort you
+with the rest of my seruants: for to speake to you
+like an honest man: I am most dreadfully attended;[9]
+but in the beaten way of friendship,[10]              [Sidenote: But in]
+
+What make you at _Elsonower_?
+
+[Footnote 1: 'it is not true that the world is grown honest': he doubts
+themselves. His eye is sharper because his heart is sorer since he left
+Wittenberg. He proceeds to examine them.]
+
+[Footnote 2: This passage, beginning with 'Let me question,' and ending
+with 'dreadfully attended,' is not in the _Quarto_.
+
+Who inserted in the Folio this and other passages? Was it or was it not
+Shakspere? Beyond a doubt they are Shakspere's all. Then who omitted
+those omitted? Was Shakspere incapable of refusing any of his own work?
+Or would these editors, who profess to have all opportunity, and who,
+belonging to the theatre, must have had the best of opportunities, have
+desired or dared to omit what far more painstaking editors have since
+presumed, though out of reverence, to restore?]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'but it is thinking that makes it so:']
+
+[Footnote 4: --feeling after the cause of Hamlet's strangeness, and
+following the readiest suggestion, that of chagrin at missing the
+succession.]
+
+[Footnote 5: objects and aims.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _foi_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Does he choose beggars as the representatives of substance
+because they lack ambition--that being shadow? Or does he take them as
+the shadows of humanity, that, following Rosincrance, he may get their
+shadows, the shadows therefore of shadows, to parallel _monarchs_ and
+_heroes_? But he is not satisfied with his own analogue--therefore will
+to the court, where good logic is not wanted--where indeed he knows a
+hellish lack of reason.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'On no account.']
+
+[Footnote 9: 'I have very bad servants.' Perhaps he judges his servants
+spies upon him. Or might he mean that he was _haunted with bad
+thoughts_? Or again, is it a stroke of his pretence of
+madness--suggesting imaginary followers?]
+
+[Footnote: 10: 'to speak plainly, as old friends.']
+
+[Page 92]
+
+_Rosin_. To visit you my Lord, no other occasion.
+
+_Ham_. Begger that I am, I am euen poore in    [Sidenote: am ever poore]
+thankes; but I thanke you: and sure deare friends
+my thanks are too deare a halfepeny[1]; were you
+[Sidenote: 72] not sent for? Is it your owne inclining? Is it a
+free visitation?[2] Come, deale iustly with me:
+come, come; nay speake.                          [Sidenote: come, come,]
+
+_Guil_. What should we say my Lord?[3]
+
+_Ham_. Why any thing. But to the purpose;
+                                [Sidenote: Any thing but to'th purpose:]
+you were sent for; and there is a kinde confession
+                                          [Sidenote: kind of confession]
+in your lookes; which your modesties haue not
+craft enough to color, I know the good King and
+[Sidenote: 72] Queene haue sent for you.
+
+_Rosin_. To what end my Lord?
+
+_Ham_. That you must teach me: but let mee
+coniure[4] you by the rights of our fellowship, by
+the consonancy of our youth,[5] by the Obligation
+of our euer-preserued loue, and by what more
+deare, a better proposer could charge you withall;       [Sidenote: can]
+be euen and direct with me, whether you were sent
+for or no.
+
+_Rosin_. What say you?[6]
+
+_Ham_. Nay then I haue an eye of you[7]: if you
+loue me hold not off.[8]
+
+[Sidenote: 72] _Guil_. My Lord, we were sent for.
+
+_Ham_. I will tell you why; so shall my anticipation
+preuent your discouery of your secricie to [Sidenote: discovery, and
+          your secrecie to the King and Queene moult no feather,[10]]
+the King and Queene[9] moult no feather, I haue
+[Sidenote: 116] of late, but wherefore I know not, lost all my
+mirth, forgone all custome of exercise; and indeed,
+                                                  [Sidenote: exercises;]
+it goes so heauenly with my disposition; that this   [Sidenote: heauily]
+goodly frame the Earth, seemes to me a sterrill
+Promontory; this most excellent Canopy the Ayre,
+look you, this braue ore-hanging, this Maiesticall
+                                       [Sidenote: orehanging firmament,]
+Roofe, fretted with golden fire: why, it appeares no
+                                                   [Sidenote: appeareth]
+
+[Footnote 1: --because they were by no means hearty thanks.]
+
+[Footnote 2: He wants to know whether they are in his uncle's employment
+and favour; whether they pay court to himself for his uncle's ends.]
+
+[Footnote 3: He has no answer ready.]
+
+[Footnote 4: He will not cast them from him without trying a direct
+appeal to their old friendship for plain dealing. This must be
+remembered in relation to his treatment of them afterwards. He affords
+them every chance of acting truly--conjuring them to honesty--giving
+them a push towards repentance.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Either, 'the harmony of our young days,' or, 'the
+sympathies of our present youth.']
+
+[Footnote 6: --_to Guildenstern_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: (_aside_) 'I will keep an eye upon you;'.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'do not hold back.']
+
+[Footnote 9: The _Quarto_ seems here to have the right reading.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'your promise of secrecy remain intact;'.]
+
+[Page 94]
+
+other thing to mee, then a foule and pestilent congregation
+                                         [Sidenote: nothing to me but a]
+of vapours. What a piece of worke is              [Sidenote: what peece]
+a man! how Noble in Reason? how infinite in
+faculty? in forme and mouing how expresse and     [Sidenote: faculties,]
+admirable? in Action, how like an Angel? in apprehension,
+how like a God? the beauty of the
+world, the Parragon of Animals; and yet to me,
+what is this Quintessence of Dust? Man delights
+not me;[1] no, nor Woman neither; though by your
+                                           [Sidenote: not me, nor women]
+smiling you seeme to say so.[2]
+
+_Rosin._ My Lord, there was no such stuffe in
+my thoughts.
+
+_Ham._ Why did you laugh, when I said, Man
+                                        [Sidenote: yee laugh then, when]
+delights not me?
+
+_Rosin._ To thinke, my Lord, if you delight not
+in Man, what Lenton entertainment the Players
+shall receiue from you:[3] wee coated them[4] on the
+way, and hither are they comming to offer you
+Seruice.
+
+_Ham._[5] He that playes the King shall be welcome;
+his Maiesty shall haue Tribute of mee:                [Sidenote: on me,]
+the aduenturous Knight shal vse his Foyle and
+Target: the Louer shall not sigh _gratis_, the
+humorous man[6] shall end his part in peace: [7] the
+Clowne shall make those laugh whose lungs are
+tickled a'th' sere:[8] and the Lady shall say her
+minde freely; or the blanke Verse shall halt for't[9]:
+                                                 [Sidenote: black verse]
+what Players are they?
+
+_Rosin._ Euen those you Were wont to take
+                                           [Sidenote: take such delight]
+delight in the Tragedians of the City.
+
+_Ham._ How chances it they trauaile? their residence
+both in reputation and profit was better both
+wayes.
+
+_Rosin._ I thinke their Inhibition comes by the
+meanes of the late Innouation?[10]
+
+[Footnote 1: A genuine description, so far as it goes, of the state of
+Hamlet's mind. But he does not reveal the operating cause--his loss of
+faith in women, which has taken the whole poetic element out of heaven,
+earth, and humanity: he would have his uncle's spies attribute his
+condition to mere melancholy.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --said angrily, I think.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --a ready-witted subterfuge.]
+
+[Footnote 4: came alongside of them; got up with them; apparently rather
+from Fr. _cote_ than _coter_; like _accost_. Compare 71. But I suspect
+it only means _noted_, _observed_, and is from _coter_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: --_with humorous imitation, perhaps, of each of the
+characters_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: --the man with a whim.]
+
+[Footnote 7: This part of the speech--from [7] to [8], is not in the
+_Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Halliwell gives a quotation in which the touch-hole of a
+pistol is called the _sere_: the _sere_, then, of the lungs would mean
+the opening of the lungs--the part with which we laugh: those 'whose
+lungs are tickled a' th' sere,' are such as are ready to laugh on the
+least provocation: _tickled_--_irritable, ticklish_--ready to laugh, as
+another might be to cough. 'Tickled o' the sere' was a common phrase,
+signifying, thus, _propense_.
+
+    _1st Q._ The clowne shall make them laugh
+    That are tickled in the lungs,]
+
+[Footnote 9: Does this refer to the pause that expresses the
+unutterable? or to the ruin of the measure of the verse by an
+incompetent heroine?]
+
+[Footnote 10: Does this mean, 'I think their prohibition comes through
+the late innovation,'--of the children's acting; or, 'I think they are
+prevented from staying at home by the late new measures,'--such, namely,
+as came of the puritan opposition to stage-plays? This had grown so
+strong, that, in 1600, the Privy Council issued an order restricting the
+number of theatres in London to two: by such an _innovation_ a number of
+players might well be driven to the country.]
+
+[Page 96]
+
+_Ham_. Doe they hold the same estimation they
+did when I was in the City? Are they so follow'd?
+
+_Rosin_. No indeed, they are not.              [Sidenote: are they not.]
+
+[1]_Ham_. How comes it? doe they grow rusty?
+
+_Rosin_. Nay, their indeauour keepes in the
+wonted pace; But there is Sir an ayrie of Children,[2]
+little Yases,[3] that crye out[4] on the top of question;[5]
+and are most tyrannically clap't for't: these are
+now the fashion, and so be-ratled the common
+Stages[6] (so they call them) that many wearing
+Rapiers,[7] are affraide of Goose-quils, and dare
+scarse come thither.[8]
+
+_Ham_. What are they Children? Who maintains
+'em? How are they escoted?[9] Will they pursue
+the Quality[10] no longer then they can sing?[11] Will
+they not say afterwards if they should grow themselues
+to common Players (as it is like most[12] if
+their meanes are no better) their Writers[13] do them
+wrong, to make them exclaim against their owne
+Succession.[14]
+
+_Rosin_. Faith there ha's bene much to do on
+both sides: and the Nation holds it no sinne, to
+tarre them[15] to Controuersie. There was for a
+while, no mony bid for argument, vnlesse the Poet
+and the Player went to Cuffes in the Question.[16]
+
+_Ham_. Is't possible?
+
+_Guild_. Oh there ha's beene much throwing
+about of Braines.
+
+_Ham_. Do the Boyes carry it away?[17]
+
+_Rosin_. I that they do my Lord, _Hercules_ and
+his load too.[18]
+
+_Ham_. It is not strange: for mine Vnckle is
+                                      [Sidenote: not very strange, | my]
+King of Denmarke, and those that would make
+mowes at him while my Father liued; giue twenty,
+                                                 [Sidenote: make mouths]
+
+[Footnote 1: The whole of the following passage, beginning with 'How
+comes it,' and ending with 'Hercules and his load too,' belongs to the
+_Folio_ alone--is not in the _Quarto_.
+
+In the _1st Quarto_ we find the germ of the passage--unrepresented in
+the _2nd_, developed in the _Folio_.
+
+    _Ham_. Players, what Players be they?
+
+    _Ross_. My Lord, the Tragedians of the Citty,
+    Those that you tooke delight to see so often.
+
+    _Ham_. How comes it that they trauell? Do
+    they grow restie?
+
+    _Gil_. No my Lord, their reputation holds as it was wont.
+
+    _Ham_. How then?
+
+    _Gil_. Yfaith my Lord, noueltie carries it away,
+    For the principall publike audience that
+    Came to them, are turned to priuate playes,[19]
+    And to the humour[20] of children.
+
+    _Ham_. I doe not greatly wonder of it,
+    For those that would make mops and moes
+    At my vncle, when my father liued, &c.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _a nest of children_. The acting of the children of two or
+three of the chief choirs had become the rage.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _Eyases_--unfledged hawks.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Children _cry out_ rather than _speak_ on the stage.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'cry out beyond dispute'--_unquestionably_; 'cry out and no
+mistake.' 'He does not top his part.' _The Rehearsal_, iii. 1.--'_He is
+not up to it_.' But perhaps here is intended _above reason_: 'they cry
+out excessively, excruciatingly.' 103.
+
+This said, in top of rage the lines she rents,--_A Lover's Complaint_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: I presume it should be the present tense, _beratle_--except
+the _are_ of the preceding member be understood: 'and so beratled _are_
+the common stages.' If the _present_, then the children 'so abuse the
+grown players,'--in the pieces they acted, particularly in the new
+_arguments_, written for them--whence the reference to _goose-quills_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: --of the play-going public.]
+
+[Footnote 8: --for dread of sharing in the ridicule.]
+
+[Footnote 9: _paid_--from the French _escot_, a shot or reckoning: _Dr.
+Johnson_.]
+
+[Footnote 10: --the quality of players; the profession of the stage.]
+
+[Footnote 11: 'Will they cease playing when their voices change?']
+
+[Footnote 12: Either _will_ should follow here, or _like_ and _most_
+must change places.]
+
+[Footnote 13: 'those that write for them'.]
+
+[Footnote 14: --what they had had to come to themselves.]
+
+[Footnote 15: 'to incite the children and the grown players to
+controversy': _to tarre them on like dogs_: see _King John_, iv. 1.]
+
+[Footnote 16: 'No stage-manager would buy a new argument, or prologue,
+to a play, unless the dramatist and one of the actors were therein
+represented as falling out on the question of the relative claims of the
+children and adult actors.']
+
+[Footnote 17: 'Have the boys the best of it?']
+
+[Footnote 18: 'That they have, out and away.' Steevens suggests that
+allusion is here made to the sign of the Globe Theatre--Hercules bearing
+the world for Atlas.]
+
+[Footnote 19: amateur-plays.]
+
+[Footnote 20: whimsical fashion.]
+
+[Page 98]
+
+forty, an hundred Ducates a peece, for his picture[1]
+                                    [Sidenote: fortie, fifty, a hundred]
+in Little.[2] There is something in this more then
+                                    [Sidenote: little, s'bloud there is]
+Naturall, if Philosophic could finde it out.
+
+_Flourish for tke Players_.[3]                  [Sidenote: _A Florish_.]
+
+_Guil_. There are the Players.
+
+_Ham_. Gentlemen, you are welcom to _Elsonower_:
+your hands, come: The appurtenance of         [Sidenote: come then, th']
+Welcome, is Fashion and Ceremony. Let me
+[Sidenote: 260] comply with you in the Garbe,[4] lest my extent[5] to
+                                 [Sidenote: in this garb: let me extent]
+the Players (which I tell you must shew fairely
+outward) should more appeare like entertainment[6]
+                                                   [Sidenote: outwards,]
+then yours.[7] You are welcome: but my Vnckle
+Father, and Aunt Mother are deceiu'd.
+
+_Guil_. In what my deere Lord?
+
+_Ham_. I am but mad North, North-West: when
+the Winde is Southerly, I know a Hawke from a
+Handsaw.[8]
+
+_Enter Polonius_.
+
+_Pol_. Well[9] be with you Gentlemen.
+
+_Ham_. Hearke you _Guildensterne_, and you too:
+at each eare a hearer: that great Baby you see
+there, is not yet out of his swathing clouts.
+                                            [Sidenote: swadling clouts.]
+
+_Rosin_. Happily he's the second time come to          [Sidenote: he is]
+them: for they say, an old man is twice a childe.
+
+_Ham_. I will Prophesie. Hee comes to tell me
+of the Players. Mark it, you say right Sir: for a
+                                               [Sidenote: sir, a Monday]
+Monday morning 'twas so indeed.[10]      [Sidenote: t'was then indeede.]
+
+_Pol_. My Lord, I haue Newes to tell you.
+
+_Ham_. My Lord, I haue Newes to tell you.
+When _Rossius_ an Actor in Rome----[11]     [Sidenote: _Rossius_ was an]
+
+_Pol_. The Actors are come hither my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Buzze, buzze.[12]
+
+_Pol_. Vpon mine Honor.[13]                               [Sidenote: my]
+
+_Ham_. Then can each Actor on his Asse----         [Sidenote: came each]
+
+[Footnote 1: If there be any logical link here, except that, after the
+instance adduced, no change in social fashion--nothing at all indeed, is
+to be wondered at, I fail to see it. Perhaps the speech is intended to
+belong to the simulation. The last sentence of it appears meant to
+convey the impression that he suspects nothing--is only bewildered by
+the course of things.]
+
+[Footnote 2: his miniature.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --to indicate their approach.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _com'ply_--accent on first syllable--'pass compliments with
+you' (260)--_in the garb_, either 'in appearance,' or 'in the fashion of
+the hour.']
+
+[Footnote 5: 'the amount of courteous reception I extend'--'my advances
+to the players.']
+
+[Footnote 6: reception, welcome.]
+
+[Footnote 7: He seems to desire that they shall no more be on the
+footing of fellow-students, and thus to rid himself of the old relation.
+Perhaps he hints that they are players too. From any further show of
+friendliness he takes refuge in convention--and professed
+convention--supplying a reason in order to escape a dangerous
+interpretation of his sudden formality--'lest you should suppose me more
+cordial to the players than to you.' The speech is full of inwoven
+irony, doubtful, and refusing to be ravelled out. With what merely
+half-shown, yet scathing satire it should be spoken and accompanied!]
+
+[Footnote 8: A proverb of the time comically corrupted--_handsaw for
+hernshaw_--a heron, the quarry of the hawk. He denies his madness as
+madmen do--and in terms themselves not unbefitting madness--so making it
+seem the more genuine. Yet every now and then, urged by the commotion of
+his being, he treads perilously on the border of self-betrayal.]
+
+[Footnote 9: used as a noun.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _Point thus_: 'Mark it.--You say right, sir; &c.' He takes
+up a speech that means nothing, and might mean anything, to turn aside
+the suspicion their whispering might suggest to Polonius that they had
+been talking about him--so better to lay his trap for him.]
+
+[Footnote 11: He mentions the _actor_ to lead Polonius so that his
+prophecy of him shall come true.]
+
+[Footnote 12: An interjection of mockery: he had made a fool of him.]
+
+[Footnote 13: Polonius thinks he is refusing to believe him.]
+
+[Page 100]
+
+_Polon_. The best Actors in the world, either for
+Tragedie, Comedie, Historic, Pastorall: Pastoricall-
+Comicall-Historicall-Pastorall: [1] Tragicall-Historicall:
+Tragicall-Comicall--Historicall-Pastorall[1]:
+Scene indiuible,[2] or Poem vnlimited.[3] _Seneca_ cannot
+                                       [Sidenote: scene indeuidible,[2]]
+be too heauy, nor _Plautus_ too light, for the law of
+Writ, and the Liberty. These are the onely men.[4]
+
+_Ham_. O _Iephta_ Iudge of Israel, what a Treasure
+had'st thou?
+
+_Pol_. What a Treasure had he, my Lord?[5]
+
+_Ham_. Why one faire Daughter, and no more,[6]
+The which he loued passing well.[6]
+
+[Sidenote: 86] _Pol_. Still on my Daughter.
+
+_Ham_. Am I not i'th'right old _Iephta_?
+
+_Polon_. If you call me _Iephta_ my Lord, I haue
+a daughter that I loue passing well.
+
+_Ham_. Nay that followes not.[7]
+
+_Polon_. What followes then, my Lord?
+
+_Ham_. Why, As by lot, God wot:[6] and then you
+know, It came to passe, as most like it was:[6] The
+first rowe of the _Pons[8] Chanson_ will shew you more,
+                                               [Sidenote: pious chanson]
+For looke where my Abridgements[9] come.
+                                         [Sidenote: abridgment[9] comes]
+
+_Enter foure or fiue Players._
+                                        [Sidenote: _Enter the Players._]
+
+Y'are welcome Masters, welcome all. I am glad        [Sidenote: You are]
+to see thee well: Welcome good Friends. O my
+               [Sidenote: oh old friend, why thy face is valanct[10]]
+olde Friend? Thy face is valiant[10] since I saw thee
+last: Com'st thou to beard me in Denmarke?
+What, my yong Lady and Mistris?[11] Byrlady          [Sidenote: by lady]
+your Ladiship is neerer Heauen then when I saw      [Sidenote: nerer to]
+you last, by the altitude of a Choppine.[12] Pray
+God your voice like a peece of vncurrant Gold be
+not crack'd within the ring.[13] Masters, you are all
+welcome: wee'l e'ne to't like French Faulconers,[14]
+                                       [Sidenote: like friendly Fankner]
+flie at any thing we see: wee'l haue a Speech
+
+[Footnote 1: From [1] to [1] is not in the _Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Does this phrase mean _all in one scene_?]
+
+[Footnote 3: A poem to be recited only--one not _limited_, or _divided_
+into speeches.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _Point thus_: 'too light. For the law of Writ, and the
+Liberty, these are the onely men':--_either for written plays_, that is,
+_or for those in which the players extemporized their speeches_.
+
+    _1st Q_. 'For the law hath writ those are the onely men.']
+
+[Footnote 5: Polonius would lead him on to talk of his daughter.]
+
+[Footnote 6: These are lines of the first stanza of an old ballad still
+in existence. Does Hamlet suggest that as Jephthah so Polonius had
+sacrificed his daughter? Or is he only desirous of making him talk about
+her?]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'That is not as the ballad goes.']
+
+[Footnote 8: That this is a corruption of the _pious_ in the _Quarto_,
+is made clearer from the _1st Quarto_: 'the first verse of the godly
+Ballet wil tel you all.']
+
+[Footnote 9: _abridgment_--that which _abridges_, or cuts short. His
+'Abridgements' were the Players.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _1st Q_. 'Vallanced'--_with a beard_, that is. Both
+readings may be correct.]
+
+[Footnote 11: A boy of course: no women had yet appeared on the stage.]
+
+[Footnote 12: A Venetian boot, stilted, sometimes very high.]
+
+[Footnote 13: --because then it would be unfit for a woman-part. A piece
+of gold so worn that it had a crack reaching within the inner circle was
+no longer current. _1st Q_. 'in the ring:'--was a pun intended?]
+
+[Footnote 14: --like French sportsmen of the present day too.]
+
+[Page 102]
+
+straight. Come giue vs a tast of your quality:
+come, a passionate speech.
+
+_1. Play._ What speech, my Lord?               [Sidenote: my good Lord?]
+
+_Ham._ I heard thee speak me a speech once, but
+it was neuer Acted: or if it was, not aboue once,
+for the Play I remember pleas'd not the Million,
+'twas _Cauiarie_ to the Generall[1]: but it was (as I
+receiu'd it, and others, whose iudgement in such
+matters, cried in the top of mine)[2] an excellent
+Play; well digested in the Scoenes, set downe with
+as much modestie, as cunning.[3] I remember one
+said there was no Sallets[4] in the lines, to make the  [Sidenote: were]
+matter sauoury; nor no matter in the phrase,[5] that
+might indite the Author of affectation, but cal'd it
+                                                  [Sidenote: affection,]
+an honest method[A]. One cheefe Speech in it, I
+                                           [Sidenote: one speech in't I]
+cheefely lou'd, 'twas _AEneas_ Tale to _Dido_, and
+                                           [Sidenote: _Aeneas_ talke to]
+thereabout of it especially, where he speaks of         [Sidenote: when]
+_Priams_[6] slaughter. If it liue in your memory,
+begin at this Line, let me see, let me see: The
+rugged _Pyrrhus_ like th'_Hyrcanian_ Beast.[7] It is
+                                                     [Sidenote: tis not]
+not so: it begins[8] with _Pyrrhus_.[9]
+
+[10] The rugged _Pyrrhus_, he whose Sable Armes[11]
+Blacke as his purpose, did the night resemble
+When he lay couched in the Ominous[12] Horse,
+Hath now this dread and blacke Complexion smear'd
+With Heraldry more dismall: Head to foote
+Now is he to take Geulles,[13] horridly Trick'd
+                                     [Sidenote: is he totall Gules [18]]
+With blood of Fathers, Mothers, Daughters, Sonnes,
+[14] Bak'd and impasted with the parching streets,
+That lend a tyrannous, and damned light         [Sidenote: and a damned]
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto:_--
+as wholesome as sweete, and by very much, more handsome then
+fine:]
+
+[Footnote 1: The salted roe of the sturgeon is a delicacy disliked by
+most people.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'were superior to mine.'
+
+The _1st Quarto_ has,
+
+'Cried in the toppe of their iudgements, an excellent play,'--that is,
+_pronounced it, to the best of their judgments, an excellent play_.
+
+Note the difference between 'the top of _my_ judgment', and 'the top of
+_their_ judgments'. 97.]
+
+[Footnote 3: skill.]
+
+[Footnote 4: coarse jests. 25, 67.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _style_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _1st Q_. 'Princes slaughter.']
+
+[Footnote 7: _1st Q_. 'th'arganian beast:' 'the Hyrcan tiger,' Macbeth,
+iii. 4.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'it _begins_': emphasis on begins.]
+
+[Footnote 9: A pause; then having recollected, he starts afresh.]
+
+[Footnote 10: These passages are Shakspere's own, not quotations: the
+Quartos differ. But when he wrote them he had in his mind a phantom of
+Marlowe's _Dido, Queen of Carthage_. I find Steevens has made a similar
+conjecture, and quotes from Marlowe two of the passages I had marked as
+being like passages here.]
+
+[Footnote 11: The poetry is admirable in its kind--intentionally
+_charged_, to raise it to the second stage-level, above the blank verse,
+that is, of the drama in which it is set, as that blank verse is raised
+above the ordinary level of speech. 143.
+
+The correspondent passage in _1st Q_. runs nearly parallel for a few
+lines.]
+
+[Footnote 12:--like _portentous_.]
+
+[Footnote 13: 'all red', _1st Q_. 'totall guise.']
+
+[Footnote 14: Here the _1st Quarto_ has:--
+
+    Back't and imparched in calagulate gore,
+    Rifted in earth and fire, olde grandsire _Pryam_ seekes:
+    So goe on.]
+
+[Page 104]
+
+To their vilde Murthers, roasted in wrath and fire,
+                                        [Sidenote: their Lords murther,]
+And thus o're-sized with coagulate gore,
+With eyes like Carbuncles, the hellish _Pyrrhus_
+Old Grandsire _Priam_ seekes.[1]
+                                 [Sidenote: seekes; so proceede you.[2]]
+
+_Pol_. Fore God, my Lord, well spoken, with
+good accent, and good discretion.[3]
+
+_1. Player_. Anon he findes him,                      [Sidenote: _Play_]
+Striking too short at Greekes.[4] His anticke Sword,
+Rebellious to his Arme, lyes where it falles
+Repugnant to command[4]: vnequall match,             [Sidenote: matcht,]
+_Pyrrhus_ at _Priam_ driues, in Rage strikes wide:
+But with the whiffe and winde of his fell Sword,
+Th'vnnerued Father fals.[5] Then senselesse Illium,[6]
+Seeming to feele his blow, with flaming top
+                                        [Sidenote: seele[7] this blowe,]
+Stoopes to his Bace, and with a hideous crash
+Takes Prisoner _Pyrrhus_ eare. For loe, his Sword
+Which was declining on the Milkie head
+Of Reuerend _Priam_, seem'd i'th'Ayre to sticke:
+So as a painted Tyrant _Pyrrhus_ stood,[8]        [Sidenote: stood Like]
+And like a Newtrall to his will and matter,[9] did nothing.[10]
+[11] But as we often see against some storme,
+A silence in the Heauens, the Racke stand still,
+The bold windes speechlesse, and the Orbe below
+As hush as death: Anon the dreadfull Thunder
+[Sidenote: 110] Doth rend the Region.[11] So after _Pyrrhus_ pause,
+Arowsed Vengeance sets him new a-worke,
+And neuer did the Cyclops hammers fall
+On Mars his Armours, forg'd for proofe Eterne,
+                                              [Sidenote: _Marses_ Armor]
+With lesse remorse then _Pyrrhus_ bleeding sword
+Now falles on _Priam_.
+[12] Out, out, thou Strumpet-Fortune, all you Gods,
+In generall Synod take away her power:
+Breake all the Spokes and Fallies from her wheele,   [Sidenote: follies]
+
+[Footnote 1: This, though horrid enough, is in degree below the
+description in _Dido_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: He is directing the player to take up the speech there
+where he leaves it. See last quotation from _1st Q_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _judgment_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: --with an old man's under-reaching blows--till his arm is
+so jarred by a missed blow, that he cannot raise his sword again.]
+
+[Footnote 5:
+
+    Whereat he lifted up his bedrid limbs,
+    And would have grappled with Achilles' son,
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    Which he, disdaining, whisk'd his sword about,
+    And with the wound[13] thereof the king fell down.
+
+    Marlowe's _Dido, Queen of Carthage_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: The _Quarto_ has omitted '_Then senselesse Illium_,' or
+something else.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Printed with the long f[symbol for archaic long s].]
+
+[Footnote 8: --motionless as a tyrant in a picture.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'standing between his will and its object as if he had no
+relation to either.']
+
+[Footnote 10:
+
+    And then in triumph ran into the streets,
+    Through which he could not pass for slaughtered men;
+    So, leaning on his sword, he stood stone still,
+    Viewing the fire wherewith rich Ilion burnt.
+
+    Marlowe's _Dido, Queen of Carthage_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: Who does not feel this passage, down to 'Region,'
+thoroughly Shaksperean!]
+
+[Footnote 12: Is not the rest of this speech very plainly Shakspere's?]
+
+[Footnote 13: _wind_, I think it should be.]
+
+[Page 106]
+
+And boule the round Naue downe the hill of Heauen,
+As low as to the Fiends.
+
+_Pol_. This is too long.
+
+_Ham_. It shall to'th Barbars, with your beard.       [Sidenote: to the]
+Prythee say on: He's for a Iigge, or a tale of
+Baudry, or hee sleepes. Say on; come to _Hecuba_.
+
+_1. Play_. But who, O who, had seen the inobled[1] Queen.
+                             [Sidenote: But who, a woe, had | mobled[1]]
+
+_Ham_. The inobled[1] Queene?                         [Sidenote: mobled]
+
+_Pol_. That's good: Inobled[1] Queene is good.[2]
+
+_1. Play_. Run bare-foot vp and downe,
+Threatning the flame                                  [Sidenote: flames]
+With Bisson Rheume:[3] A clout about that head,  [Sidenote: clout vppon]
+Where late the Diadem stood, and for a Robe
+About her lanke and all ore-teamed Loines,[4]
+A blanket in th'Alarum of feare caught vp.        [Sidenote: the alarme]
+Who this had seene, with tongue in Venome steep'd,
+'Gainst Fortunes State, would Treason haue pronounc'd?[5]
+But if the Gods themselues did see her then,
+When she saw _Pyrrhus_ make malicious sport
+In mincing with his Sword her Husbands limbes,[6]    [Sidenote: husband]
+The instant Burst of Clamour that she made
+(Vnlesse things mortall moue them not at all)
+Would haue made milche[7] the Burning eyes of Heauen,
+And passion in the Gods.[8]
+
+_Pol_. Looke where[9] he ha's not turn'd his colour,
+and ha's teares in's eyes. Pray you no more.         [Sidenote: prethee]
+
+_Ham_. 'Tis well, He haue thee speake out the
+rest, soone. Good my Lord, will you see the     [Sidenote: rest of this]
+Players wel bestow'd. Do ye heare, let them be           [Sidenote: you]
+well vs'd: for they are the Abstracts and breefe    [Sidenote: abstract]
+Chronicles of the time. After your death, you
+
+[Footnote 1: '_mobled_'--also in _1st Q_.--may be the word: _muffled_
+seems a corruption of it: compare _mob-cap_, and
+
+    'The moon does mobble up herself'
+
+    --_Shirley_, quoted by _Farmer_;
+
+but I incline to '_inobled_,' thrice in the _Folio_--once with a
+capital: I take it to stand for _'ignobled,' degraded_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'Inobled Queene is good.' _Not in Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --threatening to put the flames out with blind tears:
+'_bisen,' blind_--Ang. Sax.]
+
+[Footnote 4: --she had had so many children.]
+
+[Footnote 5: There should of course be no point of interrogation here.]
+
+[Footnote 6:
+
+    This butcher, whilst his hands were yet held up,
+    Treading upon his breast, struck off his hands.
+
+    Marlowe's _Dido, Queen of Carthage_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: '_milche_'--capable of giving milk: here _capable of
+tears_, which the burning eyes of the gods were not before.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'And would have made passion in the Gods.']
+
+[Footnote 9: 'whether'.]
+
+[Page 108]
+
+were better haue a bad Epitaph, then their ill
+report while you liued.[1]                              [Sidenote: live]
+
+_Pol_. My Lord, I will vse them according to
+their desart.
+
+_Ham_. Gods bodykins man, better. Vse euerie
+                                    [Sidenote: bodkin man, much better,]
+man after his desart, and who should scape whipping:
+                                                       [Sidenote: shall]
+vse them after your own Honor and Dignity.
+The lesse they deserue, the more merit is in
+your bountie. Take them in.
+
+_Pol_. Come sirs.            _Exit Polon_.[2]
+
+_Ham_. Follow him Friends: wee'l heare a play
+to morrow.[3] Dost thou heare me old Friend, can
+you play the murther of _Gonzago_?
+
+_Play_. I my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Wee'l ha't to morrow night. You could
+for a need[4] study[5] a speech of some dosen or sixteene
+                                 [Sidenote: for neede | dosen lines, or]
+lines, which I would set downe, and insert
+in't? Could ye not?[6]                                   [Sidenote: you]
+
+_Play_. I my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Very well. Follow that Lord, and looke
+you mock him not.[7] My good Friends, Ile leaue
+you til night you are welcome to _Elsonower_?
+                                 [Sidenote: _Exeuent Pol. and Players_.]
+
+_Rosin_. Good my Lord.         _Exeunt_.
+
+_Manet Hamlet_.[8]
+
+_Ham_. I so, God buy'ye[9]: Now I am alone.   [Sidenote: buy to you,[9]]
+Oh what a Rogue and Pesant slaue am I?[10]
+Is it not monstrous that this Player heere,[11]
+But in a Fixion, in a dreame of Passion,
+Could force his soule so to his whole conceit,[12]
+                                             [Sidenote: his own conceit]
+That from her working, all his visage warm'd;
+                                        [Sidenote: all the visage wand,]
+Teares in his eyes, distraction in's Aspect,          [Sidenote: in his]
+A broken voyce, and his whole Function suiting        [Sidenote: an his]
+With Formes, to his Conceit?[13] And all for nothing?
+
+[Footnote 1: Why do the editors choose the present tense of the
+_Quarto_? Hamlet does not mean, 'It is worse to have the ill report of
+the Players while you live, than a bad epitaph after your death.' The
+order of the sentence has provided against that meaning. What he means
+is, that their ill report in life will be more against your reputation
+after death than a bad epitaph.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _Not in Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: He detains their leader.]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'for a special reason'.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _Study_ is still the Player's word for _commit to memory_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Note Hamlet's quick resolve, made clearer towards the end
+of the following soliloquy.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Polonius is waiting at the door: this is intended for his
+hearing.]
+
+[Footnote 8: _Not in Q_.]
+
+[Footnote 9: Note the varying forms of _God be with you_.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _1st Q_.
+
+    Why what a dunghill idiote slaue am I?
+    Why these Players here draw water from eyes:
+    For Hecuba, why what is Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba?]
+
+[Footnote 11: Everything rings on the one hard, fixed idea that
+possesses him; but this one idea has many sides. Of late he has been
+thinking more upon the woman-side of it; but the Player with his speech
+has brought his father to his memory, and he feels he has been
+forgetting him: the rage of the actor recalls his own 'cue for passion.'
+Always more ready to blame than justify himself, he feels as if he ought
+to have done more, and so falls to abusing himself.]
+
+[Footnote 12: _imagination_.]
+
+[Footnote 13: 'his whole operative nature providing fit forms for the
+embodiment of his imagined idea'--of which forms he has already
+mentioned his _warmed visage_, his _tears_, his _distracted look_, his
+_broken voice_.
+
+In this passage we have the true idea of the operation of the genuine
+_acting faculty_. Actor as well as dramatist, the Poet gives us here his
+own notion of his second calling.]
+
+[Page 110]
+
+For _Hecuba_?
+What's _Hecuba_ to him, or he to _Hecuba_,[1]
+                                               [Sidenote: or he to her,]
+That he should weepe for her? What would he doe,
+Had he the Motiue and the Cue[2] for passion
+                                              [Sidenote: , and that for]
+That I haue? He would drowne the Stage with teares,
+And cleaue the generall eare with horrid speech:
+Make mad the guilty, and apale[3] the free,[4]
+Confound the ignorant, and amaze indeed,
+The very faculty of Eyes and Eares. Yet I,         [Sidenote: faculties]
+A dull and muddy-metled[5] Rascall, peake
+Like Iohn a-dreames, vnpregnant of my cause,[6]
+And can say nothing: No, not for a King,
+Vpon whose property,[7] and most deere life,
+A damn'd defeate[8] was made. Am I a Coward?[9]
+Who calles me Villaine? breakes my pate a-crosse?
+Pluckes off my Beard, and blowes it in my face?
+Tweakes me by'th'Nose?[10] giues me the Lye i'th' Throate,
+                                                      [Sidenote: by the]
+As deepe as to the Lungs? Who does me this?
+Ha? Why I should take it: for it cannot be,
+                                             [Sidenote: Hah, s'wounds I]
+But I am Pigeon-Liuer'd, and lacke Gall[11]
+To make Oppression bitter, or ere this,
+[Sidenote: 104] I should haue fatted all the Region Kites
+                                             [Sidenote: should a fatted]
+With this Slaues Offall, bloudy: a Bawdy villaine,
+                                               [Sidenote: bloody, baudy]
+Remorselesse,[12] Treacherous, Letcherous, kindles[13] villaine!
+Oh Vengeance![14]
+Who? What an Asse am I? I sure, this is most braue,
+                                 [Sidenote: Why what an Asse am I, this]
+That I, the Sonne of the Deere murthered,            [Sidenote: a deere]
+Prompted to my Reuenge by Heauen, and Hell,
+Must (like a Whore) vnpacke my heart with words,
+And fall a Cursing like a very Drab,[15]
+A Scullion? Fye vpon't: Foh. About my Braine.[16]
+                                 [Sidenote: a stallyon, | braines; hum,]
+
+[Footnote 1: Here follows in 1st _Q_.
+
+    What would he do and if he had my losse?
+    His father murdred, and a Crowne bereft him,
+    [Sidenote: 174] He would turne all his teares to droppes of blood,
+    Amaze the standers by with his laments,
+
+    &c. &c.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Speaking of the Player, he uses the player-word.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _make pale_--appal.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _the innocent_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _Mettle_ is spirit--rather in the sense of _animal-spirit_:
+_mettlesome_--spirited, _as a horse_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: '_unpossessed by_ my cause'.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _personality, proper person_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: _undoing, destruction_--from French _defaire_.]
+
+[Footnote 9: In this mood he no more understands, and altogether doubts
+himself, as he has previously come to doubt the world.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _1st Q_. 'or twites my nose.']
+
+[Footnote 11: It was supposed that pigeons had no gall--I presume from
+their livers not tasting bitter like those of perhaps most birds.]
+
+[Footnote 12: _pitiless_.]
+
+[Footnote 13: _unnatural_.]
+
+[Footnote 14: This line is not in the _Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 15: Here in _Q._ the line runs on to include _Foh_. The next
+line ends with _heard_.]
+
+[Footnote 16: _Point thus_: 'About! my brain.' He apostrophizes his
+brain, telling it to set to work.]
+
+[Page 112]
+
+I haue heard, that guilty Creatures sitting at a Play,
+Haue by the very cunning of the Scoene,[1]
+Bene strooke so to the soule, that presently
+They haue proclaim'd their Malefactions.
+For Murther, though it haue no tongue, will speake
+With most myraculous Organ.[2] Ile haue these Players,
+Play something like the murder of my Father,
+Before mine Vnkle. Ile obserue his lookes,
+[Sidenote: 137] Ile tent him to the quicke: If he but blench[3]
+                                             [Sidenote: if a doe blench]
+I know my course. The Spirit that I haue seene
+[Sidenote: 48] May[4] be the Diuell, and the Diuel hath power
+                               [Sidenote: May be a deale, and the deale]
+T'assume a pleasing shape, yea and perhaps
+Out of my Weaknesse, and my Melancholly,[5]
+As he is very potent with such Spirits,[6]
+[Sidenote: 46] Abuses me to damne me.[7] Ile haue grounds
+More Relatiue then this: The Play's the thing,
+Wherein Ile catch the Conscience of the King.
+                                        _Exit._
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+SUMMARY.
+
+
+The division between the second and third acts is by common consent
+placed here. The third act occupies the afternoon, evening, and night of
+the same day with the second.
+
+This soliloquy is Hamlet's first, and perhaps we may find it correct to
+say _only_ outbreak of self-accusation. He charges himself with lack of
+feeling, spirit, and courage, in that he has not yet taken vengeance on
+his uncle. But unless we are prepared to accept and justify to the full
+his own hardest words against himself, and grant him a muddy-mettled,
+pigeon-livered rascal, we must examine and understand him, so as to
+account for his conduct better than he could himself. If we allow that
+perhaps he accuses himself too much, we may find on reflection that he
+accuses himself altogether wrongfully. If a man is content to think the
+worst of Hamlet, I care to hold no argument with that man.
+
+We must not look for _expressed_ logical sequence in a soliloquy, which
+is a vocal mind. The mind is seldom conscious of the links or
+transitions of a yet perfectly logical process developed in it. This
+remark, however, is more necessary in regard to the famous soliloquy to
+follow.
+
+In Hamlet, misery has partly choked even vengeance; and although sure in
+his heart that his uncle is guilty, in his brain he is not sure.
+Bitterly accusing himself in an access of wretchedness and rage and
+credence, he forgets the doubt that has restrained him, with all besides
+which he might so well urge in righteous defence, not excuse, of his
+delay. But ungenerous criticism has, by all but universal consent,
+accepted his own verdict against himself. So in common life there are
+thousands on thousands who, upon the sad confession of a man
+immeasurably greater than themselves, and showing his greatness in the
+humility whose absence makes admission impossible to them, immediately
+pounce upon him with vituperation, as if he were one of the vile, and
+they infinitely better. Such should be indignant with St. Paul and
+say--if he was the chief of sinners, what insolence to lecture _them_!
+and certainly the more justified publican would never by them have been
+allowed to touch the robe of the less justified Pharisee. Such critics
+surely take little or no pains to understand the object of their
+contempt: because Hamlet is troubled and blames himself, they without
+hesitation condemn him--and there where he is most commendable. It is
+the righteous man who is most ready to accuse himself; the unrighteous
+is least ready. Who is able when in deep trouble, rightly to analyze his
+feelings? Delay in action is not necessarily abandonment of duty; in
+Hamlet's case it is a due recognition of duty, which condemns
+precipitancy--and action in the face of doubt, so long as it is nowise
+compelled, is precipitancy. The first thing is _to be sure_: Hamlet has
+never been sure; he spies at length a chance of making himself sure; he
+seizes upon it; and while his sudden resolve to make use of the players,
+like the equally sudden resolve to shroud himself in pretended madness,
+manifests him fertile in expedient, the carrying out of both manifests
+him right capable and diligent in execution--_a man of action in every
+true sense of the word_.
+
+The self-accusation of Hamlet has its ground in the lapse of weeks
+during which nothing has been done towards punishing the king. Suddenly
+roused to a keen sense of the fact, he feels as if surely he might have
+done something. The first act ends with a burning vow of righteous
+vengeance; the second shows him wandering about the palace in
+profoundest melancholy--such as makes it more than easy for him to
+assume the forms of madness the moment he marks any curious eye bent
+upon him. Let him who has never loved and revered a mother, call such
+melancholy weakness. He has indeed done nothing towards the fulfilment
+of his vow; but the way in which he made the vow, the terms in which he
+exacted from his companions their promise of silence, and his scheme for
+eluding suspicion, combine to show that from the first he perceived its
+fulfilment would be hard, saw the obstacles in his way, and knew it
+would require both time and caution. That even in the first rush of his
+wrath he should thus be aware of difficulty, indicates moral symmetry;
+but the full weight of what lay in his path could appear to him only
+upon reflection. Partly in the light of passages yet to come, I will
+imagine the further course of his thoughts, which the closing couplet of
+the first act shows as having already begun to apale 'the native hue of
+resolution.'
+
+'But how shall I take vengeance on my uncle? Shall I publicly accuse
+him, or slay him at once? In the one case what answer can I make to his
+denial? in the other, what justification can I offer? If I say the
+spirit of my father accuses him, what proof can I bring? My companions
+only saw the apparition--heard no word from him; and my uncle's party
+will assert, with absolute likelihood to the minds of those who do not
+know me--and who here knows me but my mother!--that charge is a mere
+coinage of jealous disappointment, working upon the melancholy I have
+not cared to hide. (174-6.) When I act, it must be to kill him, and to
+what misconstruction shall I not expose myself! (272) If the thing must
+so be, I must brave all; but I could never present myself thereafter as
+successor to the crown of one whom I had first slain and then vilified
+on the accusation of an apparition whom no one heard but myself! I must
+find _proof_--such proof as will satisfy others as well as myself. My
+immediate duty is _evidence_, not vengeance.'
+
+We have seen besides, that, when informed of the haunting presence of
+the Ghost, he expected the apparition with not a little doubt as to its
+authenticity--a doubt which, even when he saw it, did not immediately
+vanish: is it any wonder that when the apparition was gone, the doubt
+should return? Return it did, in accordance with the reaction which
+waits upon all high-strung experience. If he did not believe in the
+person who performed it, would any man long believe in any miracle?
+Hamlet soon begins to question whether he can with confidence accept the
+appearance for that which it appeared and asserted itself to be. He
+steps over to the stand-point of his judges, and doubts the only
+testimony he has to produce. Far more:--was he not bound in common
+humanity, not to say _filialness_, to doubt it? To doubt the Ghost, was
+to doubt a testimony which to accept was to believe his father in
+horrible suffering, his uncle a murderer, his mother at least an
+adulteress; to kill his uncle was to set his seal to the whole, and,
+besides, to bring his mother into frightful suspicion of complicity in
+his father's murder. Ought not the faintest shadow of a doubt, assuaging
+ever so little the glare of the hell-sun of such crime, to be welcome to
+the tortured heart? Wretched wife and woman as his mother had shown
+herself, the Ghost would have him think her far worse--perhaps, even
+accessory to her husband's murder! For action he _must_ have proof!
+
+At the same time, what every one knew of his mother, coupled now with
+the mere idea of the Ghost's accusation, wrought in him such misery,
+roused in him so many torturing and unanswerable questions, so blotted
+the face of the universe and withered the heart of hope, that he could
+not but doubt whether, in such a world of rogues and false women, it was
+worth his while to slay one villain out of the swarm.
+
+Ophelia's behaviour to him, in obedience to her father, of which she
+gives him no explanation, has added 'the pangs of disprized love,' and
+increased his doubts of woman-kind. 120.
+
+But when his imagination, presenting afresh the awful interview, brings
+him more immediately under the influence of the apparition and its
+behest, he is for the moment delivered both from the stunning effect of
+its communication and his doubt of its truth; forgetting then the
+considerations that have wrought in him, he accuses himself of
+remissness, blames himself grievously for his delay. Soon, however, his
+senses resume their influence, and he doubts again. So goes the
+mill-round of his thoughts, with the revolving of many wheels.
+
+His whole conscious nature is frightfully shaken: he would be the poor
+creature most of his critics would make of him, were it otherwise; it is
+because of his greatness that he suffers so terribly, and doubts so
+much. A mother's crime is far more paralyzing than a father's murder is
+stimulating; and either he has not set himself in thorough earnest to
+find the proof he needs, or he has as yet been unable to think of any
+serviceable means to the end, when the half real, half simulated emotion
+of the Player yet again rouses in him the sense of remissness, leads him
+to accuse himself of forgotten obligation and heartlessness, and
+simultaneously suggests a device for putting the Ghost and his words to
+the test. Instantly he seizes the chance: when a thing has to be done,
+and can be done, Hamlet is _never_ wanting--shows himself the very
+promptest of men.
+
+In the last passage of this act I do not take it that he is expressing
+an idea then first occurring to him: that the whole thing may be a snare
+of the devil is a doubt with which during weeks he has been familiar.
+
+The delay through which, in utter failure to comprehend his character,
+he has been so miserably misjudged, falls really between the first and
+second acts, although it seems in the regard of most readers to underlie
+and protract the whole play. Its duration is measured by the journey of
+the ambassadors to and from the neighbouring kingdom of Norway.
+
+It is notably odd, by the way, that those who accuse Hamlet of inaction,
+are mostly the same who believe his madness a reality! In truth,
+however, his affected madness is one of the strongest signs of his
+activity, and his delay one of the strongest proofs of his sanity.
+
+This second act, the third act, and a part always given to the fourth,
+but which really belongs to the third, occupy in all only one day.
+
+[Footnote 1: Here follows in _1st Q._
+
+                        confest a murder
+    Committed long before.
+    This spirit that I haue seene may be the Diuell,
+    And out of my weakenesse and my melancholy,
+    As he is very potent with such men,
+    Doth seeke to damne me, I will haue sounder proofes,
+    The play's the thing, &c.]
+
+[Footnote 2:
+
+    'Stones have been known to move, and trees to speak;' &c.
+
+    _Macbeth_, iii. 4.]
+
+[Footnote 3: In the _1st Q._ Hamlet, speaking to Horatio (l 37), says,
+
+    And if he doe not bleach, and change at that,--
+
+_Bleach_ is radically the same word as _blench_:--to bleach, to blanch,
+to blench--_to grow white_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Emphasis on _May_, as resuming previous doubtful thought
+and suspicion.]
+
+[Footnote 5: --caused from the first by his mother's behaviour, not
+constitutional.]
+
+[Footnote 6: --'such conditions of the spirits'.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Here is one element in the very existence of the preceding
+act: doubt as to the facts of the case has been throughout operating to
+restrain him; and here first he reveals, perhaps first recognizes its
+influence. Subject to change of feeling with the wavering of conviction,
+he now for a moment regards his uncertainty as involving unnatural
+distrust of a being in whose presence he cannot help _feeling_ him his
+father. He was familiar with the lore of the supernatural, and knew the
+doubt he expresses to be not without support.--His companions as well
+had all been in suspense as to the identity of the apparition with the
+late king.]
+
+[Page 116]
+
+_Enter King, Queene, Polonius, Ophelia, Rosincrance,
+Guildenstern, and Lords._[1]           [Sidenote: Guyldensterne, Lords.]
+
+[Sidenote: 72] _King._ And can you by no drift of circumstance
+                                      [Sidenote: An can | of conference]
+Get from him why he puts on[2] this Confusion:
+Grating so harshly all his dayes of quiet
+With turbulent and dangerous Lunacy.
+
+_Rosin._ He does confesse he feeles himselfe distracted,
+[Sidenote: 92] But from what cause he will by no meanes speake.
+                                                      [Sidenote: a will]
+
+_Guil._ Nor do we finde him forward to be sounded,
+But with a crafty Madnesse[3] keepes aloofe:
+When we would bring him on to some Confession
+Of his true state.
+
+_Qu._ Did he receiue you well?
+
+_Rosin._ Most like a Gentleman.
+
+_Guild._ But with much forcing of his disposition.[4]
+
+_Rosin._ Niggard of question, but of our demands
+Most free in his reply.[5]
+
+_Qu._ Did you assay him to any pastime?
+
+_Rosin._ Madam, it so fell out, that certaine Players
+We ore-wrought on the way: of these we told him,
+                                               [Sidenote: ore-raught[6]]
+And there did seeme in him a kinde of ioy
+To heare of it: They are about the Court,    [Sidenote: are heere about]
+And (as I thinke) they haue already order
+This night to play before him.
+
+_Pol._ 'Tis most true;
+And he beseech'd me to intreate your Majesties
+To heare, and see the matter.
+
+_King._ With all my heart, and it doth much content me
+To heare him so inclin'd. Good Gentlemen,
+
+[Footnote 1: This may be regarded as the commencement of the Third Act.]
+
+[Footnote 2: The phrase seems to imply a doubt of the genuineness of the
+lunacy.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _Nominative pronoun omitted here._]
+
+[Footnote 4: He has noted, without understanding them, the signs of
+Hamlet's suspicion of themselves.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Compare the seemingly opposite statements of the two:
+Hamlet had bewildered them.]
+
+[Foonote 6: _over-reached_--came up with, caught up, overtook.]
+
+[Page 118]
+
+Giue him a further edge,[1] and driue his purpose on
+                                          [Sidenote: purpose into these]
+To these delights.
+
+_Rosin._ We shall my Lord. _Exeunt._
+                                       [Sidenote: _Exeunt Ros. & Guyl._]
+
+_King._ Sweet Gertrude leaue vs too,          [Sidenote: Gertrard | two]
+For we haue closely sent for _Hamlet_ hither,
+[Sidenote: 84] That he, as 'twere by accident, may there
+                                                       [Sidenote: heere]
+Affront[2] _Ophelia_.  Her Father, and my selfe[3] (lawful espials)[4]
+Will so bestow our selues, that seeing vnseene
+We may of their encounter frankely iudge,
+And gather by him, as he is behaued,
+If't be th'affliction of his loue, or no,
+That thus he suffers for.
+
+_Qu._ I shall obey you,
+And for your part _Ophelia_,[5] I do wish
+That your good Beauties be the happy cause
+Of _Hamlets_ wildenesse: so shall I hope your Vertues
+[Sidenote: 240] Will bring him to his wonted way againe,
+To both your Honors.[6]
+
+_Ophe._ Madam, I wish it may.
+
+_Pol. Ophelia_, walke you heere.  Gracious so please ye[7]
+                                                        [Sidenote: you,]
+We will bestow our selues: Reade on this booke,[8]
+That shew of such an exercise may colour
+Your lonelinesse.[9] We are oft too blame in this,[10]
+                                                   [Sidenote: lowlines:]
+'Tis too much prou'd, that with Deuotions visage,
+And pious Action, we do surge o're                     [Sidenote: sugar]
+The diuell himselfe.
+
+[Sidenote: 161]  _King._ Oh 'tis true:          [Sidenote: tis too true]
+How smart a lash that speech doth giue my Conscience?
+The Harlots Cheeke beautied with plaist'ring Art
+Is not more vgly to the thing that helpes it,[11]
+Then is my deede, to my most painted word.[12]
+Oh heauie burthen![13]
+
+[Footnote 1: '_edge_ him on'--somehow corrupted into _egg_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _confront_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _Clause in parenthesis not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 4: --apologetic to the queen.]
+
+[Footnote 5: --_going up to Ophelia_--I would say, who stands at a
+little distance, and has not heard what has been passing between them.]
+
+[Footnote 6: The queen encourages Ophelia in hoping to marry Hamlet, and
+may so have a share in causing a certain turn her madness takes.]
+
+[Footnote 7: --_aside to the king_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: --_to Ophelia:_ her prayer-book. 122.]
+
+[Footnote 9: _1st Q._
+
+    And here _Ofelia_, reade you on this booke,
+    And walke aloofe, the King shal be vnseene.]
+
+[Footnote 10: --_aside to the king._ I insert these _asides_, and
+suggest the queen's going up to Ophelia, to show how we may easily hold
+Ophelia ignorant of their plot. Poor creature as she was, I would
+believe Shakspere did not mean her to lie to Hamlet. This may be why he
+omitted that part of her father's speech in the _1st Q._ given in the
+note immediately above, telling her the king is going to hide. Still, it
+would be excuse enough for _her_, that she thought his madness justified
+the deception.]
+
+[Footnote 11: --ugly to the paint that helps by hiding it--to which it
+lies so close, and from which it has no secrets. Or, 'ugly to' may mean,
+'ugly _compared with_.']
+
+[Footnote 12: 'most painted'--_very much painted_. His painted word is
+the paint to the deed. _Painted_ may be taken for _full of paint_.]
+
+[Footnote 13: This speech of the king is the first _assurance_ we have
+of his guilt.]
+
+[Page 120]
+
+_Pol._ I heare him comming, let's withdraw my Lord.
+                                          [Sidenote: comming, with-draw]
+                                     _Exeunt._[1]
+
+_Enter Hamlet._[2]
+
+_Ham._ To be, or not to be, that is the Question:
+Whether 'tis Nobler in the minde to suffer
+The Slings and Arrowes of outragious Fortune,
+[Sidenote: 200,250] Or to take Armes against a Sea of troubles,[3]
+And by opposing end them:[4] to dye, to sleepe
+No more; and by a sleepe, to say we end
+The Heart-ake, and the thousand Naturall shockes
+That Flesh is heyre too? 'Tis a consummation
+Deuoutly to be wish'd.[5] To dye to sleepe,
+To sleepe, perchance to Dreame;[6] I, there's the rub,
+For in that sleepe of death, what[7] dreames may come,[8]
+When we haue shuffle'd off this mortall coile,
+[Sidenote: 186] Must giue vs pawse.[9] There's the respect
+That makes Calamity of so long life:[10]
+For who would beare the Whips and Scornes of time,
+The Oppressors wrong, the poore mans Contumely,
+                                                 [Sidenote: proude mans]
+[Sidenote: 114] The pangs of dispriz'd Loue,[11] the Lawes delay,
+                                                    [Sidenote: despiz'd]
+The insolence of Office, and the Spurnes
+That patient merit of the vnworthy takes,                [Sidenote: th']
+When he himselfe might his _Quietus_ make
+[Sidenote: 194,252-3] With a bare Bodkin?[12] Who would these Fardles
+    beare[13]                                  [Sidenote: would fardels]
+To grunt and sweat vnder a weary life,
+[Sidenote: 194] But that the dread of something after death,[14]
+The vndiscouered Countrey, from whose Borne
+No Traueller returnes,[15] Puzels the will,
+And makes vs rather beare those illes we haue,
+Then flye to others that we know not of.
+Thus Conscience does make Cowards of vs all,[16]
+[Sidenote: 30] And thus the Natiue hew of Resolution[17]
+Is sicklied o're, with the pale cast of Thought,[18]
+                                                     [Sidenote: sickled]
+
+[Footnote 1: _Not in Q._--They go behind the tapestry, where it hangs
+over the recess of the doorway. Ophelia thinks they have left the room.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _In Q. before last speech._]
+
+[Footnote 3: Perhaps to a Danish or Dutch critic, or one from the
+eastern coast of England, this simile would not seem so unfit as it does
+to some.]
+
+[Footnote 4: To print this so as I would have it read, I would complete
+this line from here with points, and commence the next with points. At
+the other breaks of the soliloquy, as indicated below, I would do the
+same--thus:
+
+    And by opposing end them....
+                       ....To die--to sleep,]
+
+[Footnote 5: _Break_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _Break_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Emphasis on _what_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Such dreams as the poor Ghost's.]
+
+[Footnote 9: _Break._ --'_pawse_' is the noun, and from its use at page
+186, we may judge it means here 'pause for reflection.']
+
+[Footnote 10: 'makes calamity so long-lived.']
+
+[Footnote 11: --not necessarily disprized by the _lady_; the disprizer
+in Hamlet's case was the worldly and suspicious father--and that in
+part, and seemingly to Hamlet altogether, for the king's sake.]
+
+[Footnote 12: _small sword_. If there be here any allusion to suicide,
+it is on the general question, and with no special application to
+himself. 24. But it is the king and the bare bodkin his thought
+associates. How could he even glance at the things he has just
+mentioned, as each, a reason for suicide? It were a cowardly country
+indeed where the question might be asked, 'Who would not commit suicide
+because of any one of these things, except on account of what may follow
+after death?'! One might well, however, be tempted to destroy an
+oppressor, _and risk his life in that._]
+
+[Footnote 13: _Fardel_, burden: the old French for _fardeau_, I am
+informed.]
+
+[Footnote 14: --a dread caused by conscience.]
+
+[Footnote 15: The Ghost could not be imagined as having _returned_.]
+
+[Footnote 16: 'of us all' _not in Q._ It is not the fear of evil that
+makes us cowards, but the fear of _deserved_ evil. The Poet may intend
+that conscience alone is the cause of fear in man. '_Coward_' does not
+here involve contempt: it should be spoken with a grim smile. But Hamlet
+would hardly call turning from _suicide_ cowardice in any sense. 24.]
+
+[Footnote 17: --such as was his when he vowed vengeance.]
+
+[Footnote 18: --such as immediately followed on that The _native_ hue of
+resolution--that which is natural to man till interruption comes--is
+ruddy; the hue of thought is pale. I suspect the '_pale cast_' of an
+allusion to whitening with _rough-cast_.]
+
+[Page 122]
+
+And enterprizes of great pith and moment,[1]       [Sidenote: pitch [1]]
+With this regard their Currants turne away,             [Sidenote: awry]
+And loose the name of Action.[2] Soft you now,
+[Sidenote: 119] The faire _Ophelia_? Nimph, in thy Orizons[3]
+Be all my sinnes remembred.[4]
+
+_Ophe._ Good my Lord,
+How does your Honor for this many a day?
+
+_Ham._ I humbly thanke you: well, well, well.[5]
+
+_Ophe._ My Lord, I haue Remembrances of yours,
+That I haue longed long to re-deliuer.
+I pray you now, receiue them.
+
+_Ham._ No, no, I neuer gaue you ought.[6]
+                                          [Sidenote: No, not I, I never]
+
+_Ophe._ My honor'd Lord, I know right well you did,
+                                                    [Sidenote: you know]
+And with them words of so sweet breath compos'd,
+As made the things more rich, then perfume left:
+                    [Sidenote: these things | their perfume lost.[7]]
+Take these againe, for to the Noble minde
+Rich gifts wax poore, when giuers proue vnkinde.
+There my Lord.[8]
+
+_Ham._ Ha, ha: Are you honest?[9]
+
+_Ophe._ My Lord.
+
+_Ham._ Are you faire?
+
+_Ophe._ What meanes your Lordship?
+
+_Ham._ That if you be honest and faire, your
+                                     [Sidenote: faire, you should admit]
+Honesty[10] should admit no discourse to your Beautie.
+
+_Ophe._ Could Beautie my Lord, haue better
+Comerce[11] then your Honestie?[12]
+                                     [Sidenote: Then with honestie?[11]]
+
+_Ham._ I trulie: for the power of Beautie, will
+sooner transforme Honestie from what it is, to a
+Bawd, then the force of Honestie can translate
+Beautie into his likenesse. This was sometime a
+Paradox, but now the time giues it proofe. I did
+loue you once.[13]
+
+_Ophe._ Indeed my Lord, you made me beleeue so.
+
+[Footnote 1: How could _suicide_ be styled _an enterprise of great
+pith_? Yet less could it be called _of great pitch_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: I allow this to be a general reflection, but surely it
+serves to show that _conscience_ must at least be one of Hamlet's
+restraints.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --by way of intercession.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Note the entire change of mood from that of the last
+soliloquy. The right understanding of this soliloquy is indispensable to
+the right understanding of Hamlet. But we are terribly trammelled and
+hindered, as in the understanding of Hamlet throughout, so here in the
+understanding of his meditation, by traditional assumption. I was roused
+to think in the right direction concerning it, by the honoured friend
+and relative to whom I have feebly acknowledged my obligation by
+dedicating to him this book. I could not at first see it as he saw it:
+'Think about it, and you will,' he said. I did think, and by
+degrees--not very quickly--my prejudgments thinned, faded, and almost
+vanished. I trust I see it now as a whole, and in its true relations,
+internal and external--its relations to itself, to the play, and to the
+Hamlet, of Shakspere.
+
+Neither in its first verse, then, nor in it anywhere else, do I find
+even an allusion to suicide. What Hamlet is referring to in the said
+first verse, it is not possible with certainty to determine, for it is
+but the vanishing ripple of a preceding ocean of thought, from which he
+is just stepping out upon the shore of the articulate. He may have been
+plunged in some profound depth of the metaphysics of existence, or he
+may have been occupied with the one practical question, that of the
+slaying of his uncle, which has, now in one form, now in another,
+haunted his spirit for weeks. Perhaps, from the message he has just
+received, he expects to meet the king, and conscience, confronting
+temptation, has been urging the necessity of proof; perhaps a righteous
+consideration of consequences, which sometimes have share in the primary
+duty, has been making him shrink afresh from the shedding of blood, for
+every thoughtful mind recoils from the irrevocable, and that is an awful
+form of the irrevocable. But whatever thought, general or special, this
+first verse may be dismissing, we come at once thereafter into the light
+of a definite question: 'Which is nobler--to endure evil fortune, or to
+oppose it _a outrance_; to bear in passivity, or to resist where
+resistance is hopeless--resist to the last--to the death which is its
+unavoidable end?'
+
+Then comes a pause, during which he is thinking--we will not say 'too
+precisely on the event,' but taking his account with consequences: the
+result appears in the uttered conviction that the extreme possible
+consequence, death, is a good and not an evil. Throughout, observe, how
+here, as always, he generalizes, himself being to himself but the type
+of his race.
+
+Then follows another pause, during which he seems prosecuting the
+thought, for he has already commenced further remark in similar strain,
+when suddenly a new and awful element introduces itself:
+
+                       ....To die--to sleep.--
+    --To _sleep_! perchance to _dream_!
+
+He had been thinking of death only as the passing away of the present
+with its troubles; here comes the recollection that death has its own
+troubles--its own thoughts, its own consciousness: if it be a sleep, it
+has its dreams. '_What dreams may come_' means, 'the sort of dreams that
+may come'; the emphasis is on the _what_, not on the _may_; there is no
+question whether dreams will come, but there is question of the
+character of the dreams. This consideration is what makes calamity so
+long-lived! 'For who would bear the multiform ills of life'--he alludes
+to his own wrongs, but mingles, in his generalizing way, others of those
+most common to humanity, and refers to the special cure for some of his
+own which was close to his hand--'who would bear these things if he
+could, as I can, make his quietus with a bare bodkin'--that is, by
+slaying his enemy--'who would then bear them, but that he fears the
+future, and the divine judgment upon his life and actions--that
+conscience makes a coward of him!'[14]
+
+To run, not the risk of death, but the risks that attend upon and follow
+death, Hamlet must be certain of what he is about; he must be sure it is
+a right thing he does, or he will leave it undone. Compare his speech,
+250, 'Does it not, &c.':--by the time he speaks this speech, he has had
+perfect proof, and asserts the righteousness of taking vengeance in
+almost an agony of appeal to Horatio.
+
+The more continuous and the more formally logical a soliloquy, the less
+natural it is. The logic should be all there, but latent; the bones of
+it should not show: they do not show here.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _One_ 'well' _only in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 6: He does not want to take them back, and so sever even that
+weak bond between them. He has not given her up.]
+
+[Footnote 7: The _Q._ reading seems best. The perfume of his gifts was
+the sweet words with which they were given; those words having lost
+their savour, the mere gifts were worth nothing.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Released from the commands her father had laid upon her,
+and emboldened by the queen's approval of more than the old relation
+between them, she would timidly draw Hamlet back to the past--to love
+and a sound mind.]
+
+[Footnote 9: I do not here suppose a noise or movement of the arras, or
+think that the talk from this point bears the mark of the madness he
+would have assumed on the least suspicion of espial. His distrust of
+Ophelia comes from a far deeper source--suspicion of all women, grown
+doubtful to him through his mother. Hopeless for her, he would give his
+life to know that Ophelia was not like her. Hence the cruel things he
+says to her here and elsewhere; they are the brood of a heart haunted
+with horrible, alas! too excusable phantoms of distrust. A man wretched
+as Hamlet must be forgiven for being rude; it is love suppressed, love
+that can neither breathe nor burn, that makes him rude. His horrid
+insinuations are a hungry challenge to indignant rejection. He would
+sting Ophelia to defence of herself and her sex. But, either from her
+love, or from gentleness to his supposed madness, as afterwards in the
+play-scene, or from the poverty and weakness of a nature so fathered and
+so brothered, she hears, and says nothing. 139.]
+
+[Footnote 10: Honesty is here figured as a porter,--just after, as a
+porter that may be corrupted.]
+
+[Footnote 11: If the _Folio_ reading is right, _commerce_ means
+_companionship_; if the _Quarto_ reading, then it means _intercourse_.
+Note _then_ constantly for our _than_.]
+
+[Footnote 12: I imagine Ophelia here giving Hamlet a loving look--which
+hardens him. But I do not think she lays emphasis on _your_; the word is
+here, I take it, used (as so often then) impersonally.]
+
+[Footnote 13: '--proof in you and me: _I_ loved _you_ once, but my
+honesty did not translate your beauty into its likeness.']
+
+[Footnote 14: That the Great Judgement was here in Shakspere's thought,
+will be plain to those who take light from the corresponding passage in
+the _1st Quarto_. As it makes an excellent specimen of that issue in the
+character I am most inclined to attribute to it--that of original sketch
+and continuous line of notes, with more or less finished passages in
+place among the notes--I will here quote it, recommending it to my
+student's attention. If it be what I suggest, it is clear that Shakspere
+had not at first altogether determined how he would carry the
+soliloquy--what line he was going to follow in it: here hope and fear
+contend for the place of motive to patience. The changes from it in the
+text are well worth noting: the religion is lessened: the hope
+disappears: were they too much of pearls to cast before 'barren
+spectators'? The manuscript could never have been meant for any eye but
+his own, seeing it was possible to print from it such a chaos--over
+which yet broods the presence of the formative spirit of the Poet.
+
+    _Ham._ To be, or not to be, I there's the point,
+    To Die, to sleepe, is that all? I all:
+    No, to sleepe, to dreame, I mary there it goes,
+    For in that dreame of death, when wee awake,
+    [Sidenote: 24, 247, 260] And borne before an euerlasting Iudge,
+    From whence no passenger euer retur'nd,
+    The vndiscouered country, at whose sight
+    The happy smile, and the accursed damn'd.
+    But for this, the ioyfull hope of this,
+    Whol'd beare the scornes and flattery of the world,
+    Scorned by the right rich, the rich curssed of the poore?
+    The widow being oppressed, the orphan wrong'd,
+    The taste of hunger, or a tirants raigne,
+    And thousand more calamities besides,
+    To grunt and sweate vnder this weary life,
+    When that he may his full _Quietus_ make,
+    With a bare bodkin, who would this indure,
+    But for a hope of something after death?
+    Which pulses the braine, and doth confound the sence,
+    Which makes vs rather beare those euilles we haue,
+    Than flie to others that we know not of.
+    I that, O this conscience makes cowardes of vs all,
+    Lady in thy orizons, be all my sinnes remembred.]
+
+[Page 126]
+
+_Ham._ You should not haue beleeued me. For
+vertue cannot so innocculate[1] our old stocke,[2] but
+we shall rellish of it.[3] I loued you not.[4]
+
+_Ophe._ I was the more deceiued.
+
+_Ham._ Get thee to a Nunnerie. Why would'st           [Sidenote: thee a]
+thou be a breeder of Sinners? I am my selfe indifferent[5]
+[Sidenote: 132] honest, but yet I could accuse me of
+such things,[6] that it were better my Mother had
+[Sidenote: 62] not borne me,[7] I am very prowd, reuengefull,
+Ambitious, with more offences at my becke, then I
+haue thoughts to put them in imagination, to giue
+them shape, or time to acte them in. What should
+such Fellowes as I do, crawling betweene Heauen
+                                            [Sidenote: earth and heauen]
+and Earth.[8] We are arrant Knaues all[10], beleeue
+none of vs.[9] Goe thy wayes to a Nunnery.
+Where's your Father?[11]
+
+_Ophe._ At home, my Lord.[12]
+
+_Ham._ Let the doores be shut vpon him, that
+he may play the Foole no way, but in's owne house.[13]
+                                                [Sidenote: no where but]
+Farewell.[14]
+
+_Ophe._ O helpe him, you sweet Heauens.
+
+_Ham._[15] If thou doest Marry, Ile giue thee this
+Plague for thy Dowrie. Be thou as chast as Ice,
+as pure as Snow, thou shalt not escape Calumny.[16]
+Get thee to a Nunnery. Go,[17] Farewell.[18] Or if
+thou wilt needs Marry, marry a fool: for Wise men
+know well enough, what monsters[19] you make of
+them. To a Nunnery go, and quickly too. Farwell.[20]
+
+_Ophe._ O[21] heauenly Powers, restore him.
+
+_Ham._[22] I haue heard of your pratlings[23] too wel
+                                         [Sidenote: your paintings well]
+enough. God has giuen you one pace,[23] and you
+                                            [Sidenote: hath | one face,]
+make your selfe another: you gidge, you amble,
+                             [Sidenote: selfes | you gig and amble, and]
+and you lispe, and nickname Gods creatures, and
+                                       [Sidenote: you list you nickname]
+make your Wantonnesse, your[24] Ignorance.[25] Go
+
+[Footnote 1: 'inoculate'--_bud_, in the horticultural use.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _trunk_ or _stem_ of the family tree.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Emphasis on _relish_--'keep something of the old flavour of
+the stock.']
+
+[Footnote 4: He tries her now with denying his love--perhaps moved in
+part by a feeling, taught by his mother's, of how imperfect it was.]
+
+[Footnote 5: tolerably.]
+
+[Footnote 6: He turns from baiting woman in her to condemn himself. Is
+it not the case with every noble nature, that the knowledge of wrong in
+another arouses in it the consciousness of its own faults and sins, of
+its own evil possibilities? Hurled from the heights of ideal humanity,
+Hamlet not only recognizes in himself every evil tendency of his race,
+but almost feels himself individually guilty of every transgression.
+'God, God, forgive us all!' exclaims the doctor who has just witnessed
+the misery of Lady Macbeth, unveiling her guilt.
+
+This whole speech of Hamlet is profoundly sane--looking therefore
+altogether insane to the shallow mind, on which the impression of its
+insanity is deepened by its coming from him so freely. The common nature
+disappointed rails at humanity; Hamlet, his earthly ideal destroyed,
+would tear his individual human self to pieces.]
+
+[Footnote 7: This we may suppose uttered with an expression as startling
+to Ophelia as impenetrable.]
+
+[Footnote 8: He is disgusted with himself, with his own nature and
+consciousness--]
+
+[Footnote 9: --and this reacts on his kind.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'all' _not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 11: Here, perhaps, he grows suspicious--asks himself why he is
+allowed this prolonged _tete a tete_.]
+
+[Footnote 12: I am willing to believe she thinks so.]
+
+[Footnote 13: Whether he trusts Ophelia or not, he does not take her
+statement for correct, and says this in the hope that Polonius is not
+too far off to hear it. The speech is for him, not for Ophelia, and will
+seem to her to come only from his madness.]
+
+[Footnote 14: _Exit_.]
+
+[Footnote 15: (_re-entering_)]
+
+[Footnote 16: 'So many are bad, that your virtue will not be believed
+in.']
+
+[Footnote 17: 'Go' _not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 18: _Exit, and re-enter._]
+
+[Footnote 19: _Cornuti._]
+
+[Footnote 20: _Exit._]
+
+[Footnote 21: 'O' _not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 22: (_re-entering_)]
+
+[Footnote 23: I suspect _pratlings_ to be a corruption, not of the
+printed _paintings_, but of some word substituted for it by the Poet,
+perhaps _prancings_, and _pace_ to be correct.]
+
+[Footnote 24: 'your' _not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 25: As the present type to him of womankind, he assails her
+with such charges of lightness as are commonly brought against women. He
+does not go farther: she is not his mother, and he hopes she is
+innocent. But he cannot make her speak!]
+
+[Page 128]
+
+too, Ile no more on't, it hath made me mad. I say,
+we will haue no more Marriages.[1] Those that are
+                                             [Sidenote: no mo marriage,]
+married already,[2] all but one shall liue, the rest
+shall keep as they are. To a Nunnery, go.
+
+                         _Exit Hamlet_.               [Sidenote: _Exit_]
+
+[3]_Ophe._ O what a Noble minde is heere o're-throwne?
+The Courtiers, Soldiers, Schollers: Eye, tongue, sword,
+Th'expectansie and Rose[4] of the faire State,
+                                            [Sidenote: Th' expectation,]
+The glasse of Fashion,[5] and the mould of Forme,[6]
+Th'obseru'd of all Obseruers, quite, quite downe.
+Haue I of Ladies most deiect and wretched,          [Sidenote: And I of]
+That suck'd the Honie of his Musicke Vowes:          [Sidenote: musickt]
+Now see that Noble, and most Soueraigne Reason,     [Sidenote: see what]
+Like sweet Bels iangled out of tune, and harsh,[7]
+                                                 [Sidenote: out of time]
+That vnmatch'd Forme and Feature of blowne youth,[8]
+                                              [Sidenote: and stature of]
+Blasted with extasie.[9] Oh woe is me,
+T'haue scene what I haue scene: see what I see.[10]
+                                                     [Sidenote: _Exit_.]
+
+_Enter King, and Polonius_.
+
+_King_. Loue? His affections do not that way tend,
+Nor what he spake, though it lack'd Forme a little,      [Sidenote: Not]
+Was not like Madnesse.[11] There's something in his soule?
+O're which his Melancholly sits on brood,
+And I do doubt the hatch, and the disclose[12]
+Will be some danger,[11] which to preuent       [Sidenote: which for to]
+I haue in quicke determination
+[Sidenote: 138, 180] Thus set it downe. He shall with speed to England
+For the demand of our neglected Tribute:
+Haply the Seas and Countries different
+
+[Footnote 1: 'The thing must be put a stop to! the world must cease! it
+is not fit to go on.']
+
+[Footnote 2: 'already--(_aside_) all but one--shall live.']
+
+[Footnote 3: _1st Q_.
+
+    _Ofe._ Great God of heauen, what a quicke change is this?
+    The Courtier, Scholler, Souldier, all in him,
+    All dasht and splinterd thence, O woe is me,
+    To a seene what I haue seene, see what I see. _Exit_.
+
+To his cruel words Ophelia is impenetrable--from the conviction that not
+he but his madness speaks.
+
+The moment he leaves her, she breaks out in such phrase as a young girl
+would hardly have used had she known that the king and her father were
+listening. I grant, however, the speech may be taken as a soliloquy
+audible to the spectators only, who to the persons of a play are _but_
+the spiritual presences.]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'The hope and flower'--The _rose_ is not unfrequently used
+in English literature as the type of perfection.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'he by whom Fashion dressed herself'--_he who set the
+fashion_. His great and small virtues taken together, Hamlet makes us
+think of Sir Philip Sidney--ten years older than Shakspere, and dead
+sixteen years before _Hamlet_ was written.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'he after whose ways, or modes of behaviour, men shaped
+theirs'--therefore the mould in which their forms were cast;--_the
+object of universal imitation_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: I do not know whether this means--the peal rung without
+regard to tune or time--or--the single bell so handled that the tongue
+checks and jars the vibration. In some country places, I understand,
+they go about ringing a set of hand-bells.]
+
+[Footnote 8: youth in full blossom.]
+
+[Footnote 9: madness 177.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'to see now such a change from what I saw then.']
+
+[Footnote 11: The king's conscience makes him keen. He is, all through,
+doubtful of the madness.]
+
+[Footnote 12: --of the fact- or fancy-egg on which his melancholy sits
+brooding]
+
+[Page 130]
+
+With variable Obiects, shall expell
+This something setled matter[1] in his heart
+Whereon his Braines still beating, puts him thus
+From[2] fashion of himselfe. What thinke you on't?
+
+_Pol_. It shall do well. But yet do I beleeue
+The Origin and Commencement of this greefe       [Sidenote: his greefe,]
+Sprung from neglected loue.[3] How now _Ophelia_?
+You neede not tell vs, what Lord _Hamlet_ saide,
+We heard it all.[4] My Lord, do as you please,
+But if you hold it fit after the Play,
+Let his Queene Mother all alone intreat him
+To shew his Greefes: let her be round with him,      [Sidenote: griefe,]
+And Ile be plac'd so, please you in the eare
+Of all their Conference. If she finde him not,[5]
+To England send him: Or confine him where
+Your wisedome best shall thinke.
+
+_King_. It shall be so:
+Madnesse in great Ones, must not vnwatch'd go.[6]
+                                                   [Sidenote: unmatched]
+                                       _Exeunt_.
+
+_Enter Hamlet, and two or three of the Players_.
+                                                 [Sidenote: _and three_]
+
+_Ham_.[7] Speake the Speech I pray you, as I
+pronounc'd it to you trippingly[8] on the Tongue:
+But if you mouth it, as many of your Players do,
+                                              [Sidenote: of our Players]
+I had as liue[9] the Town-Cryer had spoke my     [Sidenote: cryer spoke]
+Lines:[10] Nor do not saw the Ayre too much your   [Sidenote: much with]
+hand thus, but vse all gently; for in the verie
+Torrent, Tempest, and (as I may say) the Whirlewinde
+                                              [Sidenote: say, whirlwind]
+of Passion, you must acquire and beget a             [Sidenote: of your]
+Temperance that may giue it Smoothnesse.[11] O it
+offends mee to the Soule, to see a robustious Perywig-pated
+                                                  [Sidenote: to heare a]
+Fellow, teare a Passion to tatters, to              [Sidenote: totters,]
+verie ragges, to split the eares of the Groundlings:[12]
+                                                      [Sidenote: spleet]
+who (for the most part) are capeable[13] of nothing,
+but inexplicable dumbe shewes,[14] and noise:[15] I
+could haue such a Fellow whipt for o're-doing          [Sidenote: would]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'something of settled matter'--_idee fixe_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: '_away from_ his own true likeness'; 'makes him so unlike
+himself.']
+
+[Footnote 3: Polonius is crestfallen, but positive.]
+
+[Footnote 4: This supports the notion of Ophelia's ignorance of the
+espial. Polonius thinks she is about to disclose what has passed, and
+_informs_ her of its needlessness. But it _might_ well enough be taken
+as only an assurance of the success of their listening--that they had
+heard without difficulty.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'If she do not find him out': a comparable phrase, common
+at the time, was, _Take me with you_, meaning, _Let me understand you_.
+
+Polonius, for his daughter's sake, and his own in her, begs for him
+another chance.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'in the insignificant, madness may roam the country, but in
+the great it must be watched.' The _unmatcht_ of the _Quarto_ might bear
+the meaning of _countermatched_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: I should suggest this exhortation to the Players introduced
+with the express purpose of showing how absolutely sane Hamlet was,
+could I believe that Shakspere saw the least danger of Hamlet's pretence
+being mistaken for reality.]
+
+[Footnote 8: He would have neither blundering nor emphasis such as might
+rouse too soon the king's suspicion, or turn it into certainty.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'liue'--_lief_]
+
+[Footnote 10: 1st Q.:--
+
+    I'de rather heare a towne bull bellow,
+    Then such a fellow speake my lines.
+
+_Lines_ is a player-word still.]
+
+[Footnote 11: --smoothness such as belongs to the domain of Art, and
+will both save from absurdity, and allow the relations with surroundings
+to manifest themselves;--harmoniousness, which is the possibility of
+co-existence.]
+
+[Footnote 12: those on the ground--that is, in the pit; there was no
+gallery then.]
+
+[Footnote 13: _receptive_.]
+
+[Footnote 14: --gestures extravagant and unintelligible as those of a
+dumb show that could not by the beholder be interpreted; gestures
+incorrespondent to the words.
+
+A _dumb show_ was a stage-action without words.]
+
+[Footnote 15: Speech that is little but rant, and scarce related to the
+sense, is hardly better than a noise; it might, for the purposes of art,
+as well be a sound inarticulate.]
+
+[Page 132]
+
+Termagant[1]: it out-Herod's Herod[2] Pray you
+auoid it.
+
+_Player._ I warrant your Honor.
+
+_Ham._ Be not too tame neyther: but let your
+owne Discretion be your Tutor. Sute the Action
+to the Word, the Word to the Action, with this
+speciall obseruance: That you ore-stop not the    [Sidenote: ore-steppe]
+modestie of Nature; for any thing so ouer-done,     [Sidenote ore-doone]
+is fro[3] the purpose of Playing, whose end both at
+the first and now, was and is, to hold as 'twer the
+Mirrour vp to Nature; to shew Vertue her owne   [Sidenote: her feature;]
+Feature, Scorne[4] her owne Image, and the verie
+Age and Bodie of the Time, his forme and pressure.[5]
+Now, this ouer-done, or come tardie off,[6] though it
+make the vnskilfull laugh, cannot but make the      [Sidenote: it makes]
+Iudicious greeue; The censure of the which One,[7]
+                                                [Sidenote: of which one]
+must in your allowance[8] o're-way a whole Theater
+of Others. Oh, there bee Players that I haue
+scene Play, and heard others praise, and that highly
+                                                     [Sidenote: praysd,]
+(not to speake it prophanely) that neyther hauing
+the accent of Christians, nor the gate of Christian,
+Pagan, or Norman, haue so strutted and bellowed,
+                                        [Sidenote: Pagan, nor man, haue]
+that I haue thought some of Natures Iouerney-men
+had made men, and not made them well, they
+imitated Humanity so abhominably.[9]
+
+[Sidenote: 126] _Play._ I hope we haue reform'd that indifferently[10]
+with vs, Sir.
+
+_Ham._ O reforme it altogether. And let those
+that play your Clownes, speake no more then is set
+downe for them.[12] For there be of them, that will
+themselues laugh, to set on some quantitie of
+barren Spectators to laugh too, though in the
+meane time, some necessary Question of the Play
+be then to be considered:[12] that's Villanous, and
+shewes a most pittifull Ambition in the Fool that
+vses it.[13] Go make you readie.    _Exit Players_
+
+[Footnote 1: 'An imaginary God of the Mahometans, represented as a most
+violent character in the old Miracle-plays and Moralities.'--_Sh. Lex._]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'represented as a swaggering tyrant in the old dramatic
+performances.'--_Sh. Lex._]
+
+[Footnote 3: _away from_: inconsistent with.]
+
+[Footnote 4: --that which is deserving of scorn.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _impression_, as on wax. Some would persuade us that
+Shakspere's own plays do not do this; but such critics take the
+_accidents_ or circumstances of a time for the _body_ of it--the clothes
+for the person. _Human_ nature is 'Nature,' however _dressed_.
+
+There should be a comma after 'Age.']
+
+[Footnote 6: 'laggingly represented'--A word belonging to _time_ is
+substituted for a word belonging to _space_:--'this over-done, or
+inadequately effected'; 'this over-done, or under-done.']
+
+[Footnote 7: 'and the judgment of such a one.' '_the which_' seems
+equivalent to _and--such_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'must, you will grant.']
+
+[Footnote 9: Shakspere may here be playing with a false derivation, as I
+was myself when the true was pointed out to me--fancying _abominable_
+derived from _ab_ and _homo_. If so, then he means by the phrase: 'they
+imitated humanity so from the nature of man, so _inhumanly_.']
+
+[Footnote 10: tolerably.]
+
+[Footnote 11: 'Sir' _not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 12: Shakspere must have himself suffered from such clowns:
+Coleridge thinks some of their _gag_ has crept into his print.]
+
+[Footnote 13: Here follow in the _1st Q._ several specimens of such a
+clown's foolish jests and behaviour.]
+
+[Page 134]
+
+_Enter Polonius, Rosincrance, and Guildensterne_.[1]
+                              [Sidenote: _Guyldensterne, & Rosencraus_.]
+
+How now my Lord,
+Will the King heare this peece of Worke?
+
+_Pol_. And the Queene too, and that presently.[2]
+
+_Ham_. Bid the Players make hast.
+
+                              _Exit Polonius_.[3]
+
+Will you two helpe to hasten them?[4]
+
+_Both_. We will my Lord.        _Exeunt_.
+                        [Sidenote: _Ros_. I my Lord. _Exeunt they two_.]
+
+_Enter Horatio_[5]
+
+_Ham_. What hoa, _Horatio_?                       [Sidenote: What howe,]
+
+_Hora_. Heere sweet Lord, at your Seruice.
+
+[Sidenote: 26] _Ham_.[7] _Horatio_, thou art eene as iust a man
+As ere my Conversation coap'd withall.
+
+_Hora_. O my deere Lord.[6]
+
+_Ham_.[7] Nay do not thinke I flatter:
+For what aduancement may I hope from thee,[8]
+That no Reuennew hast, but thy good spirits
+To feed and cloath thee. Why shold the poor be flatter'd?
+No, let the Candied[9] tongue, like absurd pompe,      [Sidenote: licke]
+And crooke the pregnant Hindges of the knee,[10]
+Where thrift may follow faining? Dost thou heare,
+                                                    [Sidenote: fauning;]
+Since my deere Soule was Mistris of my choyse;[11]
+                                                 [Sidenote: her choice,]
+And could of men distinguish, her election
+Hath seal'd thee for her selfe. For thou hast bene
+                                                [Sidenote: S'hath seald]
+[Sidenote: 272] As one in suffering all, that suffers nothing.
+A man that Fortunes buffets, and Rewards
+Hath 'tane with equall Thankes. And blest are those,    [Sidenote: Hast]
+Whose Blood and Iudgement are so well co-mingled,
+                                               [Sidenote: comedled,[12]]
+[Sidenote: 26] That they are not a Pipe for Fortunes finger,
+To sound what stop she please.[13] Giue me that man,
+That is not Passions Slaue,[14] and I will weare him
+In my hearts Core: I, in my Heart of heart,[15]
+As I do thee. Something too much of this.[16]
+
+[Footnote 1: _In Q. at end of speech._]
+
+[Footnote 2: He humours Hamlet as if he were a child.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 4: He has sent for Horatio, and is expecting him.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _In Q. after next speech._]
+
+[Footnote 6: --repudiating the praise.]
+
+[Footnote 7: To know a man, there is scarce a readier way than to hear
+him talk of his friend--why he loves, admires, chooses him. The Poet
+here gives us a wide window into Hamlet. So genuine is his respect for
+_being_, so indifferent is he to _having_, that he does not shrink, in
+argument for his own truth, from reminding his friend to his face that,
+being a poor man, nothing is to be gained from him--nay, from telling
+him that it is through his poverty he has learned to admire him, as a
+man of courage, temper, contentment, and independence, with nothing but
+his good spirits for an income--a man whose manhood is dominant both
+over his senses and over his fortune--a true Stoic. He describes an
+ideal man, then clasps the ideal to his bosom as his own, in the person
+of his friend. Only a great man could so worship another, choosing him
+for such qualities; and hereby Shakspere shows us his Hamlet--a brave,
+noble, wise, pure man, beset by circumstances the most adverse
+conceivable. That Hamlet had not misapprehended Horatio becomes evident
+in the last scene of all. 272.]
+
+[Footnote 8: The mother of flattery is self-advantage.]
+
+[Footnote 9: _sugared_. _1st Q._:
+
+    Let flattery sit on those time-pleasing tongs;
+    To glose with them that loues to heare their praise;
+    And not with such as thou _Horatio_.
+    There is a play to night, &c.]
+
+[Footnote 10: A pregnant figure and phrase, requiring thought.]
+
+[Footnote 11: 'since my real self asserted its dominion, and began to
+rule my choice,' making it pure, and withdrawing it from the tyranny of
+impulse and liking.]
+
+[Footnote 12: The old word _medle_ is synonymous with _mingle._]
+
+[Footnote 13: To Hamlet, the lordship of man over himself, despite of
+circumstance, is a truth, and therefore a duty.]
+
+[Footnote 14: The man who has chosen his friend thus, is hardly himself
+one to act without sufficing reason, or take vengeance without certain
+proof of guilt.]
+
+[Footnote 15: He justifies the phrase, repeating it.]
+
+[Footnote 16: --apologetic for having praised him to his face.]
+
+[Page 136]
+
+There is a Play to night before the King,
+One Scoene of it comes neere the Circumstance
+Which I haue told thee, of my Fathers death.
+I prythee, when thou see'st that Acte a-foot,[1]
+Euen with the verie Comment of my[2] Soule      [Sidenote: thy[2] soule]
+Obserue mine Vnkle: If his occulted guilt,         [Sidenote: my Vncle,]
+Do not it selfe vnkennell in one speech,
+[Sidenote: 58] It is a damned Ghost that we haue seene:[3]
+And my Imaginations are as foule
+As Vulcans Stythe.[4] Giue him needfull note,
+                                          [Sidenote: stithy; | heedfull]
+For I mine eyes will riuet to his Face:
+And after we will both our iudgements ioyne,[5]
+To censure of his seeming.[6]                     [Sidenote: in censure]
+
+_Hora._ Well my Lord.
+If he steale ought the whil'st this Play is Playing.    [Sidenote: if a]
+And scape detecting, I will pay the Theft.[1]      [Sidenote: detected,]
+
+_Enter King, Queene, Polonius, Ophelia, Rosincrance,
+Guildensterne, and other Lords attendant with
+his Guard carrying Torches. Danish March.
+Sound a Flourish._
+            [Sidenote: _Enter Trumpets and Kettle Drummes, King, Queene,
+                                                    Polonius, Ophelia._]
+
+_Ham._ They are comming to the Play: I must
+[Sidenote: 60, 156, 178] be idle.[7] Get you a place.
+
+_King._ How fares our Cosin _Hamlet_?
+
+_Ham._ Excellent Ifaith, of the Camelions dish:
+[Sidenote: 154] I eate the Ayre promise-cramm'd,[8] you cannot feed
+Capons so.[9]
+
+_King._ I haue nothing with this answer _Hamlet_,
+these words are not mine.[10]
+
+_Ham._ No, nor mine. Now[11] my Lord, you
+plaid once i'th'Vniuersity, you say?
+
+_Polon._ That I did my Lord, and was accounted         [Sidenote: did I]
+a good Actor.
+
+[Footnote 1: Here follows in _1st Q._
+
+    Marke thou the King, doe but obserue his lookes,
+    For I mine eies will riuet to his face:
+    [Sidenote: 112] And if he doe not bleach, and change at that,
+    It is a damned ghost that we haue seene.
+    _Horatio_, haue a care, obserue him well.
+
+    _Hor_. My lord, mine eies shall still be on his face,
+    And not the smallest alteration
+    That shall appeare in him, but I shall note it.]
+
+[Footnote 2: I take 'my' to be right: 'watch my uncle with the
+comment--the discriminating judgment, that is--of _my_ soul, more intent
+than thine.']
+
+[Footnote 3: He has then, ere this, taken Horatio into his
+confidence--so far at least as the Ghost's communication concerning the
+murder.]
+
+[Footnote 4: a dissyllable: _stithy_, _anvil_; Scotch, _studdy_.
+
+Hamlet's doubt is here very evident: he hopes he may find it a false
+ghost: what good man, what good son would not? He has clear cause and
+reason--it is his duty to delay. That the cause and reason and duty are
+not invariably clear to Hamlet himself--not clear in every mood, is
+another thing. Wavering conviction, doubt of evidence, the corollaries
+of assurance, the oppression of misery, a sense of the worthlessness of
+the world's whole economy--each demanding delay, might yet well, all
+together, affect the man's feeling as mere causes of rather than reasons
+for hesitation. The conscientiousness of Hamlet stands out the clearer
+that, throughout, his dislike to his uncle, predisposing him to believe
+any ill of him, is more than evident. By his incompetent or prejudiced
+judges, Hamlet's accusations and justifications of himself are equally
+placed to the _discredit_ of his account. They seem to think a man could
+never accuse himself except he were in the wrong; therefore if ever he
+excuses himself, he is the more certainly in the wrong: whatever point
+may tell on the other side, it is to be disregarded.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'bring our two judgments together for comparison.']
+
+[Footnote 6: 'in order to judge of the significance of his looks and
+behaviour.']
+
+[Footnote 7: Does he mean _foolish_, that is, _lunatic_? or
+_insouciant_, and _unpreoccupied_?]
+
+[Footnote 8: The king asks Hamlet how he _fares_--that is, how he gets
+on; Hamlet pretends to think he has asked him about his diet. His talk
+has at once become wild; ere the king enters he has donned his cloak of
+madness. Here he confesses to ambition--will favour any notion
+concerning himself rather than give ground for suspecting the real state
+of his mind and feeling.
+
+In the _1st Q._ 'the Camelions dish' almost appears to mean the play,
+not the king's promises.]
+
+[Footnote 9: In some places they push food down the throats of the
+poultry they want to fatten, which is technically, I believe, called
+_cramming_ them.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'You have not taken me with you; I have not laid hold of
+your meaning; I have nothing by your answer.' 'Your words have not
+become my property; they have not given themselves to me in their
+meaning.']
+
+[Footnote 11: _Point thus_: 'No, nor mine now.--My Lord,' &c. '--not
+mine, now I have uttered them, for so I have given them away.' Or does
+he mean to disclaim their purport?]
+
+[Page 138]
+
+_Ham._ And[1] what did you enact?
+
+_Pol._ I did enact _Iulius Caesar_, I was kill'd
+i'th'Capitol: _Brutus_ kill'd me.
+
+_Ham._ It was a bruite part of him, to kill so
+Capitall a Calfe there.[2] Be the Players ready?
+
+_Rosin._ I my Lord, they stay vpon your patience.
+
+_Qu._ Come hither my good _Hamlet_, sit by me.      [Sidenote: my deere]
+
+_Ham._ No good Mother, here's Mettle more attractiue.[3]
+
+_Pol._ Oh ho, do you marke that?[4]
+
+_Ham._ Ladie, shall I lye in your Lap?
+
+_Ophe._ No my Lord.
+
+_Ham._ I meane, my Head vpon your Lap?[5]
+
+_Ophe._ I my Lord.[6]
+
+_Ham._ Do you thinke I meant Country[7] matters?
+
+_Ophe._ I thinke nothing, my Lord.
+
+_Ham._ That's a faire thought to ly between
+Maids legs.
+
+_Ophe._ What is my Lord?
+
+_Ham._ Nothing.
+
+_Ophe._ You are merrie, my Lord?
+
+_Ham._ Who I?
+
+_Ophe._ I my Lord.[8]
+
+_Ham._ Oh God, your onely Iigge-maker[9]: what
+should a man do, but be merrie. For looke you
+how cheerefully my Mother lookes, and my Father
+dyed within's two Houres.
+
+[Sidenote: 65] _Ophe._ Nay, 'tis twice two moneths, my Lord.[10]
+
+_Ham._ So long? Nay then let the Diuel weare
+[Sidenote: 32] blacke, for Ile haue a suite of Sables.[11] Oh
+Heauens! dye two moneths ago, and not forgotten
+yet?[12] Then there's hope, a great mans Memorie,
+may out-liue his life halfe a yeare: But byrlady  [Sidenote: ber Lady a]
+he must builde Churches then: or else shall he       [Sidenote: shall a]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'And ' _not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 2: Emphasis on _there_. 'There' is not in _1st Q._ Hamlet
+means it was a desecration of the Capitol.]
+
+[Footnote 3: He cannot be familiar with his mother, so avoids her--will
+not sit by her, cannot, indeed, bear to be near her. But he loves and
+hopes in Ophelia still.]
+
+[Footnote 4: '--Did I not tell you so?']
+
+[Footnote 5: This speech and the next are not in the _Q._, but are
+shadowed in the _1st Q._]
+
+[Footnote 6: _--consenting_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: In _1st Quarto_, 'contrary.'
+
+Hamlet hints, probing her character--hoping her unable to understand. It
+is the festering soreness of his feeling concerning his mother, making
+him doubt with the haunting agony of a loathed possibility, that
+prompts, urges, forces from him his ugly speeches--nowise to be
+justified, only to be largely excused in his sickening consciousness of
+his mother's presence. Such pain as Hamlet's, the ferment of subverted
+love and reverence, may lightly bear the blame of hideous manners,
+seeing, they spring from no wantonness, but from the writhing of
+tortured and helpless Purity. Good manners may be as impossible as out
+of place in the presence of shameless evil.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Ophelia bears with him for his own and his madness' sake,
+and is less uneasy because of the presence of his mother. To account
+_satisfactorily_ for Hamlet's speeches to her, is not easy. The freer
+custom of the age, freer to an extent hardly credible in this, will not
+_satisfy_ the lovers of Hamlet, although it must have _some_ weight. The
+necessity for talking madly, because he is in the presence of his uncle,
+and perhaps, to that end, for uttering whatever comes to him, without
+pause for choice, might give us another hair's-weight. Also he may be
+supposed confident that Ophelia would not understand him, while his
+uncle would naturally set such worse than improprieties down to wildest
+madness. But I suspect that here as before (123), Shakepere would show
+Hamlet's soul full of bitterest, passionate loathing; his mother has
+compelled him to think of horrors and women together, so turning their
+preciousness into a disgust; and this feeling, his assumed madhess
+allows him to indulge and partly relieve by utterance. Could he have
+provoked Ophelia to rebuke him with the severity he courted, such rebuke
+would have been joy to him. Perhaps yet a small addition of weight to
+the scale of his excuse may be found in his excitement about his play,
+and the necessity for keeping down that excitement. Suggestion is easier
+than judgment.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'here's for the jig-maker! he's the right man!' Or perhaps
+he is claiming the part as his own: 'I am your only jig-maker!']
+
+[Footnote 10: This needs not be taken for the exact time. The statement
+notwithstanding suggests something like two months between the first and
+second acts, for in the first, Hamlet says his father has not been dead
+two months. 24. We are not bound to take it for more than a rough
+approximation; Ophelia would make the best of things for the queen, who
+is very kind to her.]
+
+[Footnote 11: the fur of the sable.]
+
+[Footnote 12: _1st Q._
+
+                nay then there's some
+    Likelyhood, a gentlemans death may outliue memorie,
+    But by my faith &c.]
+
+[Page 140]
+
+suffer not thinking on, with the Hoby-horsse,
+whose Epitaph is, For o, For o, the Hoby-horse
+is forgot.
+
+_Hoboyes play. The dumbe shew enters._
+                 [Sidenote: _The Trumpets sounds. Dumbe show followes._]
+
+_Enter a King and Queene, very louingly; the Queene
+                                   [Sidenote: _and a Queene, the queen_]
+embracing him. She kneeles, and makes shew of
+   [Sidenote: _embracing him, and he her, he takes her up, and_]
+Protestation vnto him. He takes her vp, and
+declines his head vpon her neck. Layes him downe
+                                            [Sidenote: _necke, he lyes_]
+vpon a Banke of Flowers.  She seeing him
+a-sleepe, leaues him. Anon comes in a Fellow,
+                                [Sidenote: _anon come in an other man_,]
+takes off his Crowne, kisses it, and powres poyson
+                                                 [Sidenote: _it, pours_]
+in the Kings eares, and Exits. The Queene returnes,
+                       [Sidenote: _the sleepers eares, and leaues him:_]
+findes the King dead, and makes passionate       [Sidenote: dead, makes]
+Action. The Poysoner, with some two or
+                   [Sidenote: _some three or foure come in againe, seeme
+                                                            to condole_]
+three Mutes comes in againe, seeming to lament
+with her. The dead body is carried away: The
+                                             [Sidenote: _with her, the_]
+Poysoner Wooes the Queene with Gifts, she
+[Sidenote: 54] seemes loath and vnwilling awhile, but in the end,
+                                      [Sidenote: _seemes harsh awhile_,]
+accepts his loue.[1]   _Exeunt[2]_           [Sidenote: _accepts loue._]
+
+_Ophe._ What meanes this, my Lord?
+
+_Ham._ Marry this is Miching _Malicho_[3] that
+                                     [Sidenote: this munching _Mallico_]
+meanes Mischeefe.
+
+_Ophe._ Belike this shew imports the Argument
+of the Play?
+
+_Ham._ We shall know by these Fellowes:
+                               [Sidenote: this fellow, _Enter Prologue_]
+the Players cannot keepe counsell, they'l tell
+                                              [Sidenote: keepe, they'le]
+all.[4]
+
+_Ophe._ Will they tell vs what this shew meant?  [Sidenote: Will a tell]
+
+_Ham._ I, or any shew that you'l shew him. Bee      [Sidenote: you will]
+not you asham'd to shew, hee'l not shame to tell
+you what it meanes.
+
+_Ophe._ You are naught,[5] you are naught, Ile
+marke the Play.
+
+[Footnote 1: The king, not the queen, is aimed at. Hamlet does not
+forget the injunction of the Ghost to spare his mother. 54.
+
+The king should be represented throughout as struggling not to betray
+himself.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 3: _skulking mischief_: the latter word is Spanish, To _mich_
+is to _play truant_.
+
+    How tenderly her tender hands betweene
+    In yvorie cage she did the micher bind.
+
+_The Countess of Pembroke's Arcadia_, page 84.
+
+My _Reader_ tells me the word is still in use among printers, with the
+pronunciation _mike_, and the meaning _to skulk_ or _idle_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: --their part being speech, that of the others only dumb
+show.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _naughty_: persons who do not behave well are treated as if
+they were not--are made nought of--are set at nought; hence our word
+naughty.
+
+'Be naught awhile' (_As You Like It_, i. 1)--'take yourself away;' 'be
+nobody;' 'put yourself in the corner.']
+
+[Page 142]
+
+_Enter[1] Prologue._
+
+_For vs, and for our Tragedie,
+Heere stooping to your Clemencie:
+We begge your hearing Patientlie._
+
+_Ham._ Is this a Prologue, or the Poesie[2] of a       [Sidenote: posie]
+Ring?
+
+_Ophe._ 'Tis[3] briefe my Lord.
+
+_Ham._ As Womans loue.
+
+[4] _Enter King and his Queene._                [Sidenote: _and Queene_]
+
+[Sidenote: 234] _King._ Full thirtie times[5] hath Phoebus Cart gon
+round,
+Neptunes salt Wash, and _Tellus_ Orbed ground:     [Sidenote: orb'd the]
+And thirtie dozen Moones with borrowed sheene,
+About the World haue times twelue thirties beene,
+Since loue our hearts, and _Hymen_ did our hands
+Vnite comutuall, in most sacred Bands.[6]
+
+_Bap._ So many iournies may the Sunne and Moone      [Sidenote: _Quee._]
+Make vs againe count o're, ere loue be done.
+But woe is me, you are so sicke of late,
+So farre from cheere, and from your forme state,
+                                      [Sidenote: from our former state,]
+That I distrust you: yet though I distrust,
+Discomfort you (my Lord) it nothing must:
+[A]
+For womens Feare and Loue, holds quantitie,  [Sidenote: And womens hold]
+In neither ought, or in extremity:[7]
+                                     [Sidenote: Eyther none, in neither]
+Now what my loue is, proofe hath made you know,
+                                           [Sidenote: my Lord is proofe]
+And as my Loue is siz'd, my Feare is so.              [Sidenote: ciz'd,]
+[B]
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+    For women feare too much, euen as they loue,]
+
+[Footnote B: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+    Where loue is great, the litlest doubts are feare,
+    Where little feares grow great, great loue growes there.]
+
+[Footnote 1: _Enter_ not in _Q._]
+
+[Footnote 2: Commonly _posy_: a little sentence engraved inside a
+ring--perhaps originally a tiny couplet, therefore _poesy_, _1st Q._, 'a
+poesie for a ring?']
+
+[Footnote 3: Emphasis on ''Tis.']
+
+[Footnote 4: Very little blank verse of any kind was written before
+Shakspere's; the usual form of dramatic verse was long, irregular, rimed
+lines: the Poet here uses the heroic couplet, which gives a resemblance
+to the older plays by its rimes, while also by its stately and
+monotonous movement the play-play is differenced from the play into
+which it is introduced, and caused to _look_ intrinsically like a play
+in relation to the rest of the play of which it is part. In other words,
+it stands off from the surrounding play, slightly elevated both by form
+and formality. 103.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _1st Q._
+
+    _Duke._ Full fortie yeares are past, their date is gone,
+    Since happy time ioyn'd both our hearts as one:
+    And now the blood that fill'd my youthfull veines,
+    Ruunes weakely in their pipes, and all the straines
+    Of musicke, which whilome pleasde mine eare,
+    Is now a burthen that Age cannot beare:
+    And therefore sweete Nature must pay his due,
+    To heauen must I, and leaue the earth with you.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Here Hamlet gives the time his father and mother had been
+married, and Shakspere points at Hamlet's age. 234. The Poet takes
+pains to show his hero's years.]
+
+[Footnote 7: This line, whose form in the _Quarto_ is very careless,
+seems but a careless correction, leaving the sense as well as the
+construction obscure: 'Women's fear and love keep the scales level; in
+_neither_ is there ought, or in _both_ there is fulness;' or: 'there is
+no moderation in their fear and their love; either they have _none_ of
+either, or they have _excess_ of both.' Perhaps he tried to express both
+ideas at once. But compression is always in danger of confusion.]
+
+[Page 144]
+
+_King._ Faith I must leaue thee Loue, and shortly too:
+My operant Powers my Functions leaue to do:  [Sidenote: their functions]
+And thou shall liue in this faire world behinde,
+Honour'd, belou'd, and haply, one as kinde.
+For Husband shalt thou----
+
+_Bap._ Oh confound the rest:                         [Sidenote: _Quee._]
+Such Loue, must needs be Treason in my brest:
+In second Husband, let me be accurst,
+None wed the second, but who kill'd the first.[1]
+
+_Ham._ Wormwood, Wormwood.         [Sidenote: _Ham_. That's wormwood[2]]
+
+_Bapt._ The instances[3] that second Marriage moue,
+Are base respects of Thrift,[4] but none of Loue.
+A second time, I kill my Husband dead,
+When second Husband kisses me in Bed.
+
+_King._ I do beleeue you. Think what now you speak:
+But what we do determine, oft we breake:
+Purpose is but the slaue to Memorie,[5]
+Of violent Birth, but poore validitie:[6]
+Which now like Fruite vnripe stickes on the Tree,
+                                              [Sidenote: now the fruite]
+But fall vnshaken, when they mellow bee.[7]
+Most necessary[8] 'tis, that we forget
+To pay our selues, what to our selues is debt:
+What to our selues in passion we propose,
+The passion ending, doth the purpose lose.
+The violence of other Greefe or Ioy,                 [Sidenote: eyther,]
+Their owne ennactors with themselues destroy:     [Sidenote: ennactures]
+Where Ioy most Reuels, Greefe doth most lament;
+Greefe ioyes, Ioy greeues on slender accident.[9]
+                                      [Sidenote: Greefe ioy ioy griefes]
+This world is not for aye, nor 'tis not strange
+That euen our Loues should with our Fortunes change.
+For 'tis a question left vs yet to proue,
+Whether Loue lead Fortune, or else Fortune Loue.
+
+[Footnote 1: Is this to be supposed in the original play, or inserted by
+Hamlet, embodying an unuttered and yet more fearful doubt with regard to
+his mother?]
+
+[Footnote 2: This speech is on the margin in the _Quarto_, and the
+Queene's speech runs on without break.]
+
+[Footnote 3: the urgencies; the motives.]
+
+[Footnote 4: worldly advantage.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'Purpose holds but while Memory holds.']
+
+[Footnote 6: 'Purpose is born in haste, but is of poor strength to
+live.']
+
+[Footnote 7: Here again there is carelessness of construction, as if the
+Poet had not thought it worth his while to correct this subsidiary
+portion of the drama. I do not see how to lay the blame on the
+printer.--'Purpose is a mere fruit, which holds on or falls only as it
+must. The element of persistency is not in it.']
+
+[Footnote 8: unavoidable--coming of necessity.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'Grief turns into joy, and joy into grief, on a slight
+chance.']
+
+[Page 146]
+
+The great man downe, you marke his fauourites flies,
+                                                   [Sidenote: fauourite]
+The poore aduanc'd, makes Friends of Enemies:
+And hitherto doth Loue on Fortune tend,
+For who not needs, shall neuer lacke a Frend:
+And who in want a hollow Friend doth try,
+Directly seasons him his Enemie.[1]
+But orderly to end, where I begun,
+Our Willes and Fates do so contrary run,
+That our Deuices still are ouerthrowne,
+Our thoughts are ours, their ends none of our owne.[2]
+[Sidenote: 246] So thinke thou wilt no second Husband wed.
+But die thy thoughts, when thy first Lord is dead.
+
+_Bap._ Nor Earth to giue me food, nor Heauen light,  [Sidenote: _Quee._]
+Sport and repose locke from me day and night:[3]
+[A]
+Each opposite that blankes the face of ioy,
+Meet what I would haue well, and it destroy:
+Both heere, and hence, pursue me lasting strife,[4]
+If once a Widdow, euer I be Wife.[5] [Sidenote: once I be a | be a wife]
+
+_Ham._ If she should breake it now.[6]
+
+_King._ 'Tis deepely sworne:
+Sweet, leaue me heere a while,
+My spirits grow dull, and faine I would beguile
+The tedious day with sleepe.
+
+_Qu._ Sleepe rocke thy Braine,                    [Sidenote: Sleepes[7]]
+And neuer come mischance betweene vs twaine,
+                              _Exit_               [Sidenote: _Exeunt._]
+
+_Ham._ Madam, how like you this Play?
+
+_Qu._ The Lady protests to much me thinkes,     [Sidenote: doth protest]
+
+_Ham._ Oh but shee'l keepe her word.
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto:_--
+
+    To desperation turne my trust and hope,[8]
+    And Anchors[9] cheere in prison be my scope]
+
+[Footnote 1: All that is wanted to make a real enemy of an unreal friend
+is the seasoning of a requested favour.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'Our thoughts are ours, but what will come of them we
+cannot tell.']
+
+[Footnote 3: 'May Day and Night lock from me sport and repose.']
+
+[Footnote 4: 'May strife pursue me in the world and out of it.']
+
+[Footnote 5: In all this, there is nothing to reflect on his mother
+beyond what everybody knew.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _This speech is in the margin of the Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 7: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'May my trust and hope turn to despair.']
+
+[Footnote 9: an anchoret's.]
+
+[Page 148]
+
+_King_. Haue you heard the Argument, is there
+no Offence in't?[1]
+
+_Ham_. No, no, they do but iest, poyson in iest,
+no Offence i'th'world.[2]
+
+_King_. What do you call the Play?
+
+_Ham._ The Mouse-trap: Marry how? Tropically:[3]
+This Play is the Image of a murder done
+in _Vienna: Gonzago_ is the Dukes name, his wife
+_Baptista_: you shall see anon: 'tis a knauish peece
+of worke: But what o'that? Your Maiestie, and       [Sidenote: of that?]
+wee that haue free soules, it touches vs not: let the
+gall'd iade winch: our withers are vnrung.[4]
+
+_Enter Lucianus._[5]
+
+This is one _Lucianus_ nephew to the King.
+
+_Ophe_. You are a good Chorus, my Lord.
+                                     [Sidenote: are as good as a Chorus]
+
+_Ham_. I could interpret betweene you and your
+loue: if I could see the Puppets dallying.[6]
+
+_Ophe_. You are keene my Lord, you are keene.
+
+_Ham_. It would cost you a groaning, to take off my edge.
+                                                        [Sidenote: mine]
+
+_Ophe_. Still better and worse.
+
+_Ham_. So you mistake Husbands.[7]              [Sidenote: mistake your]
+Begin Murderer. Pox, leaue thy damnable Faces,
+                                            [Sidenote: murtherer, leave]
+and begin. Come, the croaking Rauen doth bellow
+for Reuenge.[8]
+
+_Lucian_. Thoughts blacke, hands apt,
+Drugges fit, and Time agreeing:
+Confederate season, else, no Creature seeing:[9]  [Sidenote: Considerat]
+Thou mixture ranke, of Midnight Weeds collected,
+With Hecats Ban, thrice blasted, thrice infected,   [Sidenote: invected]
+Thy naturall Magicke, and dire propertie,
+On wholsome life, vsurpe immediately.                 [Sidenote: vsurps]
+
+_Powres the poyson in his eares_.[10]
+
+_Ham_. He poysons him i'th Garden for's estate:
+                                         [Sidenote: A poysons | for his]
+
+[Footnote 1: --said, perhaps, to Polonius. Is there a lapse here in the
+king's self-possession? or is this speech only an outcome of its
+completeness--a pretence of fearing the play may glance at the queen for
+marrying him?]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'It is but jest; don't be afraid: there is no reality in
+it'--as one might say to a child seeing a play.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Figuratively: from _trope_. In the _1st Q._ the passage
+stands thus:
+
+    _Ham_. Mouse-trap: mary how trapically: this play is
+    The image of a murder done in _guyana_,]
+
+[Footnote 4: Here Hamlet endangers himself to force the king to
+self-betrayal.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _In Q. after next line._]
+
+[Footnote 6: In a puppet-play, if she and her love were the puppets, he
+could supply the speeches.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Is this a misprint for 'so you _must take_ husbands'--for
+better and worse, namely? or is it a thrust at his mother--'So you
+mis-take husbands, going from the better to a worse'? In _1st Q._: 'So
+you must take your husband, begin.']
+
+[Footnote 8: Probably a mocking parody or burlesque of some well-known
+exaggeration--such as not a few of Marlowe's lines.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'none beholding save the accomplice hour:'.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Page 150]
+
+His name's _Gonzago_: the Story is extant and writ
+                                                 [Sidenote: and written]
+in choyce Italian. You shall see anon how the
+                                              [Sidenote: in very choice]
+Murtherer gets the loue of _Gonzago's_ wife.
+
+_Ophe_. The King rises.[1]
+
+_Ham_. What, frighted with false fire.[2]
+
+_Qu_. How fares my Lord?
+
+_Pol_. Giue o're the Play.
+
+_King_. Giue me some Light. Away.[3]
+
+_All_. Lights, Lights, Lights.      _Exeunt_
+                     [Sidenote: _Pol. | Exeunt all but Ham. & Horatio._]
+
+_Manet Hamlet & Horatio._
+
+_Ham_.[4] Why let the strucken Deere go weepe,
+The Hart vngalled play:
+For some must watch, while some must sleepe;
+So runnes the world away.
+Would not this[5] Sir, and a Forrest of Feathers, if
+the rest of my Fortunes turne Turke with me; with
+two Prouinciall Roses[6] on my rac'd[7] Shooes, get me
+                                    [Sidenote: with prouinciall | raz'd]
+a Fellowship[8] in a crie[9] of Players sir.        [Sidenote: Players?]
+
+_Hor_. Halfe a share.
+
+_Ham_. A whole one I,[10]
+[11] For thou dost know: Oh Damon deere,
+This Realme dismantled was of Loue himselfe,
+And now reignes heere.
+A verie verie Paiocke.[12]
+
+_Hora_. You might haue Rim'd.[13]
+
+_Ham_. Oh good _Horatio_, Ile take the Ghosts
+word for a thousand pound. Did'st perceiue?
+
+_Hora_. Verie well my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Vpon the talke of the poysoning?
+
+_Hora_. I did verie well note him.
+
+_Enter Rosincrance and Guildensterne_.[14]
+
+_Ham_. Oh, ha? Come some Musick.[15] Come the Recorders:
+                                                      [Sidenote: Ah ha,]
+
+[Footnote 1: --in ill suppressed agitation.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _This speech is not in the Quarto_.--Is the 'false fire'
+what we now call _stage-fire_?--'What! frighted at a mere play?']
+
+[Footnote 3: The stage--the stage-stage, that is--alone is lighted. Does
+the king stagger out blindly, madly, shaking them from him? I think
+not--but as if he were taken suddenly ill.]
+
+[Footnote 4: --_singing_--that he may hide his agitation, restrain
+himself, and be regarded as careless-mad, until all are safely gone.]
+
+[Footnote 5: --his success with the play.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'Roses of Provins,' we are told--probably artificial.]
+
+[Footnote 7: The meaning is very doubtful. But for the _raz'd_ of the
+_Quarto_, I should suggest _lac'd_. Could it mean _cut low_?]
+
+[Footnote 8: _a share_, as immediately below.]
+
+[Footnote 9: A _cry_ of hounds is a pack. So in _King Lear_, act v. sc.
+3, 'packs and sects of great ones.']
+
+[Footnote 10: _I_ for _ay_--that is, _yes_!--He insists on a whole
+share.]
+
+[Footnote 11: Again he takes refuge in singing.]
+
+[Footnote 12: The lines are properly measured in the _Quarto_:
+
+    For thou doost know oh Damon deere
+    This Realme dismantled was
+    Of _Ioue_ himselfe, and now raignes heere
+    A very very paiock.
+
+By _Jove_, he of course intends _his father_. 170. What 'Paiocke' means,
+whether _pagan_, or _peacock_, or _bajocco_, matters nothing, since it
+is intended for nonsense.]
+
+[Footnote 13: To rime with _was_, Horatio naturally expected _ass_ to
+follow as the end of the last line: in the wanton humour of his
+excitement, Hamlet disappointed him.]
+
+[Footnote 14: _In Q. after next speech_.]
+
+[Footnote 15: He hears Rosincrance and Guildensterne coming, and changes
+his behaviour--calling for music to end the play with. Either he wants,
+under its cover, to finish his talk with Horatio in what is for the
+moment the safest place, or he would mask himself before his two false
+friends. Since the departure of the king--I would suggest--he has borne
+himself with evident apprehension, every now and then glancing about
+him, as fearful of what may follow his uncle's recognition of the intent
+of the play. Three times he has burst out singing.
+
+Or might not his whole carriage, with the call for music, be the outcome
+of a grimly merry satisfaction at the success of his scheme?]
+
+[Page 152]
+
+For if the King like not the Comedie,
+Why then belike he likes it not perdie.[1]
+Come some Musicke.
+
+_Guild._ Good my Lord, vouchsafe me a word
+with you.
+
+_Ham._ Sir, a whole History.
+
+_Guild._ The King, sir.
+
+_Ham._ I sir, what of him?
+
+_Guild._ Is in his retyrement, maruellous distemper'd.
+
+_Ham._ With drinke Sir?
+
+_Guild._ No my Lord, rather with choller.[2]      [Sidenote: Lord, with]
+
+_Ham._ Your wisedome should shew it selfe more
+richer, to signifie this to his Doctor: for me to
+                                                 [Sidenote: the Doctor,]
+put him to his Purgation, would perhaps plundge
+him into farre more Choller.[2]                    [Sidenote: into more]
+
+_Guild._ Good my Lord put your discourse into
+some frame,[3] and start not so wildely from my        [Sidenote: stare]
+affayre.
+
+_Ham._ I am tame Sir, pronounce.
+
+_Guild._ The Queene your Mother, in most great
+affliction of spirit, hath sent me to you.
+
+_Ham._ You are welcome.[4]
+
+_Guild._ Nay, good my Lord, this courtesie is
+not of the right breed. If it shall please you to
+make me a wholsome answer, I will doe your
+Mothers command'ment: if not, your pardon, and
+my returne shall bee the end of my Businesse.    [Sidenote: of busines.]
+
+_Ham._ Sir, I cannot.
+
+_Guild._ What, my Lord?
+
+_Ham._ Make you a wholsome answere: my wits
+diseas'd. But sir, such answers as I can make, you   [Sidenote: answere]
+shal command: or rather you say, my Mother:    [Sidenote: rather as you]
+therfore no more but to the matter. My Mother
+you say.
+
+[Footnote 1: These two lines he may be supposed to sing.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Choler means bile, and thence anger. Hamlet in his answer
+plays on the two meanings:--'to give him the kind of medicine I think
+fit for him, would perhaps much increase his displeasure.']
+
+[Footnote 3: some logical consistency.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _--with an exaggeration of courtesy_.]
+
+[Page 154]
+
+_Rosin._ Then thus she sayes: your behauior
+hath stroke her into amazement, and admiration.[1]
+
+_Ham._ Oh wonderfull Sonne, that can so astonish     [Sidenote: stonish]
+a Mother. But is there no sequell at the heeles
+of this Mothers admiration?              [Sidenote: admiration, impart.]
+
+_Rosin._ She desires to speake with you in her
+Closset, ere you go to bed.
+
+_Ham._ We shall obey, were she ten times our
+Mother. Haue you any further Trade with vs?
+
+_Rosin._ My Lord, you once did loue me.
+
+_Ham._ So I do still, by these pickers and     [Sidenote: And doe still]
+stealers.[2]
+
+_Rosin._ Good my Lord, what is your cause of
+distemper? You do freely barre the doore of your
+                             [Sidenote: surely barre the door vpon your]
+owne Libertie, if you deny your greefes to your your
+Friend.
+
+_Ham._ Sir I lacke Aduancement.
+
+_Rosin._ How can that be, when you haue the
+[Sidenote: 136] voyce of the King himselfe, for your Succession in
+Denmarke?
+
+[3]
+
+_Ham._ I, but while the grasse growes,[4] the         [Sidenote: I sir,]
+Prouerbe is something musty.
+
+_Enter one with a Recorder._[5]
+
+O the Recorder. Let me see, to withdraw with,
+                        [Sidenote: o the Recorders, let mee see one, to]
+you,[6] why do you go about to recouer the winde of
+mee,[7] as if you would driue me into a toyle?[8]
+
+_Guild._ O my Lord, if my Dutie be too bold,
+my loue is too vnmannerly.[9]
+
+_Ham._ I do not well vnderstand that.[10] Will you,
+play vpon this Pipe?
+
+_Guild._ My Lord, I cannot.
+
+_Ham._ I pray you.
+
+_Guild._ Beleeue me, I cannot.
+
+_Ham._ I do beseech you.
+
+[Footnote 1: wonder, astonishment.]
+
+[Footnote 2: He swears an oath that will not hold, being by the hand of
+a thief.
+
+In the Catechism: 'Keep my hands from picking and stealing.']
+
+[Footnote 3: Here in Quarto, _Enter the Players with Recorders._]
+
+[Footnote 4: '... the colt starves.']
+
+[Footnote 5: _Not in Q._ The stage-direction of the _Folio_ seems
+doubtful. Hamlet has called for the orchestra: we may either suppose one
+to precede the others, or that the rest are already scattered; but the
+_Quarto_ direction and reading seem better.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _--taking Guildensterne aside_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'to get to windward of me.']
+
+[Footnote 8: 'Why do you seek to get the advantage of me, as if you
+would drive me to betray myself?'--Hunters, by sending on the wind their
+scent to the game, drive it into their toils.]
+
+[Footnote 9: Guildensterne tries euphuism, but hardly succeeds. He
+intends to plead that any fault in his approach must be laid to the
+charge of his love. _Duty_ here means _homage_--so used still by the
+common people.]
+
+[Footnote 10: --said with a smile of gentle contempt.]
+
+[Page 156]
+
+_Guild_. I know no touch of it, my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Tis as easie as lying: gouerne these            [Sidenote: It is]
+Ventiges with your finger and thumbe, giue it
+                                  [Sidenote: fingers, & the vmber, giue]
+breath with your mouth, and it will discourse most
+                                               [Sidenote: most eloquent]
+excellent Musicke.  Looke you, these are the
+stoppes.
+
+_Guild_. But these cannot I command to any
+vtterance of hermony, I haue not the skill.
+
+_Ham_. Why looke you now, how vnworthy a
+thing you make of me: you would play vpon mee;
+you would seeme to know my stops: you would
+pluck out the heart of my Mysterie; you would
+sound mee from my lowest Note, to the top of my
+                                         [Sidenote: note to my compasse]
+Compasse: and there is much Musicke, excellent
+Voice, in this little Organe, yet cannot you make
+                            [Sidenote: it speak, s'hloud do you think I]
+it. Why do you thinke, that I am easier to bee
+plaid on, then a Pipe? Call me what Instrument
+you will, though you can fret[1] me, you cannot
+                                            [Sidenote: you fret me not,]
+[Sidenote: 184] play vpon me. God blesse you Sir.[2]
+
+_Enter Polonius_.
+
+_Polon_. My Lord; the Queene would speak
+with you, and presently.
+
+_Ham_. Do you see that Clowd? that's almost in  [Sidenote: yonder clowd]
+shape like a Camell.                              [Sidenote: shape of a]
+
+_Polon_. By'th'Misse, and it's like a Camell  [Sidenote: masse and tis,]
+indeed.
+
+_Ham_. Me thinkes it is like a Weazell.
+
+_Polon_. It is back'd like a Weazell.
+
+_Ham_. Or like a Whale?[3]
+
+_Polon_. Verie like a Whale.[4]
+
+_Ham_. Then will I come to my Mother, by and by:      [Sidenote: I will]
+[Sidenote: 60, 136, 178] They foole me to the top of my bent.[5]
+I will come by and by.
+
+[Footnote 1: --with allusion to the _frets_ or _stop-marks_ of a
+stringed instrument.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --_to Polonius_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: There is nothing insanely arbitrary in these suggestions of
+likeness; a cloud might very well be like every one of the three; the
+camel has a hump, the weasel humps himself, and the whale is a hump.]
+
+[Footnote 4: He humours him in everything, as he would a madman.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Hamlet's cleverness in simulating madness is dwelt upon in
+the old story. See '_Hystorie of Hamblet, prince of Denmarke_.']
+
+[Page 158]
+
+_Polon_.[1] I will say so.        _Exit_.[1]
+
+_Ham_.[1] By and by, is easily said. Leaue me Friends:
+'Tis now the verie witching time of night,
+When Churchyards yawne, and Hell it selfe breaths out
+                                                   [Sidenote: brakes[2]]
+Contagion to this world.[3] Now could I drink hot blood,
+And do such bitter businesse as the day
+                              [Sidenote: such busines as the bitter day]
+Would quake to looke on.[4] Soft now, to my Mother:
+Oh Heart, loose not thy Nature;[5] let not euer
+The Soule of _Nero_[6] enter this firme bosome:
+Let me be cruell, not vnnaturall.
+[Sidenote: 172] I will speake Daggers[7] to her, but vse none:
+                                                      [Sidenote: dagger]
+My Tongue and Soule in this be Hypocrites.[8]
+How in my words someuer she be shent,[9]
+To giue them Seales,[10] neuer my Soule consent.[4]
+                                                     [Sidenote: _Exit._]
+
+_Enter King, Rosincrance, and Guildensterne_.
+
+_King_. I like him not, nor stands it safe with vs,
+To let his madnesse range.[11] Therefore prepare you,
+[Sidenote: 167] I your Commission will forthwith dispatch,[12]
+[Sidenote: 180] And he to England shall along with you:
+The termes of our estate, may not endure[13]
+Hazard so dangerous as doth hourely grow        [Sidenote: so neer's as]
+Out of his Lunacies.                             [Sidenote: his browes.]
+
+_Guild_. We will our selues prouide:
+Most holie and Religious feare it is[14]
+To keepe those many many bodies safe
+That liue and feede vpon your Maiestie.[15]
+
+_Rosin_. The single
+And peculiar[16] life is bound
+With all the strength and Armour of the minde,
+
+[Footnote 1: The _Quarto_, not having _Polon., Exit, or Ham._, and
+arranging differently, reads thus:--
+
+    They foole me to the top of my bent, I will come by and by,
+    Leaue me friends.
+    I will, say so. By and by is easily said,
+    Tis now the very &c.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _belches_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --thinking of what the Ghost had told him, perhaps: it was
+the time when awful secrets wander about the world. Compare _Macbeth_,
+act ii. sc. 1; also act iii. sc. 2.]
+
+[Footnote 4: The assurance of his uncle's guilt, gained through the
+effect of the play upon him, and the corroboration of his mother's guilt
+by this partial confirmation of the Ghost's assertion, have once more
+stirred in Hamlet the fierceness of vengeance. But here afresh comes
+out the balanced nature of the man--say rather, the supremacy in him of
+reason and will. His dear soul, having once become mistress of his
+choice, remains mistress for ever. He _could_ drink hot blood, he
+_could_ do bitter business, but he will carry himself as a son, and the
+son of his father, _ought_ to carry himself towards a guilty
+mother--_mother_ although guilty.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Thus he girds himself for the harrowing interview. Aware of
+the danger he is in of forgetting his duty to his mother, he strengthens
+himself in filial righteousness, dreading to what word or deed a burst
+of indignation might drive him. One of his troubles now is the way he
+feels towards his mother.]
+
+[Footnote 6: --who killed his mother.]
+
+[Footnote 7: His words should be as daggers.]
+
+[Footnote 8: _Pretenders_.]
+
+[Footnote 9: _reproached_ or _rebuked_--though oftener _scolded_.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'to seal them with actions'--Actions are the seals to
+words, and make them irrevocable.]
+
+[Footnote 11: _walk at liberty_.]
+
+[Footnote 12: _get ready_.]
+
+[Footnote 13: He had, it would appear, taken them into his confidence in
+the business; they knew what was to be in their commission, and were
+thorough traitors to Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 14: --holy and religious precaution for the sake of the many
+depending on him.]
+
+[Footnote 15: Is there not unconscious irony of their own parasitism
+here intended?]
+
+[Footnote 16: _private individual_.]
+
+[Page 160]
+
+To keepe it selfe from noyance:[1] but much more,
+That Spirit, vpon whose spirit depends and rests
+                                         [Sidenote: whose weale depends]
+The lives of many, the cease of Maiestie               [Sidenote: cesse]
+Dies not alone;[2] but like a Gulfe doth draw
+What's neere it, with it. It is a massie wheele
+                                           [Sidenote: with it, or it is]
+Fixt on the Somnet of the highest Mount,
+To whose huge Spoakes, ten thousand lesser things
+                                                [Sidenote: hough spokes]
+Are mortiz'd and adioyn'd: which when it falles,
+Each small annexment, pettie consequence
+Attends the boystrous Ruine. Neuer alone              [Sidenote: raine,]
+Did the King sighe, but with a generall grone.      [Sidenote: but a[3]]
+
+_King._[4] Arme you,[5] I pray you to this speedie Voyage;
+                                                      [Sidenote: viage,]
+For we will Fetters put vpon this feare,[6]   [Sidenote: put about this]
+Which now goes too free-footed.
+
+_Both._ We will haste vs.     _Exeunt Gent_
+
+_Enter Polonius._
+
+Pol. My Lord, he's going to his Mothers Closset:
+Behinde the Arras Ile conuey my selfe
+To heare the Processe. Ile warrant shee'l tax him home,
+And as you said, and wisely was it said,
+'Tis meete that some more audience then a Mother,
+Since Nature makes them partiall, should o're-heare
+The speech of vantage.[7] Fare you well my Liege,
+Ile call vpon you ere you go to bed,
+And tell you what I know.                              [Sidenote: Exit.]
+
+_King._ Thankes deere my Lord.
+Oh my offence is ranke, it smels to heauen,
+It hath the primall eldest curse vpon't,
+A Brothers murther.[8] Pray can I not,
+Though inclination be as sharpe as will:
+My stronger guilt,[9] defeats my strong intent,
+
+[Footnote 1: The philosophy of which self is the centre. The speeches of
+both justify the king in proceeding to extremes against Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 2: The same as to say: 'The passing, ceasing, or ending of
+majesty dies not--is not finished or accomplished, without that of
+others;' 'the dying ends or ceases not,' &c.]
+
+[Footnote 3: The _but_ of the _Quarto_ is better, only the line halts.
+It is the preposition, meaning _without_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _heedless of their flattery_. It is hardly applicable
+enough to interest him.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'Provide yourselves.']
+
+[Footnote 6: fear active; cause of fear; thing to be afraid of; the noun
+of the verb _fear_, to _frighten_:
+
+    Or in the night, imagining some fear,
+    How easy is a bush supposed a bear!
+
+_A Midsummer Night's Dream_, act v. sc. i.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Schmidt (_Sh. Lex._) says _of vantage_ means _to boot_. I
+do not think he is right. Perhaps Polonius means 'from a position of
+advantage.' Or perhaps 'The speech of vantage' is to be understood as
+implying that Hamlet, finding himself in a position of vantage, that is,
+alone with his mother, will probably utter himself with little
+restraint.]
+
+[Footnote 8: This is the first proof positive of his guilt accorded even
+to the spectator of the play: here Claudius confesses not merely guilt
+(118), but the very deed. Thoughtless critics are so ready to judge
+another as if he knew all they know, that it is desirable here to remind
+the student that only he, not Hamlet, hears this soliloquy. The
+falseness of half the judgments in the world comes from our not taking
+care and pains first to know accurately the actions, and then to
+understand the mental and moral condition, of those we judge.]
+
+[Footnote 9: --his present guilty indulgence--stronger than his strong
+intent to pray.]
+
+[Page 162]
+
+And like a man to double businesse bound,[1]
+I stand in pause where I shall first begin,
+And both[2] neglect; what if this cursed hand
+Were thicker then it selfe with Brothers blood,
+Is there not Raine enough in the sweet Heauens
+To wash it white as Snow? Whereto serues mercy,
+But to confront the visage of Offence?
+And what's in Prayer, but this two-fold force,
+To be fore-stalled ere we come to fall,
+Or pardon'd being downe? Then Ile looke vp,           [Sidenote: pardon]
+My fault is past. But oh, what forme of Prayer
+Can serue my turne? Forgiue me my foule Murther:
+That cannot be, since I am still possest
+Of those effects for which I did the Murther.[3]
+My Crowne, mine owne Ambition, and my Queene:
+May one be pardon'd, and retaine th'offence?
+In the corrupted currants of this world,
+Offences gilded hand may shoue by Iustice              [Sidenote: showe]
+And oft 'tis seene, the wicked prize it selfe
+Buyes out the Law; but 'tis not so aboue,
+There is no shuffling, there the Action lyes
+In his true Nature, and we our selues compell'd
+Euen to the teeth and forehead of our faults,
+To giue in euidence. What then? What rests?
+Try what Repentance can. What can it not?
+Yet what can it, when one cannot repent?[4]
+Oh wretched state! Oh bosome, blacke as death!
+Oh limed[5] soule, that strugling to be free,
+Art more ingag'd[6]: Helpe Angels, make assay:[7]
+Bow stubborne knees, and heart with strings of Steele,
+Be soft as sinewes of the new-borne Babe,
+All may be well.
+
+[Footnote 1: Referring to his double guilt--the one crime past, the
+other in continuance.
+
+Here is the corresponding passage in the _1st Q._, with the adultery
+plainly confessed:--
+
+    _Enter the King._
+
+    _King_. O that this wet that falles vpon my face
+    Would wash the crime cleere from my conscience!
+    When I looke vp to heauen, I see my trespasse,
+    The earth doth still crie out vpon my fact,
+    Pay me the murder of a brother and a king,
+    And the adulterous fault I haue committed:
+    O these are sinnes that are vnpardonable:
+    Why say thy sinnes were blacker then is ieat,
+    Yet may contrition make them as white as snowe:
+    I but still to perseuer in a sinne,
+    It is an act gainst the vniuersall power,
+    Most wretched man, stoope, bend thee to thy prayer,
+    Aske grace of heauen to keepe thee from despaire.]
+
+[Footnote 2: both crimes.]
+
+[Footnote 3: He could repent of and pray forgiveness for the murder, if
+he could repent of the adultery and incest, and give up the queen. It is
+not the sins they have done, but the sins they will not leave, that damn
+men. 'This is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and
+men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.'
+The murder deeply troubled him; the adultery not so much; the incest and
+usurpation mainly as interfering with the forgiveness of the murder.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Even hatred of crime committed is not repentance:
+repentance is the turning away from wrong doing: 'Cease to do evil;
+learn to do well.']
+
+[Footnote 5: --caught and held by crime, as a bird by bird-lime.]
+
+[Footnote 6: entangled.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _said to his knees_. Point thus:--'Helpe Angels! Make
+assay--bow, stubborne knees!']
+
+[Page 164]
+
+_Enter Hamlet_.
+
+_Ham_.[1] Now might I do it pat, now he is praying,
+                             [Sidenote: doe it, but now a is a praying,]
+And now Ile doo't, and so he goes to Heauen,       [Sidenote: so a goes]
+And so am I reueng'd: that would be scann'd,       [Sidenote: reuendge,]
+A Villaine killes my Father, and for that
+I his foule Sonne, do this same Villaine send     [Sidenote: sole sonne]
+To heauen. Oh this is hyre and Sallery, not Reuenge.
+                 [Sidenote: To heauen. Why, this is base and silly, not]
+He tooke my Father grossely, full of bread,          [Sidenote: A tooke]
+[Sidenote: 54, 262] With all his Crimes broad blowne, as fresh as May,
+                                                 [Sidenote: as flush as]
+And how his Audit stands, who knowes, saue Heauen:[2]
+But in our circumstance and course of thought
+'Tis heauie with him: and am I then reueng'd,
+To take him in the purging of his Soule,
+When he is fit and season'd for his passage? No.
+Vp Sword, and know thou a more horrid hent[3]
+When he is drunke asleepe: or in his Rage,
+Or in th'incestuous pleasure of his bed,
+At gaming, swearing, or about some acte  [Sidenote: At game a swearing,]
+That ha's no rellish of Saluation in't,
+Then trip him,[4] that his heeles may kicke at Heauen,
+And that his Soule may be as damn'd and blacke
+As Hell, whereto it goes.[5] My Mother stayes,[6]
+This Physicke but prolongs thy sickly dayes.[7]
+                                          _Exit_.
+
+_King_. My words flye vp, my thoughts remain below,
+Words without thoughts, neuer to Heauen go.[8]
+                                          _Exit_.
+
+_Enter Queene and Polonius_.            [Sidenote: _Enter Gertrard and_]
+
+_Pol_. He will come straight:                         [Sidenote: A will]
+Looke you lay home to him
+
+[Footnote 1: In the _1st Q._ this speech commences with, 'I so, come
+forth and worke thy last,' evidently addressed to his sword; afterwards,
+having changed his purpose, he says, 'no, get thee vp agen.']
+
+[Footnote 2: This indicates doubt of the Ghost still. He is unwilling to
+believe in him.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _grasp_. This is the only instance I know of _hent_ as a
+noun. The verb _to hent, to lay hold of_, is not so rare. 'Wait till
+thou be aware of a grasp with a more horrid purpose in it.']
+
+[Footnote 4: --still addressed to his sword.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Are we to take Hamlet's own presentment of his reasons as
+exhaustive? Doubtless to kill him at his prayers, whereupon, after the
+notions of the time, he would go to heaven, would be anything but
+justice--the murdered man in hell--the murderer in heaven! But it is
+easy to suppose Hamlet finding it impossible to slay a man on his
+knees--and that from behind: thus in the unseen Presence, he was in
+sanctuary, and the avenger might well seek reason or excuse for not
+_then_, not _there_ executing the decree.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'waits for me.']
+
+[Footnote 7: He seems now to have made up his mind, and to await only
+fit time and opportunity; but he is yet to receive confirmation strong
+as holy writ.
+
+This is the first chance Hamlet has had--within the play--of killing the
+king, and any imputation of faulty irresolution therein is simply silly.
+It shows the soundness of Hamlet's reason, and the steadiness of his
+will, that he refuses to be carried away by passion, or the temptation
+of opportunity. The sight of the man on his knees might well start fresh
+doubt of his guilt, or even wake the thought of sparing a repentant
+sinner. He knows also that in taking vengeance on her husband he could
+not avoid compromising his mother. Besides, a man like Hamlet could not
+fail to perceive how the killing of his uncle, and in such an attitude,
+would look to others.
+
+It may be judged, however, that the reason he gives to himself for not
+slaying the king, was only an excuse, that his soul revolted from the
+idea of assassination, and was calmed in a measure by the doubt whether
+a man could thus pray--in supposed privacy, we must remember--and be a
+murderer. Not even yet had he proof _positive_, absolute, conclusive:
+the king might well take offence at the play, even were he innocent; and
+in any case Hamlet would desire _presentable_ proof: he had positively
+none to show the people in justification of vengeance.
+
+As in excitement a man's moods may be opalescent in their changes, and
+as the most contrary feelings may coexist in varying degrees, all might
+be in a mind, which I have suggested as present in that of Hamlet.
+
+To have been capable of the kind of action most of his critics would
+demand of a man, Hamlet must have been the weakling they imagine him.
+When at length, after a righteous delay, partly willed, partly
+inevitable, he holds documents in the king's handwriting as proofs of
+his treachery--_proofs which can be shown_--giving him both right and
+power over the life of the traitor, then, and only then, is he in cool
+blood absolutely satisfied as to his duty--which conviction, working
+with opportunity, and that opportunity plainly the last, brings the end;
+the righteous deed is done, and done righteously, the doer blameless in
+the doing of it. The Poet is not careful of what is called poetic
+justice in his play, though therein is no failure; what he is careful of
+is personal rightness in the hero of it.]
+
+[Footnote 8: _1st Q_.
+
+    _King_ My wordes fly vp, my sinnes remaine below.
+    No King on earth is safe, if Gods his foe. _Exit King_.
+
+So he goes to make himself safe by more crime! His repentance is mainly
+fear.]
+
+[Page 166]
+
+Tell him his prankes haue been too broad to beare with,
+And that your Grace hath scree'nd, and stoode betweene
+Much heate, and him. Ile silence me e'ene heere:
+                                                 [Sidenote: euen heere,]
+Pray you be round[1] with him.[2]            [Sidenote: _Enter Hamlet_.]
+
+_Ham. within_. Mother, mother, mother.[3]
+
+_Qu_. Ile warrant you, feare me not.    [Sidenote: _Ger_. Ile wait you,]
+Withdraw, I heare him comming.
+
+_Enter Hamlet_.[4]
+
+_Ham_.[5] Now Mother, what's the matter?
+
+_Qu_. _Hamlet_, thou hast thy Father much offended.   [Sidenote: _Ger_.]
+
+_Ham_. Mother, you haue my Father much offended.
+
+_Qu_. Come, come, you answer with an idle tongue.     [Sidenote: _Ger_.]
+
+_Ham._ Go, go, you question with an idle tongue.
+                                       [Sidenote: with a wicked tongue.]
+
+_Qu_. Why how now _Hamlet_?[6]                        [Sidenote: _Ger_.]
+
+_Ham_. Whats the matter now?
+
+_Qu_. Haue you forgot me?[7]                          [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+
+_Ham_. No by the Rood, not so:
+You are the Queene, your Husbands Brothers wife,
+But would you were not so. You are my Mother.[8]
+                                           [Sidenote: And would it were]
+
+_Qu_. Nay, then Ile set those to you that can speake.[9]
+                                                      [Sidenote: _Ger_.]
+
+_Ham_. Come, come, and sit you downe, you shall not boudge:
+You go not till I set you vp a glasse,
+Where you may see the inmost part of you?      [Sidenote: the most part]
+
+_Qu_. What wilt thou do? thou wilt not murther        [Sidenote: _Ger_.]
+me?[10] Helpe, helpe, hoa.                        [Sidenote: Helpe how.]
+
+_Pol_. What hoa, helpe, helpe, helpe.        [Sidenote: What how helpe.]
+
+_Ham_. How now, a Rat? dead for a Ducate, dead.[11]
+
+[Footnote 1: _The Quarto has not_ 'with him.']
+
+[Footnote 2: _He goes behind the arras._]
+
+[Footnote 3: _The Quarto has not this speech._]
+
+[Footnote 4: _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 5: _1st Q._
+
+    _Ham_. Mother, mother, O are you here?
+    How i'st with you mother?
+
+    _Queene_ How i'st with you?
+
+    _Ham_, I'le tell you, but first weele make all safe.
+
+Here, evidently, he bolts the doors.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _1st Q._
+
+    _Queene_ How now boy?
+
+    _Ham_. How now mother! come here, sit downe, for you
+    shall heare me speake.]
+
+[Footnote 7: --'that you speak to me in such fashion?']
+
+[Footnote 8: _Point thus_: 'so: you'--'would you were not so, for you
+are _my_ mother.'--_with emphasis on_ 'my.' The whole is spoken sadly.]
+
+[Footnote 9: --'speak so that you must mind them.']
+
+[Footnote 10: The apprehension comes from the combined action of her
+conscience and the notion of his madness.]
+
+[Footnote 11: There is no precipitancy here--only instant resolve and
+execution. It is another outcome and embodiment of Hamlet's rare faculty
+for action, showing his delay the more admirable. There is here neither
+time nor call for delay. Whoever the man behind the arras might be, he
+had, by spying upon him in the privacy of his mother's room, forfeited
+to Hamlet his right to live; he had heard what he had said to his
+mother, and his death was necessary; for, if he left the room, Hamlet's
+last chance of fulfilling his vow to the Ghost was gone: if the play had
+not sealed, what he had now spoken must seal his doom. But the decree
+had in fact already gone forth against his life. 158.]
+
+[Page 168]
+
+_Pol._ Oh I am slaine. [1]_Killes Polonius._[2]
+
+_Qu._ Oh me, what hast thou done?                     [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+
+_Ham._ Nay I know not, is it the King?[3]
+
+_Qu._ Oh what a rash, and bloody deed is this?        [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+
+_Ham._ A bloody deed, almost as bad good Mother,
+[Sidenote: 56] As kill a King,[4] and marrie with his Brother.
+
+_Qu._ As kill a King?                                 [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+
+_Ham._ I Lady, 'twas my word.[5]                      [Sidenote: it was]
+Thou wretched, rash, intruding foole farewell,
+I tooke thee for thy Betters,[3] take thy Fortune,   [Sidenote: better,]
+Thou find'st to be too busie, is some danger,
+Leaue wringing of your hands, peace, sit you downe,
+And let me wring your heart, for so I shall
+If it be made of penetrable stuffe;
+If damned Custome haue not braz'd it so,
+That it is proofe and bulwarke against Sense.          [Sidenote: it be]
+
+_Qu._ What haue I done, that thou dar'st wag thy tong,
+                                                      [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+In noise so rude against me?[6]
+
+_Ham._ Such an Act
+That blurres the grace and blush of Modestie,[7]
+Calls Vertue Hypocrite, takes off the Rose
+From the faire forehead of an innocent loue,
+And makes a blister there.[8] Makes marriage vowes
+                                                  [Sidenote: And sets a]
+As false as Dicers Oathes. Oh such a deed,
+As from the body of Contraction[9] pluckes
+The very soule, and sweete Religion makes
+A rapsidie of words. Heauens face doth glow,           [Sidenote: dooes]
+Yea this solidity and compound masse,               [Sidenote: Ore this]
+With tristfull visage as against the doome,
+                                         [Sidenote: with heated visage,]
+Is thought-sicke at the act.[10]                [Sidenote: thought sick]
+
+_Qu._ Aye me; what act,[11] that roares so lowd,[12]
+and thunders in the Index.[13]
+
+[Footnote 1: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 2: --_through the arras_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Hamlet takes him for, hopes it is the king, and thinks here
+to conclude: he is not praying now! and there is not a moment to be
+lost, for he has betrayed his presence and called for help. As often as
+immediate action is demanded of Hamlet, he is immediate with his
+response--never hesitates, never blunders. There is no blunder here:
+being where he was, the death of Polonius was necessary now to the death
+of the king. Hamlet's resolve is instant, and the act simultaneous with
+the resolve. The weak man is sure to be found wanting when immediate
+action is necessary; Hamlet never is. Doubtless those who blame him as
+dilatory, here blame him as precipitate, for they judge according to
+appearance and consequence.
+
+All his delay after this is plainly compelled, although I grant he was
+not sorry to have to await such _more presentable_ evidence as at last
+he procured, so long as he did not lose the final possibility of
+vengeance.]
+
+[Footnote 4: This is the sole reference in the interview to the murder.
+I take it for tentative, and that Hamlet is satisfied by his mother's
+utterance, carriage, and expression, that she is innocent of any
+knowledge of that crime. Neither does he allude to the adultery: there
+is enough in what she cannot deny, and that only which can be remedied
+needs be taken up; while to break with the king would open the door of
+repentance for all that had preceded.]
+
+[Footnote 5: He says nothing of the Ghost to his mother.]
+
+[Footnote 6: She still holds up and holds out.]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'makes Modesty itself suspected.']
+
+[Footnote 8: 'makes Innocence ashamed of the love it cherishes.']
+
+[Footnote 9: 'plucks the spirit out of all forms of contracting or
+agreeing.' We have lost the social and kept only the physical meaning of
+the noun.]
+
+[Footnote 10: I cannot help thinking the _Quarto_ reading of this
+passage the more intelligible, as well as much the more powerful. We may
+imagine a red aurora, by no means a very unusual phenomenon, over the
+expanse of the sky:--
+
+            Heaven's face doth glow (_blush_)
+    O'er this solidity and compound mass,
+
+(_the earth, solid, material, composite, a corporeal mass in
+confrontment with the spirit-like etherial, simple, uncompounded heaven
+leaning over it_)
+
+    With tristful (_or_ heated, _as the reader may choose_)
+          visage: as against the doom,
+
+(_as in the presence, or in anticipation of the revealing judgment_)
+
+    Is thought sick at the act.
+
+(_thought is sick at the act of the queen_)
+
+My difficulties as to the _Folio_ reading are--why the earth should be
+so described without immediate contrast with the sky; and--how the earth
+could be showing a tristful visage, and the sickness of its thought. I
+think, if the Poet indeed made the alterations and they are not mere
+blunders, he must have made them hurriedly, and without due attention. I
+would not forget, however, that there may be something present but too
+good for me to find, which would make the passage plain as it stands.
+
+Compare _As you like it_, act i. sc. 3.
+
+    For, by this heaven, now at our sorrows pale,
+    Say what thou canst, I'll go along with thee.]
+
+[Footnote 11: In Q. the rest of this speech is Hamlet's; his long speech
+begins here, taking up the queen's word.]
+
+[Footnote 12: She still stands out.]
+
+[Footnote 13: 'thunders in the very indication or mention of it.' But by
+'the Index' may be intended the influx or table of contents of a book,
+at the beginning of it.]
+
+[Page 170]
+
+_Ham._ Looke heere vpon this Picture, and on this,
+The counterfet presentment of two Brothers:[1]
+See what a grace was seated on his Brow,             [Sidenote: on this]
+[Sidenote: 151] _Hyperions_ curies, the front of Ioue himselfe,
+An eye like Mars, to threaten or command        [Sidenote: threaten and]
+A Station, like the Herald Mercurie
+New lighted on a heauen kissing hill:  [Sidenote: on a heaue, a kissing]
+A Combination, and a forme indeed,
+Where euery God did seeme to set his Seale,
+To giue the world assurance of a man.[2]
+This was your Husband. Looke you now what followes.
+Heere is your Husband, like a Mildew'd eare
+Blasting his wholsom breath. Haue you eyes?
+                                           [Sidenote: wholsome brother,]
+Could you on this faire Mountaine leaue to feed,
+And batten on this Moore?[3] Ha? Haue you eyes?
+You cannot call it Loue: For at your age,
+The hey-day[4] in the blood is tame, it's humble,
+And waites vpon the Judgement: and what Iudgement
+Would step from this, to this? [A] What diuell was't,
+That thus hath cousend you at hoodman-blinde?[5]      [Sidenote: hodman]
+[B]
+O Shame! where is thy Blush? Rebellious Hell,
+If thou canst mutine in a Matrons bones,
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+                            sence sure youe haue
+Els could you not haue motion, but sure that sence
+Is appoplext, for madnesse would not erre
+Nor sence to extacie[6] was nere so thral'd
+But it reseru'd some quantity of choise[7]
+To serue in such[8] a difference,]
+
+[Footnote B: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+Eyes without feeling, feeling without sight.
+Eares without hands, or eyes, smelling sance[9] all,
+Or but a sickly part of one true sence
+Could not so mope:[10]]
+
+[Footnote 1: He points to the portraits of the two brothers, side by
+side on the wall.]
+
+[Footnote 2: See _Julius Caesar_, act v. sc. 5,--speech of _Antony_ at
+the end.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --perhaps an allusion as well to the complexion of
+Claudius, both moral and physical.]
+
+[Footnote 4: --perhaps allied to the German _heida_, and possibly the
+English _hoyden_ and _hoity-toity_. Or is it merely
+_high-day--noontide_?]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'played tricks with you while hooded in the game of
+_blind-man's-bluff_?' The omitted passage of the _Quarto_ enlarges the
+figure.
+
+_1st Q._ 'hob-man blinde.']
+
+[Footnote 6: madness.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Attributing soul to sense, he calls its distinguishment
+_choice_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: --emphasis on _such_.]
+
+[Footnote 9: This spelling seems to show how the English word _sans_
+should be pronounced.]
+
+[Footnote 10: --'be so dull.']
+
+[Page 172]
+
+To flaming youth, let Vertue be as waxe,
+And melt in her owne fire. Proclaime no shame,
+When the compulsiue Ardure giues the charge,
+Since Frost it selfe,[1] as actiuely doth burne,
+As Reason panders Will.             [Sidenote: And reason pardons will.]
+
+_Qu._ O Hamlet, speake no more.[2]                    [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+Thou turn'st mine eyes into my very soule,
+                                 [Sidenote: my very eyes into my soule,]
+And there I see such blacke and grained[3] spots,
+                                               [Sidenote: greeued spots]
+As will not leaue their Tinct.[4]     [Sidenote: will leaue there their]
+
+_Ham._ Nay, but to liue[5]
+In the ranke sweat of an enseamed bed,              [Sidenote: inseemed]
+Stew'd in Corruption; honying and making loue
+[Sidenote: 34] Ouer the nasty Stye.[6]
+
+_Qu._ Oh speake to me, no more,                       [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+[Sidenote: 158] These words like Daggers enter in mine eares.
+                                                          [Sidenote: my]
+No more sweet _Hamlet_.
+
+_Ham._ A Murderer, and a Villaine:
+A Slaue, that is not twentieth part the tythe  [Sidenote: part the kyth]
+Of your precedent Lord. A vice[7] of Kings,
+A Cutpurse of the Empire and the Rule.
+That from a shelfe, the precious Diadem stole,
+And put it in his Pocket.
+
+_Qu._ No more.[8]                                     [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+
+_Enter Ghost._[9]
+
+_Ham._ A King of shreds and patches.
+[Sidenote: 44] Saue me; and houer o're me with your wings[10]
+You heauenly Guards. What would you gracious figure?
+                                               [Sidenote: your gracious]
+
+_Qu._ Alas he's mad.[11]                              [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+
+_Ham._ Do you not come your tardy Sonne to chide,
+That laps't in Time and Passion, lets go by[12]
+Th'important acting of your dread command? Oh say.[13]
+
+[Footnote 1: --his mother's matronly age.]
+
+[Footnote 2: She gives way at last.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --spots whose blackness has sunk into the grain, or final
+particles of the substance.]
+
+[Footnote 4: --transition form of tint:--'will never give up their
+colour;' 'will never be cleansed.']
+
+[Footnote 5: He persists.]
+
+[Footnote 6: --Claudius himself--his body no 'temple of the Holy Ghost,'
+but a pig-sty. 3.]
+
+[Footnote 7: The clown of the old Moral Play.]
+
+[Footnote 8: She seems neither surprised nor indignant at any point in
+the accusation: her consciousness of her own guiit has overwhelmed her.]
+
+[Footnote 9: The _1st Q._ has _Enter the ghost in his night gowne_. It
+was then from the first intended that he should not at this point appear
+in armour--in which, indeed, the epithet _gracious figure_ could hardly
+be applied to him, though it might well enough in one of the costumes in
+which Hamlet was accustomed to see him--as this dressing-gown of the
+_1st Q._ A ghost would appear in the costume in which he naturally
+imagined himself, and in his wife's room would not show himself clothed
+as when walking among the fortifications of the castle. But by the words
+lower down (174)--
+
+    My Father in his habite, as he liued,
+
+the Poet indicates, not his dressing-gown, but his usual habit, _i.e._
+attire.]
+
+[Footnote 10: --almost the same invocation as when first he saw the
+apparition.]
+
+[Footnote 11: The queen cannot see the Ghost. Her conduct has built such
+a wall between her and her husband that I doubt whether, were she a
+ghost also, she could see him. Her heart had left him, so they are no
+more together in the sphere of mutual vision. Neither does the Ghost
+wish to show himself to her. As his presence is not corporeal, a ghost
+may be present to but one of a company.]
+
+[Footnote 12: 1. 'Who, lapsed (_fallen, guilty_), lets action slip in
+delay and suffering.' 2. 'Who, lapsed in (_fallen in, overwhelmed by_)
+delay and suffering, omits' &c. 3. 'lapsed in respect of time, and
+because of passion'--the meaning of the preposition _in_, common to
+both, reacted upon by the word it governs. 4. 'faulty both in delaying,
+and in yielding to suffering, when action is required.' 5. 'lapsed
+through having too much time and great suffering.' 6. 'allowing himself
+to be swept along by time and grief.'
+
+Surely there is not another writer whose words would so often admit of
+such multiform and varied interpretation--each form good, and true, and
+suitable to the context! He seems to see at once all the relations of a
+thing, and to try to convey them at once, in an utterance single as the
+thing itself. He would condense the infinite soul of the meaning into
+the trembling, overtaxed body of the phrase!]
+
+[Footnote 13: In the renewed presence of the Ghost, all its former
+influence and all the former conviction of its truth, return upon him.
+He knows also how his behaviour must appear to the Ghost, and sees
+himself as the Ghost sees him. Confronted with the gracious figure, how
+should he think of self-justification! So far from being able to explain
+things, he even forgets the doubt that had held him back--it has
+vanished from the noble presence! He is now in the world of belief; the
+world of doubt is nowhere!--Note the masterly opposition of moods.]
+
+[Page 174]
+
+_Ghost._ Do not forget: this Visitation
+Is but to whet thy almost blunted purpose.[1]
+But looke, Amazement on thy Mother sits;[2]
+[Sidenote: 30, 54] O step betweene her, and her fighting Soule,[3]
+[Sidenote: 198] Conceit[4] in weakest bodies, strongest workes.
+Speake to her _Hamlet_.[5]
+
+_Ham._ How is it with you Lady?[6]
+
+_Qu._ Alas, how is't with you?                        [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+That you bend your eye on vacancie,              [Sidenote: you do bend]
+And with their corporall ayre do hold discourse.
+                                    [Sidenote: with th'incorporall ayre]
+Forth at your eyes, your spirits wildely peepe,
+And as the sleeping Soldiours in th'Alarme,
+Your bedded haire, like life in excrements,[7]
+Start vp, and stand an end.[8] Oh gentle Sonne,
+Vpon the heate and flame of thy distemper
+Sprinkle coole patience. Whereon do you looke?[9]
+
+_Ham._ On him, on him: look you how pale he glares,
+His forme and cause conioyn'd, preaching to stones,
+Would make them capeable.[10] Do not looke vpon me,[11]
+Least with this pitteous action you conuert
+My sterne effects: then what I haue to do,[12]
+[Sidenote: 111] Will want true colour; teares perchance for blood.[13]
+
+_Qu._ To who do you speake this?              [Sidenote: _Ger._ To whom]
+
+_Ham._ Do you see nothing there?
+
+_Qu._ Nothing at all, yet all that is I see.[14]      [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+
+_Ham._ Nor did you nothing heare?
+
+_Qu._ No, nothing but our selues.                     [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+
+_Ham._ Why look you there: looke how it steals away:
+[Sidenote: 173] My Father in his habite, as he liued,
+Looke where he goes euen now out at the Portall.
+                        _Exit._                [Sidenote: _Exit Ghost._]
+
+[Sidenote: 114] _Qu._ This is the very coynage of your Braine,
+                                                      [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+
+[Footnote 1: The Ghost here judges, as alone is possible to him, from
+what he knows--from the fact that his brother Claudius has not yet made
+his appearance in the ghost-world. Not understanding Hamlet's
+difficulties, he mistakes Hamlet himself.]
+
+[Footnote 2: He mistakes also, through his tenderness, the condition of
+his wife--imagining, it would seem, that she feels his presence, though
+she cannot see him, or recognize the source of the influence which he
+supposes to be moving her conscience: she is only perturbed by Hamlet's
+behaviour.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --fighting within itself, as the sea in a storm may be said
+to fight.
+
+He is careful as ever over the wife he had loved and loves still;
+careful no less of the behaviour of the son to his mother.
+
+In the _1st Q._ we have:--
+
+    But I perceiue by thy distracted lookes,
+    Thy mother's fearefull, and she stands amazde:
+    Speake to her Hamlet, for her sex is weake,
+    Comfort thy mother, Hamlet, thinke on me.]
+
+[Footnote 4: --not used here for bare _imagination_, but imagination
+with its concomitant feeling:--_conception_. 198.]
+
+[Footnote 5: His last word ere he vanishes utterly, concerns his queen;
+he is tender and gracious still to her who sent him to hell. This
+attitude of the Ghost towards his faithless wife, is one of the
+profoundest things in the play. All the time she is not thinking of him
+any more than seeing him--for 'is he not dead!'--is looking straight at
+where he stands, but is all unaware of him.]
+
+[Footnote 6: I understand him to speak this with a kind of lost,
+mechanical obedience. The description his mother gives of him makes it
+seem as if the Ghost were drawing his ghost out to himself, and turning
+his body thereby half dead.]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'as if there were life in excrements.' The nails and hair
+were 'excrements'--things _growing out_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Note the form _an end_--not _on end_. 51, 71.]
+
+[Footnote 9: --all spoken coaxingly, as to one in a mad fit. She regards
+his perturbation as a sudden assault of his ever present malady. One who
+sees what others cannot see they are always ready to count mad.]
+
+[Footnote 10: able to _take_, that is, to _understand_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: --_to the Ghost_.]
+
+[Footnote 12: 'what is in my power to do.']
+
+[Footnote 13: Note antithesis here: '_your piteous action_;' '_my stern
+effects_'--the things, that is, 'which I have to effect.' 'Lest your
+piteous show convert--change--my stern doing; then what I do will lack
+true colour; the result may be tears instead of blood; I shall weep
+instead of striking.']
+
+[Footnote 14: It is one of the constantly recurring delusions of
+humanity that we see all there is.]
+
+[Page 176]
+
+[Sidenote: 114] This bodilesse Creation extasie[1] is very cunning
+in.[2]
+
+_Ham._ Extasie?[3]
+My Pulse as yours doth temperately keepe time,
+And makes as healthfull Musicke.[4] It is not madnesse
+That I haue vttered; bring me to the Test
+And I the matter will re-word: which madnesse        [Sidenote: And the]
+Would gamboll from. Mother, for loue of Grace,
+Lay not a flattering Vnction to your soule,
+                                         [Sidenote: not that flattering]
+That not your trespasse, but my madnesse speakes:
+[Sidenote: 182] It will but skin and filme the Vlcerous place,
+Whil'st ranke Corruption mining all within,           [Sidenote: whiles]
+Infects vnseene, Confesse your selfe to Heauen,
+Repent what's past, auoyd what is to come,
+And do not spred the Compost or the Weedes,   [Sidenote: compost on the]
+To make them ranke. Forgiue me this my Vertue,       [Sidenote: ranker,]
+For in the fatnesse of this pursie[5] times,           [Sidenote: these]
+Vertue it selfe, of Vice must pardon begge,
+Yea courb,[6] and woe, for leaue to do him good.
+                                              [Sidenote: curbe and wooe]
+
+_Qu._ Oh Hamlet,                                      [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+Thou hast cleft my heart in twaine.
+
+_Ham._ O throw away the worser part of it,
+And Liue the purer with the other halfe.       [Sidenote: And leaue the]
+Good night, but go not to mine Vnkles bed,                [Sidenote: my]
+Assume a Vertue, if you haue it not,[7][A] refraine to night
+                                 [Sidenote: Assune | to refraine night,]
+And that shall lend a kinde of easinesse
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+[8]That monster custome, who all sence doth eate
+Of habits deuill,[9] is angell yet in this
+That to the vse of actions faire and good,
+He likewise giues a frock or Liuery
+That aptly is put on]
+
+[Footnote 1: madness 129.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Here is the correspondent speech in the _1st Q._ I give it
+because of the queen's denial of complicity in the murder.
+
+    _Queene_ Alas, it is the weakenesse of thy braine.
+    Which makes thy tongue to blazon thy hearts griefe:
+    But as I haue a soule, I sweare by heauen,
+    I neuer knew of this most horride murder:
+    But Hamlet, this is onely fantasie,
+    And for my loue forget these idle fits.
+
+    _Ham_. Idle, no mother, my pulse doth beate like yours,
+    It is not madnesse that possesseth Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 4: --_time_ being a great part of music. Shakspere more than
+once or twice employs _music_ as a symbol with reference to corporeal
+condition: see, for instance, _As you like it_, act i. sc. 2, 'But is
+there any else longs to see this broken music in his sides? is there yet
+another dotes upon rib-breaking?' where the _broken music_ may be
+regarded as the antithesis of the _healthful music_ here.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _swoln, pampered_: an allusion to the _purse_ itself,
+whether intended or not, is suggested.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _bend, bow_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: To _assume_ is to take to one: by _assume a virtue_, Hamlet
+does not mean _pretend_--but the very opposite: _to pretend_ is _to hold
+forth, to show_; what he means is, 'Adopt a virtue'--that of
+_abstinence_--'and act upon it, order your behaviour by it, although you
+may not _feel_ it. Choose the virtue--take it, make it yours.']
+
+[Footnote 8: This omitted passage is obscure with the special
+Shaksperean obscurity that comes of over-condensation. He omitted it, I
+think, because of its obscurity. Its general meaning is plain
+enough--that custom helps the man who tries to assume a virtue, as well
+as renders it more and more difficult for him who indulges in vice to
+leave it. I will paraphrase: 'That monster, Custom, who eats away all
+sense, the devil of habits, is angel yet in this, that, for the exercise
+of fair and good actions, he also provides a habit, a suitable frock or
+livery, that is easily put on.' The play with the two senses of the word
+_habit_ is more easily seen than set forth. To paraphrase more freely:
+'That devil of habits, Custom, who eats away all sense of wrong-doing,
+has yet an angel-side to him, in that he gives a man a mental dress, a
+habit, helpful to the doing of the right thing.' The idea of hypocrisy
+does not come in at all. The advice of Hamlet is: 'Be virtuous in your
+actions, even if you cannot in your feelings; do not do the wrong thing
+you would like to do, and custom will render the abstinence easy.']
+
+[Footnote 9: I suspect it should be '_Of habits evil_'--the antithesis
+to _angel_ being _monster_.]
+
+[Page 178]
+
+To the next abstinence. [A] Once more goodnight,
+And when you are desirous to be blest,
+Ile blessing begge of you.[1] For this same Lord,
+I do repent: but heauen hath pleas'd it so,[2]
+To punish me with this, and this with me,
+That I must be their[3] Scourge and Minister.
+I will bestow him,[4] and will answer well
+The death I gaue him:[5] so againe, good night.
+I must be cruell, onely to be kinde;[6]
+Thus bad begins,[7] and worse remaines behinde.[8]  [Sidenote: This bad]
+
+[B]
+
+_Qu_. What shall I do?                                [Sidenote: _Ger_.]
+
+_Ham_. Not this by no meanes that I bid you do:
+Let the blunt King tempt you againe to bed,   [Sidenote: the blowt King]
+Pinch Wanton on your cheeke, call you his Mouse,
+And let him for a paire of reechie[9] kisses,
+Or padling in your necke with his damn'd Fingers,
+Make you to rauell all this matter out,               [Sidenote: rouell]
+[Sidenote: 60, 136, 156] That I essentially am not in madnesse.
+But made in craft.[10] 'Twere good you let him know,     [Sidenote: mad]
+For who that's but a Queene, faire, sober, wise,
+Would from a Paddocke,[11] from a Bat, a Gibbe,[12]
+Such deere concernings hide, Who would do so,
+No in despight of Sense and Secrecie,
+Vnpegge the Basket on the houses top:
+Let the Birds flye, and like the famous Ape
+To try Conclusions[13] in the Basket, creepe
+And breake your owne necke downe.[14]
+
+_Qu_. Be thou assur'd, if words be made of breath,    [Sidenote: _Ger_.]
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto;_--
+
+                     the next more easie:[15]
+For vse almost can change the stamp of nature,
+And either[16] the deuill, or throwe him out
+With wonderous potency:]
+
+[Footnote B: _Here in the Quarto:_--
+
+One word more good Lady.[17]]
+
+[Footnote 1: In bidding his mother good night, he would naturally, after
+the custom of the time, have sought her blessing: it would be a farce
+now: when she seeks the blessing of God, he will beg hers; now, a plain
+_good night_ must serve.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Note the curious inverted use of _pleased_. It is here a
+transitive, not an impersonal verb. The construction of the sentence is,
+'pleased it so, _in order to_ punish us, that I must' &c.]
+
+[Footnote 3: The noun to which _their_ is the pronoun is _heaven_--as if
+he had written _the gods_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'take him to a place fit for him to lie in.']
+
+[Footnote 5: 'hold my face to it, and justify it.']
+
+[Footnote 6: --omitting or refusing to embrace her.]
+
+[Footnote 7: --looking at Polonius.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Does this mean for himself to do, or for Polonius to
+endure?]
+
+[Footnote 9: reeky, smoky, fumy.]
+
+[Footnote 10: Hamlet considers his madness the same that he so
+deliberately assumed. But his idea of himself goes for nothing where the
+experts conclude him mad! His absolute clarity where he has no occasion
+to act madness, goes for as little, for 'all madmen have their sane
+moments'!]
+
+[Footnote 11: _a toad_; in Scotland, _a frog_.]
+
+[Footnote 12: an old cat.]
+
+[Footnote 13: _Experiments_, Steevens says: is it not rather _results_?]
+
+[Footnote 14: I fancy the story, which so far as I know has not been
+traced, goes on to say that the basket was emptied from the house-top to
+send the pigeons flying, and so the ape got his neck broken. The phrase
+'breake your owne necke _downe_' seems strange: it could hardly have
+been written _neck-bone_!]
+
+[Footnote 15: This passage would fall in better with the preceding with
+which it is vitally one--for it would more evenly continue its form--if
+the preceding _devil_ were, as I propose above, changed to _evil_. But,
+precious as is every word in them, both passages are well omitted.]
+
+[Footnote 16: Plainly there is a word left out, if not lost here. There
+is no authority for the supplied _master_. I am inclined to propose a
+pause and a gesture, with perhaps an _inarticulation_.]
+
+[Footnote 17: --interrogatively perhaps, Hamlet noting her about to
+speak; but I would prefer it thus: 'One word more:--good lady--' Here
+he pauses so long that she speaks. Or we _might_ read it thus:
+
+    _Qu._ One word more.
+    _Ham._ Good lady?
+    _Qu._ What shall I do?]
+
+[Page 180]
+
+And breath of life: I haue no life to breath
+What thou hast saide to me.[1]
+
+[Sidenote: 128, 158] _Ham._ I must to England, you know that?[2]
+
+_Qu._ Alacke I had forgot: Tis so concluded on.       [Sidenote: _Ger._]
+
+_Ham._ [A] This man shall set me packing:[3]
+Ile lugge the Guts into the Neighbor roome,[4]
+Mother goodnight. Indeede this Counsellor [Sidenote: night indeed, this]
+Is now most still, most secret, and most graue,
+[Sidenote: 84] Who was in life, a foolish prating Knaue.
+                                              [Sidenote: a most foolish]
+Come sir, to draw toward an end with you.[5]
+Good night Mother.
+
+_Exit Hamlet tugging in Polonius._[6]                [Sidenote: _Exit._]
+
+[7]
+
+_Enter King._                    [Sidenote: Enter King, and Queene, with
+                                          Rosencraus and Guyldensterne.]
+
+_King._ There's matters in these sighes.
+These profound heaues
+You must translate; Tis fit we vnderstand them.
+Where is your Sonne?[8]
+
+_Qu._ [B] Ah my good Lord, what haue I seene to night?
+                                 [Sidenote: _Ger._ | Ah mine owne Lord,]
+
+_King._ What _Gertrude_? How do's _Hamlet_?
+
+_Qu._ Mad as the Seas, and winde, when both contend
+                                            [Sidenote: _Ger._ | sea and]
+Which is the Mightier, in his lawlesse fit[9]
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+[10]Ther's letters seald, and my two Schoolefellowes,
+Whom I will trust as I will Adders fang'd,
+They beare the mandat, they must sweep my way
+And marshall me to knauery[11]: let it worke,
+For tis the sport to haue the enginer
+Hoist[12] with his owne petar,[13] an't shall goe hard
+But I will delue one yard belowe their mines,
+And blowe them at the Moone: o tis most sweete
+When in one line two crafts directly meete,]
+
+[Footnote B: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+Bestow this place on vs a little while.[14]]
+
+[Footnote 1: _1st Q._
+
+    O mother, if euer you did my deare father loue,
+    Forbeare the adulterous bed to night,
+    And win your selfe by little as you may,
+    In time it may be you wil lothe him quite:
+    And mother, but assist mee in reuenge,
+    And in his death your infamy shall die.
+
+    _Queene. Hamlet_, I vow by that maiesty,
+    That knowes our thoughts, and lookes into our hearts,
+    I will conceale, consent, and doe my best,
+    What stratagem soe're thou shalt deuise.]
+
+[Footnote 2: The king had spoken of it both before and after the play:
+Horatio might have heard of it and told Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'My banishment will be laid to this deed of mine.']
+
+[Footnote 4: --to rid his mother of it.]
+
+[Footnote 5: It may cross him, as he says this, dragging the body out by
+one end of it, and toward the end of its history, that he is himself
+drawing toward an end along with Polonius.]
+
+[Footnote 6: --_and weeping_. 182. See _note_ 5, 183.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Here, according to the editors, comes 'Act IV.' For this
+there is no authority, and the point of division seems to me very
+objectionable. The scene remains the same, as noted from Capell in _Cam.
+Sh._, and the entrance of the king follows immediately on the exit of
+Hamlet. He finds his wife greatly perturbed; she has not had time to
+compose herself.
+
+From the beginning of Act II., on to where I would place the end of Act
+III., there is continuity.]
+
+[Footnote 8: I would have this speech uttered with pauses and growing
+urgency, mingled at length with displeasure.]
+
+[Footnote 9: She is faithful to her son, declaring him mad, and
+attributing the death of 'the unseen' Polonius to his madness.]
+
+[Footnote 10: This passage, like the rest, I hold to be omitted by
+Shakspere himself. It represents Hamlet as divining the plot with whose
+execution his false friends were entrusted. The Poet had at first
+intended Hamlet to go on board the vessel with a design formed upon this
+for the out-witting of his companions, and to work out that design.
+Afterwards, however, he alters his plan, and represents his escape as
+more plainly providential: probably he did not see how to manage it by
+any scheme of Hamlet so well as by the attack of a pirate; possibly he
+wished to write the passage (246) in which Hamlet, so consistently with
+his character, attributes his return to the divine shaping of the end
+rough-hewn by himself. He had designs--'dear plots'--but they were other
+than fell out--a rough-hewing that was shaped to a different end. The
+discomfiture of his enemies was not such as he had designed: it was
+brought about by no previous plot, but through a discovery. At the same
+time his deliverance was not effected by the fingering of the packet,
+but by the attack of the pirate: even the re-writing of the commission
+did nothing towards his deliverance, resulted only in the punishment of
+his traitorous companions. In revising the Quarto, the Poet sees that
+the passage before us, in which is expressed the strongest suspicion of
+his companions, with a determination to outwit and punish them, is
+inconsistent with the representation Hamlet gives afterwards of a
+restlessness and suspicion newly come upon him, which he attributes to
+the Divinity.
+
+Neither was it likely he would say so much to his mother while so little
+sure of her as to warn her, on the ground of danger to herself, against
+revealing his sanity to the king. As to this, however, the portion
+omitted might, I grant, be regarded as an _aside_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: --to be done _to_ him.]
+
+[Footnote 12: _Hoised_, from verb _hoise_--still used in Scotland.]
+
+[Footnote 13: a kind of explosive shell, which was fixed to the object
+meant to be destroyed. Note once more Hamlet's delight in action.]
+
+[Footnote 14: --_said to Ros. and Guild._: in plain speech, 'Leave us a
+little while.']
+
+[Page 182]
+
+Behinde the Arras, hearing something stirre,
+He whips his Rapier out, and cries a Rat, a Rat,
+                               [Sidenote: Whyps out his Rapier, cryes a]
+And in his brainish apprehension killes              [Sidenote: in this]
+The vnseene good old man.
+
+_King._ Oh heauy deed:
+It had bin so with vs[1] had we beene there:
+His Liberty is full of threats to all,[2]
+To you your selfe, to vs, to euery one.
+Alas, how shall this bloody deede be answered?
+It will be laide to vs, whose prouidence
+Should haue kept short, restrain'd, and out of haunt,
+This mad yong man.[2] But so much was our loue,
+We would not vnderstand what was most fit,
+But like the Owner of a foule disease,
+[Sidenote: 176] To keepe it from divulging, let's it feede
+                                                      [Sidenote: let it]
+Euen on the pith of life. Where is he gone?
+
+_Qu._ To draw apart the body he hath kild,              [Sidenote: Ger.]
+O're whom his very madnesse[3] like some Oare
+Among a Minerall of Mettels base
+[Sidenote: 181] Shewes it selfe pure.[4] He weepes for what is done.[5]
+                                             [Sidenote: pure, a weeepes]
+
+_King:_ Oh _Gertrude_, come away:
+The Sun no sooner shall the Mountaines touch,
+But we will ship him hence, and this vilde deed,
+We must with all our Maiesty and Skill
+[Sidenote: 200] Both countenance, and excuse.[6]
+                       _Enter Ros. & Guild_.[7]
+Ho _Guildenstern_:
+Friends both go ioyne you with some further ayde:
+_Hamlet_ in madnesse hath Polonius slaine,
+And from his Mother Clossets hath he drag'd him.
+                                             [Sidenote: closet | dreg'd]
+Go seeke him out, speake faire, and bring the body
+Into the Chappell. I pray you hast in this.
+                             _Exit Gent_[8]
+Come _Gertrude_, wee'l call vp our wisest friends,
+To let them know both what we meane to do,           [Sidenote: And let]
+
+[Footnote 1: the royal plural.]
+
+[Footnote 2: He knows the thrust was meant for him. But he would not
+have it so understood; he too lays it to his madness, though he too
+knows better.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'he, although mad'; 'his nature, in spite of his madness.']
+
+[Footnote 4: by his weeping, in the midst of much to give a different
+impression.]
+
+[Footnote 5: We have no reason to think the queen inventing here: what
+could she gain by it? the point indeed was rather against Hamlet, as
+showing it was not Polonius he had thought to kill. He was more than
+ever annoyed with the contemptible old man, who had by his
+meddlesomeness brought his death to his door; but he was very sorry
+nevertheless over Ophelia's father: those rough words in his last speech
+are spoken with the tears running down his face. We have seen the
+strange, almost discordant mingling in him of horror and humour, after
+the first appearance of the Ghost, 58, 60: something of the same may be
+supposed when he finds he has killed Polonius: in the highstrung nervous
+condition that must have followed such a talk with his mother, it would
+be nowise strange that he should weep heartily even in the midst of
+contemptuous anger. Or perhaps a sudden breakdown from attempted show of
+indifference, would not be amiss in the representation.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'both countenance with all our majesty, and excuse with all
+our skill.']
+
+[Footnote 7: In the _Quarto_ a line back.]
+
+[Footnote 8: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Page 184]
+
+And what's vntimely[1] done. [A] Oh come away,        [Sidenote: doone,]
+My soule is full of discord and dismay.   _Exeunt._
+
+_Enter Hamlet._            [Sidenote: _Hamlet, Rosencrans, and others._]
+
+_Ham._ Safely stowed.[2]       [Sidenote: stowed, but soft, what noyse,]
+
+_Gentlemen within._ _Hamlet_. Lord _Hamlet_?
+
+_Ham._ What noise? Who cals on _Hamlet_?
+Oh heere they come.
+
+_Enter Ros. and Guildensterne._[4]
+
+_Ro._ What haue you done my Lord with the dead body?
+
+_Ham._ Compounded it with dust, whereto 'tis Kinne.[5]
+                                                 [Sidenote: Compound it]
+
+_Rosin._ Tell vs where 'tis, that we may take it thence,
+And beare it to the Chappell.
+
+_Ham._ Do not beleeue it.[6]
+
+_Rosin._ Beleeue what?
+
+[Sidenote: 156] _Ham._ That I can keepe your counsell, and not
+mine owne. Besides, to be demanded of a Spundge,
+what replication should be made by the Sonne of
+a King.[7]
+
+_Rosin._ Take you me for a Spundge, my Lord?
+
+_Ham._ I sir, that sokes vp the Kings Countenance,
+his Rewards, his Authorities, but such Officers
+do the King best seruice in the end. He keepes
+them like an Ape in the corner of his iaw,[8] first
+                                            [Sidenote: like an apple in]
+mouth'd to be last swallowed, when he needes what
+you haue glean'd, it is but squeezing you, and
+Spundge you shall be dry againe.
+
+_Rosin._ I vnderstand you not my Lord.
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+Whose whisper ore the worlds dyameter,[9]
+[Sidenote: 206] As leuell as the Cannon to his blanck,[10]
+Transports his poysned shot, may miffe[11] our Name,
+And hit the woundlesse ayre.]
+
+[Footnote 1: unhappily.]
+
+[Footnote 2: He has hid the body--to make the whole look the work of a
+mad fit.]
+
+[Footnote 3: This line is not in the _Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _Not in Q. See margin above._]
+
+[Footnote 5: He has put it in a place which, little visited, is very
+dusty.]
+
+[Footnote 6: He is mad to them--sane only to his mother and Horatio.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _euphuistic_: 'asked a question by a sponge, what answer
+should a prince make?']
+
+[Footnote 8: _1st Q._:
+
+    For hee doth keep you as an Ape doth nuttes,
+    In the corner of his Iaw, first mouthes you,
+    Then swallowes you:]
+
+[Footnote 9: Here most modern editors insert, '_so, haply, slander_'.
+But, although I think the Poet left out this obscure passage merely from
+dissatisfaction with it, I believe it renders a worthy sense as it
+stands. The antecedent to _whose_ is _friends_: _cannon_ is nominative
+to _transports_; and the only difficulty is the epithet _poysned_
+applied to _shot_, which seems transposed from the idea of an
+_unfriendly_ whisper. Perhaps Shakspere wrote _poysed shot_. But taking
+this as it stands, the passage might be paraphrased thus: 'Whose
+(favourable) whisper over the world's diameter (_from one side of the
+world to the other_), as level (_as truly aimed_) as the cannon (of an
+evil whisper) transports its poisoned shot to his blank (_the white
+centre of the target_), may shoot past our name (so keeping us clear),
+and hit only the invulnerable air.' ('_the intrenchant air_': _Macbeth_,
+act v. sc. 8). This interpretation rests on the idea of
+over-condensation with its tendency to seeming confusion--the only fault
+I know in the Poet--a grand fault, peculiarly his own, born of the
+beating of his wings against the impossible. It is much as if, able to
+think two thoughts at once, he would compel his phrase to utter them at
+once.]
+
+[Footnote 10:
+
+                    for the harlot king
+    Is quite beyond mine arm, out of the blank
+    And level of my brain, plot-proof;
+
+    _The Winter's Tale_, act ii. sc. 3.
+
+    My life stands in the level of your dreams,
+
+    _Ibid_, act iii. sc. 2.]
+
+[Footnote 11: two _ff_ for two long _ss_.]
+
+[Page 186]
+
+_Ham._ I am glad of it: a knavish speech
+sleepes in a foolish eare.
+
+_Rosin._ My Lord, you must tell us where the
+body is, and go with us to the King.
+
+_Ham._ The body is with the King, but the King
+is not with the body.[1] The King, is a thing----
+
+_Guild._ A thing my Lord?
+
+_Ham._ Of nothing[2]: bring me to him, hide
+Fox, and all after.[3]              _Exeunt_[4]
+
+_Enter King._                      [Sidenote: _King, and two or three._]
+
+_King._ I have sent to seeke him, and to find the bodie:
+How dangerous is it that this man goes loose:[5]
+Yet must not we put the strong Law on him:
+[Sidenote: 212] Hee's loved of the distracted multitude,[6]
+Who like not in their iudgement, but their eyes:
+And where 'tis so, th'Offenders scourge is weigh'd
+But neerer the offence: to beare all smooth, and euen,
+                                                   [Sidenote: neuer the]
+This sodaine sending him away, must seeme
+[Sidenote: 120] Deliberate pause,[7] diseases desperate growne,
+By desperate appliance are releeved,
+Or not at all.       _Enter Rosincrane._
+                              [Sidenote: _Rosencraus and all the rest._]
+How now? What hath befalne?
+
+_Rosin._ Where the dead body is bestow'd my Lord,
+We cannot get from him.
+
+_King._ But where is he?[8]
+
+_Rosin._ Without my Lord, guarded[9] to know your pleasure.
+
+_King._ Bring him before us.
+
+_Rosin._ Hoa, Guildensterne? Bring in my Lord.
+                [Sidenote: _Ros._ How, bring in the Lord. _They enter._]
+
+_Enter Hamlet and Guildensterne_[10]
+
+_King._ Now _Hamlet_, where's _Polonius?_
+
+[Footnote 1: 'The body is in the king's house, therefore with the king;
+but the king knows not where, therefore the king is not with the body.']
+
+[Footnote 2: 'A thing of nothing' seems to have been a common phrase.]
+
+[Footnote 3: The _Quarto_ has not 'hide Fox, and all after.']
+
+[Footnote 4: Hamlet darts out, with the others after him, as in a hunt.
+Possibly there was a game called _Hide fox, and all after_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: He is a hypocrite even to himself.]
+
+[Footnote 6: This had all along helped to Hamlet's safety.]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'must be made to look the result of deliberate reflection.'
+Claudius fears the people may imagine Hamlet treacherously used, driven
+to self-defence, and hurried out of sight to be disposed of.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Emphasis on _he_; the point of importance with the king, is
+_where he is_, not where the body is.]
+
+[Footnote 9: Henceforward he is guarded, or at least closely watched,
+according to the _Folio_--left much to himself according to the
+_Quarto_. 192.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Page 188]
+
+_Ham._ At Supper.
+
+_King._ At Supper? Where?
+
+_Ham._ Not where he eats, but where he is eaten,
+                                                  [Sidenote: where a is]
+a certaine conuocation of wormes are e'ne at him.
+                                      [Sidenote: of politique wormes[1]]
+Your worm is your onely Emperor for diet. We
+fat all creatures else to fat vs, and we fat our selfe
+                                                   [Sidenote: ourselves]
+for Magots.  Your fat King, and your leane
+Begger is but variable seruice to dishes, but to one
+                                                  [Sidenote: two dishes]
+Table that's the end.
+
+[A]
+
+_King._ What dost thou meane by this?[2]
+
+_Ham._  Nothing but to shew you how a King
+may go a Progresse[3] through the guts of a Begger.[4]
+
+_King._ Where is _Polonius_.
+
+_Ham._ In heauen, send thither to see. If your
+Messenger finde him not there, seeke him i'th other
+place your selfe: but indeed, if you finde him not
+                  [Sidenote: but if indeed you find him not within this]
+this moneth, you shall nose him as you go vp the
+staires into the Lobby.
+
+_King._ Go seeke him there.
+
+_Ham._ He will stay till ye come.
+                                        [Sidenote: A will stay till you]
+
+_K._ _Hamlet_, this deed of thine, for thine especial safety
+                              [Sidenote: this deede for thine especiall]
+Which we do tender, as we deerely greeue
+For that which thou hast done,[5] must send thee hence
+With fierie Quicknesse.[6] Therefore prepare thy selfe,
+The Barke is readie, and the winde at helpe,[7]
+Th'Associates tend,[8] and euery thing at bent       [Sidenote: is bent]
+For England.
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto:_--
+
+_King_ Alas, alas.[9]
+
+_Ham._ A man may fish with the worme that hath eate of a King, and eate
+of the fish that hath fedde of that worme.]
+
+[Footnote 1: --such as Rosincrance and Guildensterne!]
+
+[Footnote 2: I suspect this and the following speech ought by the
+printers to have been omitted also: without the preceding two speeches
+of the Quarto they are not accounted for.]
+
+[Footnote 3: a royal progress.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Hamlet's philosophy deals much now with the worthlessness
+of all human distinctions and affairs.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'and we care for your safety as much as we grieve for the
+death of Polonius.']
+
+[Footnote 6: 'With fierie Quicknesse.' _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 7: fair--ready to help.]
+
+[Footnote 8: attend, wait.]
+
+[Footnote 9: pretending despair over his madness.]
+
+[Page 190]
+
+_Ham._ For England?
+
+_King._ I _Hamlet_.
+
+_Ham._ Good.
+
+_King._ So is it, if thou knew'st our purposes.
+
+_Ham._ I see a Cherube that see's him: but        [Sidenote: sees them,]
+come, for England. Farewell deere Mother.
+
+_King._ Thy louing Father _Hamlet_.
+
+_Hamlet._ My Mother: Father and Mother is
+man and wife: man and wife is one flesh, and so [Sidenote: flesh, so my]
+my mother.[1] Come, for England.     _Exit_
+
+[Sidenote: 195] _King._ Follow him at foote,[2]
+Tempt him with speed aboord:
+Delay it not, He haue him hence to night.
+Away, for euery thing is Seal'd and done
+That else leanes on[3] th'Affaire pray you make hast.
+And England, if my loue thou holdst at ought,
+As my great power thereof may giue thee sense,
+Since yet thy Cicatrice lookes raw and red[4]
+After the Danish Sword, and thy free awe
+Payes homage to vs[5]; thou maist not coldly set[6]
+Our Soueraigne Processe,[7] which imports at full
+By Letters conjuring to that effect                [Sidenote: congruing]
+The present death of _Hamlet_. Do it England,
+For like the Hecticke[8] in my blood he rages,
+And thou must cure me: Till I know 'tis done,
+How ere my happes,[9] my ioyes were ne're begun.[10]
+                                      [Sidenote: ioyes will nere begin.]
+                                       _Exit_[11]
+
+[Sidenote: 274]  [12]_Enter Fortinbras with an Armie._
+                               [Sidenote: with his Army ouer the stage.]
+
+_For._ Go Captaine, from me greet the Danish King,
+Tell him that by his license, _Fortinbras_
+[Sidenote: 78] Claimes the conueyance[13] of a promis'd March
+                                                  [Sidenote: Craues the]
+Ouer his Kingdome. You know the Rendeuous:[14]
+
+[Footnote 1: He will not touch the hand of his father's murderer.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'at his heels.']
+
+[Footnote 3: 'belongs to.']
+
+[Footnote 4: 'as my great power may give thee feeling of its value,
+seeing the scar of my vengeance has hardly yet had time to heal.']
+
+[Footnote 5: 'and thy fear uncompelled by our presence, pays homage to
+us.']
+
+[Footnote 6: 'set down to cool'; 'set in the cold.']
+
+[Footnote 7: _mandate_: 'Where's Fulvia's process?' _Ant. and Cl._, act
+i. sc. 1. _Shakespeare Lexicon_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: _hectic fever--habitual_ or constant fever.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'whatever my fortunes.']
+
+[Footnote 10: The original, the _Quarto_ reading--'_my ioyes will nere
+begin_' seems to me in itself better, and the cause of the change to be
+as follows.
+
+In the _Quarto_ the next scene stands as in our modern editions, ending
+with the rime,
+
+                  o from this time forth,
+    My thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth.   _Exit_.
+
+This was the act-pause, the natural end of act iii.
+
+But when the author struck out all but the commencement of the scene,
+leaving only the three little speeches of Fortinbras and his captain,
+then plainly the act-pause must fall at the end of the preceding scene.
+He therefore altered the end of the last verse to make it rime with the
+foregoing, in accordance with his frequent way of using a rime before an
+important pause.
+
+It perplexes us to think how on his way to the vessel, Hamlet could fall
+in with the Norwegian captain. This may have been one of Shakspere's
+reasons for striking the whole scene out--but he had other and more
+pregnant reasons.]
+
+[Footnote 11: Here is now the proper close of the _Third Act_.]
+
+[Footnote 12: _Commencement of the Fourth Act._
+
+Between the third and the fourth passes the time Hamlet is away; for the
+latter, in which he returns, and whose scenes are _contiguous_, needs no
+more than one day.]
+
+[Footnote 13: 'claims a convoy in fulfilment of the king's promise to
+allow him to march over his kingdom.' The meaning is made plainer by the
+correspondent passage in the _1st Quarto_:
+
+    Tell him that _Fortenbrasse_ nephew to old _Norway_,
+    Craues a free passe and conduct ouer his land,
+    According to the Articles agreed on:]
+
+[Footnote 14: 'where to rejoin us.']
+
+[Page 192]
+
+If that his Maiesty would ought with vs,
+We shall expresse our dutie in his eye,[1]
+And let[2] him know so.
+
+_Cap._ I will doo't, my Lord.
+
+_For._ Go safely[3] on.      _Exit._                  [Sidenote: softly]
+
+[A]
+
+[4] _Enter Queene and Horatio_.
+                 [Sidenote: _Enter Horatio, Gertrard, and a Gentleman_.]
+
+_Qu._ I will not speake with her.
+
+_Hor._[5] She is importunate, indeed distract, her   [Sidenote: _Gent_.]
+moode will needs be pittied.
+
+_Qu_. What would she haue?
+
+_Hor_. She speakes much of her Father; saies she heares
+                                                     [Sidenote: _Gent_.]
+
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+_Enter Hamlet, Rosencraus, &c._
+
+_Ham_. Good sir whose powers are these?
+
+_Cap_. They are of _Norway_ sir.
+
+_Ham_. How purposd sir I pray you?
+
+_Cap_. Against some part of _Poland_.
+
+_Ham_. Who commaunds them sir?
+
+_Cap_. The Nephew to old _Norway, Fortenbrasse_.
+
+_Ham_. Goes it against the maine of _Poland_ sir,
+Or for some frontire?
+
+_Cap_. Truly to speake, and with no addition,[6]
+We goe to gaine a little patch of ground[7]
+That hath in it no profit but the name
+To pay fiue duckets, fiue I would not farme it;
+Nor will it yeeld to _Norway_ or the _Pole_
+A rancker rate, should it be sold in fee.
+
+_Ham_. Why then the Pollacke neuer will defend it.
+
+_Cap_. Yes, it is already garisond.
+
+_Ham_. Two thousand soules, and twenty thousand duckets
+Will not debate the question of this straw
+This is th'Impostume of much wealth and peace,
+That inward breakes, and showes no cause without
+Why the man dies.[8] I humbly thanke you sir.
+
+_Cap_. God buy you sir.
+
+_Ros_. Wil't please you goe my Lord?
+
+[Sidenote: 187, 195] _Ham_. Ile be with you straight, goe a little
+before.[9]
+[10]How all occasions[11] doe informe against me,
+
+[Continued on next text page.]]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'we shall pay our respects, waiting upon his person.']
+
+[Footnote 2: 'let,' _imperative mood_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'with proper precaution,' _said to his attendant
+officers._]
+
+[Footnote 4: This was originally intended, I repeat, for the
+commencement of the act. But when the greater part of the foregoing
+scene was omitted, and the third act made to end with the scene before
+that, then the small part left of the all-but-cancelled scene must open
+the fourth act.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Hamlet absent, we find his friend looking after Ophelia.
+Gertrude seems less friendly towards her.]
+
+[Footnote 6: exaggeration.]
+
+[Footnote 7: --probably a small outlying island or coast-fortress, _not
+far off_, else why should Norway care about it at all? If the word
+_frontier_ has the meaning, as the _Shakespeare Lexicon_ says, of 'an
+outwork in fortification,' its use two lines back would, taken
+figuratively, tend to support this.]
+
+[Footnote 8: The meaning may be as in the following paraphrase: 'This
+quarrelling about nothing is (the breaking of) the abscess caused by
+wealth and peace--which breaking inward (in general corruption), would
+show no outward sore in sign of why death came.' Or it might be _forced_
+thus:--
+
+    This is the imposthume of much wealth and peace.
+    That (which) inward breaks, and shows no cause without--
+    Why, the man dies!
+
+But it may mean:--'The war is an imposthume, which will break within,
+and cause much affliction to the people that make the war.' On the other
+hand, Hamlet seems to regard it as a process for, almost a sign of
+health.]
+
+[Footnote 9: Note his freedom.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _See_ 'examples grosse as earth' _below_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: While every word that Shakspere wrote we may well take
+pains to grasp thoroughly, my endeavour to cast light on this passage is
+made with the distinct understanding in my own mind that the author
+himself disapproved of and omitted it, and that good reason is not
+wanting why he should have done so. At the same time, if my student, for
+this book is for those who would have help and will take pains to the
+true understanding of the play, would yet retain the passage, I protest
+against the acceptance of Hamlet's judgment of himself, except as
+revealing the simplicity and humility of his nature and character. That
+as often as a vivid memory of either interview with the Ghost came back
+upon him, he should feel rebuked and ashamed, and vexed with himself,
+is, in the morally, intellectually, and emotionally troubled state of
+his mind, nowise the less natural that he had the best of reasons for
+the delay because of which he _here_ so unmercifully abuses himself. A
+man of self-satisfied temperament would never in similar circumstances
+have done so. But Hamlet was, by nature and education, far from such
+self-satisfaction; and there is in him besides such a strife and turmoil
+of opposing passions and feelings and apparent duties, as can but rarely
+rise in a human soul. With which he ought to side, his conscience is not
+sure--sides therefore now with one, now with another. At the same time
+it is by no means the long delay the critics imagine of which he is
+accusing himself--it is only that the thing _is not done_.
+
+In certain moods the action a man dislikes will _therefore_ look to him
+the more like a duty; and this helps to prevent Hamlet from knowing
+always how great a part conscience bears in the omission because of
+which he condemns and even contemns himself. The conscience does not
+naturally examine itself--is not necessarily self-conscious. In any
+soliloquy, a man must speak from his present mood: we who are not
+suffering, and who have many of his moods before us, ought to understand
+Hamlet better than he understands himself. To himself, sitting in
+judgment on himself, it would hardly appear a decent cause of, not to
+say reason for, a moment's delay in punishing his uncle, that he was so
+weighed down with misery because of his mother and Ophelia, that it
+seemed of no use to kill one villain out of the villainous world; it
+would seem but 'bestial oblivion'; and, although his reputation as a
+prince was deeply concerned, _any_ reflection on the consequences to
+himself would at times appear but a 'craven scruple'; while at times
+even the whispers of conscience might seem a 'thinking too precisely on
+the event.' A conscientious man of changeful mood wilt be very ready in
+either mood to condemn the other. The best and rightest men will
+sometimes accuse themselves in a manner that seems to those who know
+them best, unfounded, unreasonable, almost absurd. We must not, I say,
+take the hero's judgment of himself as the author's judgment of him. The
+two judgments, that of a man upon himself from within, and that of his
+beholder upon him from without, are not congeneric. They are different
+in origin and in kind, and cannot be adopted either of them into the
+source of the other without most serious and dangerous mistake. So
+adopted, each becomes another thing altogether. It is to me probable
+that, although it involves other unfitnesses, the Poet omitted the
+passage chiefly from coming to see the danger of its giving occasion, or
+at least support, to an altogether mistaken and unjust idea of his
+Hamlet.]
+
+[Page 194]
+
+There's trickes i'th'world, and hems, and beats her heart,
+Spurnes enuiously at Strawes,[1] speakes things in doubt,[2]
+That carry but halfe sense: Her speech is nothing,[3]
+Yet the vnshaped vse of it[4] doth moue
+The hearers to Collection[5]; they ayme[6] at it,
+                                               [Sidenote: they yawne at]
+And botch the words[7] vp fit to their owne thoughts
+
+
+[_Continuation of quote from Quarto from previous text page_:--
+
+And spur my dull reuenge. [8]What is a man
+If his chiefe good and market of his time
+Be but to sleepe and feede, a beast, no more;
+Sure he that made vs with such large discourse[9]
+Looking before and after, gaue vs not
+That capabilitie and god-like reason
+To fust in vs vnvsd,[8] now whether it be
+[Sidenote: 52, 120] Bestiall obliuion,[10] or some crauen scruple
+Of thinking too precisely on th'euent,[11]
+A thought which quarterd hath but one part wisedom,
+And euer three parts coward, I doe not know
+Why yet I liue to say this thing's to doe,
+Sith I haue cause, and will, and strength, and meanes
+To doo't;[12] examples grosse as earth exhort me,
+Witnes this Army of such masse and charge,
+[Sidenote: 235] Led by a delicate and tender Prince,
+Whose spirit with diuine ambition puft,
+Makes mouthes at the invisible euent,
+[Sidenote: 120] Exposing what is mortall, and vnsure,
+To all that fortune, death, and danger dare,[13]
+Euen for an Egge-shell. Rightly to be great,
+Is not to stirre without great argument,
+But greatly to find quarrell in a straw
+When honour's at the stake, how stand I then
+That haue a father kild, a mother staind,
+Excytements of my reason, and my blood,
+And let all sleepe,[14] while to my shame I see
+The iminent death of twenty thousand men,
+That for a fantasie and tricke[15] of fame
+Goe to their graues like beds, fight for a plot
+Whereon the numbers cannot try the cause,[16]
+Which is not tombe enough and continent[17]
+To hide the slaine,[18] o from this time forth,
+My thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth.[19]    _Exit._]
+
+[Footnote 1: trifles.]
+
+[Footnote 2: doubtfully.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'there is nothing in her speech.']
+
+[Footnote 4: 'the formless mode of it.']
+
+[Footnote 5: 'to gathering things and putting them together.']
+
+[Footnote 6: guess.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Ophelia's words.]
+
+[Footnote 8: I am in doubt whether this passage from 'What is a man'
+down to 'unused,' does not refer to the king, and whether Hamlet is not
+persuading himself that it can be no such objectionable thing to kill
+one hardly above a beast. At all events it is far more applicable to the
+king: it was not one of Hamlet's faults, in any case, to fail of using
+his reason. But he may just as well accuse himself of that too! At the
+same time the worst neglect of reason lies in not carrying out its
+conclusions, and if we cannot justify Hamlet in his delay, the passage
+is of good application to him. 'Bestiall oblivion' does seem to connect
+himself with the reflection; but how thoroughly is the thing intended by
+such a phrase alien from the character of Hamlet!]
+
+[Footnote 9: --the mental faculty of running hither and thither: 'We
+look before and after.' _Shelley: To a Skylark_.]
+
+[Footnote 10: --the forgetfulness of such a beast as he has just
+mentioned.]
+
+[Footnote 11: --the _consequences_. The scruples that come of thinking
+of the event, Hamlet certainly had: that they were _craven_ scruples,
+that his thinking was too precise, I deny to the face of the noble
+self-accuser. Is that a craven scruple which, seeing no good to result
+from the horrid deed, shrinks from its irretrievableness, and demands at
+least absolute assurance of guilt? or that 'a thinking too precisely on
+the event,' to desire, as the prince of his people, to leave an un
+wounded name behind him?]
+
+[Footnote 12: This passage is the strongest there is on the side of the
+ordinary misconception of the character of Hamlet. It comes from
+himself; and it is as ungenerous as it is common and unfair to use such
+a weapon against a man. Does any but St. Paul himself say he was the
+chief of sinners? Consider Hamlet's condition, tormented on all sides,
+within and without, and think whether this outbreak against himself be
+not as unfair as it is natural. Lest it should be accepted against him,
+Shakspere did well to leave it out. In bitter disappointment, both
+because of what is and what is not, both because of what he has done and
+what he has failed to do, having for the time lost all chance, with the
+last vision of the Ghost still haunting his eyes, his last reproachful
+words yet ringing in his ears, are we bound to take his judgment of
+himself because it is against himself? Are we _bound_ to take any man's
+judgment because it is against himself? I answer, 'No more than if it
+were for himself.' A good man's judgment, where he is at all perplexed,
+especially if his motive comes within his own question, is ready to be
+against himself, as a bad man's is sure to be for himself. Or because he
+is a philosopher, does it follow that throughout he understands himself?
+Were such a man in cool, untroubled conditions, we might feel compelled
+to take his judgment, but surely not here! A philosopher in such state
+as Hamlet's would understand the quality of his spiritual operations
+with no more certainty than another man. In his present mood, Hamlet
+forgets the cogency of the reasons that swayed him in the other; forgets
+that his uppermost feeling then was doubt, as horror, indignation, and
+conviction are uppermost now. Things were never so clear to Hamlet as to
+us.
+
+But how can he say he has strength and means--in the position in which
+he now finds himself? I am glad to be able to believe, let my defence of
+Hamlet against himself be right or wrong, that Shakspere intended the
+omission of the passage. I lay nothing on the great lack of logic
+throughout the speech, for that would not make it unfit for Hamlet in
+such mood, while it makes its omission from the play of less consequence
+to my general argument.]
+
+[Footnote 13: _threaten_. This supports my argument as to the great
+soliloquy--that it was death as the result of his slaying the king, or
+attempting to do so, not death by suicide, he was thinking of: he
+expected to die himself in the punishing of his uncle.]
+
+[Footnote 14: He had had no chance but that when the king was on his
+knees.]
+
+[Footnote 15: 'a fancy and illusion.']
+
+[Footnote 16: 'which is too small for those engaged to find room to
+fight on it.']
+
+[Footnote 17: 'continent,' _containing space_.]
+
+[Footnote 18: This soliloquy is antithetic to the other. Here is no
+thought of the 'something after death.']
+
+[Footnote 19: If, with this speech in his mouth, Hamlet goes coolly on
+board the vessel, _not being compelled thereto_ (190, 192, 216), and
+possessing means to his vengeance, as here he says, and goes merely in
+order to hoist Rosincrance and Guildensterne with their own petard--that
+is, if we must keep the omitted passages, then the author exposes his
+hero to a more depreciatory judgment than any from which I would justify
+him, and a conception of his character entirely inconsistent with the
+rest of the play. He did not observe the risk at the time he wrote the
+passage, but discovering it afterwards, rectified the oversight--to the
+dissatisfaction of his critics, who have agreed in restoring what he
+cancelled.]
+
+[Page 196]
+
+Which as her winkes, and nods, and gestures yeeld[1] them,
+Indeed would make one thinke there would[2] be thought,
+                                           [Sidenote: there might[2] be]
+Though nothing sure, yet much vnhappily.
+
+_Qu_. 'Twere good she were spoken with,[3]           [Sidenote: _Hora_.]
+For she may strew dangerous coniectures
+In ill breeding minds.[4] Let her come in.  [Sidenote: _Enter Ophelia_.]
+To my sicke soule (as sinnes true Nature is)
+                                           [Sidenote: _Quee_. 'To my[5]]
+Each toy seemes Prologue, to some great amisse,        [Sidenote: 'Each]
+So full of Artlesse iealousie is guilt,                  [Sidenote: 'So]
+It spill's it selfe, in fearing to be spilt.[6]          [Sidenote: 'It]
+
+_Enter Ophelia distracted_.[7]
+
+_Ophe_. Where is the beauteous Maiesty of
+Denmark.
+
+_Qu_. How now _Ophelia_?                       [Sidenote: _shee sings_.]
+
+_Ophe. How should I your true loue know from another one?
+By his Cockle hat and staffe, and his Sandal shoone._
+
+_Qu_. Alas sweet Lady: what imports this Song?
+
+_Ophe_. Say you? Nay pray you marke.
+_He is dead and gone Lady, he is dead and gone,
+At his head a grasse-greene Turfe, at his heeles a stone._
+                                                       [Sidenote: O ho.]
+
+_Enter King_.
+
+_Qu_. Nay but _Ophelia_.
+
+_Ophe_. Pray you marke.
+_White his Shrow'd as the Mountaine Snow._     [Sidenote: _Enter King_.]
+
+_Qu_. Alas looke heere my Lord,
+
+[Sidenote: 246] _Ophe. Larded[8] with sweet flowers_:
+                                             [Sidenote: Larded all with]
+_Which bewept to the graue did not go_,     [Sidenote: ground | _Song_.]
+_With true-loue showres_,
+
+[Footnote 1: 'present them,'--her words, that is--giving significance or
+interpretation to them.]
+
+[Footnote 2: If this _would_, and not the _might_ of the _Quarto_, be
+the correct reading, it means that Ophelia would have something thought
+so and so.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --changing her mind on Horatio's representation. At first
+she would not speak with her.]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'minds that breed evil.']
+
+[Footnote 5: --as a quotation.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Instance, the history of Macbeth.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _1st Q. Enter Ofelia playing on a Lute, and her haire downe
+singing._
+
+Hamlet's apparent madness would seem to pass into real madness in
+Ophelia. King Lear's growing perturbation becomes insanity the moment he
+sees the pretended madman Edgar.
+
+The forms of Ophelia's madness show it was not her father's death that
+drove her mad, but his death by the hand of Hamlet, which, with Hamlet's
+banishment, destroyed all the hope the queen had been fostering in her
+of marrying him some day.]
+
+[Footnote 8: This expression is, as Dr. Johnson says, taken from
+cookery; but it is so used elsewhere by Shakspere that we cannot regard
+it here as a scintillation of Ophelia's insanity.]
+
+[Page 198]
+
+_King_. How do ye, pretty Lady?                          [Sidenote: you]
+
+_Ophe_. Well, God dil'd you.[1] They say the
+                                           [Sidenote: good dild you,[1]]
+Owle was a Bakers daughter.[2] Lord, wee know
+what we are, but know not what we may be. God
+be at your Table.
+
+[Sidenote: 174] _King_. Conceit[3] vpon her Father.
+
+_Ophe_. Pray you let's haue no words of this:      [Sidenote: Pray lets]
+but when they aske you what it meanes, say you
+this:
+
+[4] _To morrow is S. Valentines day, all in the morning betime,
+And I a Maid at your Window to be your Valentine.
+Then vp he rose, and don'd[5] his clothes, and dupt[5] the chamber dore,
+Let in the Maid, that out a Maid, neuer departed more._
+
+_King_. Pretty _Ophelia._
+
+_Ophe_. Indeed la? without an oath Ile make an
+                                             [Sidenote: Indeede without]
+end ont.[6]
+
+_By gis, and by S. Charity,
+Alacke, and fie for shame:
+Yong men wil doo't, if they come too't,
+By Cocke they are too blame.
+Quoth she before you tumbled me,
+You promis'd me to Wed:
+So would I ha done by yonder Sunne_,  [Sidenote: (He answers,) So would]
+_And thou hadst not come to my bed._
+
+_King_. How long hath she bin this?              [Sidenote: beene thus?]
+
+_Ophe_. I hope all will be well. We must bee
+patient, but I cannot choose but weepe, to thinke
+they should lay him i'th'cold ground: My brother
+                                              [Sidenote: they wouid lay]
+shall knowe of it, and so I thanke you for your
+good counsell. Come, my Coach: Goodnight
+Ladies: Goodnight sweet Ladies: Goodnight,
+goodnight.                       _Exit_[7]
+
+[Footnote 1: _1st Q_. 'God yeeld you,' that is, _reward you_. Here we
+have a blunder for the contraction, 'God 'ild you'--perhaps a common
+blunder.]
+
+[Footnote 2: For the silly legend, see Douce's note in _Johnson and
+Steevens_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: imaginative brooding.]
+
+[Footnote 4: We dare no judgment on madness in life: we need not in
+art.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Preterites of _don_ and _dup_, contracted from _do on_ and
+_do up_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: --disclaiming false modesty.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _Not in Q_.]
+
+[Page 200]
+
+_King_. Follow her close,
+Giue her good watch I pray you:
+Oh this is the poyson of deepe greefe, it springs
+All from her Fathers death. Oh _Gertrude, Gertrude_,
+      [Sidenote: death, and now behold, o _Gertrard, Gertrard_,]
+When sorrowes comes, they come not single spies,[1]
+                                               [Sidenote: sorrowes come]
+But in Battaliaes. First, her Father slaine,     [Sidenote: battalians:]
+Next your Sonne gone, and he most violent Author
+Of his owne iust remoue: the people muddied,[2]
+Thicke and vnwholsome in their thoughts, and whispers
+                                                 [Sidenote: in thoughts]
+For[3] good _Polonius_ death; and we haue done but greenly
+[Sidenote: 182] In hugger mugger[4] to interre him. Poore _Ophelia_
+Diuided from her selfe,[5] and her faire Iudgement,
+Without the which we are Pictures, or meere Beasts.
+Last, and as much containing as all these,
+Her Brother is in secret come from France,
+Keepes on his wonder,[6] keepes himselfe in clouds,
+                                            [Sidenote: Feeds on this[6]]
+And wants not Buzzers to infect his eare                [Sidenote: care]
+With pestilent Speeches of his Fathers death,
+Where in necessitie of matter Beggard,     [Sidenote: Wherein necessity]
+Will nothing sticke our persons to Arraigne           [Sidenote: person]
+In eare and eare.[7] O my deere _Gertrude_, this,
+Like to a murdering Peece[8] in many places,
+Giues me superfluous death.          _A Noise within_.
+
+_Enter a Messenger_.
+
+_Qu_. Alacke, what noyse is this?[9]
+
+_King_. Where are my _Switzers_?[10]
+                       [Sidenote: _King_. Attend, where is my Swissers,]
+Let them guard the doore. What is the matter?
+
+_Mes_. Saue your selfe, my Lord.
+[Sidenote: 120] The Ocean (ouer-peering of his List[11])
+Eates not the Flats with more impittious[12] haste
+
+[Footnote 1: --each alone, like scouts.]
+
+[Footnote 2: stirred up like pools--with similar result.]
+
+[Footnote 3: because of.]
+
+[Footnote 4: The king wished to avoid giving the people any pretext or
+cause for interfering: he dreaded whatever might lead to enquiry--to the
+queen of course pretending it was to avoid exposing Hamlet to the
+popular indignation. _Hugger mugger--secretly: Steevens and Malone._]
+
+[Footnote 5: The phrase has the same _visual_ root as _beside
+herself_--both signifying '_not at one_ with herself.']
+
+[Footnote 6: If the _Quarto_ reading is right, 'this wonder' means the
+hurried and suspicious funeral of his father. But the _Folio_ reading is
+quite Shaksperean: 'He keeps on (as a garment) the wonder of the people
+at him'; _keeps his behaviour such that the people go on wondering about
+him_: the phrase is explained by the next clause. Compare:
+
+    By being seldom seen, I could not stir
+    But, like a comet, I was wondered at.
+
+_K. Henry IV. P. I_. act iii. sc. 1.]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'wherein Necessity, beggared of material, will not scruple
+to whisper invented accusations against us.']
+
+[Footnote 8: --the name given to a certain small cannon--perhaps charged
+with various missiles, hence the better figuring the number and variety
+of 'sorrows' he has just recounted.]
+
+[Footnote 9: _This line not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 10: Note that the king is well guarded, and Hamlet had to lay
+his account with great risk in the act of killing him.]
+
+[Footnote 11: _border, as of cloth_: the mounds thrown up to keep the sea out.
+The figure here specially fits a Dane.]
+
+[Footnote 12: I do not know whether this word means _pitiless_, or
+stands for _impetuous_. The _Quarto_ has one _t_.]
+
+[Page 202]
+
+Then young _Laertes_, in a Riotous head,[1]
+Ore-beares your Officers, the rabble call him Lord,
+And as the world were now but to begin,
+Antiquity forgot, Custome not knowne,
+The Ratifiers and props of euery word,[2]
+[Sidenote: 62] They cry choose we? _Laertes_ shall be King,[3]
+                                                     [Sidenote: The cry]
+Caps, hands, and tongues, applaud it to the clouds,
+_Laertes_ shall be King, _Laertes_ King.
+
+_Qu_. How cheerefully on the false Traile they cry,
+                                           [Sidenote: _A noise within_.]
+Oh this is Counter you false Danish Dogges.[4]
+
+_Noise within.  Enter Laertes_[5].    [Sidenote: _Laertes with others_.]
+
+_King_. The doores are broke.
+
+_Laer_. Where is the King, sirs? Stand you all without.
+                                       [Sidenote: this King? sirs stand]
+
+_All_. No, let's come in.
+
+_Laer_. I pray you giue me leaue.[6]
+
+_All_. We will, we will.
+
+_Laer_. I thanke you: Keepe the doore.
+Oh thou vilde King, giue me my Father.
+
+_Qu_. Calmely good _Laertes_.
+
+_Laer_. That drop of blood, that calmes[7]       [Sidenote: thats calme]
+Proclaimes me Bastard:
+Cries Cuckold to my Father, brands the Harlot
+Euen heere betweene the chaste vnsmirched brow
+Of my true Mother.[8]
+
+_Kin_. What is the cause _Laertes_,
+That thy Rebellion lookes so Gyant-like?
+Let him go _Gertrude_: Do not feare[9] our person:
+There's such Diuinity doth hedge a King,[10]
+That Treason can but peepe to what it would,
+Acts little of his will.[11] Tell me _Laertes_,
+
+[Footnote 1: _Head_ is a rising or gathering of people--generally
+rebellious, I think.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Antiquity and Custom.]
+
+[Footnote 3: This refers to the election of Claudius--evidently not a
+popular election, but effected by intrigue with the aristocracy and the
+army: 'They cry, Let us choose: Laertes shall be king!'
+
+We may suppose the attempt of Claudius to have been favoured by the
+lingering influence of the old Norse custom of succession, by which not
+the son but the brother inherited. 16, _bis._]
+
+[Footnote 4: To hunt counter is to 'hunt the game by the heel or track.'
+The queen therefore accuses them of not using their scent or judgment,
+but following appearances.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Now at length re-appears Laertes, who has during the
+interim been ripening in Paris for villainy. He is wanted for the
+catastrophe, and requires but the last process of a few hours in the
+hell-oven of a king's instigation.]
+
+[Footnote 6: The customary and polite way of saying _leave me_: 'grant
+me your absence.' 85, 89.]
+
+[Footnote 7: grows calm.]
+
+[Footnote 8: In taking vengeance Hamlet must acknowledge his mother such
+as Laertes says inaction on his part would proclaim his mother.
+
+The actress should here let a shadow cross the queen's face: though too
+weak to break with the king, she has begun to repent.]
+
+[Footnote 9: fear _for_.]
+
+[Footnote 10: The consummate hypocrite claims the protection of the
+sacred hedge through which he had himself broken--or crept rather, like
+a snake, to kill. He can act innocence the better that his conscience is
+clear as to Polonius.]
+
+[Footnote 11: 'can only peep through the hedge to its desire--acts
+little of its will.']
+
+[Page 204]
+
+Why thou art thus Incenst? Let him go _Gertrude_.
+Speake man.
+
+_Laer_. Where's my Father?                             [Sidenote: is my]
+
+_King_. Dead.
+
+_Qu_. But not by him.
+
+_King_. Let him demand his fill.
+
+_Laer_. How came he dead? Ile not be Iuggel'd with.
+To hell Allegeance: Vowes, to the blackest diuell.
+Conscience and Grace, to the profoundest Pit
+I dare Damnation: to this point I stand,
+That both the worlds I giue to negligence,
+Let come what comes: onely Ile be reueng'd
+Most throughly for my Father.
+
+_King_. Who shall stay you?[1]
+
+_Laer_. My Will, not all the world,[1]               [Sidenote: worlds:]
+And for my meanes, Ile husband them so well,
+They shall go farre with little.
+
+_King_. Good _Laertes_:
+If you desire to know the certaintie
+Of your deere Fathers death, if writ in your reuenge,
+                                           [Sidenote: Father, i'st writ]
+That Soop-stake[2] you will draw both Friend and Foe,
+Winner and Looser.[3]
+
+_Laer_. None but his Enemies.
+
+_King_. Will you know them then.
+
+_La_. To his good Friends, thus wide Ile ope my Armes:
+And like the kinde Life-rend'ring Politician,[4]
+                                      [Sidenote: life-rendring Pelican,]
+Repast them with my blood.[5]
+
+_King_. Why now you speake
+Like a good Childe,[6] and a true Gentleman.
+That I am guiltlesse of your Fathers death,
+And am most sensible in greefe for it,[7]           [Sidenote: sencibly]
+
+[Footnote 1:
+
+    'Who shall _prevent_ you?'
+    'My own will only--not all the world,'
+
+or,
+
+    'Who will _support_ you?'
+    'My will. Not all the world shall prevent me,'--
+
+so playing on the two meanings of the word _stay._ Or it _might_ mean:
+'Not all the world shall stay my will.']
+
+[Footnote 2: swoop-stake--_sweepstakes_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'and be loser as well as winner--' If the _Folio's_ is
+the right reading, then the sentence is unfinished, and should have a
+dash, not a period.]
+
+[Footnote 4: A curious misprint: may we not suspect a somewhat dull
+joker among the compositors?]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'a true son to your father.']
+
+[Footnote 7: 'feel much grief for it.']
+
+[Footnote 5: Laertes is a ranter--false everywhere.
+
+Plainly he is introduced as the foil from which Hamlet 'shall stick
+fiery off.' In this speech he shows his moral condition directly the
+opposite of Hamlet's: he has no principle but revenge. His conduct ought
+to be quite satisfactory to Hamlet's critics; there is action enough in
+it of the very kind they would have of Hamlet; and doubtless it would be
+satisfactory to them but for the treachery that follows. The one, dearly
+loving a father who deserves immeasurably better of him than Polonius of
+Laertes, will not for the sake of revenge disregard either conscience,
+justice, or grace; the other will not delay even to inquire into the
+facts of his father's fate, but will act at once on hearsay, rushing to
+a blind satisfaction that cannot even be called retaliation, caring for
+neither right nor wrong, cursing conscience and the will of God, and
+daring damnation. He slights assurance as to the hand by which his
+father fell, dismisses all reflection that might interfere with a stupid
+revenge. To make up one's mind at once, and act without ground, is
+weakness, not strength: this Laertes does--and is therefore just the man
+to be the villainous, not the innocent, tool of villainy. He who has
+sufficing ground and refuses to act is weak; but the ground that will
+satisfy the populace, of which the commonplace critic is the fair type,
+will not satisfy either the man of conscience or of wisdom. The mass of
+world-bepraised action owes its existence to the pressure of
+circumstance, not to the will and conscience of the man. Hamlet waits
+for light, even with his heart accusing him; Laertes rushes into the
+dark, dagger in hand, like a mad Malay: so he kill, he cares not whom.
+Such a man is easily tempted to the vilest treachery, for the light that
+is in him is darkness; he is not a true man; he is false in himself.
+This is what comes of his father's maxim:
+
+    To thine own self be true;
+    And it must follow, _as the night the day_ (!)
+    Thou canst not then be false to any man.
+
+Like the aphorism 'Honesty is the best policy,' it reveals the
+difference between a fact and a truth. Both sayings are correct as
+facts, but as guides of conduct devilishly false, leading to dishonesty
+and treachery. To be true to the divine self in us, is indeed to be true
+to all; but it is only by being true to all, against the ever present
+and urging false self, that at length we shall see the divine self rise
+above the chaotic waters of our selfishness, and know it so as to be
+true to it.
+
+Of Laertes we must note also that it is not all for love of his father
+that he is ready to cast allegiance to hell, and kill the king: he has
+the voice of the people to succeed him.]
+
+[Page 206]
+
+[Sidenote: 184] It shall as leuell to your Iudgement pierce
+                                                      [Sidenote: peare']
+As day do's to your eye.[1]
+
+_A noise within. [2]Let her come in._
+
+_Enter Ophelia[3]_
+
+_Laer_. How now? what noise is that?[4]
+                           [Sidenote: _Laer_. Let her come in. How now,]
+Oh heate drie vp my Braines, teares seuen times salt,
+Burne out the Sence and Vertue of mine eye.
+By Heauen, thy madnesse shall be payed by waight,
+                                                 [Sidenote: with weight]
+Till our Scale turnes the beame. Oh Rose of May,       [Sidenote: turne]
+Deere Maid, kinde Sister, sweet _Ophelia_:
+Oh Heauens, is't possible, a yong Maids wits,
+Should be as mortall as an old mans life?[5]    [Sidenote: a poore mans]
+Nature is fine[6] in Loue, and where 'tis fine,
+It sends some precious instance of it selfe
+After the thing it loues.[7]
+
+_Ophe. They bore him bare fac'd on the Beer._
+                              [Sidenote: _Song_.] [Sidenote: bare-faste]
+_Hey non nony, nony, hey nony:[8]
+And on his graue raines many a teare_,
+                                     [Sidenote: And in his graue rain'd]
+_Fare you well my Doue._
+
+_Laer_. Had'st thou thy wits, and did'st perswade
+Reuenge, it could not moue thus.
+
+_Ophe_. You must sing downe a-downe, and
+                                   [Sidenote: sing a downe a downe, And]
+you call him[9] a-downe-a. Oh, how the wheele[10]
+becomes it? It is the false Steward that stole his
+masters daughter.[11]
+
+_Laer_. This nothings more then matter.[12]
+
+_Ophe_. There's Rosemary,[13] that's for Remembraunce.
+Pray loue remember: and there is             [Sidenote: , pray you loue]
+Paconcies, that's for Thoughts.                  [Sidenote: Pancies[14]]
+
+_Laer_. A document[15] in madnesse, thoughts and
+remembrance fitted.
+
+_Ophe_. There's Fennell[16] for you, and Columbines[16]:
+ther's Rew[17] for you, and heere's some for
+
+[Footnote 1: 'pierce as _directly_ to your judgment.'
+
+But the simile of the _day_ seems to favour the reading of the
+_Q._--'peare,' for _appear_. In the word _level_ would then be indicated
+the _rising_ sun.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 3: _1st Q. 'Enter Ofelia as before_.']
+
+[Footnote 4: To render it credible that Laertes could entertain the vile
+proposal the king is about to make, it is needful that all possible
+influences should be represented as combining to swell the commotion of
+his spirit, and overwhelm what poor judgment and yet poorer conscience
+he had. Altogether unprepared, he learns Ophelia's pitiful condition by
+the sudden sight of the harrowing change in her--and not till after that
+hears who killed his father and brought madness on his sister.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _1st Q._
+
+    I'st possible a yong maides life,
+    Should be as mortall as an olde mans sawe?]
+
+[Footnote 6: delicate, exquisite.]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'where 'tis fine': I suggest that the _it_ here may be
+impersonal: 'where _things_, where _all_ is fine,' that is, 'in a fine
+soul'; then the meaning would be, 'Nature is fine always in love, and
+where the soul also is fine, she sends from it' &c. But the _where_ may
+be equal, perhaps, to _whereas_. I can hardly think the phrase means
+merely '_and where it is in love_.' It might intend--'and where Love is
+fine, it sends' &c. The 'precious instance of itself,' that is,
+'something that is a part and specimen of itself,' is here the 'young
+maid's wits': they are sent after the 'old man's life.'--These three
+lines are not in the Quarto. It is not disputed that they are from
+Shakspere's hand: if the insertion of these be his, why should the
+omission of others not be his also?]
+
+[Footnote 8: _This line is not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 9: '_if_ you call him': I think this is not a part of the
+song, but is spoken of her father.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _the burden of the song_: Steevens.]
+
+[Footnote 11: The subject of the ballad.]
+
+[Footnote 12: 'more than sense'--in incitation to revenge.]
+
+[Footnote 13: --an evergreen, and carried at funerals: _Johnson_.
+
+    For you there's rosemary and rue; these keep
+    Seeming and savour ail the winter long:
+    Grace and remembrance be to you both.
+
+_The Winter's Tale_, act iv. sc. 3.]
+
+[Footnote 14: _pensees_.]
+
+[Footnote 15: _a teaching, a lesson_--the fitting of thoughts and
+remembrance, namely--which he applies to his intent of revenge. Or may
+it not rather be meant that the putting of these two flowers together
+was a happy hit of her madness, presenting the fantastic emblem of a
+document or writing--the very idea of which is the keeping of thoughts
+in remembrance?]
+
+[Footnote 16: --said to mean _flattery_ and _thanklessness_--perhaps
+given to the king.]
+
+[Footnote 17: _Repentance_--given to the queen. Another name of the
+plant was _Herb-Grace_, as below, in allusion, doubtless, to its common
+name--_rue_ or _repentance_ being both the gift of God, and an act of
+grace.]
+
+[Page 208]
+
+me. Wee may call it Herbe-Grace a Sundaies:
+                    [Sidenote: herbe of Grace a Sondaies, you may weare]
+Oh you must weare your Rew with a difference.[1]
+There's a Daysie,[2] I would giue you some Violets,[3]
+but they wither'd all when my Father dyed: They
+say, he made a good end;                          [Sidenote: say a made]
+
+_For bonny sweet Robin is all my ioy._
+
+_Laer_. Thought, and Affliction, Passion, Hell it selfe:
+                                                [Sidenote: afflictions,]
+She turnes to Fauour, and to prettinesse.
+
+                                                      [Sidenote:_Song._]
+
+_Ophe. And will he not come againe_,              [Sidenote: will a not]
+_And will he not come againe_:                    [Sidenote: will a not]
+_No, no, he is dead, go to thy Death-bed,
+He neuer wil come againe.
+His Beard as white as Snow_,                    [Sidenote: beard was as]
+_All[4] Flaxen was his Pole:
+He is gone, he is gone, and we cast away mone,
+Gramercy[5] on his Soule._                    [Sidenote: God a mercy on]
+And of all Christian Soules, I pray God.[6]
+                                          [Sidenote: Christians soules,]
+God buy ye.[7]          _Exeunt Ophelia_[8]             [Sidenote: you.]
+
+_Laer_. Do you see this, you Gods?       [Sidenote: Doe you this o God.]
+
+_King. Laertes_, I must common[9] with your greefe,  [Sidenote: commune]
+Or you deny me right: go but apart,
+Make choice of whom your wisest Friends you will,
+And they shall heare and iudge 'twixt you and me;
+If by direct or by Colaterall hand
+They finde vs touch'd,[10] we will our Kingdome giue,
+Our Crowne, our Life, and all that we call Ours
+To you in satisfaction. But if not,
+Be you content to lend your patience to vs,[11]
+And we shall ioyntly labour with your soule
+To giue it due content.
+
+_Laer_. Let this be so:[12]
+His meanes of death,[13] his obscure buriall;      [Sidenote: funerall,]
+No Trophee, Sword, nor Hatchment o're his bones,[14]
+
+[Footnote 1: --perhaps the heraldic term. The Poet, not Ophelia, intends
+the special fitness of the speech. Ophelia means only that the rue of
+the matron must differ from the rue of the girl.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'the dissembling daisy': _Greene_--quoted by _Henley_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --standing for _faithfulness: Malone_, from an old song.]
+
+[Footnote 4: '_All' not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 5: Wherever else Shakspere uses the word, it is in the sense
+of _grand merci--great thanks (Skeat's Etym. Dict.)_; here it is surely
+a corruption, whether Ophelia's or the printer's, of the _Quarto_
+reading, '_God a mercy_' which, spoken quickly, sounds very near
+_gramercy_. The _1st Quarto_ also has 'God a mercy.']
+
+[Footnote 6: 'I pray God.' _not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'God b' wi' ye': _good bye._]
+
+[Footnote 8: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'I must have a share in your grief.' The word does mean
+_commune_, but here is more pregnant, as evidenced in the next phrase,
+'Or you deny me right:'--'do not give me justice.']
+
+[Footnote 10: 'touched with the guilt of the deed, either as having done
+it with our own hand, or caused it to be done by the hand of one at our
+side.']
+
+[Footnote 11: We may paraphrase thus: 'Be pleased to grant us a loan of
+your patience,' that is, _be patient for a while at our request_, 'and
+we will work along with your soul to gain for it (your soul) just
+satisfaction.']
+
+[Footnote 12: He consents--but immediately _re-sums_ the grounds of his
+wrathful suspicion.]
+
+[Footnote 13: --the way in which he met his death.]
+
+[Footnote 14: --customary honours to the noble dead. _A trophy_ was an
+arrangement of the armour and arms of the dead in a set decoration. The
+origin of the word _hatchment_ shows its intent: it is a corruption of
+_achievement_.]
+
+[Page 210]
+
+No Noble rite, nor formall ostentation,[1]
+Cry to be heard, as 'twere from Heauen to Earth,
+That I must call in question.[2]                   [Sidenote: call't in]
+
+_King_. So you shall:
+And where th'offence is, let the great Axe fall.
+I pray you go with me.[3]                _Exeunt_
+
+_Enter Horatio, with an Attendant_.    [Sidenote: _Horatio and others_.]
+
+_Hora_. What are they that would speake with
+me?
+
+_Ser_. Saylors sir, they say they haue Letters
+                                           [_Gent_. Sea-faring men sir,]
+for you.
+
+_Hor_. Let them come in,[4]
+I do not know from what part of the world
+I should be greeted, if not from Lord _Hamlet_.
+
+_Enter Saylor_.                                   [Sidenote: _Saylers_.]
+
+_Say_. God blesse you Sir.
+
+_Hor_. Let him blesse thee too.
+
+_Say_. Hee shall Sir, and't[5] please him. There's
+                                      [Sidenote: A shall sir and please]
+a Letter for you Sir: It comes from th'Ambassadours
+                                  [Sidenote: it came fro th' Embassador]
+that was bound for England, if your name
+be _Horatio_, as I am let to know[6] it is.
+
+_Reads the Letter_[7]
+
+Horatio, _When thou shalt haue ouerlook'd this_,
+                                         [Sidenote: _Hor. Horatio_ when]
+_giue these Fellowes some meanes to the King: They
+haue Letters for him. Ere we were two dayes[8] old
+at Sea, a Pyrate of very Warlicke appointment gaue
+vs Chace. Finding our selues too slow of Saile, we
+put on a compelled Valour. In the Grapple, I boarded_
+                                          [Sidenote: valour, and in the]
+_them: On the instant they got cleare of our Shippe,
+so I alone became their Prisoner.[9] They haue dealt
+with mee, like Theeues of Mercy, but they knew what
+they did. I am to doe a good turne for them. Let_
+                                                     [Sidenote: a turne]
+_the King have the Letters I haue sent, and repaire
+thou to me with as much hast as thou wouldest flye_
+                                              [Sidenote: much speede as]
+_death[10] I haue words to speake in your eare, will_
+                                               [Sidenote: in thine eare]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'formal ostentation'--show or publication of honour
+according to form or rule.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'so that I must call in question'--institute inquiry; or
+'--_that_ (these things) I must call in question.']
+
+[Footnote 3: Note such a half line frequently after the not uncommon
+closing couplet--as if to take off the formality of the couplet, and
+lead back, through the more speech-like, to greater verisimilitude.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Here the servant goes, and the rest of the speech Horatio
+speaks _solus_. He had expected to hear from Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'and it please'--_if it please_. _An_ for _if_ is merely
+_and_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'I am told.']
+
+[Footnote 7: _Not in Q_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: This gives an approximate clue to the time between the
+second and third acts: it needs not have been a week.]
+
+[Footnote 9: Note once more the unfailing readiness of Hamlet where
+there was no question as to the fitness of the action seemingly
+required. This is the man who by too much thinking, forsooth, has
+rendered himself incapable of action!--so far ahead of the foremost
+behind him, that, when the pirate, not liking such close quarters, 'on
+the instant got clear,' he is the only one on her deck! There was no
+question here as to what ought to be done: the pirate grappled them; he
+boarded her. Thereafter, with his prompt faculty for dealing with men,
+he soon comes to an understanding with his captors, and they agree, upon
+some certain condition, to put him on shore.
+
+He writes in unusual spirits; for he has now gained full, presentable,
+and indisputable proof of the treachery which before he scarcely
+doubted, but could not demonstrate. The present instance of it has to do
+with himself, not his father, but in itself would justify the slaying of
+his uncle, whose plausible way had possibly perplexed him so that he
+could not thoroughly believe him the villain he was: bad as he must be,
+could he actually have killed his own brother, and _such_ a brother? A
+better man than Laertes might have acted more promptly than Hamlet, and
+so happened to _do_ right; but he would not have _been_ right, for the
+proof was _not_ sufficient.]
+
+[Footnote 10: The value Hamlet sets on his discovery, evident in his
+joyous urgency to share it with his friend, is explicable only on the
+ground of the relief it is to his mind to be now at length quite certain
+of his duty.]
+
+[Page 212]
+
+_make thee dumbe, yet are they much too light for the
+bore of the Matter.[1] These good Fellowes will bring_
+                                                 [Sidenote: the bord of]
+_thee where I am. Rosincrance and Guildensterne,
+hold their course for England. Of them I haue
+much to tell thee, Farewell.
+                       He that thou knowest thine._
+                        [Sidenote: _So that thou knowest thine Hamlet._]
+                                    Hamlet.
+
+Come, I will giue you way for these your Letters,
+                                  [Sidenote: _Hor_. Come I will you way]
+And do't the speedier, that you may direct me
+To him from whom you brought them.      _Exit_.    [Sidenote: _Exeunt._]
+
+_Enter King and Laertes._[2]
+
+_King_. Now must your conscience my acquittance seal,
+And you must put me in your heart for Friend,
+Sith you haue heard, and with a knowing eare,[3]
+That he which hath your Noble Father slaine,
+Pursued my life.[4]
+
+_Laer_. It well appeares. But tell me,
+Why you proceeded not against these feates,[5]      [Sidenote: proceede]
+So crimefull, and so Capitall in Nature,[6]        [Sidenote: criminall]
+As by your Safety, Wisedome, all things else,
+                                 [Sidenote: safetie, greatnes, wisdome,]
+You mainly[7] were stirr'd vp?
+
+_King_. O for two speciall Reasons,
+Which may to you (perhaps) seeme much vnsinnowed,[8]
+And yet to me they are strong. The Queen his Mother,
+                                      [Sidenote: But yet | tha'r strong]
+Liues almost by his lookes: and for my selfe,
+My Vertue or my Plague, be it either which,[9]
+She's so coniunctiue to my life and soule;
+                                          [Sidenote: she is so concliue]
+That as the Starre moues not but in his Sphere,[10]
+I could not but by her. The other Motiue,
+Why to a publike count I might not go,
+[Sidenote: 186] Is the great loue the generall gender[11] beare him,
+Who dipping all his Faults in their affection,
+
+[Footnote 1: Note here also Hamlet's feeling of the importance of what
+has passed since he parted with his friend. 'The bullet of my words,
+though it will strike thee dumb, is much too small for the bore of the
+reality (the facts) whence it will issue.']
+
+[Footnote 2: While we have been present at the interview between Horatio
+and the sailors, the king has been persuading Laertes.]
+
+[Footnote 3: an ear of judgment.]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'thought then to have killed me.']
+
+[Footnote 5: _faits_, deeds.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'deeds so deserving of death, not merely in the eye of the
+law, but in their own nature.']
+
+[Footnote 7: powerfully.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'unsinewed.']
+
+[Footnote 9: 'either-which.']
+
+[Footnote 10: 'moves not but in the moving of his sphere,'--The stars
+were popularly supposed to be fixed in a solid crystalline sphere, and
+moved in its motion only. The queen, Claudius implies, is his sphere; he
+could not move but by her.]
+
+[Footnote 11: Here used in the sense of the Fr. _'genre'--sort_. It is
+not the only instance of the word so used by Shakspere.
+
+The king would rouse in Laertes jealousy of Hamlet.]
+
+[Page 214]
+
+Would like the Spring that turneth Wood to Stone, [Sidenote: Worke like]
+Conuert his Gyues to Graces.[1] So that my Arrowes
+Too slightly timbred for so loud a Winde,
+                                       [Sidenote: for so loued Arm'd[2]]
+Would haue reuerted to my Bow againe,
+And not where I had arm'd them.[2]
+                                  [Sidenote: But not | have aym'd them.]
+
+_Laer_. And so haue I a Noble Father lost,
+A Sister driuen into desperate tearmes,[3]
+Who was (if praises may go backe againe)     [Sidenote: whose worth, if]
+Stood Challenger on mount of all the Age
+For her perfections. But my reuenge will come.
+
+_King_. Breake not your sleepes for that,
+You must not thinke
+That we are made of stuffe, so flat, and dull,
+That we can let our Beard be shooke with danger,[4]
+And thinke it pastime. You shortly shall heare more,[5]
+I lou'd your Father, and we loue our Selfe,
+And that I hope will teach you to imagine----[6]
+
+_Enter a Messenger_.                         [Sidenote: _with letters._]
+
+How now? What Newes?
+
+_Mes._ Letters my Lord from _Hamlet_.[7] This to
+                                          [Sidenote: _Messen_. These to]
+your Maiesty: this to the Queene.
+
+_King_. From _Hamlet_? Who brought them?
+
+_Mes_. Saylors my Lord they say, I saw them not:
+They were giuen me by _Claudio_, he recciu'd them.[8]
+                              [Sidenote: them Of him that brought them.]
+
+_King. Laertes_ you shall heare them:[9]
+Leaue vs.                 _Exit Messenger_[10]
+
+_High and Mighty, you shall know I am set
+naked on your Kingdome. To morrow shall I begge
+leaue to see your Kingly Eyes[11] When I shall (first
+asking your Pardon thereunto) recount th'Occasions_
+                        [Sidenote: the occasion of my suddaine returne.]
+_of my sodaine, and more strange returne._[12]
+                                        Hamlet.[13]
+What should this meane? Are all the rest come backe?
+                                                [Sidenote: _King_. What]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'would convert his fetters--if I imprisoned him--to graces,
+commending him yet more to their regard.']
+
+[Footnote 2: _arm'd_ is certainly the right, and a true Shaksperean
+word:--it was no fault in the aim, but in the force of the flight--no
+matter of the eye, but of the arm, which could not give momentum enough
+to such slightly timbered arrows. The fault in the construction of the
+last line, I need not remark upon.
+
+I think there is a hint of this the genuine meaning even in the
+blundered and partly unintelligible reading of the _Quarto_. If we leave
+out 'for so loued,' we have this: 'So that my arrows, too slightly
+timbered, would have reverted armed to my bow again, but not (_would not
+have gone_) where I have aimed them,'--implying that his arrows would
+have turned their armed heads against himself.
+
+What the king says here is true, but far from _the_ truth: he feared
+driving Hamlet, and giving him at the same time opportunity, to speak in
+his own defence and render his reasons.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _extremes_? or _conditions_?]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'With many a tempest hadde his berd ben
+schake.'--_Chaucer_, of the Schipman, in _The Prologue_ to _The
+Canterbury Tales_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: --hear of Hamlet's death in England, he means.
+
+At this point in the _1st Q._ comes a scene between Horatio and the
+queen, in which he informs her of a letter he had just received from
+Hamlet,
+
+    Whereas he writes how he escap't the danger,
+    And subtle treason that the king had plotted,
+    Being crossed by the contention of the windes,
+    He found the Packet &c.
+
+Horatio does not mention the pirates, but speaks of Hamlet 'being set
+ashore,' and of _Gilderstone_ and _Rossencraft_ going on to their fate.
+The queen assures Horatio that she is but temporizing with the king, and
+shows herself anxious for the success of her son's design against his
+life. The Poet's intent was not yet clear to himself.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Here his crow cracks.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _From_ 'How now' _to_ 'Hamlet' is _not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 8: Horatio has given the sailors' letters to Claudio, he to
+another.]
+
+[Footnote 9: He wants to show him that he has nothing behind--that he is
+open with him: he will read without having pre-read.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 11: He makes this request for an interview with the intent of
+killing him. The king takes care he does not have it.]
+
+[Footnote 12: '_more strange than sudden_.']
+
+[Footnote 13: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Page 216]
+
+Or is it some abuse?[1] Or no such thing?[2]
+                                            [Sidenote: abuse, and no[2]]
+
+_Laer_. Know you the hand?[3]
+
+_Kin_. 'Tis _Hamlets_ Character, naked and in a
+Postscript here he sayes alone:[4] Can you aduise [Sidenote: deuise me?]
+me?[5]
+
+_Laer_. I'm lost in it my Lord; but let him come,       [Sidenote: I am]
+It warmes the very sicknesse in my heart,
+That I shall liue and tell him to his teeth; [Sidenote: That I liue and]
+Thus diddest thou.                                     [Sidenote: didst]
+
+_Kin_. If it be so _Laertes_, as how should it be so:[6]
+How otherwise will you be rul'd by me?
+
+_Laer_. If so[7] you'l not o'rerule me to a peace.
+                                  [Sidenote: I my Lord, so you will not]
+
+_Kin_. To thine owne peace: if he be now return'd,
+[Sidenote: 195] As checking[8] at his Voyage, and that he meanes
+                                       [Sidenote: As the King[8] at his]
+No more to vndertake it; I will worke him
+To an exployt now ripe in my Deuice,                 [Sidenote: deuise,]
+Vnder the which he shall not choose but fall;
+And for his death no winde of blame shall breath,
+[Sidenote: 221] But euen his Mother shall vncharge the practice,[9]
+And call it accident: [A] Some two Monthes hence[10]
+                                            [Sidenote: two months since]
+Here was a Gentleman of _Normandy_,
+I'ue seene my selfe, and seru'd against the French,   [Sidenote: I haue]
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+_Laer_. My Lord I will be rul'd,
+The rather if you could deuise it so
+That I might be the organ.
+
+_King_. It falls right,
+You haue beene talkt of since your trauaile[11] much,
+And that in _Hamlets_ hearing, for a qualitie
+Wherein they say you shine, your summe of parts[12]
+Did not together plucke such enuie from him
+As did that one, and that in my regard
+Of the vnworthiest siedge.[13]
+
+_Laer_. What part is that my Lord?
+
+_King_. A very ribaud[14] in the cap of youth,
+Yet needfull to, for youth no lesse becomes[15]
+The light and carelesse liuery that it weares
+Then setled age, his sables, and his weedes[16]
+Importing health[17] and grauenes;]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'some trick played on me?' Compare _K. Lear_, act v. sc. 7:
+'I am mightily abused.']
+
+[Footnote 2: I incline to the _Q._ reading here: 'or is it some trick,
+and no reality in it?']
+
+[Footnote 3: --following the king's suggestion.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _Point thus_: 'Tis _Hamlets_ Character. 'Naked'!--And, in a
+Postscript here, he sayes 'alone'! Can &c.
+
+'_Alone_'--to allay suspicion of his having brought assistance with
+him.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Fine flattery--preparing the way for the instigation he is
+about to commence.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _Point thus_: '--as how should it be so? how
+otherwise?--will' &c. The king cannot tell what to think--either how it
+can be, or how it might be otherwise--for here is Hamlet's own hand!]
+
+[Footnote 7: provided.]
+
+[Footnote 8: A hawk was said _to check_ when it forsook its proper game
+for some other bird that crossed its flight. The blunder in the _Quarto_
+is odd, plainly from manuscript copy, and is not likely to have been set
+right by any but the author.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'shall not give the _practice'--artifice, cunning attempt,
+chicane_, or _trick_--but a word not necessarily offensive--'the name it
+deserves, but call it _accident_:' 221.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'Some' _not in Q.--Hence_ may be either _backwards_ or
+_forwards_; now it is used only _forwards_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: travels.]
+
+[Footnote 12: 'all your excellencies together.']
+
+[Footnote 13: seat, place, grade, position, merit.]
+
+[Footnote 14: 'A very riband'--a mere trifling accomplishment: the _u_
+of the text can but be a misprint for _n_.]
+
+[Footnote 15: _youth_ obj., _livery_ nom. to _becomes_.]
+
+[Footnote 16: 'than his furs and his robes become settled age.']
+
+[Footnote 17: Warburton thinks the word ought to be _wealth_, but I
+doubt it; _health_, in its sense of wholeness, general soundness, in
+affairs as well as person, I should prefer.]
+
+[Page 218]
+
+And they ran[1] well on Horsebacke; but this Gallant
+                                            [Sidenote: they can well[1]]
+Had witchcraft in't[2]; he grew into his Seat,   [Sidenote: vnto his]
+And to such wondrous doing brought his Horse,
+As had he beene encorps't and demy-Natur'd
+With the braue Beast,[3] so farre he past my thought,
+                                      [Sidenote: he topt me thought,[4]]
+That I in forgery[5] of shapes and trickes,
+Come short of what he did.[6]
+
+_Laer_. A Norman was't?
+
+_Kin_. A Norman.
+
+_Laer_. Vpon my life _Lamound_.                    [Sidenote: _Lamord_.]
+
+_Kin_. The very same.
+
+_Laer_. I know him well, he is the Brooch indeed,
+And Iemme of all our Nation,                 [Sidenote: all the Nation.]
+
+_Kin_. Hee mad confession of you,
+And gaue you such a Masterly report,
+For Art and exercise in your defence;
+And for your Rapier most especially,              [Sidenote: especiall,]
+That he cryed out, t'would be a sight indeed,[7]
+If one could match you [A] Sir. This report of his
+                                                  [Sidenote: ; sir this]
+[Sidenote: 120, 264] Did _Hamlet_ so envenom with his Enuy,[8]
+That he could nothing doe but wish and begge,
+Your sodaine comming ore to play with him;[9]       [Sidenote: with you]
+Now out of this.[10]
+
+_Laer_. Why out of this, my Lord?                   [Sidenote: What out]
+
+_Kin. Laertes_ was your Father deare to you?
+Or are you like the painting[11] of a sorrow,
+A face without a heart?
+
+_Laer_. Why aske you this?
+
+_Kin_. Not that I thinke you did not loue your Father,
+But that I know Loue is begun by Time[12]:
+
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto:--_
+
+                      ; the Scrimures[13] of their nation
+He swore had neither motion, guard nor eye,
+If you opposd them;]
+
+[Footnote 1: I think the _can_ of the _Quarto_ is the true word.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --in his horsemanship.]
+
+[Footnote 3: There is no mistake in the order 'had he beene'; the
+transposition is equivalent to _if_: 'as if he had been unbodied with,
+and shared half the nature of the brave beast.'
+
+These two lines, from _As_ to _thought_, must be taken parenthetically;
+or else there must be supposed a dash after _Beast_, and a fresh start
+made.
+
+'But he (as if Centaur-like he had been one piece with the horse) was no
+more moved than one with the going of his own legs:'
+
+'it seemed, as he borrowed the horse's body, so he lent the horse his
+mind:'--Sir Philip Sidney. _Arcadia_, B. ii. p. 115.]
+
+[Footnote 4: '--surpassed, I thought.']
+
+[Footnote 5: 'in invention of.']
+
+[Footnote 6: Emphasis on _did_, as antithetic to _forgery_: 'my
+inventing came short of his doing.']
+
+[Footnote 7: 'it would be a sight indeed to see you matched with an
+equal.' The king would strengthen Laertes' confidence in his
+proficiency.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'made him so spiteful by stirring up his habitual envy.']
+
+[Footnote 9: All invention.]
+
+[Footnote 10: Here should be a dash: the king pauses. He is approaching
+dangerous ground--is about to propose a thing abominable, and therefore
+to the influence of flattered vanity and roused emulation, would add the
+fiercest heat of stimulated love and hatred--to which end he proceeds to
+cast doubt on the quality of Laertes' love for his father.]
+
+[Footnote 11: the picture.]
+
+[Footnote 12: 'through habit.']
+
+[Footnote 13: French _escrimeurs_: fencers.]
+
+[Page 220]
+
+And that I see in passages of proofe,[1]
+Time qualifies the sparke and fire of it:[2]
+[A]
+_Hamlet_ comes backe: what would you vndertake,
+To show your selfe your Fathers sonne indeed,
+                            [Sidenote: selfe indeede your fathers sonne]
+More then in words?
+
+_Laer_. To cut his throat i'th'Church.[3]
+
+_Kin_. No place indeed should murder Sancturize;
+Reuenge should haue no bounds: but good _Laertes_
+Will you doe this, keepe close within your Chamber,
+_Hamlet_ return'd, shall know you are come home:
+Wee'l put on those shall praise your excellence,
+And set a double varnish on the fame
+The Frenchman gaue you, bring you in fine together,
+And wager on your heads, he being remisse,[4]       [Sidenote: ore your]
+[Sidenote: 218] Most generous, and free from all contriuing,
+Will not peruse[5] the Foiles? So that with ease,
+Or with a little shuffling, you may choose
+A Sword vnbaited,[6] and in a passe of practice,[7]  [Sidenote: pace of]
+Requit him for your Father.
+
+_Laer_. I will doo't,
+And for that purpose Ile annoint my Sword:[8]   [Sidenote: for purpose,]
+I bought an Vnction of a Mountebanke
+So mortall, I but dipt a knife in it,[9]
+                                   [Sidenote: mortall, that but dippe a]
+Where it drawes blood, no Cataplasme so rare,
+Collected from all Simples that haue Vertue
+
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+There liues within the very flame of loue
+A kind of weeke or snufe that will abate it,[10]
+And nothing is at a like goodnes still,[11]
+For goodnes growing to a plurisie,[12]
+Dies in his owne too much, that we would doe
+We should doe when we would: for this would change,[13]
+And hath abatements and delayes as many,
+As there are tongues, are hands, are accedents,
+And then this should is like a spend thrifts sigh,
+That hurts by easing;[14] but to the quick of th'vlcer,]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'passages of proofe,'--_trials_. 'I see when it is put to
+the test.']
+
+[Footnote 2: 'time modifies it.']
+
+[Footnote 3: Contrast him here with Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 4: careless.]
+
+[Footnote 5: _examine_--the word being of general application then.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _unblunted_. Some foils seem to have been made with a
+button that could be taken--probably _screwed_ off.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Whether _practice_ here means exercise or cunning, I cannot
+determine. Possibly the king uses the word as once before 216--to be
+taken as Laertes may please.]
+
+[Footnote 8: In the _1st Q._ this proposal also is made by the king.]
+
+[Footnote 9:
+
+    'So mortal, yes, a knife being but dipt in it,' or,
+    'So mortal, did I but dip a knife in it.']
+
+[Footnote 10: To understand this figure, one must be familiar with the
+behaviour of the wick of a common lamp or tallow candle.]
+
+[Footnote 11: 'nothing keeps always at the same degree of goodness.']
+
+[Footnote 12: A _plurisie_ is just a _too-muchness_, from _plus,
+pluris--a plethora_, not our word _pleurisy_, from [Greek: pleura]. See
+notes in _Johnson and Steevens_.]
+
+[Footnote 13: The sense here requires an _s_, and the space in the
+_Quarto_ between the _e_ and the comma gives the probability that a
+letter has dropt out.]
+
+[Footnote 14: Modern editors seem agreed to substitute the adjective
+_spendthrift_: our sole authority has _spendthrifts_, and by it I hold.
+The meaning seems this: 'the _would_ changes, the thing is not done, and
+then the _should_, the mere acknowledgment of duty, is like the sigh of
+a spendthrift, who regrets consequences but does not change his way: it
+eases his conscience for a moment, and so injures him.' There would at
+the same time be allusion to what was believed concerning sighs: Dr.
+Johnson says, 'It is a notion very prevalent, that _sighs_ impair the
+strength, and wear out the animal powers.']
+
+[Page 222]
+
+Vnder the Moone, can saue the thing from death,
+That is but scratcht withall: Ile touch my point,
+With this contagion, that if I gall him slightly,[1]
+It may be death.
+
+_Kin_. Let's further thinke of this,
+Weigh what conuenience[2] both of time and meanes
+May fit vs to our shape,[3] if this should faile;
+And that our drift looke through our bad performance,
+'Twere better not assaid; therefore this Proiect
+Should haue a backe or second, that might hold,
+If this should blast in proofe:[4] Soft, let me see[5]
+                                                   [Sidenote: did blast]
+Wee'l make a solemne wager on your commings,[6]  [Sidenote: cunnings[6]]
+I ha't: when in your motion you are hot and dry,  [Sidenote: hate, when]
+As[7] make your bowts more violent to the end,[8]
+                                                [Sidenote: to that end,]
+And that he cals for drinke; Ile haue prepar'd him
+                                                 [Sidenote: prefard him]
+[Sidenote: 268] A Challice for the nonce[9]; whereon but sipping,
+If he by chance escape your venom'd stuck,[10]
+Our purpose may[11] hold there: how sweet Queene.
+                                [Sidenote: there: but stay, what noyse?]
+
+_Enter Queene_.
+
+_Queen_. One woe doth tread vpon anothers heele,
+So fast they'l follow[12]: your Sister's drown'd _Laertes_.
+                                                [Sidenote: they follow;]
+
+_Laer_. Drown'd! O where?[13]
+
+_Queen_. There is a Willow[14] growes aslant a Brooke,
+                                          [Sidenote: ascaunt the Brooke]
+That shewes his hore leaues in the glassie streame:
+                                                [Sidenote: horry leaues]
+There with fantasticke Garlands did she come,[15]
+                                        [Sidenote: Therewith | she make]
+Of Crow-flowers,[16] Nettles, Daysies, and long Purples,
+That liberall Shepheards giue a grosser name;
+But our cold Maids doe Dead Mens Fingers call them:
+                                               [Sidenote: our cull-cold]
+There on the pendant[17] boughes, her Coronet weeds[18]
+Clambring to hang;[19] an enuious sliuer broke,[20]
+When downe the weedy Trophies,[19] and her selfe,  [Sidenote: her weedy]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'that though I should gall him but slightly,' or, 'that if
+I gall him ever so slightly.']
+
+[Footnote 2: proper arrangement.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'fit us exactly, like a garment cut to our shape,' or
+perhaps 'shape' is used for _intent, purpose. Point thus_: 'shape. If
+this should faile, And' &c.]
+
+[Footnote 4: This seems to allude to the assay of a firearm, and to mean
+'_burst on the trial_.' Note 'assaid' two lines back.]
+
+[Footnote 5: There should be a pause here, and a longer pause after
+_commings_: the king is contriving. 'I ha't' should have a line to
+itself, with again a pause, but a shorter one.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _Veney, venue_, is a term of fencing: a bout, a
+thrust--from _venir, to come_--whence 'commings.' (259) But _cunnings_,
+meaning _skills_, may be the word.]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'As' is here equivalent to 'and so.']
+
+[Footnote 8: --to the end of making Hamlet hot and dry.]
+
+[Footnote 9: for the special occasion.]
+
+[Footnote 10: thrust. _Twelfth Night_, act iii. sc. 4. 'he gives me the
+stuck in with such a mortal motion.' _Stocco_ in Italian is a long
+rapier; and _stoccata_ a thrust. _Rom. and Jul_., act iii. sc. 1. See
+_Shakespeare-Lexicon_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: 'may' does not here express _doubt_, but _intention_.]
+
+[Footnote 12: If this be the right reading, it means, 'so fast they
+insist on following.']
+
+[Footnote 13: He speaks it as about to rush to her.]
+
+[Footnote 14: --the choice of Ophelia's fantastic madness, as being the
+tree of lamenting lovers.]
+
+[Footnote 15: --always busy with flowers.]
+
+[Footnote 16: Ranunculus: _Sh. Lex._]
+
+[Footnote 17: --specially descriptive of the willow.]
+
+[Footnote 18: her wild flowers made into a garland.]
+
+[Footnote 19: The intention would seem, that she imagined herself
+decorating a monument to her father. Hence her _Coronet weeds_ and the
+Poet's _weedy Trophies_.]
+
+[Footnote 20: _Sliver_, I suspect, called so after the fact, because
+_slivered_ or torn off. In _Macbeth_ we have:
+
+    slips of yew
+    Slivered in the moon's eclipse.
+
+But it may be that _sliver_ was used for a _twig_, such as could be torn
+off.
+
+_Slip_ and _sliver_ must be of the same root.]
+
+[Page 224]
+
+Fell in the weeping Brooke, her cloathes spred wide,
+And Mermaid-like, a while they bore her vp,
+Which time she chaunted snatches of old tunes,[1]
+                                              [Sidenote: old laudes,[1]]
+As one incapable of[2] her owne distresse,
+Or like a creature Natiue, and indued[3]
+Vnto that Element: but long it could not be,
+Till that her garments, heauy with her drinke,  [Sidenote: theyr drinke]
+Pul'd the poore wretch from her melodious buy,[4]
+                                               [Sidenote: melodious lay]
+To muddy death.[5]
+
+_Laer_. Alas then, is she drown'd?                    [Sidenote: she is]
+
+_Queen_. Drown'd, drown'd.
+
+_Laer_. Too much of water hast thou poore _Ophelia_,
+And therefore I forbid my teares: but yet
+It is our tricke,[6] Nature her custome holds,
+Let shame say what it will; when these are gone
+The woman will be out:[7] Adue my Lord,
+I haue a speech of fire, that faine would blaze,
+                                               [Sidenote: speech a fire]
+But that this folly doubts[8] it.     _Exit._ [Sidenote: drownes it.[8]]
+
+_Kin_. Let's follow, _Gertrude_:
+How much I had to doe to calme his rage?
+Now feare I this will giue it start againe;
+Therefore let's follow.                _Exeunt_.[9]
+
+[10]_Enter two Clownes._
+
+_Clown_. Is she to bee buried in Christian buriall,
+                                  [Sidenote: buriall, when she wilfully]
+that wilfully seekes her owne saluation?[11]
+
+_Other_. I tell thee she is, and therefore make her
+                                               [Sidenote: is, therefore]
+Graue straight,[12] the Crowner hath sate on her, and
+finds it Christian buriall.
+
+_Clo_. How can that be, vnlesse she drowned her
+selfe in her owne defence?
+
+_Other_. Why 'tis found so.[13]
+
+_Clo_. It must be _Se offendendo_,[14] it cannot bee else:
+                                          [Sidenote: be so offended, it]
+
+[Footnote 1: They were not lauds she was in the habit of singing, to
+judge by the snatches given.]
+
+[Footnote 2: not able to take in, not understanding, not conscious of.]
+
+[Footnote 3: clothed, endowed, fitted for. See _Sh. Lex._]
+
+[Footnote 4: _Could_ the word be for _buoy_--'her clothes spread wide,'
+on which she floated singing--therefore her melodious buoy or float?]
+
+[Footnote 5: How could the queen know all this, when there was no one
+near enough to rescue her? Does not the Poet intend the mode of her
+death given here for an invention of the queen, to hide the girl's
+suicide, and by circumstance beguile the sorrow-rage of Laertes?]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'I cannot help it.']
+
+[Footnote 7: 'when these few tears are spent, all the woman will be out
+of me: I shall be a man again.']
+
+[Footnote 8: _douts_: 'this foolish water of tears puts it out.' _See Q.
+reading._]
+
+[Footnote 9: Here ends the Fourth Act, between which and the Fifth may
+intervene a day or two.]
+
+[Footnote 10: Act V. This act _requires_ only part of a day; the funeral
+and the catastrophe might be on the same.]
+
+[Footnote 11: Has this a confused connection with the fancy that
+salvation is getting to heaven?]
+
+[Footnote 12: Whether this means _straightway_, or _not crooked_, I
+cannot tell.]
+
+[Footnote 13: 'the coroner has settled it.']
+
+[Footnote 14: The Clown's blunder for _defendendo_.]
+
+[Page 226]
+
+for heere lies the point; If I drowne my selfe
+wittingly, it argues an Act: and an Act hath three
+branches. It is an Act to doe and to performe;
+              [Sidenote: it is to act, to doe, to performe, or all: she]
+argall[1] she drown'd her selfe wittingly.
+
+_Other_. Nay but heare you Goodman Deluer.  [Sidenote: good man deluer.]
+
+_Clown_. Giue me leaue; heere lies the water;
+good: heere stands the man; good: If the man
+goe to this water and drowne himsele; it is will
+he nill he, he goes; marke you that? But if the
+water come to him and drowne him; hee drownes
+not himselfe. Argall, hee that is not guilty of his
+owne death, shortens not his owne life.
+
+_Other_. But is this law?
+
+_Clo_. I marry is't, Crowners Quest Law.
+
+_Other_. Will you ha the truth on't: if this had  [Sidenote: truth an't]
+not beene a Gentlewoman, shee should haue beene
+buried out of[2] Christian Buriall.                    [Sidenote: out a]
+
+_Clo_. Why there thou say'st. And the more
+pitty that great folke should haue countenance in
+this world to drowne or hang themselues, more then
+their euen[3] Christian. Come, my Spade; there is
+no ancient Gentlemen, but Gardiners, Ditchers and
+Graue-makers; they hold vp _Adams_ Profession.
+
+_Other_. Was he a Gentleman?
+
+_Clo_. He was the first that euer bore Armes.          [Sidenote: A was]
+
+[4]_Other_. Why he had none.
+
+_Clo_. What, ar't a Heathen? how dost thou vnderstand
+the Scripture? the Scripture sayes _Adam_
+dig'd; could hee digge without Armes?[4] Ile put
+another question to thee; if thou answerest me not
+to the purpose, confesse thy selfe----
+
+_Other_. Go too.
+
+_Clo_. What is he that builds stronger then either
+the Mason, the Shipwright, or the Carpenter?
+
+_Other_. The Gallowes-maker; for that Frame
+outliues a thousand Tenants.                   [Sidenote: that outliues]
+
+[Footnote 1: _ergo_, therefore.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _without_. The pleasure the speeches of the Clown give us,
+lies partly in the undercurrent of sense, so disguised by stupidity in
+the utterance; and partly in the wit which mainly succeeds in its end by
+the failure of its means.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _equal_, that is _fellow_ Christian.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _From 'Other' to_ 'Armes' _not in Quarto._]
+
+[Page 228]
+
+_Clo_. I like thy wit well in good faith, the
+Gallowes does well; but how does it well? it does
+well to those that doe ill: now, thou dost ill to say
+the Gallowes is built stronger then the Church:
+Argall, the Gallowes may doe well to thee. Too't
+againe, Come.
+
+_Other_. Who builds stronger then a Mason, a
+Shipwright, or a Carpenter?
+
+_Clo_. I, tell me that, and vnyoake.[1]
+
+_Other_. Marry, now I can tell.
+
+_Clo_. Too't.
+
+_Other_. Masse, I cannot tell.
+
+_Enter Hamlet and Horatio a farre off._[2]
+
+_Clo_. Cudgell thy braines no more about it; for
+your dull Asse will not mend his pace with beating,
+and when you are ask't this question next, say
+a Graue-maker: the Houses that he makes, lasts
+                                            [Sidenote: houses hee makes]
+till Doomesday: go, get thee to _Yaughan_,[3] fetch
+                           [Sidenote: thee in, and fetch mee a soope of]
+me a stoupe of Liquor.
+
+_Sings._[4]
+
+_In youth when I did loue, did loue_,                [Sidenote: _Song._]
+  _me thought it was very sweete:
+To contract O the time for a my behoue,
+  O me thought there was nothing meete[5]_
+                                 [Sidenote: there a was nothing a meet.]
+
+                            [Sidenote: _Enter Hamlet & Horatio_]
+
+_Ham_. Ha's this fellow no feeling of his businesse,
+                           [Sidenote: busines? a sings in graue-making.]
+that he sings at Graue-making?[6]
+
+_Hor_. Custome hath made it in him a property[7]
+of easinesse.
+
+_Ham_. 'Tis ee'n so; the hand of little Imployment
+hath the daintier sense.
+
+_Clowne sings._[8]
+
+_But Age with his stealing steps_               [Sidenote _Clow. Song._]
+_hath caught me in his clutch_:               [Sidenote: hath clawed me]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'unyoke your team'--as having earned his rest.]
+
+[Footnote 2: _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 3: Whether this is the name of a place, or the name of an
+innkeeper, or is merely an inexplicable corruption--some take it for a
+stage-direction to yawn--I cannot tell. See _Q._ reading.
+
+It is said to have been discovered that a foreigner named Johan sold ale
+next door to the Globe.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 5: A song ascribed to Lord Vaux is in this and the following
+stanzas made nonsense of.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Note Hamlet's mood throughout what follows. He has entered
+the shadow of death.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _Property_ is what specially belongs to the individual;
+here it is his _peculiar work_, or _personal calling_: 'custom has made
+it with him an easy duty.']
+
+[Footnote 8: _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Page 230]
+
+_And hath shipped me intill the Land_,                  [Sidenote: into]
+  _as if I had neuer beene such_.
+
+_Ham_. That Scull had a tongue in it, and could
+sing once: how the knaue iowles it to th' grownd,        [Sidenote: the]
+as if it were _Caines_ Iaw-bone, that did the first    [Sidenote: twere]
+murther: It might be the Pate of a Polititian which
+                                          [Sidenote: murder, this might]
+this Asse o're Offices: one that could circumuent
+                        [Sidenote: asse now ore-reaches; one that would]
+God, might it not?
+
+_Hor_. It might, my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Or of a Courtier, which could say, Good
+Morrow sweet Lord: how dost thou, good Lord?
+                                            [Sidenote: thou sweet lord?]
+this might be my Lord such a one, that prais'd my
+Lord such a ones Horse, when he meant to begge
+                                              [Sidenote: when a went to]
+it; might it not?[1]
+
+_Hor_. I, my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Why ee'n so: and now my Lady
+Wormes,[2] Chaplesse,[3] and knockt about the Mazard[4]
+                                  [Sidenote: Choples | the massene with]
+with a Sextons Spade; heere's fine Reuolution, if
+                                                  [Sidenote: and we had]
+wee had the tricke to see't. Did these bones cost
+no more the breeding, but to play at Loggets[5] with
+'em? mine ake to thinke on't.                           [Sidenote: them]
+
+_Clowne sings._[6]
+
+_A Pickhaxe and a Spade, a Spade_,             [Sidenote: _Clow. Song._]
+  _for and a shrowding-Sheete:
+O a Pit of Clay for to be made,
+  for such a Guest is meete_.
+
+_Ham_. There's another: why might not that
+bee the Scull of of a Lawyer? where be his        [Sidenote: skull of a]
+Quiddits[7] now? his Quillets[7]? his Cases? his  [Sidenote: quiddities]
+Tenures, and his Tricks? why doe's he suffer this
+rude knaue now to knocke him about the Sconce[8]
+                                            [Sidenote: this madde knaue]
+with a dirty Shouell, and will not tell him of his
+Action of Battery? hum. This fellow might be
+in's time a great buyer of Land, with his
+Statutes, his Recognizances, his Fines, his double
+
+[Footnote 1: To feel the full force of this, we must call up the
+expression on the face of 'such a one' as he begged the horse--probably
+imitated by Hamlet--and contrast it with the look on the face of the
+skull.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'now the property of my Lady Worm.']
+
+[Footnote 3: the lower jaw gone.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _the upper jaw_, I think--not _the head_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: a game in which pins of wood, called loggats, nearly two
+feet long, were half thrown, half slid, towards a bowl. _Blount_:
+Johnson and Steevens.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 7: a lawyer's quirks and quibbles. See _Johnson and Steevens_.
+
+_1st Q._
+
+                    now where is your
+    Quirkes and quillets now,]
+
+[Footnote 8: Humorous, or slang word for _the head_. 'A fort--a
+head-piece--the head': _Webster's Dict_.]
+
+[Page 232]
+
+Vouchers, his Recoueries: [1] Is this the fine[2] of his
+Fines, and the recouery[3] of his Recoueries,[1] to haue
+his fine[4] Pate full of fine[4] Dirt? will his Vouchers
+                                               [Sidenote: will vouchers]
+vouch him no more of his Purchases, and double
+                                    [Sidenote: purchases & doubles then]
+ones too, then the length and breadth of a paire of
+Indentures? the very Conueyances of his Lands
+will hardly lye in this Boxe[5]; and must the Inheritor
+                                         [Sidenote: scarcely iye; | th']
+himselfe haue no more?[6] ha?
+
+_Hor_. Not a iot more, my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. Is not Parchment made of Sheep-skinnes?
+
+_Hor_. I my Lord, and of Calue-skinnes too.
+                                           [Sidenote: Calues-skinnes to]
+
+_Ham_. They are Sheepe and Calues that seek       [Sidenote: which seek]
+out assurance in that. I will speake to this fellow:
+whose Graue's this Sir?                          [Sidenote: this sirra?]
+
+_Clo_. Mine Sir:                  [Sidenote: _Clow_. Mine sir, or a pit]
+
+_O a Pit of Clay for to be made,
+for such a Guest is meete._[7]
+
+_Ham_. I thinke it be thine indeed: for thou
+liest in't.
+
+_Clo_. You lye out on't Sir, and therefore it is not     [Sidenote: tis]
+yours: for my part, I doe not lye in't; and yet it [Sidenote: in't, yet]
+is mine.
+
+_Ham_. Thou dost lye in't, to be in't and say 'tis     [Sidenote: it is]
+thine: 'tis for the dead, not for the quicke, therefore
+thou lyest.
+
+_Clo_. Tis a quicke lye Sir, 'twill away againe
+from me to you.[8]
+
+_Ham_. What man dost thou digge it for?
+
+_Clo_. For no man Sir.
+
+_Ham_. What woman then?
+
+_Clo_. For none neither.
+
+_Ham_. Who is to be buried in't?
+
+_Clo_. One that was a woman Sir; but rest her
+Soule, shee's dead.
+
+[Footnote 1: _From_ 'Is' _to_ 'Recoueries' _not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 2: the end.]
+
+[Footnote 3: the property regained by his Recoveries.]
+
+[Footnote 4: third and fourth meanings of the word _fine_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: the skull.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'must the heir have no more either?'
+
+_1st Q_.
+
+                                     and must
+    The honor (_owner?_) lie there?]
+
+[Footnote 7: _This line not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 8: He _gives_ the lie.]
+
+[Page 234]
+
+_Ham_. How absolute[1] the knaue is? wee must
+[Sidenote: 256] speake by the Carde,[2] or equiuocation will vndoe
+vs: by the Lord _Horatio_, these three yeares[3] I haue
+                                                  [Sidenote: this three]
+taken note of it, the Age is growne so picked,[4]      [Sidenote: tooke]
+that the toe of the Pesant comes so neere the
+heeles of our Courtier, hee galls his Kibe.[5] How
+                                            [Sidenote: the heele of the]
+long hast thou been a Graue-maker?         [Sidenote: been Graue-maker?]
+
+_Clo_. Of all the dayes i'th'yeare, I came too't
+                                                [Sidenote: Of the dayes]
+that day[6] that our last King _Hamlet_ o'recame    [Sidenote: ouercame]
+_Fortinbras_.
+
+_Ham_. How long is that since?
+
+_Clo_. Cannot you tell that? euery foole can tell
+[Sidenote: 143] that: It was the very day,[6] that young _Hamlet_ was
+                                               [Sidenote: was that very]
+borne,[8] hee that was mad, and sent into England,
+                                                 [Sidenote: that is mad]
+
+_Ham_. I marry, why was he sent into England?
+
+_Clo_. Why, because he was mad; hee shall recouer
+                                          [Sidenote: a was mad: a shall]
+his wits there; or if he do not, it's no great
+                                               [Sidenote: if a do | tis]
+matter there.
+
+_Ham_. Why?
+
+_Clo_. 'Twill not be scene in him, there the men
+                                            [Sidenote: him there, there]
+are as mad as he.
+
+_Ham_. How came he mad?
+
+_Clo_. Very strangely they say.
+
+_Ham_. How strangely?[7]
+
+_Clo_. Faith e'ene with loosing his wits.
+
+_Ham_. Vpon what ground?
+
+_Clo_. Why heere in Denmarke[8]: I haue bin sixeteene [Sidenote: Sexten]
+[Sidenote: 142-3] heere, man and Boy thirty yeares.[9]
+
+_Ham_. How long will a man lie 'ith' earth ere he
+rot?
+
+_Clo_. Ifaith, if he be not rotten before he die (as
+                                   [Sidenote: Fayth if a be not | a die]
+we haue many pocky Coarses now adaies, that will
+                                           [Sidenote: corses, that will]
+scarce hold the laying in) he will last you some      [Sidenote: a will]
+eight yeare, or nine yeare. A Tanner will last you
+nine yeare.
+
+[Footnote 1: 'How the knave insists on precision!']
+
+[Footnote 2: chart: _Skeat's Etym. Dict._]
+
+[Footnote 3: Can this indicate any point in the history of English
+society?]
+
+[Footnote 4: so fastidious; so given to _picking_ and choosing; so
+choice.]
+
+[Footnote 5: The word is to be found in any dictionary, but is not
+generally understood. Lord Byron, a very inaccurate writer, takes it to
+mean _heel_:
+
+    Devices quaint, and frolics ever new,
+      Tread on each others' kibes:
+
+_Childe Harold, Canto 1. St. 67._
+
+It means a _chilblain_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Then Fortinbras _could_ have been but a few months younger
+than Hamlet, and may have been older. Hamlet then, in the Quarto
+passage, could not by _tender_ mean _young_.]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'In what way strangely?'--_in what strange way_? Or the
+_How_ may be _how much_, in retort to the _very_; but the intent would
+be the same--a request for further information.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Hamlet has asked on what ground or provocation, that is,
+from what cause, Hamlet lost his wits; the sexton chooses to take the
+word _ground_ materially.]
+
+[Footnote 9: The Poet makes him say how long he had been sexton--but how
+naturally and informally--by a stupid joke!--in order a second time, and
+more certainly, to tell us Hamlet's age: he must have held it a point
+necessary to the understanding of Hamlet.
+
+Note Hamlet's question immediately following. It looks as if he had
+first said to himself: 'Yes--I have been thirty years above ground!' and
+_then_ said to the sexton, 'How long will a man lie i' th' earth ere he
+rot?' We might enquire even too curiously as to the connecting links.]
+
+[Page 236]
+
+_Ham_. Why he, more then another?
+
+_Clo_. Why sir, his hide is so tan'd with his Trade,
+that he will keepe out water a great while. And       [Sidenote: a will]
+your water, is a sore Decayer of your horson dead
+body. Heres a Scull now: this Scul, has laine in
+                    [Sidenote: now hath iyen you i'th earth 23. yeeres.]
+the earth three and twenty years.
+
+_Ham_. Whose was it?
+
+_Clo_. A whoreson mad Fellowes it was;
+Whose doe you thinke it was?
+
+_Ham_. Nay, I know not.
+
+_Clo_. A pestlence on him for a mad Rogue, a
+pou'rd a Flaggon of Renish on my head once.
+This same Scull Sir, this same Scull sir, was _Yoricks_
+                [Sidenote: once; this same skull sir, was sir _Yoricks_]
+Scull, the Kings Iester.
+
+_Ham_. This?
+
+_Clo_. E'ene that.
+
+_Ham_. Let me see. Alas poore _Yorick_, I knew
+                                           [Sidenote: _Ham_. Alas poore]
+him _Horatio_, a fellow of infinite Iest; of most excellent
+fancy, he hath borne me on his backe a                  [Sidenote: bore]
+thousand times: And how abhorred[1] my Imagination
+                                         [Sidenote: and now how | in my]
+is, my gorge rises at it. Heere hung those            [Sidenote: it is:]
+lipps, that I haue kist I know not how oft. Where
+be your Iibes now? Your Gambals? Your Songs?
+Your flashes of Merriment that were wont to set
+the Table on a Rore? No one[2] now to mock your      [Sidenote: not one]
+own Ieering? Quite chopfalne[3]? Now get you to
+                                              [Sidenote: owne grinning,]
+my Ladies Chamber, and tell her, let her paint an
+                                               [Sidenote: Ladies table,]
+inch thicke, to this fauour[4] she must come. Make
+her laugh at that: prythee _Horatio_ tell me one
+thing.
+
+_Hor_. What's that my Lord?
+
+_Ham_. Dost thou thinke _Alexander_ lookt o'this      [Sidenote: a this]
+fashion i'th' earth?
+
+_Hor_. E'ene so.
+
+_Ham_. And smelt so? Puh.
+
+[Footnote 1: If this be the true reading, _abhorred_ must mean
+_horrified_; but I incline to the _Quarto_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'Not one jibe, not one flash of merriment now?']
+
+[Footnote 3: --chop indeed quite fallen off!]
+
+[Footnote 4: _to this look_--that of the skull.]
+
+[Page 238]
+
+_Hor_. E'ene so, my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. To what base vses we may returne
+_Horatio_. Why may not Imagination trace the
+Noble dust of _Alexander_, till he[1] find it stopping a
+                                                      [Sidenote: a find]
+bunghole.
+
+_Hor_. 'Twere to consider: to curiously to consider
+                                     [Sidenote:  consider too curiously]
+so.
+
+_Ham_. No faith, not a iot. But to follow him
+thether with modestie[2] enough, and likeliehood to
+lead it; as thus. _Alexander_ died: _Alexander_ was
+                                        [Sidenote: lead it. _Alexander_]
+buried: _Alexander_ returneth into dust; the dust is      [Sidenote: to]
+earth; of earth we make Lome, and why of that
+Lome (whereto he was conuerted) might they not
+stopp a Beere-barrell?[3]
+
+Imperiall _Caesar_, dead and turn'd to clay,       [Sidenote: Imperious]
+Might stop a hole to keepe the winde away.
+Oh, that that earth, which kept the world in awe,
+Should patch a Wall, t'expell the winters flaw.[4]
+                                                [Sidenote: waters flaw.]
+But soft, but soft, aside; heere comes the King.
+                                     [Sidenote: , but soft awhile, here]
+
+_Enter King, Queene, Laertes, and a Coffin_,
+                        [Sidenote: _Enter K. Q. Laertes and the corse._]
+      _with Lords attendant._
+
+The Queene, the Courtiers. Who is that they follow,
+                                                   [Sidenote: this they]
+And with such maimed rites? This doth betoken,
+The Coarse they follow, did with disperate hand,
+Fore do it owne life; 'twas some Estate.[5]  [Sidenote: twas of some[5]]
+Couch[6] we a while, and mark.
+
+_Laer_. What Cerimony else?
+
+_Ham_. That is _Laertes_, a very Noble youth:[7]
+Marke.
+
+_Laer_. What Cerimony else?[8]
+
+_Priest_. Her Obsequies haue bin as farre inlarg'd,  [Sidenote: _Doct_.]
+As we haue warrantis,[9] her death was doubtfull,[10]
+                                                  [Sidenote: warrantie,]
+And but that great Command, o're-swaies the order,[11]
+
+[Footnote 1: Imagination personified.]
+
+[Footnote 2: moderation.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'Loam, Lome--grafting clay. Mortar made of Clay and Straw;
+also a sort of Plaister used by Chymists to stop up their
+Vessels.'--_Bailey's Dict._]
+
+[Footnote 4: a sudden puff or blast of wind.
+
+Hamlet here makes a solemn epigram. For the right understanding of the
+whole scene, the student must remember that Hamlet is
+philosophizing--following things out, curiously or otherwise--on the
+brink of a grave, concerning the tenant for which he has enquired--'what
+woman then?'--but received no answer.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'the corpse was of some position.']
+
+[Footnote 6: 'let us lie down'--behind a grave or stone.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Hamlet was quite in the dark as to Laertes' character; he
+had seen next to nothing of him.]
+
+[Footnote 8: The priest making no answer, Laertes repeats the question.]
+
+[Footnote 9: _warrantise_.]
+
+[Footnote 10: This casts discredit on the queen's story, 222. The
+priest believes she died by suicide, only calls her death doubtful to
+excuse their granting her so many of the rites of burial.]
+
+[Footnote 11: 'settled mode of proceeding.'--_Schmidt's Sh. Lex._--But
+is it not rather _the order_ of the church?]
+
+[Page 240]
+
+She should in ground vnsanctified haue lodg'd,
+                                    [Sidenote: vnsanctified been lodged]
+Till the last Trumpet. For charitable praier,       [Sidenote: prayers,]
+Shardes,[1] Flints, and Peebles, should be throwne on her:
+Yet heere she is allowed her Virgin Rites,
+                                           [Sidenote: virgin Crants,[2]]
+Her Maiden strewments,[3] and the bringing home
+Of Bell and Buriall.[4]
+
+_Laer_. Must there no more be done?
+
+_Priest_. No more be done:[5]                        [Sidenote: _Doct._]
+We should prophane the seruice of the dead,
+To sing sage[6] _Requiem_, and such rest to her
+                                              [Sidenote: sing a Requiem]
+As to peace-parted Soules.
+
+_Laer_. Lay her i'th' earth,
+And from her faire and vnpolluted flesh,
+May Violets spring. I tell thee (churlish Priest)
+A Ministring Angell shall my Sister be,
+When thou liest howling?
+
+_Ham_. What, the faire _Ophelia_?[7]
+
+_Queene_. Sweets, to the sweet farewell.[8]
+[Sidenote: 118] I hop'd thou should'st haue bin my _Hamlets_ wife:
+I thought thy Bride-bed to haue deckt (sweet Maid)
+And not t'haue strew'd thy Graue.                   [Sidenote: not haue]
+
+_Laer_. Oh terrible woer,[9]                    [Sidenote: O treble woe]
+Fall ten times trebble, on that cursed head  [Sidenote: times double on]
+Whose wicked deed, thy most Ingenioussence
+Depriu'd thee of. Hold off the earth a while,
+Till I haue caught her once more in mine armes:
+                          _Leaps in the graue._[10]
+Now pile your dust, vpon the quicke, and dead,
+Till of this flat a Mountaine you haue made,
+To o're top old _Pelion_, or the skyish head        [Sidenote: To'retop]
+Of blew _Olympus_.[11]
+
+_Ham_.[12] What is he, whose griefes                  [Sidenote: griefe]
+Beares such an Emphasis? whose phrase of Sorrow
+
+[Footnote 1: 'Shardes' _not in Quarto._ It means _potsherds_.]
+
+[Footnote 2: chaplet--_German_ krantz, used even for virginity itself.]
+
+[Footnote 3: strewments with _white_ flowers. (?)]
+
+[Footnote 4: the burial service.]
+
+[Footnote 5: as an exclamation, I think.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Is the word _sage_ used as representing the unfitness of a
+requiem to her state of mind? or is it only from its kindred with
+_solemn_? It was because she was not 'peace-parted' that they could not
+sing _rest_ to her.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _Everything_ here depends on the actor.]
+
+[Footnote 8: I am not sure the queen is not _apostrophizing_ the flowers
+she is throwing into or upon the coffin: 'Sweets, be my farewell to the
+sweet.']
+
+[Footnote 9: The Folio _may_ be right here:--'Oh terrible wooer!--May
+ten times treble thy misfortunes fall' &c.]
+
+[Footnote 10: This stage-direction is not in the _Quarto_.
+
+Here the _1st Quarto_ has:--
+
+    _Lear_. Forbeare the earth a while: sister farewell:
+           _Leartes leapes into the graue._
+    Now powre your earth on _Olympus_ hie,
+    And make a hill to o're top olde _Pellon_:
+           _Hamlet leapes in after Leartes_
+    Whats he that coniures so?
+
+    _Ham_. Beholde tis I, _Hamlet_ the Dane.]
+
+[Footnote 11: The whole speech is bravado--the frothy grief of a weak,
+excitable effusive nature.]
+
+[Footnote 12: He can remain apart no longer, and approaches the
+company.]
+
+[Page 242]
+
+Coniure the wandring Starres, and makes them stand   [Sidenote: Coniues]
+Like wonder-wounded hearers? This is I,
+_Hamlet_ the Dane.[1]
+
+_Laer_. The deuill take thy soule.[2]
+
+_Ham_. Thou prai'st not well,
+I prythee take thy fingers from my throat;[3]
+Sir though I am not Spleenatiue, and rash,
+                              [Sidenote: For though | spleenatiue rash,]
+Yet haue I something in me dangerous,        [Sidenote: in me something]
+Which let thy wisenesse feare. Away thy hand.
+                               [Sidenote: wisedome feare; hold off they]
+
+_King_. Pluck them asunder.
+
+_Qu. Hamlet, Hamlet_.                      [Sidenote: _All_. Gentlemen.]
+
+_Gen_. Good my Lord be quiet.                   [Sidenote: _Hora_. Good]
+
+_Ham_. Why I will fight with him vppon this Theme,
+Vntill my eielids will no longer wag.[4]
+
+_Qu_. Oh my Sonne, what Theame?
+
+_Ham_. I lou'd _Ophelia_[5]; fortie thousand Brothers
+Could not (with all there quantitie of Loue)
+Make vp my summe. What wilt thou do for her?[6]
+
+_King_. Oh he is mad _Laertes_.[7]
+
+_Qu_. For loue of God forbeare him.
+
+_Ham_. Come show me what thou'lt doe.
+                          [Sidenote: _Ham_ S'wounds shew | th'owt fight,
+                                                woo't fast, woo't teare]
+Woo't weepe? Woo't fight? Woo't teare thy selfe?
+Woo't drinke vp _Esile_, eate a Crocodile?[6]
+Ile doo't. Dost thou come heere to whine;         [Sidenote: doost come]
+To outface me with leaping in her Graue?
+Be[8] buried quicke with her, and so will I.
+And if thou prate of Mountaines; let them throw
+Millions of Akers on vs; till our ground
+Sindging his pate against the burning Zone,
+[Sidenote: 262] Make _Ossa_ like a wart. Nay, and thoul't mouth,
+Ile rant as well as thou.[9]
+
+[Footnote 1: This fine speech is yet spoken in the character of madman,
+which Hamlet puts on once more the moment he has to appear before the
+king. Its poetry and dignity belong to Hamlet's feeling; its
+extravagance to his assumed insanity. It must be remembered that death
+is a small affair to Hamlet beside his mother's life, and that the death
+of Ophelia may even be some consolation to him.
+
+In the _Folio_, a few lines back, Laertes leaps into the grave. There is
+no such direction in the _Q_. In neither is Hamlet said to leap into the
+grave; only the _1st Q._ so directs. It is a stage-business that must
+please the _common_ actor of Hamlet; but there is nothing in the text
+any more than in the margin of _Folio_ or _Quarto_ to justify it, and it
+would but for the horror of it be ludicrous. The coffin is supposed to
+be in the grave: must Laertes jump down upon it, followed by Hamlet, and
+the two fight and trample over the body?
+
+Yet I take the '_Leaps in the grave_' to be an action intended for
+Laertes by the Poet. His 'Hold off the earth a while,' does not
+necessarily imply that the body is already in the grave. He has before
+said, 'Lay her i'th' earth': then it was not in the grave. It is just
+about to be lowered, when, with that cry of 'Hold off the earth a
+while,' he jumps into the grave, and taking the corpse, on a bier at the
+side of it, in his arms, calls to the spectators to pile a mountain on
+them--in the wild speech that brings out Hamlet. The quiet dignity of
+Hamlet's speech does not comport with his jumping into the grave:
+Laertes comes out of the grave, and flies at Hamlet's throat. So, at
+least, I would have the thing acted.
+
+There is, however, nothing in the text to show that Laertes comes out of
+the grave, and if the manager insist on the traditional mode, I would
+suggest that the grave be represented much larger. In Mr. Jewitt's book
+on Grave-Mounds, I read of a 'female skeleton in a grave six feet deep,
+ten feet long, and eight feet wide.' Such a grave would give room for
+both beside the body, and dismiss the hideousness of the common
+representation.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --_springing out of the grave and flying at Hamlet_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Note the temper, self-knowledge, self-government, and
+self-distrust of Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 4: The eyelids last of all become incapable of motion.]
+
+[Footnote 5: That he loved her is the only thing to explain the
+harshness of his behaviour to her. Had he not loved her and not been
+miserable about her, he would have been as polite to her as well bred
+people would have him.]
+
+[Footnote 6: The gallants of Shakspere's day would challenge each other
+to do more disagreeable things than any of these in honour of their
+mistresses.
+
+'_Esil._ s.m. Ancien nom du Vinaigre.' _Supplement to Academy Dict._,
+1847.--'Eisile, _vinegar_': Bosworth's _Anglo-Saxon Dict_., from
+Somner's _Saxon Dict._, 1659.--'Eisel (_Saxon), vinegar; verjuice; any
+acid_': Johnson's _Dict_.
+
+_1st Q_. 'Wilt drinke vp vessels.' The word _up_ very likely implies the
+steady emptying of a vessel specified--at a draught, and not by
+degrees.]
+
+[Footnote 7: --pretending care over Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Emphasis on _Be_, which I take for the _imperative mood_.]
+
+[Footnote 9: The moment it is uttered, he recognizes and confesses to
+the rant, ashamed of it even under the cover of his madness. It did not
+belong _altogether_ to the madness. Later he expresses to Horatio his
+regret in regard to this passage between him and Laertes, and afterwards
+apologizes to Laertes. 252, 262.
+
+Perhaps this is the speech in all the play of which it is most difficult
+to get into a sympathetic comprehension. The student must call to mind
+the elements at war in Hamlet's soul, and generating discords in his
+behaviour: to those comes now the shock of Ophelia's death; the last tie
+that bound him to life is gone--the one glimmer of hope left him for
+this world! The grave upon whose brink he has been bandying words with
+the sexton, is for _her_! Into such a consciousness comes the rant of
+Laertes. Only the forms of madness are free to him, while no form is too
+strong in which to repudiate indifference to Ophelia: for her sake, as
+well as to relieve his own heart, he casts the clear confession of his
+love into her grave. He is even jealous, over her dead body, of her
+brother's profession of love to her--as if any brother could love as he
+loved! This is foolish, no doubt, but human, and natural to a certain
+childishness in grief. 252.
+
+Add to this, that Hamlet--see later in his speeches to Osricke--had a
+lively inclination to answer a fool according to his folly (256), to
+outherod Herod if Herod would rave, out-euphuize Euphues himself if he
+would be ridiculous:--the digestion of all these things in the retort of
+meditation will result, I would fain think, in an understanding and
+artistic justification of even this speech of Hamlet: the more I
+consider it the truer it seems. If proof be necessary that real feeling
+is mingled in the madness of the utterance, it may be found in the fact
+that he is immediately ashamed of its extravagance.]
+
+[Page 244]
+
+_Kin_.[1] This is meere Madnesse:                 [Sidenote: _Quee_.[1]]
+And thus awhile the fit will worke on him:          [Sidenote: And this]
+Anon as patient as the female Doue,
+When that her golden[2] Cuplet[3] are disclos'd[4];
+                                                  [Sidenote: cuplets[3]]
+His silence will sit drooping.[5]
+
+_Ham_. Heare you Sir:[6]
+What is the reason that you vse me thus?
+I loud' you euer;[7] but it is no matter:[8]
+Let _Hercules_ himselfe doe what he may,
+The Cat will Mew, and Dogge will haue his day.[9]
+           _Exit._                [Sidenote: _Exit Hamlet and Horatio._]
+
+_Kin_. I pray you good Horatio wait vpon him,
+                                              [Sidenote: pray thee good]
+Strengthen you patience in our last nights speech,      [Sidenote: your]
+[Sidenote: 254] Wee'l put the matter to the present push:[10]
+Good _Gertrude_ set some watch ouer your Sonne,
+This Graue shall haue a liuing[11] Monument:[12]
+An houre of quiet shortly shall we see;[13]
+                                         [Sidenote: quiet thirtie shall]
+Till then, in patience our proceeding be.   _Exeunt._
+
+[Footnote 1: I hardly know which to choose as the speaker of this
+speech. It would be a fine specimen of the king's hypocrisy; and perhaps
+indeed its poetry, lovely in itself, but at such a time sentimental, is
+fitter for him than the less guilty queen.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'covered with a yellow down' _Heath_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: The singular is better: 'the pigeon lays no more than _two_
+eggs.' _Steevens_. Only, _couplets_ might be used like _twins_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: --_hatched_, the sporting term of the time.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'The pigeon never quits her nest for three days after her
+two young ones are hatched, except for a few moments to get food.'
+_Steevens_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Laertes stands eyeing him with evil looks.]
+
+[Footnote 7: I suppose here a pause: he waits in vain some response from
+Laertes.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Here he retreats into his madness.]
+
+[Footnote 9: '--but I cannot compel you to hear reason. Do what he will,
+Hercules himself cannot keep the cat from mewing, or the dog from
+following his inclination!'--said in a half humorous, half contemptuous
+despair.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'into immediate train'--_to Laertes_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: _life-like_, or _lasting_?]
+
+[Footnote 12: --_again to Laertes_.]
+
+[Footnote 13: --when Hamlet is dead.]
+
+[Page 246]
+
+_Enter Hamlet and Horatio._
+
+_Ham._ So much for this Sir; now let me see the other,[1]
+                                           [Sidenote: now shall you see]
+You doe remember all the Circumstance.[2]
+
+_Hor._ Remember it my Lord?[3]
+
+_Ham._ Sir, in my heart there was a kinde of fighting,
+That would not let me sleepe;[4] me thought I lay
+                                                  [Sidenote: my thought]
+Worse then the mutines in the Bilboes,[5] rashly,      [Sidenote: bilbo]
+(And praise be rashnesse for it)[6] let vs know,      [Sidenote: prayed]
+Our indiscretion sometimes serues vs well,          [Sidenote: sometime]
+When our deare plots do paule,[7] and that should teach vs,
+                                    [Sidenote: deepe | should learne us]
+[Sidenote: 146, 181] There's a Diuinity that shapes our ends,[8]
+Rough-hew them how we will.[9]
+
+_Hor._ That is most certaine.
+
+_Ham._ Vp from my Cabin
+My sea-gowne scarft about me in the darke,
+Grop'd I to finde out them;[10] had my desire,
+Finger'd their Packet[11], and in fine, withdrew
+To mine owne roome againe, making so bold,
+(My feares forgetting manners) to vnseale          [Sidenote: to vnfold]
+Their grand Commission, where I found _Horatio_,
+Oh royall[12] knauery: An exact command,            [Sidenote: A royall]
+[Sidenote: 196] Larded with many seuerall sorts of reason;
+                                                    [Sidenote: reasons,]
+Importing Denmarks health, and Englands too,
+With hoo, such Bugges[13] and Goblins in my life,        [Sidenote: hoe]
+That on the superuize[14] no leasure bated,[15]
+No not to stay the grinding of the Axe,
+My head shoud be struck off.
+
+_Hor._ Ist possible?
+
+_Ham._ Here's the Commission, read it at more leysure:
+
+[Footnote 1: I would suggest that the one paper, which he has just
+shown, is a commission the king gave to himself; the other, which he is
+about to show, that given to Rosincrance and Guildensterne. He is
+setting forth his proof of the king's treachery.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --of the king's words and behaviour, possibly, in giving
+him his papers, Horatio having been present; or it might mean, 'Have you
+got the things I have just told you clear in your mind?']
+
+[Footnote 3: '--as if I could forget a single particular of it!']
+
+[Footnote 4: The _Shaping Divinity_ was moving him.]
+
+[Footnote 5: The fetters called _bilboes_ fasten a couple of mutinous
+sailors together by the legs.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Does he not here check himself and begin
+afresh--remembering that the praise belongs to the Divinity?]
+
+[Footnote 7: _pall_--from the root of _pale_--'come to nothing.' He had
+had his plots from which he hoped much; the king's commission had
+rendered them futile. But he seems to have grown doubtful of his plans
+before, probably through the doubt of his companions which led him to
+seek acquaintance with their commission, and he may mean that his 'dear
+plots' had begun to pall _upon him_. Anyhow the sudden 'indiscretion' of
+searching for and unsealing the ambassadors' commission served him as
+nothing else could have served him.]
+
+[Footnote 8: --even by our indiscretion. Emphasis on _shapes_.]
+
+[Footnote 9: Here is another sign of Hamlet's religion. 24, 125, 260.
+We start to work out an idea, but the result does not correspond with
+the idea: another has been at work along with us. We rough-hew--block
+out our marble, say for a Mercury; the result is an Apollo. Hamlet had
+rough-hewn his ends--he had begun plans to certain ends, but had he been
+allowed to go on shaping them alone, the result, even had he carried out
+his plans and shaped his ends to his mind, would have been failure.
+Another mallet and chisel were busy shaping them otherwise from the
+first, and carrying them out to a true success. For _success_ is not the
+success of plans, but the success of ends.]
+
+[Footnote 10: Emphasize _I_ and _them_, as the rhythm requires, and the
+phrase becomes picturesque.]
+
+[Footnote 11: 'got my fingers on their papers.']
+
+[Footnote 12: Emphasize _royal_.]
+
+[Footnote 13: A _bug_ is any object causing terror.]
+
+[Footnote 14: immediately on the reading.]
+
+[Footnote 15: --no interval abated, taken off the immediacy of the order
+respite granted.]
+
+[Page 248]
+
+But wilt thou heare me how I did proceed?      [Sidenote: heare now how]
+
+_Hor_. I beseech you.
+
+_Ham_. Being thus benetted round with Villaines,[1]
+Ere I could make a Prologue to my braines,        [Sidenote: Or I could]
+They had begun the Play.[2] I sate me downe,
+Deuis'd a new Commission,[3] wrote it faire,
+I once did hold it as our Statists[4] doe,
+A basenesse to write faire; and laboured much
+How to forget that learning: but Sir now,
+It did me Yeomans[5] seruice: wilt thou know          [Sidenote: yemans]
+The effects[6] of what I wrote?                 [Sidenote: Th'effect[6]]
+
+_Hor_. I, good my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. An earnest Coniuration from the King,
+As England was his faithfull Tributary,
+As loue betweene them, as the Palme should flourish,
+                              [Sidenote: them like the | might florish,]
+As Peace should still her wheaten Garland weare,
+And stand a Comma 'tweene their amities,[7]
+And many such like Assis[8] of great charge,
+                                             [Sidenote: like, as sir of]
+That on the view and know of these Contents,         [Sidenote: knowing]
+Without debatement further, more or lesse,
+He should the bearers put to sodaine death,    [Sidenote: those bearers]
+Not shriuing time allowed.
+
+_Hor_. How was this seal'd?
+
+_Ham_. Why, euen in that was Heauen ordinate;      [Sidenote: ordinant,]
+I had my fathers Signet in my Purse,
+Which was the Modell of that Danish Seale:
+Folded the Writ vp in forme of the other,
+                                         [Sidenote: in the forme of th']
+Subscrib'd it, gau't th'impression, plac't it safely,
+                                               [Sidenote: Subscribe it,]
+The changeling neuer knowne: Now, the next day
+Was our Sea Fight, and what to this was sement,  [Sidenote: was sequent]
+Thou know'st already.[9]
+
+_Hor_. So _Guildensterne_ and _Rosincrance_, go too't.
+
+[Footnote 1: --the nearest, Rosincrance and Guildensterne: Hamlet was
+quite satisfied of their villainy.]
+
+[Footnote 2: 'I had no need to think: the thing came to me at once.']
+
+[Footnote 3: Note Hamlet's rapid practicality--not merely in devising,
+but in carrying out.]
+
+[Footnote 4: statesmen.]
+
+[Footnote 5: '_Yeomen of the guard of the king's body_ were anciently
+two hundred and fifty men, of the best rank under gentry, and of larger
+stature than ordinary; every one being required to be six feet
+high.'--_E. Chambers' Cyclopaedia_. Hence '_yeoman's_ service' must mean
+the very best of service.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Note our common phrase: 'I wrote to this effect.']
+
+[Footnote 7: 'as he would have Peace stand between their friendships
+like a comma between two words.' Every point has in it a conjunctive, as
+well as a disjunctive element: the former seems the one regarded
+here--only that some amities require more than a comma to separate them.
+The _comma_ does not make much of a figure--is good enough for its
+position, however; if indeed the fact be not, that, instead of standing
+for _Peace_, it does not even stand for itself, but for some other word.
+I do not for my part think so.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Dr. Johnson says there is a quibble here with _asses_ as
+beasts of _charge_ or burden. It is probable enough, seeing, as Malone
+tells us, that in Warwickshire, as did Dr. Johnson himself, they
+pronounce _as_ hard. In Aberdeenshire the sound of the _s_ varies with
+the intent of the word: '_az_ he said'; '_ass_ strong _az_ a horse.']
+
+[Footnote 9: To what purpose is this half-voyage to England made part of
+the play? The action--except, as not a few would have it, the very
+action be delay--is nowise furthered by it; Hamlet merely goes and
+returns.
+
+To answer this question, let us find the real ground for Hamlet's
+reflection, 'There's a Divinity that shapes our ends.' Observe, he is
+set at liberty without being in the least indebted to the finding of the
+commission--by the attack, namely, of the pirate; and this was not the
+shaping of his ends of which he was thinking when he made the
+reflection, for it had reference to the finding of the commission. What
+then was the ground of the reflection? And what justifies the whole
+passage in relation to the Poet's object, the character of Hamlet?
+
+This, it seems to me:--
+
+Although Hamlet could not have had much doubt left with regard to his
+uncle's guilt, yet a man with a fine, delicate--what most men would
+think, because so much more exacting than theirs--fastidious conscience,
+might well desire some proof more positive yet, before he did a deed so
+repugnant to his nature, and carrying in it such a loud condemnation of
+his mother. And more: he might well wish to have something to _show_: a
+man's conviction is no proof, though it may work in others inclination
+to receive proof. Hamlet is sent to sea just to get such proof as will
+not only thoroughly satisfy himself, but be capable of being shown to
+others. He holds now in his hand--to lay before the people--the two
+contradictory commissions. By his voyage then he has gained both
+assurance of his duty, and provision against the consequence he mainly
+dreaded, that of leaving a wounded name behind him. 272. This is the
+shaping of his ends--so exactly to his needs, so different from his
+rough-hewn plans--which is the work of the Divinity. The man who desires
+to know his duty that he may _do_ it, who will not shirk it when he does
+know it, will have time allowed him and the thing made plain to him; his
+perplexity will even strengthen and purify his will. The weak man is he
+who, certain of what is required of him, fails to meet it: so never once
+fails Hamlet. Note, in all that follows, that a load seems taken off
+him: after a gracious tardiness to believe up to the point of action, he
+is at length satisfied. Hesitation belongs to the noble nature, to
+Hamlet; precipitation to the poor nature, to Laertes, the son of
+Polonius. Compare Brutus in _Julius Caesar_--a Hamlet in favourable
+circumstances, with Hamlet--a Brutus in the most unfavourable
+circumstances conceivable.]
+
+[Page 250]
+
+_Ham_. Why man, they did make loue to this imployment[1]
+They are not neere my Conscience; their debate
+                                             [Sidenote: their defeat[2]]
+Doth by their owne insinuation[3] grow:[4]             [Sidenote: Dooes]
+'Tis dangerous, when the baser nature comes
+Betweene the passe, and fell incensed points
+Of mighty opposites.[5]
+
+_Hor_. Why, what a King is this?[6]
+
+_Ham_. Does it not, thinkst thee,[7] stand me now vpon[8]
+                                    [Sidenote: not thinke thee[7] stand]
+[Sidenote: 120] He that hath kil'd my King,[9] and whor'd my Mother,
+[Sidenote: 62] Popt in betweene th'election and my hopes,
+
+[Footnote 1: _This verse not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 2: destruction.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'Their destruction they have enticed on themselves by their
+own behaviour;' or, 'they have _crept into_ their fate by their
+underhand dealings.' The _Sh. Lex._ explains _insinuation_ as
+_meddling_.]
+
+[Footnote 4: With the concern of Horatio for the fate of Rosincrance and
+Guildensterne, Hamlet shows no sympathy. It has been objected to his
+character that there is nothing in the play to show them privy to the
+contents of their commission; to this it would be answer enough, that
+Hamlet is satisfied of their worthlessness, and that their whole
+behaviour in the play shows them merest parasites; but, at the same
+time, we must note that, in changing the commission, he had no
+intention, could have had no thought, of letting them go to England
+without him: that was a pure shaping of their ends by the Divinity.
+Possibly his own 'dear plots' had in them the notion of getting help
+against his uncle from the king of England, in which case he would
+willingly of course have continued his journey; but whatever they may be
+supposed to have been, they were laid in connection with the voyage, not
+founded on the chance of its interruption. It is easy to imagine a man
+like him, averse to the shedding of blood, intending interference for
+their lives: as heir apparent, he would certainly have been listened to.
+The tone of his reply to Horatio is that of one who has been made the
+unintending cause of a deserved fate: the thing having fallen out so,
+the Divinity having so shaped their ends, there was nothing in their
+character, any more than in that of Polonius, to make him regret their
+death, or the part he had had in it.]
+
+[Footnote 5: The 'mighty opposites' here are the king and Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Perhaps, as Hamlet talked, he has been parenthetically
+glancing at the real commission. Anyhow conviction is growing stronger
+in Horatio, whom, for the occasion, we may regard as a type of the
+public.]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'thinkst thee,' in the fashion of the Friends, or 'thinke
+thee' in the sense of 'bethink thee.']
+
+[Footnote 8: 'Does it not rest now on me?--is it not now my duty?--is it
+not _incumbent on me_ (with _lie_ for _stand_)--"is't not perfect
+conscience"?']
+
+[Footnote 9: Note '_my king_' not _my father_: he had to avenge a crime
+against the state, the country, himself as a subject--not merely a
+private wrong.]
+
+[Page 252]
+
+Throwne out his Angle for my proper life,[1]
+And with such coozenage;[2] is't not perfect conscience,[3]
+                                                 [Sidenote: conscience?]
+[Sidenote: 120] To quit him with this arme?[4] And is't not to be
+damn'd[5]
+To let this Canker of our nature come
+In further euill.[6]
+
+_Hor._ It must be shortly knowne to him from England
+What is the issue of the businesse there.[7]
+
+_Ham._ It will be short,
+[Sidenote: 262] The _interim's_ mine,[8] and a mans life's no more[9]
+Then to say one:[10] but I am very sorry good _Horatio_,
+[Sidenote: 245] That to _Laertes_ I forgot my selfe;
+For by the image of my Cause, I see
+[Sidenote: 262] The Portraiture of his;[11] Ile count his fauours:[12]
+
+[Footnote 1: Here is the charge at length in full against the king--of
+quality and proof sufficient now, not merely to justify, but to compel
+action against him.]
+
+[Footnote 2: He was such a _fine_ hypocrite that Hamlet, although he
+hated and distrusted him, was perplexed as to the possibility of his
+guilt. His good acting was almost too much for Hamlet himself. This is
+his 'coozenage.'
+
+After 'coozenage' should come a dash, bringing '--is't not perfect
+conscience' (_is it not absolutely righteous_) into closest sequence,
+almost apposition, with 'Does it not stand me now upon--'.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Here comes in the _Quarto, 'Enter a Courtier_.' All from
+this point to 'Peace, who comes heere?' included, is in addition to the
+_Quarto_ text--not in the _Q._, that is.]
+
+[Footnote 4: I would here refer my student to the soliloquy--with its
+_sea of troubles_, and _the taking of arms against it_. 123, n. 4.]
+
+[Footnote 5: These three questions: 'Does it not stand me now
+upon?'--'Is't not perfect conscience?'--'Is't not to be damned?' reveal
+the whole relation between the inner and outer, the unseen and the seen,
+the thinking and the acting Hamlet. 'Is not the thing right?--Is it not
+my duty?--Would not the neglect of it deserve damnation?' He is
+satisfied.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'is it not a thing to be damned--to let &c.?' or, 'would it
+not be to be damned, (to be in a state of damnation, or, to bring
+damnation on oneself) to let this human cancer, the king, go on to
+further evil?']
+
+[Footnote 7: '--so you have not much time.']
+
+[Footnote 8: 'True, it will be short, but till then is mine, and will be
+long enough for me.' He is resolved.]
+
+[Footnote 9: Now that he is assured of what is right, the Shadow that
+waits him on the path to it, has no terror for him. He ceases to be
+anxious as to 'what dreams may come,' as to the 'something after death,'
+as to 'the undiscovered country,' the moment his conscience is
+satisfied. 120. It cannot now make a coward of him. It was never in
+regard to the past that Hamlet dreaded death, but in regard to the
+righteousness of the action which was about to occasion his death. Note
+that he expects death; at least he has long made up his mind to the
+great risk of it--the death referred to in the soliloquy--which, after
+all, was not that which did overtake him. There is nothing about suicide
+here, nor was there there.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'a man's life must soon be over anyhow.']
+
+[Footnote 11: The approach of death causes him to think of and regret
+even the small wrongs he has done; he laments his late behaviour to
+Laertes, and makes excuse for him: the similarity of their condition,
+each having lost a father by violence, ought, he says, to have taught
+him gentleness with him. The _1st Quarto_ is worth comparing here:--
+
+    _Enter Hamlet and Horatio_
+
+    _Ham_. Beleeue mee, it greeues mee much _Horatio_,
+    That to _Leartes_ I forgot my selfe:
+    For by my selfe me thinkes I feele his griefe,
+    Though there's a difference in each others wrong.]
+
+[Footnote 12: 'I will not forget,' or, 'I will call to mind, what merits
+he has,' or 'what favours he has shown me.' But I suspect the word
+'_count_' ought to be _court_.--He does court his favour when next they
+meet--in lovely fashion. He has no suspicion of his enmity.]
+
+[Page 254]
+
+[Sidenote: 242, 262] But sure the brauery[1] of his griefe did put me
+Into a Towring passion.[2]
+
+_Hor._ Peace, who comes heere?
+
+_Enter young Osricke._[3]                [Sidenote: _Enter a Courtier._]
+
+_Osr._ Your Lordship is right welcome back to        [Sidenote: _Cour._]
+Denmarke.
+
+_Ham._ I humbly thank you Sir, dost know this   [Sidenote: humble thank]
+waterflie?[4]
+
+_Hor._ No my good Lord.
+
+_Ham._ Thy state is the more gracious; for 'tis a
+vice to know him[5]: he hath much Land, and fertile;
+let a Beast be Lord of Beasts, and his Crib shall
+stand at the Kings Messe;[6] 'tis a Chowgh[7]; but
+as I saw spacious in the possession of dirt.[8]    [Sidenote: as I say,]
+
+_Osr._ Sweet Lord, if your friendship[9] were at
+                                     [Sidenote: _Cour._ | Lordshippe[?]]
+leysure, I should impart a thing to you from his
+Maiesty.
+
+_Ham._ I will receiue it with all diligence of   [Sidenote: it sir with]
+spirit; put your Bonet to his right vse, 'tis for the
+                                                [Sidenote: spirit, your]
+head.
+
+Osr. I thanke your Lordship, 'tis very hot[10]
+                                               [Sidenote: Cour. | it is]
+
+_Ham._ No, beleeue mee 'tis very cold, the winde
+is Northerly.
+
+_Osr._ It is indifferent cold[11] my Lord indeed.    [Sidenote: _Cour._]
+
+_Ham._ Mee thinkes it is very soultry, and hot
+                           [Sidenote: But yet me | sully and hot, or my]
+for my Complexion.[12]
+
+_Osr._ Exceedingly, my Lord, it is very soultry,     [Sidenote: _Cour._]
+as 'twere I cannot tell how: but my Lord,[13] his
+                                                [Sidenote: how: my Lord]
+Maiesty bad me signifie to you, that he ha's laid a
+                                                  [Sidenote: that a had]
+[Sidenote: 244] great wager on your head: Sir, this is the matter.[14]
+
+_Ham._ I beseech you remember.[15]
+
+_Osr._ Nay, in good faith, for mine ease in good
+                          [Sidenote: Cour. Nay good my Lord for my ease]
+
+[Footnote 1: the great show; bravado.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --with which fell in well the forms of his pretended
+madness. But that the passion was real, this reaction of repentance
+shows. It was not the first time his pretence had given him liberty to
+ease his heart with wild words. Jealous of the boastfulness of Laertes'
+affection, he began at once--in keeping with his assumed character of
+madman, but not the less in harmony with his feelings--to outrave him.]
+
+[Footnote 3: One of the sort that would gather to such a king--of the
+same kind as Rosincrance and Guildensterne.
+
+In the _1st Q. 'Enter a Bragart Gentleman_.']
+
+[Footnote 4: --_to Horatio_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: 'Thou art the more in a state of grace, for it is a vice to
+know him.']
+
+[Footnote 6: 'his manger shall stand where the king is served.' Wealth
+is always received by Rank--Mammon nowhere better worshipped than in
+kings' courts.]
+
+[Footnote 7: '_a bird of the crow-family_'--as a figure, '_always
+applied to rich and avaricious people_.' A _chuff_ is a surly _clown_.
+In Scotch a _coof_ is 'a silly, dastardly fellow.']
+
+[Footnote 8: land.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'friendship' is better than 'Lordshippe,' as euphuistic.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'I thanke your Lordship; (_puts on his hat_) 'tis very
+hot.']
+
+[Footnote 11: 'rather cold.']
+
+[Footnote 12: 'and hot--for _my_ temperament.']
+
+[Footnote 13: Not able to go on, he plunges into his message.]
+
+[Footnote 14: --_takes off his hat_.]
+
+[Footnote 15: --making a sign to him again to put on his hat.]
+
+[Page 256]
+
+faith[1]: Sir, [A] you are not ignorant of what excellence
+_Laertes_ [B] is at his weapon.[2]          [Sidenote: _Laertes_ is.[2]]
+
+_Ham_. What's his weapon?[3]
+
+_Osr_. Rapier and dagger.               [Sidenote: _Cour._]
+
+_Ham_. That's two of his weapons: but well.
+
+_Osr_. The sir King ha's wag'd with him six
+                            [Sidenote: _Cour_. The King sir hath wagerd]
+Barbary Horses, against the which he impon'd[4] as I
+                                             [Sidenote: hee has impaund]
+take it, sixe French Rapiers and Poniards, with
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+[5] here is newly com to Court _Laertes_, belieue me an absolute
+gentlemen, ful of most excellent differences,[6] of very soft
+society,[7] and great
+[Sidenote: 234] showing[8]: indeede to speake sellingly[9] of him, hee
+is the card or kalender[10] of gentry: for you shall find in him the
+continent of what part a Gentleman would see.[11]
+
+[Sidenote: 245] _Ham_.[12] Sir, his definement suffers no perdition[13]
+in you, though I know to deuide him inuentorially,[14] would dosie[15]
+th'arithmaticke of memory, and yet but yaw[16] neither in respect of
+his quick saile, but in the veritie of extolment, I take him to be a
+soule of great article,[17] & his infusion[18] of such dearth[19] and
+rarenesse, as to make true dixion of him, his semblable is his
+mirrour,[20] & who els would trace him, his vmbrage, nothing more.[21]
+
+_Cour_. Your Lordship speakes most infallibly of him.[22]
+
+_Ham_. The concernancy[23] sir, why doe we wrap the gentleman in our
+more rawer breath?[24]
+
+_Cour_. Sir.[25]
+
+_Hora_. Ist not possible to vnderstand in another tongue,[26] you will
+too't sir really.[27]
+
+_Ham_. What imports the nomination of this gentleman.
+
+_Cour_. Of _Laertes_.[28]
+
+_Hora_. His purse is empty already, all's golden words are spent.
+
+_Ham_. Of him sir.[29]
+
+_Cour_. I know you are not ignorant.[30]
+
+_Ham_. I would you did sir, yet in faith if you did, it would not
+much approoue me,[31] well sir.
+
+_Cour_.]
+
+[Footnote B: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+_Ham_. I dare not confesse that, least I should compare with him in
+excellence, but to know a man wel, were to knowe himselfe.[32]
+
+_Cour_. I meane sir for this weapon, but in the imputation laide on
+him,[33] by them in his meed, hee's vnfellowed.[34]]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'in good faith, it is not for manners, but for my comfort I
+take it off.' Perhaps the hat was intended only to be carried, and would
+not really go on his head.]
+
+[Footnote 2: The _Quarto_ has not 'at his weapon,' which is inserted to
+take the place of the passage omitted, and connect the edges of the
+gap.]
+
+[Footnote 3: So far from having envied Laertes' reputation for fencing,
+as the king asserts, Hamlet seems not even to have known which was
+Laertes' weapon.]
+
+[Footnote 4: laid down--staked.]
+
+[Footnote 5: This and the following passages seem omitted for
+curtailment, and perhaps in part because they were less amusing when the
+fashion of euphuism had passed. The good of holding up the mirror to
+folly was gone when it was no more the 'form and pressure' of 'the very
+age and body of the time.']
+
+[Footnote 6: of great variety of excellence.]
+
+[Footnote 7: gentle manners.]
+
+[Footnote 8: fine presence.]
+
+[Footnote 9: Is this a stupid attempt at wit on the part of Osricke--'to
+praise him as if you wanted to sell him'--stupid because it acknowledges
+exaggeration?]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'the chart or book of reference.' 234.]
+
+[Footnote 11: I think _part_ here should be plural; then the passage
+would paraphrase thus:--'you shall find in him the sum of what parts
+(_endowments_) a gentleman would wish to see.']
+
+[Footnote 12: Hamlet answers the fool according to his folly, but
+outdoes him, to his discomfiture.]
+
+[Footnote 13: 'his description suffers no loss in your mouth.']
+
+[Footnote 14: 'to analyze him into all and each of his qualities.']
+
+[Footnote 15: dizzy.]
+
+[Footnote 16: 'and yet _would_ but yaw neither' _Yaw_, 'the movement by
+which a ship deviates from the line of her course towards the right or
+left in steering.' Falconer's _Marine Dictionary_. The meaning seems to
+be that the inventorial description could not overtake his merits,
+because it would _yaw_--keep turning out of the direct line of their
+quick sail. But Hamlet is set on using far-fetched and absurd forms and
+phrases to the non-plussing of Osricke, nor cares much to be _correct_.]
+
+[Footnote 17: I take this use of the word _article_ to be merely for the
+occasion; it uas never surely in _use_ for _substance_.]
+
+[Footnote 18: '--the infusion of his soul into his body,' 'his soul's
+embodiment.' The _Sh. Lex._ explains _infusion_ as 'endowments,
+qualities,' and it may be right.]
+
+[Footnote 19: scarcity.]
+
+[Footnote 20: '--it alone can show his likeness.']
+
+[Footnote 21: 'whoever would follow in his footsteps--copy him--is only
+his shadow.']
+
+[Footnote 22: Here a pause, I think.]
+
+[Footnote 23: 'To the matter in hand!'--recalling the attention of
+Osricke to the purport of his visit.]
+
+[Footnote 24: 'why do we presume to talk about him with our less refined
+breath?']
+
+[Footnote 25: The Courtier is now thoroughly bewildered.]
+
+[Footnote 26: 'Can you only _speak_ in another tongue? Is it not
+possible to _understand_ in it as well?']
+
+[Footnote 27: 'It is your own fault; you _will_ court your fate! you
+_will_ go and be made a fool of!']
+
+[Footnote 28: He catches at the word he understands. The actor must here
+supply the meaning, with the baffled, disconcerted look of a fool who
+has failed in the attempt to seem knowing.]
+
+[Footnote 29:--answering the Courtier.]
+
+[Footnote 30: He pauses, looking for some out-of-the-way mode wherein to
+continue. Hamlet takes him up.]
+
+[Footnote 31: 'your witness to my knowledge would not be of much
+avail.']
+
+[Footnote 32: Paraphrase: 'for merely to know a man well, implies that
+you yourself _know_.' To know a man well, you must know his knowledge: a
+man, to judge his neighbour, must be at least his equal.]
+
+[Footnote 33: faculty attributed to him.]
+
+[Footnote 34: _Point thus_: 'laide on him by them, in his meed hee's
+unfellowed.' 'in his merit he is peerless.']
+
+[Page 258]
+
+their assignes,[1] as Girdle, Hangers or so[2]: three of
+                                              [Sidenote: hanger and so.]
+the Carriages infaith are very deare to fancy,[3] very
+responsiue[4] to the hilts, most delicate carriages
+and of very liberall conceit.[5]
+
+_Ham_. What call you the Carriages?[6]
+
+[A]
+
+_Osr_. The Carriages Sir, are the hangers.
+                                        [Sidenote: _Cour_. The carriage]
+
+_Ham_. The phrase would bee more Germaine[7] to
+the matter: If we could carry Cannon by our sides;
+                                              [Sidenote: carry a cannon]
+I would it might be Hangers till then; but on sixe
+                                   [Sidenote: it be | then, but on, six]
+Barbary Horses against sixe French Swords: their
+Assignes, and three liberall conceited Carriages,[8]
+that's the French but against the Danish; why is  [Sidenote: French bet]
+this impon'd as you call it[9]?              [Sidenote: this all you[9]]
+
+_Osr_.  The King Sir, hath laid that in a dozen
+                                    [Sidenote: _Cour_. | layd sir, that]
+passes betweene you and him, hee shall not exceed
+                                         [Sidenote: your selfe and him,]
+you three hits;[10] He hath one twelue for mine,[11]
+                               [Sidenote: hath layd on twelue for nine,]
+and that would come to imediate tryall, if your [Sidenote: and it would]
+Lordship would vouchsafe the Answere.[12]
+
+_Ham_. How if I answere no?[13]
+
+_Osr_. I meane my Lord,[14] the opposition of your   [Sidenote: _Cour_.]
+person in tryall.
+
+_Ham_. Sir, I will walke heere in the Hall; if it
+please his Maiestie, 'tis the breathing time of day    [Sidenote: it is]
+with me[15]; let the Foyles bee brought, the Gentleman
+willing, and the King hold his purpose; I will
+win for him if I can: if not, Ile gaine nothing but
+                                          [Sidenote: him and I | I will]
+my shame, and the odde hits.[16]
+
+_Osr_. Shall I redeliuer you ee'n so?[17]
+                             [Sidenote: _Cour_. Shall I deliuer you so?]
+
+_Ham_. To this effect Sir, after what flourish your
+nature will.
+
+_Osr_. I commend my duty to your Lordship.           [Sidenote: _Cour_.]
+
+_Ham_. Yours, yours [18]: hee does well to commend
+                                 [Sidenote: _Ham_. Yours doo's well[18]]
+it himselfe, there are no tongues else for's tongue,  [Sidenote: turne.]
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto_:--
+
+_Hora_. I knew you must be edified by the margent[19] ere you had
+done.]
+
+[Footnote 1: accompaniments or belongings; things _assigned_ to them.]
+
+[Footnote 2: the thongs or chains attaching the sheath of a weapon to
+the girdle; what the weapon _hangs_ by. The '_or so_' seems to indicate
+that Osricke regrets having used the old-fashioned word, which he
+immediately changes for _carriages_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: imagination, taste, the artistic faculty.]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'corresponding to--going well with the hilts,'--in shape,
+ornament, and colour.]
+
+[Footnote 5: bold invention.]
+
+[Footnote 6: a new word, unknown to Hamlet;--court-slang, to which he
+prefers the old-fashioned, homely word.]
+
+[Footnote 7: related; 'akin to the matter.']
+
+[Footnote 8: He uses Osricke's words--with a touch of derision, I should
+say.]
+
+[Footnote 9: I do not take the _Quarto_ reading for incorrect. Hamlet
+says: 'why is this all----you call it --? --?' as if he wanted to use
+the word (_imponed_) which Osricke had used, but did not remember it: he
+asks for it, saying '_you call it_' interrogatively.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _1st Q_
+
+                  that yong Leartes in twelue venies   223
+    At Rapier and Dagger do not get three oddes of you,]
+
+[Footnote 11: In all printer's work errors are apt to come in clusters.]
+
+[Footnote 12: the response, or acceptance of the challenge.]
+
+[Footnote 13: Hamlet plays with the word, pretending to take it in its
+common meaning.]
+
+[Footnote 14: 'By _answer_, I mean, my lord, the opposition &c.']
+
+[Footnote 15: 'my time for exercise:' he treats the proposal as the
+trifle it seems--a casual affair to be settled at once--hoping perhaps
+that the king will come with like carelessness.]
+
+[Footnote 16: the _three_.]
+
+[Footnote 17: To Osricke the answer seems too direct and unadorned for
+ears royal.]
+
+[Footnote 18: I cannot help here preferring the _Q_. If we take the
+_Folio_ reading, we must take it thus: 'Yours! yours!' spoken with
+contempt;--'as if _you_ knew anything of duty!'--for we see from what
+follows that he is playing with the word _duty_. Or we might read it,
+'Yours commends yours,' with the same sense as the reading of the _Q._,
+which is, 'Yours,' that is, '_Your_ lordship--does well to commend his
+duty himself--there is no one else to do it.' This former shape is
+simpler; that of the _Folio_ is burdened with ellipsis--loaded with
+lack. And surely _turne_ is the true reading!--though we may take the
+other to mean, 'there are no tongues else on the side of his tongue.']
+
+[Footnote 19: --as of the Bible, for a second interpretative word or
+phrase.]
+
+[Page 260]
+
+_Hor_. This Lapwing runs away with the shell
+on his head.[1]
+
+[Sidenote: 98] _Ham_. He did Compile[2] with his Dugge before
+                                    [Sidenote: _Ham_. A did sir[2] with]
+hee suck't it: thus had he and mine more of the
+                                  [Sidenote: a suckt has he | many more]
+same Beauy[3] that I know the drossie age dotes  [Sidenote: same breede]
+on; only got the tune[4] of the time, and outward
+                                   [Sidenote: and out of an habit of[5]]
+habite of encounter,[5] a kinde of yesty collection,   [Sidenote: histy]
+which carries them through and through the most
+fond and winnowed opinions; and doe but blow
+                             [Sidenote: prophane and trennowed opinions]
+them to their tryalls: the Bubbles are out.[6]
+                                           [Sidenote: their triall, the]
+
+[A]
+
+_Hor_. You will lose this wager, my Lord.     [Sidenote: loose my Lord.]
+
+_Ham_. I doe not thinke so, since he went into
+France, I haue beene in continuall practice; I shall
+[Sidenote: 265] winne at the oddes:[7] but thou wouldest not thinke
+                                                   [Sidenote: ods; thou]
+how all heere about my heart:[8] but it is no matter[9]
+                                         [Sidenote: how ill all's heere]
+
+_Hor_. Nay, good my Lord.
+
+_Ham_. It is but foolery; but it is such a kinde
+of gain-giuing[10] as would perhaps trouble a woman,
+                                                  [Sidenote: gamgiuing.]
+
+_Hor_. If your minde dislike any thing, obey.[11]   [Sidenote: obay it.]
+I will forestall[12] their repaire hither, and say you
+are not fit.
+
+_Ham_. Not a whit, we defie Augury[13]; there's a
+                                           [Sidenote: there is speciall]
+[Sidenote: 24, 125, 247] speciall Prouidence in the fall of a
+sparrow.[14] If
+
+
+[Footnote A: _Here in the Quarto:--_
+
+_Enter a Lord_.[15]
+
+_Lord_. My Lord, his Maiestie commended him to you by young
+Ostricke,[16] who brings backe to him that you attend him in the hall,
+he sends to know if your pleasure hold to play with _Laertes_, or that
+you will take longer time?[17]
+
+_Ham_. I am constant to my purposes, they followe the Kings pleasure,
+if his fitnes speakes, mine is ready[18]: now or whensoeuer, prouided I
+be so able as now.
+
+_Lord_. The King, and Queene, and all are comming downe.
+
+_Ham_. In happy time.[19]
+
+_Lord_. The Queene desires you to vse some gentle
+entertainment[20] _Laertes_, before you fall to play.
+
+_Ham_. Shee well instructs me.]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'Well, he _is_ a young one!']
+
+[Footnote 2: '_Com'ply_,' with accent on first syllable: _comply with_
+means _pay compliments to, compliment_. See _Q._ reading: 'A did sir
+with':--_sir_ here is a verb--_sir with_ means _say sir to_: 'he
+_sirred, complied_ with his nurse's breast before &c.' Hamlet speaks in
+mockery of the affected court-modes of speech and address, the fashion
+of euphuism--a mechanical attempt at the poetic.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _a flock of birds_--suggested by '_This Lapwing_.']
+
+[Footnote 4: 'the mere mode.']
+
+[Footnote 5: 'and external custom of intercourse.' But here too I rather
+take the _Q._ to be right: 'They have only got the fashion of the time;
+and, out of a habit of wordy conflict, (they have got) a collection of
+tricks of speech,--a yesty, frothy mass, with nothing in it, which
+carries them in triumph through the most foolish and fastidious (nice,
+choice, punctilious, whimsical) judgments.' _Yesty_ I take to be right,
+and _prophane_ (vulgar) to have been altered by the Poet to _fond_
+(foolish); of _trennowed_ I can make nothing beyond a misprint.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Hamlet had just blown Osricke to his trial in his chosen
+kind, and the bubble had burst. The braggart gentleman had no faculty to
+generate after the dominant fashion, no invention to support his
+ambition--had but a yesty collection, which failing him the moment
+something unconventional was wanted, the fool had to look a discovered
+fool.]
+
+[Footnote 7: 'I shall win by the odds allowed me; he will not exceed me
+three hits.']
+
+[Footnote 8: He has a presentiment of what is coming.]
+
+[Footnote 9: Nothing in this world is of much consequence to him now.
+Also, he believes in 'a special Providence.']
+
+[Footnote 10: 'a yielding, a sinking' at the heart? The _Sh. Lex._ says
+_misgiving_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: 'obey the warning.']
+
+[Footnote 12: 'go to them before they come here'--'_prevent_ their
+coming.']
+
+[Footnote 13: The knowledge, even, of what is to come could never, any
+more than ordinary expediency, be the _law_ of a man's conduct. St.
+Paul, informed by the prophet Agabus of the troubles that awaited him at
+Jerusalem, and entreated by his friends not to go thither, believed the
+prophet, and went on to Jerusalem to be delivered into the hands of the
+Gentiles.]
+
+[Footnote 14: One of Shakspere's many allusions to sayings of the Lord.]
+
+[Footnote 15: Osricke does not come back: he has begged off but ventures
+later, under the wing of the king.]
+
+[Footnote 16: May not this form of the name suggest that in it is
+intended the 'foolish' ostrich?]
+
+[Footnote 17: The king is making delay: he has to have his 'union'
+ready.]
+
+[Footnote 18: 'if he feels ready, I am.']
+
+[Footnote 19: 'They are _well-come_.']
+
+[Footnote 20: 'to be polite to Laertes.' The print shows where _to_ has
+slipped out.
+
+The queen is anxious; she distrusts Laertes, and the king's influence
+over him.]
+
+[Page 262]
+
+it[1] be now, 'tis not to come: if it bee not to come,
+                                                     [Sidenote: be, tis]
+it will bee now: if it be not now; yet it will come;
+                                               [Sidenote: it well come,]
+[Sidenote: 54, 164] the readinesse is all,[2] since no man ha's ought of
+                      [Sidenote: man of ought he leaues, knowes what ist
+                                              to leaue betimes, let be.]
+[Sidenote: 252] what he leaues. What is't to leaue betimes?[3]
+
+_Enter King, Queene, Laertes and Lords, with other
+Attendants with Foyles, and Gauntlets, a Table
+and Flagons of Wine on it._
+               [Sidenote: _A table prepard, Trumpets, Drums and officers
+                         with cushion,  King, Queene, and all the state,
+                                         Foiles, Daggers, and Laertes._]
+
+_Kin_. Come _Hamlet_ come, and take this hand
+from me.
+
+[Sidenote: 245] _Ham_.[4] Giue me your pardon Sir, I'ue done you
+wrong,[5]                                             [Sidenote: I haue]
+But pardon't as you are a Gentleman.
+This presence[6] knowes,
+And you must needs haue heard how I am punisht
+With sore distraction?[7] What I haue done       [Sidenote: With a sore]
+That might your nature honour, and exception
+[Sidenote: 242, 252] Roughly awake,[8] heere proclaime was madnesse:[9]
+Was't _Hamlet_ wrong'd _Laertes_? Neuer _Hamlet_.
+If _Hamlet_ from himselfe be tane away:           [Sidenote: fane away,]
+And when he's not himselfe, do's wrong _Laertes_,
+Then _Hamlet_ does it not, _Hamlet_ denies it:[10]
+Who does it then? His Madnesse? If't be so,
+_Hamlet_ is of the Faction that is wrong'd,
+His madnesse is poore _Hamlets_ Enemy.[11]
+Sir, in this Audience,[12]
+Let my disclaiming from a purpos'd euill,[13]
+Free me so farre[14] in your most generous thoughts,
+That I haue shot mine Arrow o're the house,               [Sidenote: my]
+And hurt my Mother.[15]                         [Sidenote: brother.[15]]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'it'--death, the end.]
+
+[Footnote 2: His father had been taken unready. 54.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _Point_: 'all. Since'; 'leaves, what'--'Since no man has
+anything of what he has left, those who left it late are in the same
+position as those who left it early.' Compare the common saying, 'It
+will be all the same in a hundred years.' The _Q._ reading comes much to
+the same thing--'knows of ought he leaves'--'has any knowledge of it,
+anything to do with it, in any sense possesses it.'
+
+We may find a deeper meaning in the passage, however--surely not too
+deep for Shakspere:--'Since nothing can be truly said to be possessed as
+his own which a man must at one time or another yield; since that which
+is _own_ can never be taken from the owner, but solely that which is
+lent him; since the nature of a thing that has to be left is not such
+that it _could_ be possessed, why should a man mind parting with it
+early?'--There is far more in this than merely that at the end of the
+day it will be all the same. The thing that ever was really a man's own,
+God has given, and God will not, and man cannot, take away. Note the
+unity of religion and philosophy in Hamlet: he takes the one true
+position. Note also his courage: he has a strong presentiment of death,
+but will not turn a step from his way. If Death be coming, he will
+confront him. He does not believe in chance. He is ready--that is
+willing. All that is needful is, that he should not go as one who cannot
+help it, but as one who is for God's will, who chooses that will as his
+own.
+
+There is so much behind in Shakspere's characters--so much that can only
+be hinted at! The dramatist has not the _word_-scope of the novelist;
+his art gives him little _room_; he must effect in a phrase what the
+other may take pages to. He needs good seconding by his actors as sorely
+as the composer needs good rendering of his music by the orchestra. It
+is a lesson in unity that the greatest art can least work alone; that
+the greatest _finder_ most needs the help of others to show his
+_findings_. The dramatist has live men and women for the very
+instruments of his art--who must not be mere instruments, but
+fellow-workers; and upon them he is greatly dependent for final outcome.
+
+Here the actor should show a marked calmness and elevation in Hamlet. He
+should have around him as it were a luminous cloud, the cloud of his
+coming end. A smile not all of this world should close the speech. He
+has given himself up, and is at peace.]
+
+[Footnote 4: Note in this apology the sweetness of Hamlet's nature. How
+few are alive enough, that is unselfish and true enough, to be capable
+of genuine apology! The low nature always feels, not the wrong, but the
+confession of it, degrading.]
+
+[Footnote 5: --the wrong of his rudeness at the funeral.]
+
+[Footnote 6: all present.]
+
+[Footnote 7: --true in a deeper sense than they would understand.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'that might roughly awake your nature, honour, and
+exception,':--consider the phrase--_to take exception at a thing_.]
+
+[Footnote 9: It was by cause of madness, not by cause of evil intent.
+For all purpose of excuse it was madness, if only pretended madness; it
+was there of another necessity, and excused offence like real madness.
+What he said was true, not merely expedient, to the end he meant it to
+serve. But all passion may be called madness, because therein the mind
+is absorbed with one idea; 'anger is a brief madness,' and he was in a
+'towering passion': he proclaims it madness and so abjures it.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'refuses the wrong altogether--will in his true self have
+nothing to do with it.' No evil thing comes of our true selves, and
+confession is the casting of it from us, the only true denial. He who
+will not confess a wrong, holds to the wrong.]
+
+[Footnote 11: All here depends on the expression in the utterance.]
+
+[Footnote 12: _This line not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 13: This is Hamlet's summing up of the whole--his explanation
+of the speech.]
+
+[Footnote 14: 'so far as this in your generous judgment--that you regard
+me as having shot &c.']
+
+[Footnote 15: _Brother_ is much easier to accept, though _Mother_ might
+be in the simile.
+
+To do justice to the speech we must remember that Hamlet has no quarrel
+whatever with Laertes, that he has expressed admiration of him, and that
+he is inclined to love him for Ophelia's sake. His apology has no
+reference to the fate of his father or his sister; Hamlet is not aware
+that Laertes associates him with either, and plainly the public did not
+know Hamlet killed Polonius; while Laertes could have no intention of
+alluding to the fact, seeing it would frustrate his scheme of
+treachery.]
+
+[Page 264]
+
+_Laer_. I am satisfied in Nature,[1]
+Whose motiue in this case should stirre me most
+To my Reuenge. But in my termes of Honor
+I stand aloofe, and will no reconcilement,
+Till by some elder Masters of knowne Honor,
+I haue a voyce, and president of peace
+To keepe my name vngorg'd.[2] But till that time,
+                             [Sidenote: To my name vngord: but all that]
+I do receiue your offer'd loue like loue,
+And wil not wrong it.
+
+_Ham_. I do embrace it freely,                     [Sidenote: I embrace]
+And will this Brothers wager frankely play.
+Giue vs the Foyles: Come on.[3]
+
+_Laer_. Come one for me.[4]
+
+_Ham_. Ile be your foile[5] _Laertes_, in mine ignorance,
+[Sidenote: 218] Your Skill shall like a Starre i'th'darkest night,[6]
+Sticke fiery off indeede.
+
+_Laer_. You mocke me Sir.
+
+_Ham_. No by this hand.[7]
+
+_King_. Giue them the Foyles yong _Osricke_,[8]
+                                              [Sidenote: _Ostricke_,[8]]
+Cousen _Hamlet_, you know the wager.
+
+_Ham_. Verie well my Lord,
+Your Grace hath laide the oddes a'th'weaker side,        [Sidenote: has]
+
+_King._ I do not feare it,
+I haue seene you both:[9]
+But since he is better'd, we haue therefore oddes.[10]
+                                                  [Sidenote: better, we]
+
+[Footnote 1: 'in my own feelings and person.' Laertes does not refer to
+his father or sister. He professes to be satisfied in his heart with
+Hamlet's apology for his behaviour at the funeral, but not to be sure
+whether in the opinion of others, and by the laws of honour, he can
+accept it as amends, and forbear to challenge him. But the words 'Whose
+motiue in this case should stirre me most to my Reuenge' may refer to
+his father and sister, and, if so taken, should be spoken aside. To
+accept apology for them and not for his honour would surely be too
+barefaced! The point concerning them has not been started.
+
+But why not receive the apology as quite satisfactory? That he would not
+seems to show a lingering regard to _real_ honour. A downright villain,
+like the king, would have pretended its _thorough_
+acceptance--especially as they were just going to fence like friends;
+but he, as regards his honour, will not accept it until justified in
+doing so by the opinion of 'some elder masters,' receiving from them 'a
+voice and precedent of peace'--counsel to, and justification, or example
+of peace. He keeps the door of quarrel open--will not profess to be
+_altogether_ friends with him, though he does not hint at his real
+ground of offence: that mooted, the match of skill, with its immense
+advantages for villainy, would have been impossible. He means treachery
+all the time; careful of his honour, he can, like most apes of fashion,
+let his honesty go; still, so complex is human nature, he holds his
+speech declining thorough reconciliation as a shield to shelter his
+treachery from his own contempt: he has taken care not to profess
+absolute friendship, and so left room for absolute villainy! He has had
+regard to his word! Relieved perhaps by the demoniacal quibble, he
+follows it immediately with an utterance of full-blown perfidy.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Perhaps _ungorg'd_ might mean _unthrottled_.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'Come on' _is not in the Q._--I suspect this _Come on_ but
+a misplaced shadow from the '_Come one_' immediately below, and better
+omitted. Hamlet could not say '_Come on_' before Laertes was ready, and
+'_Come one_' after 'Give us the foils,' would be very awkward. But it
+may be said to the attendant courtiers.]
+
+[Footnote 4: He says this while Hamlet is still choosing, in order that
+a second bundle of foils, in which is the unbated and poisoned one, may
+be brought him. So 'generous and free from all contriving' is Hamlet,
+(220) that, even with the presentiment in his heart, he has no fear of
+treachery.]
+
+[Footnote 5: As persons of the drama, the Poet means Laertes to be foil
+to Hamlet.--With the play upon the word before us, we can hardly help
+thinking of the _third_ signification of the word _foil_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'My ignorance will be the foil of darkest night to the
+burning star of your skill.' This is no flattery; Hamlet believes
+Laertes, to whose praises he has listened (218)--though not with the
+envy his uncle attributes to him--the better fencer: he expects to win
+only 'at the odds.' 260.]
+
+[Footnote 7: --not '_by these pickers and stealers_,' his oath to his
+false friends. 154.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Plainly a favourite with the king.--He is _Ostricke_ always
+in the _Q_.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'seen you both play'--though not together.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _Point thus_:
+
+    I do not fear it--I have seen you both!
+    But since, he is bettered: we have therefore odds.
+
+'Since'--'_since the time I saw him_.']
+
+[Page 266]
+
+_Laer_. This is too heauy,
+Let me see another.[1]
+
+_Ham_. This likes me well,
+These Foyles haue all a length.[2]   _Prepare to play._[3]
+
+_Osricke_. I my good Lord.                           [Sidenote: _Ostr._]
+
+_King_. Set me the Stopes of wine vpon that Table:
+If _Hamlet_ giue the first, or second hit,
+Or quit in answer of the third exchange,[4]
+Let all the Battlements their Ordinance fire,
+[Sidenote: 268] The King shal drinke to _Hamlets_ better breath,
+And in the Cup an vnion[5] shal he throw            [Sidenote: an Vince]
+Richer then that,[6] which foure successiue Kings
+In Denmarkes Crowne haue worne.
+Giue me the Cups,
+And let the Kettle to the Trumpets speake,           [Sidenote: trumpet]
+The Trumpet to the Cannoneer without,
+The Cannons to the Heauens, the Heauen to Earth,
+Now the King drinkes to _Hamlet_. Come, begin,
+                                       [Sidenote: _Trumpets the while._]
+And you the Iudges[7] beare a wary eye.
+
+_Ham_. Come on sir.
+
+_Laer_. Come on sir.          _They play._[8]  [Sidenote: Come my Lord.]
+
+_Ham_. One.
+
+_Laer_. No.
+
+_Ham_. Iudgement.[9]
+
+_Osr_. A hit, a very palpable hit.                [Sidenote: _Ostrick._]
+
+_Laer_. Well: againe.             [Sidenote: _Drum, trumpets and a shot.
+                                            Florish, a peece goes off._]
+
+_King_. Stay, giue me drinke.
+_Hamlet_, this Pearle is thine,
+Here's to thy health. Giue him the cup,[10]
+
+             _Trumpets sound, and shot goes off._[11]
+
+_Ham_. Ile play this bout first, set by a-while.[12]
+                                                   [Sidenote: set it by]
+Come: Another hit; what say you?
+
+_Laer_. A touch, a touch, I do confesse.[13]
+                                      [Sidenote: _Laer_. | doe confest.]
+
+_King_. Our Sonne shall win.
+
+[Footnote 1: --to make it look as if he were choosing.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --asked in an offhand way. The fencers must not measure
+weapons, because how then could the unbated point escape discovery? It
+is quite like Hamlet to take even Osricke's word for their equal
+length.]
+
+[Footnote 3: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'or be quits with Laertes the third bout':--in any case,
+whatever the probabilities, even if Hamlet be wounded, the king, who has
+not perfect confidence in the 'unction,' will fall back on his second
+line of ambush--in which he has more trust: he will drink to Hamlet,
+when Hamlet will be bound to drink also.]
+
+[Footnote 5: The Latin _unio_ was a large pearl. The king's _union_ I
+take to be poison made up like a pearl.]
+
+[Footnote 6: --a well-known one in the crown.]
+
+[Footnote 7: --of whom Osricke was one.]
+
+[Footnote 8: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 9: --appealing to the judges.]
+
+[Footnote 10: He throws in the _pearl_, and drinks--for it will take
+some moments to dissolve and make the wine poisonous--then sends the cup
+to Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 11: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 12: He does not refuse to drink, but puts it by, neither
+showing nor entertaining suspicion, fearing only the effect of the
+draught on his play. He is bent on winning the wager--perhaps with
+further intent.]
+
+[Footnote 13: Laertes has little interest in the match, but much in his
+own play.]
+
+[Page 268]
+
+[Sidenote: 266] _Qu_. He's fat, and scant of breath.[1]
+Heere's a Napkin, rub thy browes,
+                               [Sidenote: Heere _Hamlet_ take my napkin]
+The Queene Carowses to thy fortune, _Hamlet_.
+
+_Ham_. Good Madam.[2]
+
+_King_. _Gertrude_, do not drinke.
+
+_Qu_. I will my Lord;
+I pray you pardon me.[3]
+
+[Sidenote: 222]_King_. It is the poyson'd Cup, it is too late.[4]
+
+_Ham_. I dare not drinke yet Madam,
+By and by.[5]
+
+_Qu_. Come, let me wipe thy face.[6]
+
+_Laer_. My Lord, Ile hit him now.
+
+_King_. I do not thinke't.
+
+_Laer_. And yet 'tis almost 'gainst my conscience.[7]
+                                             [Sidenote: it is | against]
+
+_Ham_. Come for the third.
+_Laertes_, you but dally,                        [Sidenote: you doe but]
+I pray you passe with your best violence,
+I am affear'd you make a wanton of me.[8]      [Sidenote: I am sure you]
+
+_Laer_. Say you so? Come on.      _Play._
+
+_Osr_. Nothing neither way.                          [Sidenote: _Ostr._]
+
+_Laer_. Haue at you now.[9]
+
+    _In scuffling they change Rapiers._[10]
+
+_King_. Part them, they are incens'd.[11]
+
+_Ham_. Nay come, againe.[12]
+
+_Osr_. Looke to the Queene there hoa.  [Sidenote: _Ostr._ | there howe.]
+
+_Hor_. They bleed on both sides. How is't my           [Sidenote: is it]
+Lord?
+
+_Osr_. How is't _Laertes_?                           [Sidenote: _Ostr._]
+
+_Laer_. Why as a Woodcocke[13]
+To mine Sprindge, _Osricke_,   [Sidenote: mine owne sprindge _Ostrick_,]
+I am iustly kill'd with mine owne Treacherie.[14]
+
+_Ham_. How does the Queene?
+
+_King_. She sounds[15] to see them bleede.
+
+_Qu_. No, no, the drinke, the drinke[16]
+
+[Footnote 1: She is anxious about him. It may be that this speech, and
+that of the king before (266), were fitted to the person of the actor
+who first represented Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --a simple acknowledgment of her politeness: he can no more
+be familiarly loving with his mother.]
+
+[Footnote 3: She drinks, and offers the cup to Hamlet.]
+
+[Footnote 4: He is too much afraid of exposing his villainy to be prompt
+enough to prevent her.]
+
+[Footnote 5: This is not meant by the Poet to show suspicion: he does
+not mean Hamlet to die so.]
+
+[Footnote 6: The actor should not allow her: she approaches Hamlet; he
+recoils a little.]
+
+[Footnote 7: He has compunctions, but it needs failure to make them
+potent.]
+
+[Footnote 8: 'treat me as an effeminate creature.']
+
+[Footnote 9: He makes a sudden attack, without warning of the fourth
+bout.]
+
+[Footnote 10: _Not in Q._
+
+The 1st Q. directs:--_They catch one anothers Rapiers, find both are
+wounded_, &c.
+
+The thing, as I understand it, goes thus: With the words 'Have at you
+now!' Laertes stabs Hamlet; Hamlet, apprised thus of his treachery, lays
+hold of his rapier, wrenches it from him, and stabs him with it in
+return.]
+
+[Footnote 11: 'they have lost their temper.']
+
+[Footnote 12: --said with indignation and scorn, but without suspicion
+of the worst.]
+
+[Footnote 13: --the proverbially foolish bird. The speech must be spoken
+with breaks. Its construction is broken.]
+
+[Footnote 14: His conscience starts up, awake and strong, at the
+approach of Death. As the show of the world withdraws, the realities
+assert themselves. He repents, and makes confession of his sin, seeing
+it now in its true nature, and calling it by its own name. It is a
+compensation of the weakness of some that they cannot be strong in
+wickedness. The king did not so repent, and with his strength was the
+more to blame.]
+
+[Footnote 15: _swounds, swoons_.]
+
+[Footnote 16: She is true to her son. The maternal outlasts the
+adulterous.]
+
+[Page 270]
+
+Oh my deere _Hamlet_, the drinke, the drinke,
+I am poyson'd.
+
+_Ham_. Oh Villany! How? Let the doore be lock'd.
+Treacherie, seeke it out.[1]
+
+_Laer_. It is heere _Hamlet_.[2]
+_Hamlet_,[3] thou art slaine,
+No Medicine in the world can do thee good.
+In thee, there is not halfe an houre of life;   [Sidenote: houres life,]
+The Treacherous Instrument is in thy hand,             [Sidenote: in my]
+Vnbated and envenom'd: the foule practise[4]
+Hath turn'd it selfe on me. Loe, heere I lye,
+Neuer to rise againe: Thy Mothers poyson'd:
+I can no more, the King, the King's too blame.[5]
+
+_Ham_. The point envenom'd too,
+Then venome to thy worke.[6]
+                         _Hurts the King._[7]
+
+_All_. Treason, Treason.
+
+_King_. O yet defend me Friends, I am but hurt.
+
+_Ham_. Heere thou incestuous, murdrous,
+                         [Sidenote:  Heare thou incestious damned Dane,]
+Damned Dane,
+Drinke off this Potion: Is thy Vnion heere?
+                               [Sidenote: of this | is the Onixe heere?]
+Follow my Mother.[8]           _King Dyes._[9]
+
+_Laer_. He is iustly seru'd.
+It is a poyson temp'red by himselfe:
+Exchange forgiuenesse with me, Noble _Hamlet_;
+Mine and my Fathers death come not vpon thee,
+Nor thine on me.[10]                 _Dyes._[11]
+
+_Ham_. Heauen make thee free of it,[12] I follow thee.
+I am dead _Horatio_, wretched Queene adiew.
+You that looke pale, and tremble at this chance,
+That are but Mutes[13] or audience to this acte:
+Had I but time (as this fell Sergeant death
+Is strick'd in his Arrest) oh I could tell you.       [Sidenote: strict]
+
+[Footnote 1: The thing must be ended now. The door must be locked, to
+keep all in that are in, and all out that are out. Then he can do as he
+will.]
+
+[Footnote 2: --laying his hand on his heart, I think.]
+
+[Footnote 3: In Q. _Hamlet_ only once.]
+
+[Footnote 4: _scheme, artifice, deceitful contrivance_; in modern slang,
+_dodge_.]
+
+[Footnote 5: He turns on the prompter of his sin--crowning the justice
+of the king's capital punishment.]
+
+[Footnote 6: _Point_: 'too!'
+
+_1st Q._ Then venome to thy venome, die damn'd villaine.]
+
+[Footnote 7: _Not in Quarto._
+
+The true moment, now only, has at last come. Hamlet has lived to do his
+duty with a clear conscience, and is thereupon permitted to go. The man
+who asks whether this be poetic justice or no, is unworthy of an answer.
+'The Tragedie of Hamlet' is _The Drama of Moral Perplexity_.]
+
+[Footnote 8: A grim play on the word _Union: 'follow my mother_'. It
+suggests a terrible meeting below.]
+
+[Footnote 9: _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 10: His better nature triumphs. The moment he was wounded,
+knowing he must die, he began to change. Defeat is a mighty aid to
+repentance; and processes grow rapid in the presence of Death: he
+forgives and desires forgiveness.]
+
+[Footnote 11: _Not in Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 12: Note how heartily Hamlet pardons the wrong done to
+himself--the only wrong of course which a man has to pardon.]
+
+[Footnote 13: _supernumeraries_. Note the other figures too--_audience,
+act_--all of the theatre.]
+
+[Page 272]
+
+But let it be: _Horatio_, I am dead,
+Thou liu'st, report me and my causes right     [Sidenote: cause a right]
+To the vnsatisfied.[1]
+
+_Hor_. Neuer beleeue it.
+[Sidenote: 134] I am more an Antike Roman then a Dane:
+[Sidenote: 135] Heere's yet some Liquor left.[2]
+
+_Ham_. As th'art a man, giue me the Cup.
+Let go, by Heauen Ile haue't.                          [Sidenote: hate,]
+[Sidenote: 114, 251] Oh good _Horatio_, what a wounded name,[3]
+                                            [Sidenote: O god _Horatio_,]
+(Things standing thus vnknowne) shall liue behind me.
+                                    [Sidenote: shall I leaue behind me?]
+If thou did'st euer hold me in thy heart,
+Absent thee from felicitie awhile,
+And in this harsh world draw thy breath in paine,[1]
+                                      [Sidenote: _A march a farre off._]
+To tell my Storie.[4]
+            _March afarre off, and shout within._[5]
+What warlike noyse is this?
+
+_Enter Osricke._
+
+_Osr_. Yong _Fortinbras_, with conquest come from Poland
+To th'Ambassadors of England giues this warlike volly.[6]
+
+_Ham_. O I dye _Horatio_:
+The potent poyson quite ore-crowes my spirit,
+I cannot liue to heare the Newes from England,
+[Sidenote: 62] But I do prophesie[7] th'election lights
+[Sidenote: 276] On _Fortinbras_, he ha's my dying voyce,[8]
+So tell him with the occurrents more and lesse,[9]       [Sidenote: th']
+Which haue solicited.[10] The rest is silence. O, o, o, o.[11]
+                                       _Dyes_[12]
+
+_Hora_. Now cracke a Noble heart:                   [Sidenote: cracks a]
+Goodnight sweet Prince,
+And flights of Angels sing thee to thy rest,
+Why do's the Drumme come hither?
+
+[Footnote 1: His care over his reputation with the people is princely,
+and casts a true light on his delay. No good man can be willing to seem
+bad, except the _being good_ necessitates it. A man must be willing to
+appear a villain if that is the consequence of being a true man, but he
+cannot be indifferent to that appearance. He cannot be indifferent to
+wearing the look of the thing he hates. Hamlet, that he may be
+understood by the nation, makes, with noble confidence in his
+friendship, the large demand on Horatio, to live and suffer for his
+sake.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Here first we see plainly the love of Horatio for Hamlet:
+here first is Hamlet's judgment of Horatio (134) justified.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --for having killed his uncle:--what, then, if he had slain
+him at once?]
+
+[Footnote 4: Horatio must be represented as here giving sign of assent.
+
+_1st Q._
+
+    _Ham_. Vpon my loue I charge thee let it goe,
+    O fie _Horatio_, and if thou shouldst die,
+    What a scandale wouldst thou leaue behinde?
+    What tongue should tell the story of our deaths,
+    If not from thee?]
+
+[Footnote 5: _Not in Q._]
+
+[Footnote 6: The frame is closing round the picture. 9.]
+
+[Footnote 7: Shakspere more than once or twice makes the dying
+prophesy.]
+
+[Footnote 8: His last thought is for his country; his last effort at
+utterance goes to prevent a disputed succession.]
+
+[Footnote 9: 'greater and less'--as in the psalm,
+
+    'The Lord preserves all, more and less,
+      That bear to him a loving heart.']
+
+[Footnote 10: led to the necessity.]
+
+[Footnote 11: _These interjections are not in the Quarto._]
+
+[Footnote 12: _Not in Q._
+
+All Shakspere's tragedies suggest that no action ever ends, only goes
+off the stage of the world on to another.]
+
+[Page 274]
+
+[Sidenote: 190] _Enter Fortinbras and English Ambassador, with_
+                 [Sidenote: _Enter Fortenbrasse, with the Embassadors._]
+  _Drumme, Colours, and Attendants._
+
+_Fortin_. Where is this sight?
+
+_Hor_. What is it ye would see;                          [Sidenote: you]
+If ought of woe, or wonder, cease your search.[1]
+
+_For_. His quarry[2] cries on hauocke.[3] Oh proud death,
+                                                 [Sidenote: This quarry]
+What feast is toward[4] in thine eternall Cell.
+That thou so many Princes, at a shoote,                 [Sidenote: shot]
+So bloodily hast strooke.[5]
+
+_Amb_. The sight is dismall,
+And our affaires from England come too late,
+The eares are senselesse that should giue vs hearing,[6]
+To tell him his command'ment is fulfill'd,
+That _Rosincrance_ and _Guildensterne_ are dead:
+Where should we haue our thankes?[7]
+
+_Hor_. Not from his mouth,[8]
+Had it[9] th'abilitie of life to thanke you:
+He neuer gaue command'ment for their death.
+[Sidenote: 6] But since so iumpe[10] vpon this bloodie question,[11]
+You from the Polake warres, and you from England
+Are heere arriued. Giue order[12] that these bodies
+High on a stage be placed to the view,
+And let me speake to th'yet vnknowing world,        [Sidenote: , to yet]
+How these things came about. So shall you heare
+Of carnall, bloudie, and vnnaturall acts,[13]
+Of accidentall Judgements,[14] casuall slaughters[15]
+Of death's put on by cunning[16] and forc'd cause,[17]
+                                   [Sidenote: deaths | and for no cause]
+And in this vpshot, purposes mistooke,[18]
+Falne on the Inuentors heads. All this can I             [Sidenote: th']
+Truly deliuer.
+
+_For_. Let vs hast to heare it,
+And call the Noblest to the Audience.
+For me, with sorrow, I embrace my Fortune,
+I haue some Rites of memory[19] in this Kingdome,
+                                               [Sidenote: rights of[19]]
+
+[Footnote 1: --for here it is.]
+
+[Footnote 2: the heap of game after a hunt.]
+
+[Footnote 3: 'Havoc's victims cry out against him.']
+
+[Footnote 4: in preparation.]
+
+[Footnote 5: All the real actors in the tragedy, except Horatio, are
+dead.]
+
+[Footnote 6: This line may be taken as a parenthesis; then--'come too
+late' joins itself with 'to tell him.' Or we may connect 'hearing' with
+'to tell him':--'the ears that should give us hearing in order that we
+might tell him' etc.]
+
+[Footnote 7: They thus inquire after the successor of Claudius.]
+
+[Footnote 8: --the mouth of Claudius.]
+
+[Footnote 9: --even if it had.]
+
+[Footnote 10: 'so exactly,' or 'immediately'--perhaps
+_opportunely--fittingly_.]
+
+[Footnote 11: dispute, strife.]
+
+[Footnote 12: --addressed to Fortinbras, I should say. The state is
+disrupt, the household in disorder; there is no head; Horatio turns
+therefore to Fortinbras, who, besides having a claim to the crown, and
+being favoured by Hamlet, alone has power at the moment--for his army is
+with him.]
+
+[Footnote 13: --those of Claudius.]
+
+[Footnote 14: 'just judgments brought about by accident'--as in the case
+of all slain except the king, whose judgment was not accidental, and
+Hamlet, whose death was not a judgment.]
+
+[Footnote 15: --those of the queen, Polonius, and Ophelia.]
+
+[Footnote 16: 'put on,' _indued_, 'brought on themselves'--those of
+Rosincrance, Guildensterne, and Laertes.]
+
+[Footnote 17: --those of the king and Polonius.]
+
+[Footnote 18: 'and in this result'--_pointing to the bodies_--'purposes
+which have mistaken their way, and fallen on the inventors' heads.' _I
+am mistaken_ or _mistook_, means _I have mistaken_; 'purposes
+mistooke'--_purposes in themselves mistaken_:--that of Laertes, which
+came back on himself; and that of the king in the matter of the poison,
+which, by falling on the queen, also came back on the inventor.]
+
+[Footnote 19: The _Quarto_ is correct here, I think: '_rights of the
+past_'--'claims of descent.' Or 'rights of memory' might mean--'_rights
+yet remembered_.'
+
+Fortinbras is not one to miss a chance: even in this shadowy 'person,'
+character is recognizably maintained.]
+
+[Page 276]
+
+Which are to claime,[1] my vantage doth   [Sidenote: Which now to clame]
+Inuite me,
+
+_Hor_. Of that I shall haue alwayes[2] cause to speake,
+                                          [Sidenote: haue also cause[3]]
+And from his mouth
+[Sidenote: 272] Whose voyce will draw on more:[3]
+                                              [Sidenote: drawe no more,]
+But let this same be presently perform'd,
+Euen whiles mens mindes are wilde,                     [Sidenote: while]
+Lest more mischance
+On plots, and errors happen.[4]
+
+_For_. Let foure Captaines
+Beare _Hamlet_ like a Soldier to the Stage,
+For he was likely, had he beene put on[5]
+To haue prou'd most royally:[6]                      [Sidenote: royall;]
+And for his passage,[7]
+The Souldiours Musicke, and the rites of Warre[8]   [Sidenote: right of]
+Speake[9] lowdly for him.
+Take vp the body; Such a sight as this               [Sidenote: bodies,]
+Becomes the Field, but heere shewes much amis.
+Go, bid the Souldiers shoote.[10]
+
+_Exeunt Marching: after the which, a Peale_        [Sidenote: _Exeunt._]
+_of Ordenance are shot off._
+
+
+FINIS.
+
+[Footnote 1: 'which must now be claimed'--except the _Quarto_ be right
+here also.]
+
+[Footnote 2: The _Quarto_ surely is right here.]
+
+[Footnote 3: --Hamlet's mouth. The message he entrusted to Horatio for
+Fortinbras, giving his voice, or vote, for him, was sure to 'draw on
+more' voices.]
+
+[Footnote 4: 'lest more mischance happen in like manner, through plots
+and mistakes.']
+
+[Footnote 5: 'had he been put forward'--_had occasion sent him out_.]
+
+[Footnote 6: 'to have proved a most royal soldier:'--A soldier gives
+here his testimony to Hamlet's likelihood in the soldier's calling. Note
+the kind of regard in which the Poet would show him held.]
+
+[Footnote 7: --the passage of his spirit to its place.]
+
+[Footnote 8: --military mourning or funeral rites.]
+
+[Footnote 9: _imperative mood_: 'let the soldier's music and the rites
+of war speak loudly for him.' 'Go, bid the souldiers shoote,' with which
+the drama closes, is a more definite initiatory order to the same
+effect.]
+
+[Footnote 10: The end is a half-line after a riming couplet--as if there
+were more to come--as there must be after every tragedy. Mere poetic
+justice will not satisfy Shakspere in a tragedy, for tragedy is _life_;
+in a comedy it may do well enough, for that deals but with
+life-surfaces--and who then more careful of it! but in tragedy something
+far higher ought to be aimed at. The end of this drama is reached when
+Hamlet, having attained the possibility of doing so, performs his work
+_in righteousness_. The common critical mind would have him left the
+fatherless, motherless, loverless, almost friendless king of a
+justifiably distrusting nation--with an eternal grief for his father
+weighing him down to the abyss; with his mother's sin blackening for him
+all womankind, and blasting the face of both heaven and earth; and with
+the knowledge in his heart that he had sent the woman he loved, with her
+father and her brother, out of the world--maniac, spy, and traitor.
+Instead of according him such 'poetic justice,' the Poet gives Hamlet
+the only true success of doing his duty to the end--for it was as much
+his duty not to act before, as it was his duty to act at last--then
+sends him after his Ophelia--into a world where true heart will find
+true way of setting right what is wrong, and of atoning for every ill,
+wittingly or unwittingly done or occasioned in this.
+
+It seems to me most admirable that Hamlet, being so great, is yet
+outwardly so like other people: the Poet never obtrudes his greatness.
+And just because he is modest, confessing weakness and perplexity, small
+people take him for yet smaller than themselves who never confess
+anything, and seldom feel anything amiss with them. Such will adduce
+even Hamlet's disparagement of himself to Ophelia when overwhelmed with
+a sense of human worthlessness (126), as proof that he was no hero!
+They call it weakness that he would not, foolishly and selfishly, make
+good his succession against the king, regardless of the law of election,
+and careless of the weal of the kingdom for which he shows himself so
+anxious even in the throes of death! To my mind he is the grandest hero
+in fiction--absolutely human--so troubled, yet so true!]
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of
+Denmark, by George MacDonald
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A STUDY OF HAMLET ***
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