"This is the tragedy of a man" "who could not make up his mind." "Who's there?" "Nay, answer me." "Stand, and unfold yourself." "Long live the King!" "Bernardo?" "He." "You come most carefully upon your hour." "'T is now struck twelve." "Get thee to bed, Francisco." "For this relief much thanks." "'T is bitter cold and I am sick at heart." "Have you had quiet guard?" " Not a mouse stirring." " Well, good night." "If you do meet Horatio and Marcellus, the rivals of my watch, bid them make haste." "I think I hear them." "Stand, ho!" "Who's there?" " Friends to this ground." " And liegemen to the Dane." "Give you goodnight." " O farewell." "Who hath relieved you?" " Bernardo." "Give you goodnight." "Holla!" "Bernardo!" "Say!" "What!" "Is Horatio there?" "A piece of him." "Welcome, Horatio." "Welcome, good Marcellus." "What, has this thing appeared again to-night?" "I have seen nothing." "Horatio says 'tis but our fantasy, and will not believe this dreaded sight, twice seen of us." "I have entreated him along with us to watch the minutes of this night, that if again this apparition comes, he may speak to it." "Tush, tush, 'twill not appear." "Sit down awhile and let us again assail your ears, so fortified against our story, of what we two nights have seen." "Well, sit we down, and let us hear Bernardo speak of this." "Last night of all, when yond same star that's Westward from the pole had made his course into that part of heaven where now it burns," "Marcellus and myself, the bell then beating one..." "Peace!" "Break thee off." "Look, where it comes again!" "In the same figure, like the dead King Hamlet." "Thou art a scholar, speak to it, Horatio." "Looks it not like the King?" "Mark it, Horatio." "Most like." "It harrows me with fear and wonder." "It would be spoke to." "Question it, Horatio." "If thou hast any sound, or use of voice, speak to me." "If there be any good thing to be done, that may to thee do ease and grace to me, O speak." "Stay and speak!" "Stop it, Marcellus." " 'T is here!" " 'T is here!" "'T is gone, and will not answer." "How now, Horatio!" "You tremble and look pale." "Is not this something more than fantasy?" "What think you ort?" "I might not this believe without the true avouch of mine own eyes." "Is it not like the King?" "As thou art to thyself." "'T is strange." "It was about to speak when the cock crew." "And then it started like a guilty thing upon a fearful summons." "I have heard the cock, that is the herald to the morn, doth with his lofty throat awake the god of day," "and, at its warning, the wandering spirit hies to his confine." "It faded on the crowing of the cock." "Some say in that season wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated the bird of dawnings singeth all night long." "And then, they say, no spirit can walk abroad." "The nights are wholesome then, no planets strike, no fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm," "so hallow' and so gracious is the time." "So have I heard and do in part believe it." "But, look, the morn, in russet mantle clad, walks o'er yon high eastward hill." "Break we our watch up, and by my advice, let us impart what we have seen to-night unto young Hamlet, for, upon my life, this spirit, dumb to us," " will speak to him." " Let's do it, I pray." "Something is rotten in the state of Denmark." "Though yet of Hamlet our dear brother's death the memory be green, and that it us befitted to bear our hearts in grief and our whole kingdom to be contracted in one brow of woe," "yet so far hath discretion fought with nature that we with wisest sorrow think on him," "together with remembrance of ourselves." "Therefore our sometime sister, now our queen," "have we, as 'twere with a defeated joy, with mirth in funeral and with dirge in marriage, in equal scale weighing delight and dole, taken to wife." "Nor have we barr' your better wisdoms, which have freely gone, with this affair along." "For all, our thanks." "And now, Laertes, what's the news with you?" "You told us of some suit." "What is't, Laertes?" "You cannot speak of reason to the Dane, and lose your voice." "What wouldst thou beg, that shall not be my offer, not thy asking?" "The head is not more native to the heart than is the throne of Denmark to thy father." "What wouldst thou have, Laertes?" "Dread my lord, your leave and favour to return to France, from whence I came to Denmark, to show my duty in your coronation." "Yet now, I must confess, that duty done, my thoughts and wishes bend again toward France, and bow them to your gracious leave and pardon." "Have you your father's leave?" "What says Polonius?" "He hath, my lord, wrung from me my slow leave by laboursome petition and at last upon his will I've seal' my hard consent." "I do beseech you, give him leave to go." "Take thy fair hour, Laertes." "Time be thine, and thy best graces spend it at thy will." "But now, our cousin Hamlet, and our son, how is it that the clouds still hang on you?" "Good Hamlet, cast thy nighted colour off," "and let thine eye look like a friend on Denmark." "No more with thy lowered lids seek thy noble father in the dust." "Thou know'st 'tis common all that lives must die, passing through nature to eternity." "Ay, madam, it is common." "If it be," " why seems it so particular to thee?" " Seems, madam!" "I know not seems." "'T is not alone my inky cloak, nor customary suits of solemn black, together with all forms, modes, shows of grief, that can denote me." "These indeed seem, for they are actions that a man might play." "But I have that within which passeth show;" "these but the trappings and the suits of woe." "'T is sweet and commendable in your nature, Hamlet, to give these mourning duties to your father." "But, you must know, your father lost a father, that father lost, lost his, and the survivor bound in filial obligation for some term to do obsequious sorrow." "But to persist in obstinate condolement is a course of impious stubbornness." "'Tis unmanly grief, a fault to heaven, a fault against the dead, a fault to nature, to reason most absurd whose common theme is death of fathers, and who still hath cried from the first corpse till he who died today," "this must be so." "Why should we in our peevish opposition take it to heart?" "We pray you, throw to earth this unprevailing woe and think of us as of a father." "For let the world take note:" "you are the most immediate to our throne." "With no less nobility of love than that which father bears his son, do I impart towards you." "Your intent to go back to school in Wittenberg goes against our desire and we beseech you to remain here, in the cheer and comfort of our eye, our chiefest courtier, cousin, and our son." "Let not thy mother lose her prayers, Hamlet." "I pray thee, stay with us, go not to Wittenberg." "I shall in all my best obey you, madam." "Why, 'tis a loving and a fair reply." "Be as ourself in Denmark." "Madam, come." "This gentle and unforced accord of Hamlet sits smiling to my heart, in grace whereof, no jocund health that Denmark drinks to-day but the great cannon to the clouds shall tell, and the King's carouse the heavens shall roar again," "re-speaking earthly thunder." "Come away." "O, that this too too solid flesh would melt, thaw and resolve itself into a dew." "Or that the Everlasting had not fix'd his cannon 'gainst suicide!" "O God!" "God!" "How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable, seem to me all the uses of this world!" "Fie ort!" "O fie!" "'Tis an unweeded garden, that grows to seed." "Things rank and gross in nature possess it merely." "That it should come to this!" "But two months dead!" "Nay, not so much, not two." "So excellent a king that was to this Hyperion to a satyr." "So loving to my mother that he might not suffer the winds of heaven visit her face roughly." "Heaven and earth!" "Must I remember?" "Why, she would hang on him, as if increase of appetite had grown by what it fed on." "And yet, within a month!" "Let me not think ort." "Frailty, thy name is woman!" "A little month!" "Or ere those shoes were old with which she follow'd my father's body, like Niobe, all tears." "Why she, even she." "A beast, that wants discourse of reason, would have mourr longer, married with my uncle," "my father's brother, but no more like my father than I to Hercules." "Within a month she married." "O, most wicked speed, to post with such dexterity to incestuous sheets!" "It is not nor it cannot come to good, but break, my heart, for I must hold my tongue." "My necessaries are embark'." "Farewell." "And, sister, as the winds give benefit, let me hear from you." "Do you doubt that?" "For Hamlet and the trifling of his favour, hold it a fashion and a toy in blood, a violet in the youth of primy nature, forward, not permanent, sweet, not lasting." "The perfume and suppliance of a minute, no more." " No more but so?" " Think it no more." "Perhaps he loves you now, but you must fear, his greatness weigh', his will is not his own, for he himself is subject to his birth." "He may not, as unvalued persons do, carve for himself, for on his choice depends the safety and the health of this whole state." "Weigh what loss your honour may sustain, if you list his songs, or lose your heart," "or your chaste treasure open to his unmaster' importunity." "Be wary then." "Best safety lies in fear." "I shall the effect of this good lesson keep as watchman to my heart." "But, good my brother, do not, as some ungracious pastors do, show me the steep and thorny way to heaven, whilst, like a reckless libertine, he the path of dalliance treads," " and minds not his own creed." " O, fear me not." "But here my father comes." "I stay too long." "Yet here, Laertes?" "Aboard, aboard, for shame!" "The wind sits in the shoulder of your sail, and you are stayed for." "There, my blessing with thee." "And these few precepts in thy memory, look thou character." "Give thy thoughts no tongue, nor any unproportioned thought his act." "Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar." "Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried, grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel, but do not dull thy palm with entertainment of each new-hatched, unfledged comrade." "Beware of entrance to a quarrel, but being in, bear't that the opposed may beware of thee." "Give every man thine ear, but few thy voice." "Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy, but not express' in fancy." "Rich, not gaudy, for the apparel oft proclaims the man." "Neither a borrower nor a lender be." "Loan loses both itself and friend, and borrowing dulls husbandry." "This above all:" "to thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man." "Farewell." "My blessing season this in thee!" " Most humbly do I take my leave." " The time invites you, go." "Farewell, Ophelia." " Remember what I have said to you." " 'T is in my memory lock'," " You yourself shall keep its key." " Farewell." "What is't, Ophelia, he hath said to you?" "So please you, something touching the Lord Hamlet." "Marry, well bethought!" "What is between you?" "Give me up the truth." "He hath, my lord, of late made many tenders of his affection to me." "Affection!" "Pooh!" "You speak like a green girl, unsifted in such circumstance." "Do you believe his tenders?" "I do not know, my lord, what I should think." "Marry, I'll teach you." "Think yourself a baby." "I would not, in plain terms, from this time forth have you give words or talk with the Lord Hamlet." "Look to it, I charge you." "Come your ways." "Sir, my good friend, I'll change that name with you." " Marcellus?" " My good lord." " I am very glad to see you." " My lord." "But, what is your affair here?" "We'll teach you to drink deep ere you go." "My lord, I came to see your father's funeral." "Do not mock me, fellow-student." "It was to see my mother's wedding." "Indeed, my lord, it followed hard upon." "Thrift, thrift, Horatio." "The funeral baked-meats did coldly furnish forth the marriage tables." "Would I had met my dearest foe in heaven or ever I had seen that day." "My father!" "Methinks I see my father." "O, where, my lord?" "In my mind's eye, Horatio." "I saw him once." "He was a goodly king." "He was a man, take him for all in all, I shall not look upon his like again." "My lord," "I think I saw him yesternight." "Saw?" " Who?" " My lord, the King your father." "The King my father?" "Two nights together had these gentlemen," "Marcellus and Bernardo, on their watch, in the dead vast and middle of the night, been thus encounter', a figure like your father, arm', appears before them, and with solemn march goes slow and stately by them." "This to me in dread and secrecy did they impart, and I with them the third night kept the watch." "Where, as they had reported, both in time, form of the thing, each word made true and good, the apparition comes." "I knew your father." "These hands are not more like." " But where was this?" " Upon the platform where we watch'." " Did you not speak to it?" " I did, but answer made it none." "Yet once methought it lifted up its head as it would speak, but even then the morning cock crew loud, and at the sound it shrunk in haste away and vanish' from our sight." " 'T is very strange." " As I do live, my lord, 'tis true." "And we did think it writ down in our duty to let you know of it." "Indeed, indeed, sirs." "But this troubles me." " Hold you the watch tonight?" " We do, my lord." " Arm', you say?" " Arm', my lord." " From top to toe?" " My lord, from head to foot." " Then saw you not his face?" " O, yes my lord." "He wore his visor up." "What, look' he frowningly?" "A countenance more in sorrow than in anger." " And fix' his eyes upon you?" " Most constantly." " I would I had been there." " It would have much amazed you." "Very like, very like." "Stay' it long?" "While one with moderate haste might tell a hundred." " Longer, longer!" " Not when I saw't." " His beard was grizzled, no?" " As I have seen it in his life." "A sable silver'." " Tonight perchance 'twill walk anew." " I warrant it will." "I pray you all, if you have hitherto conceal' this sight, whatever else may hap tonight, give it understanding, but no tongue." "Fare you well." "Upon the platform, 'twixt 11 and 12, I'll visit you." " Our duty to your honour." " As mine to you." "Farewell." "My father's spirit in arms!" "All is not well." "I doubt some foul play." "Would the night were come!" "Till then sit still, my soul." "Foul deeds will rise, though all the earth o'erwhelm them to mers eyes." "The air bites shrewdly." "It is very cold." "It is a nipping and an eager air." "What hour now?" " I think it lacks of twelve." " No, it is struck." "Indeed?" "I heard it not." "It draws near the season wherein the spirit has his wont to walk." "What does this mean, my lord?" "The King doth wake to-night and makes carouse, keeps wassail, and the swaggering up-spring reels." "As he drains his Rhenish down, the drum and trumpet thus bray out the triumph of his pledge." " Is it a custom?" " Ay, marry, is't." "But to my mind, though I am native here and with the manner born, it is a custom more honour' in the breach than the observance." "This heavy-headed revel makes us mock' by other nations." "They call us drunkards and with swinish phrase soil our reputation." "And it takes from our achievements, though perform' at height." "So, oft it chances in particular men, that for some vicious mole of nature in them," "by the o'ergrowth of some complexion, oft breaking down the pales and forts of reason, or by some habit grown too much that these men, carrying, I say, the stamp of one defect, their virtues else, be they as pure as grace, in the general censure" "shall take corruption from that particular fault." " Ministers of grace defend us!" " Look, my lord, it comes!" "Be thou a spirit of health or goblin damr, thou comest in such a questionable shape that I will speak to thee." "I'll call thee Hamlet," "King, father!" "Royal Dane, O, answer me!" " It beckons you to go away with it." " It waves you to a removed ground." " But do not go with it." " No, by no means." "It will not speak, then I will follow it." " Do not, my lord." " Why, what should be the fear?" "I do not set my life at a pirs fee, and for my soul what can it do to that, being a thing immortal as itself?" "It waves me forth again." " I'll follow it." " If it tempt you toward the flood, or to the summit of the cliff that beetles o'er his base into the sea, and there assume some other form which might draw you into madness?" " Think of it." " You shall not go, my lord." " Hold off your hands." " Be ruled." "You shall not go." "My fate cries out, and makes each petty artery in this body as hardy as the Nemean liors nerve." "Still am I call'." "Unand me." "By heaven, I'll make a ghost of him that hinders me!" "I say, away!" "Go on." "I'll follow thee." "Whither wilt thou lead me?" "Speak, I'll go no further." "Mark me." "I will." "I am thy father's spirit, doom'd for a certain time to walk the night, and for the day confined to fast in fires, till the foul crimes done in my days of nature are burnt and purged away." "Alas, poor ghost!" "List, list," "O, list!" "If thou didst ever thy dear father love." "O God!" "Revenge his foul and most unnatural murder." "Murder?" "Murder most foul, as in the best it is." "But this most foul, strange and unnatural." "Haste me to know't, that I, with wings as swift as meditation, may sweep to my revenge." "Now, Hamlet, hear." "'Tis given out that, sleeping in my orchard, a serpent stung me." "So the whole ear of Denmark is by a forged process of my death rankly abused." "But know, thou noble youth, the serpent that did sting thy father's life now wears his crown." "O my prophetic soul!" "My uncle!" "Ay, that incestuous, that adulterate beast, with traitorous gifts, won to his shameful lust the will of my most seeming-virtuous queen." "O Hamlet, what a falling-off was there!" "But, soft!" "Methinks I scent the morning air." "Brief let me be." "Sleeping within my orchard, my custom always of the afternoon, upon my quiet hour thy uncle stole, with juice of cursed hemlock in a vial, and in the porches of my ears did pour the leperous distilment," "whose effect holds such an enmity with blood of man that swift as quicksilver it courses through the natural gates and alleys of the body." "Thus was I, sleeping, by a brother's hand of life, of crown, of queen at once dispatched." "Cut off even in the blossoms of my sin, no reckoning made, but sent to my account with all my imperfections on my head." "Oh horrible!" "Horrible!" "Most horrible!" "If thou hast nature in thee, bear it not." "Let not the royal bed of Denmark be a couch for luxury and damned incest." "But, howsoever thou pursuest this act, taint not thy mind, nor let thy soul contrive against thy mother aught." "Leave her to heaven." "Fare thee well at once!" "The glow-worm shows the mating to be near, and 'gins to pale his uneffectual fire." "Adieu, adieu," "adieu." "Remember me." "O all you host of heaven!" "O earth!" "What else?" "And shall I couple hell?" "Hold, hold, my heart." "Remember thee!" "Ay, thou poor ghost, while memory holds a seat in this distracted globe." "Remember thee!" "Yea, from my memory I'll wipe away all trivial fond records that youth and observation copied there and thy commandment all alone shall live within the volume of my brain, unmix' with baser matter." "Yes, by heaven!" "O most pernicious woman!" "O villain." "Villain, smiling, damned villain!" "So, uncle, there you are." "Now to my word." "It is "adieu, adieu!" "Remember me. "" "I have sworrt." " My lord, my lord." " Lord Hamlet." "So be it!" "Illo, ho, ho, my lord!" "Illo, ho, ho, boy!" "Come, then, come." " How is't, my noble lord?" " What news, my lord?" " O, wonderful!" " Good my lord, tell it." "No." "You will reveal it." "Not I, my lord, by heaven." "How say you, then?" "Would heart of man once think it?" " But you'll be secret?" " Ay, my lord." "There's ne'er a villain dwelling in all Denmark" "but... he's an arrant knave." "There needs no ghost, my lord, come from the grave to tell us this." "Why, right, you are i' the right." "Without more circumstance, I hold it fit that we shake hands and part." "You, as your business and desire shall point you, and for mine own poor part, look you, I'll go pray." "These are but wild and whirling words, my lord." "I'm sorry they offend you, heartily." "Yes, faith heartily." " There's no offence, my lord." " By St Patrick there is, and much." "Touching this vision here, it is an honest ghost, that let me tell you." "For your desire to know what is between us, o'ermaster't as you may." "As you are friends, scholars and soldiers, give me one poor request." " What is't, my lord?" "We will." " Make not known what you have seen." " My lord, we will not." " Nay, but swear't." " In faith, my lord." " Upon my sword." " We've sworn, my lord, already." " Indeed, upon my sword, indeed." " This is wondrous strange!" " As a stranger give it welcome." "More things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy." "But come." "Never, so help you mercy, how strange or odd so e'er I bear myself as I perchance hereafter shall think fit to put an antic disposition on," "that you, at such times seeing me, never shall, by the pronouncing of some doubtful phrase, as "Well, well, we know," or "We could, and if we would," denote" "that you know aught of me." "This do swear, so grace and mercy." "Swear." "Rest!" "Rest, perturbed spirit!" "So, gentlemen." "With all my love I do commend me to you, and what so poor a man as Hamlet is may do, to express his love to you," "God willing, shall not lack." "Go in, and still your fingers on your lips, I pray." "The time is out of joint." "O cursed spite, that ever I was born to set it right!" "Come, let's go together." "As I was sewing in my closet," "Lord Hamlet, with his doublet all unlaced," "pale as his shirt and with a look so piteous in purport" "as if he had been loosed out of hell to speak of horrors..." "He comes before me." "He took me by the wrist and held me hard." "Then goes he to the length of all his arm, and, with his other hand thus, o'er his brow," "he falls to such perusal of my face as he would draw it." "Long stay'd he so." "At last, a little shaking of mine arm and thrice his head thus waving up and down," "he raised a sigh so piteous and profound as it did seem to shatter all his bulk and end his being." "That done, he let me go, and, with his head over his shoulder turrd," "he seem'd to find his way without his eyes, for out o' doors he went without their help," "and, to the last, bended their light" "on me." "My liege, and madam, to expostulate what majesty should be, what duty is, why day is day, night night, and time is time, were nothing but to waste night, day and time." "Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit, and tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes, I will be brief." "Your noble son is mad." "Mad call I it, for to define true madness," " what is't but to be only mad?" " More matter, with less art." "Madam, I swear I use no art at all." "That he is mad, 'tis true." "'Tis true, 'tis pity and pity 'tis 'tis true." "A foolish figure." "But farewell it, for I will use no art." "Thus it remains, and the remainder thus." "Perpend." "I have a daughter, have while she is mine, who, in her duty and obedience, mark, hath given me this." "Now gather, and surmise." ""To the celestial and my soul's idol, the most beautified Ophelia. "" "That's an ill phrase, a vile phrase." ""Beautified" is a vile phrase, but you shall hear." "Thus..." ""In her excellent white bosom, these... "" "Etcetera." " Came this from Hamlet to her?" " Good madam, stay awhile." "I will be faithful." ""Doubt thou the stars are fire, doubt that the sun doth move, doubt truth to be a liar, but never doubt I love." "O dear Ophelia, I am ill at these numbers." "I have not art to reckon my groans." "But that I love thee best, O most best, believe it." "Adieu." "Thine evermore most dear lady, while this frame is to him." "Hamlet. "" "This, in obedience, hath my daughter shown me, and more of his solicitings hath she as they fell out by time, by means and place, all given to mine ear." "But how hath she received his love?" "What do you think of me?" "As of a man faithful and honourable." "I would fain prove so." "But what might you think, when I had seen this hot love on the wing, if I had look' upon this love with idle sight?" "What might you think?" "No," "I went round to work, and my young mistress thus I did bespeak:" ""Lord Hamlet is a prince, out of thy star." "This must not be. "" "And I prescripts gave her that she should lock herself from his resort, admit no messengers, receive no tokens." "And he, repulsed, a short tale to make, fell into a sadness, then into a fast, thence to a watch, thence into a weakness, thence to a lightness, and, by this declension, into that madness wherein now he raves" "and all we mourn for." "Do you think 'tis this?" "It may be." "Very likely." "Hath there been such a time," "I' fain know that, that I have positively said "'tis so," that it proved otherwise?" "Not that I know." "Take this from this, if this be otherwise." "How may we try it further?" "You know, sometimes he walks for hours together here in the lobby." " So he does indeed." " At such a time I'll loose her." "Be you and I behind an arras then." "Mark the encounter." "If he loves her not and be not from his reason fall'n thereon, let me be no assistant for a state, but keep a farm and can'ters." "We will try it." "But, look, where sadly the poor wretch comes reading." "Away, I do beseech you, both away." "I'll board him presently." "Oh give me leave." "How does my good Lord Hamlet?" "Well, God-a-mercy." "Do you know me, my lord?" "Excellent well." "You are a fishmonger." "Not I, my lord." " I would you were so honest a man." " Honest, my lord?" "Ay, to be honest is to be one man picked out of ten thousand." "That's very true, my lord." "For if the sun breed maggots in a dead dog..." "Have you a daughter?" "I have, my lord." "Let her not walk i' the sun." "Conception is a blessing but as your daughter may conceive." "Friend, look to't." "How say you by that?" "Still harping on my daughter." "Yet he knew me not at first." "He said I was a fishmonger." "He is far gone, far gone." "I'll speak to him again." " What do you read, my lord?" " Words, words, words." " What is the matter, my lord?" " Between who?" " I mean, the matter that you read." " Slanders, sir." "For the satirical rogue says here that old men have grey beards, that their faces are wrinkled, their eyes purging thick amber and plum-tree gum," "that they have a plentiful lack of wit, together with most weak hams." "All of which, sir, though I most powerfully believe, yet I hold it not honesty to have it thus set down, though you yourself, sir, should be old as I am, if like a crab you could go backward." "Though this be madness, yet there is method in't." " Will you walk out of the air?" " Into my grave?" "Indeed, that is out o' the air." "How pregnant sometimes his replies are!" "My honourable lord," "I will most humbly take my leave of you." "You cannot take from me anything I will more willingly part withal." "Except my life." "Except my life." "Except my life." "Read on this book, that show of such an exercise may colour your loneliness." "Gracious, so please you, we'll bestow ourselves." "Ophelia, walk you here." "Let's withdraw, my lord." "Soft you now!" "The fair Ophelia!" "Nymph, in thy orisons be all my sins remember'." "Good my lord," "how does your honour for this many a day?" "I humbly thank you." "Well... well... well." "My lord," "I have remembrances of yours, that I have longed long to re-deliver." "I pray you, now receive them." "No, not I." "I never gave you aught." "My honour' lord, you know right well you did." "And, with them, words of so sweet breath composed as made the things more rich." "Their perfume lost, take these again, for to the noble mind rich gifts wax poor when givers prove unkind." "There, my lord." " Are you honest?" " My lord?" "I did love you once." "Indeed, my lord, you made me believe so." "You should not have believed me." "Get thee to a nunnery." "Why wouldst thou be a breeder of sinners?" "I am myself indifferent honest, but yet I would accuse me of such things that it were better my mother had not borne me." "I am very proud, revengeful, ambitious," "with more offences at my beck than I have thoughts to put them in, imagination to give them shape, or time to act them in." "What should such fellows as I do crawling between heaven and earth?" "We are arrant knaves all." "Believe none of us." "Go thy ways to a nunnery." "Where's your father?" "At home, my lord." "Let the doors be shut upon him, that he may play the fool in his house." "Farewell." "O, help him, you sweet heavens!" "I have heard of your paintings too, well enough." "God has given you one face, and you make yourselves another." "You jig, you amble and you lisp, and make your wantonness your ignorance." "Get thee to a nunnery, and quickly too." "Farewell." "Or, if thou wilt needs marry, marry a fool." "For wise men know well enough what monsters you make of them." "Go to, I'll no more ort." "It hath made me mad." "I say, we will have no more marriages." "Those that are married already, all but one, shall live." "The rest shall stay as they are." "To a nunnery, go!" "Love!" "His affections do not that way tend." "Nor what he spake, though it lack' form a little, was not like madness." "There's something in his soul, o'er which his melancholy sits on brood, and I do fear the uneeded consequence will be some danger, for which to prevent, I have in determination thus set it down:" "he shall with speed to England." "Haply the seas and countries different with variable objects shall expel this matter in his heart." "What think you ort?" "It shall do well, but yet I do believe the origin and commencement of his grief sprung from neglected love." "How now, Ophelia!" "You need not tell us what Lord Hamlet said." "We heard." " My lord, do as you please." " It shall be so." "Madness in great ones must not unwatch' go." "To be, or not to be;" "that is the question." "Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune," "or to take arms against a sea of troubles, and by opposing" "end them?" "To die?" "To sleep, no more." "And by a sleep to say we end the heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to," "'tis a consummation devoutly to be wish'd." "To die, to sleep." "To sleep, perchance to dream." "Ay, there's the rub, for in that sleep of death what dreams may come when we have shuffled off this mortal coil" "must give us pause." "There's the respect that makes calamity of so long life, for who would bear the whips and scorns of time," "the oppressor's wrong, the proud mars contumely," "the pangs of despised love," "the law's delays, the insolence of office, and the spurns that patient merit of the unwon'thy takes, when he himself might his quietus make" "with a bare bodkin?" "Who would fardels bear, to grunt and sweat under a weary life, but that the dread of something after death," "the undiscover' country from whose bourn no traveller returns, puzzles the will" "and makes us rather bear those ills we have than fly to others that we know not of?" "Thus conscience does make cowards of us all, and thus the native hue of resolution is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought," "and enterprises of great pith and moment." "With this regard their currents turn awry," "and lose the name of action." "My lord," "I have news to tell you." "The actors are come hither, my lord." "He that plays the king shall be welcome." ""The best actors in the world, either for tragedy, comedy, history, pastoral, pastoral-comical, historical-pastoral, tragical-historical, tragical-comical- historical-pastoral." "Seneca cannot be too heavy, nor Plautus too light, for these are the only men. "" "You are welcome, masters." "Welcome, all." "I am glad to see thee well." "Welcome, good friends." "O, my old friend!" "Thy face is valenced since I saw thee last." "Comest thou to beard me?" "What, my young lady and mistress!" "By'r lady, your ladyship is nearer to heaven than when I saw you last." "Pray God, your voice be not cracked in its rings." "Masters, you are all welcome." "Good my lord, will you see the players well bestowed?" "Do you hear, let them be well used, for they are the abstract and brief chronicles of the time." "You were better have a bad epitaph than an ill report while you live." " I will use them to their desert." " God's bodykin, man, much better!" "Use every man after his desert, and who should 'scape whipping?" "The less they deserve, the more merit is in your bounty." " Come, sirs." " Follow him, friends." "We hear a play to-morrow." "Dost thou hear me, old friend?" "Can you play "The Murder of Gonzago"?" "Ay, my lord." "We'll ha't to-morrow night." "You could study a speech of some dozen or sixteen lines that I would set down and insert in't," " could you not?" " Ay, my lord." "Very well." "Follow that lord and look you mock him not." "The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the King." "Speak the speech, as I pronounced it to you, trippingly on the tongue." "But if you mouth it, as many of your players do," "I had as lief the town-crier spoke my lines." "Nor do not saw the air too much with your hand, thus." "But use all gently, for in the very torrent, tempest and I may say whirlwind of your passion, you must acquire and beget a temperance that may give it smoothness." "Oh, it offends me to the soul to hear a robustious periwig-pated fellow tear a passion to tatters, to split the ears of the groundlings, who, for the most part, are capable of nothing but inexplicable dumbshows and noise." "I would have such a fellow whipped." "It out-herods Herod." " Pray you, avoid it." " I warrant your honour." "Be not too tame neither, but let your own discretion be your tutor." "Suit the action to the word, the word to the action." "With this observance, that you o'erstep not the modesty of nature, for anything so overdone is from the purpose of playing, whose end, both at the first and now, was and is, to hold, as 'twere," "the mirror up to nature, to show virtue her own feature, scorn her own image, and the very age and body of the time his form and pressure." "Now this overdone, though it make the unskilful laugh, cannot but make the judicious grieve, the censure of which one must outweigh a whole theatre of others." "There be players that I have seen play, and heard others praise highly not to speak it profanely, that, having neither the accent of Christian nor the gait of Pagan, have so strutted and bellowed that I have thought some of nature's" "journeymen had made men and not made them well." "I hope we have reformed that indifferently with us, sir." "Oh, reform it altogether." "Let your clowns speak no more than is set down for them, for there be of them that will themselves laugh, to set on some barren quantity of spectators to laugh too, though some necessary question of the play be then to be considered." "It shows a most pitiful ambition in the fool that uses it." "Go, make you ready." "How now my lord." "Will the King hear this piece of work?" "And the Queen too, and that presently." " Bid the players make haste." " Ay, my lord." "Horatio!" " Here, sweet lord, at your service." " Give mine uncle heedful note." " Well, my lord." " They are coming to the play." "I must be idle, get you a place." " How fares our cousin Hamlet?" " Excellent." "Of the chameleors dish" "I eat the air, promise-crammed." "You cannot feed capons so." "I have nothing with this answer, Hamlet; these words are not mine." "Nor mine now." "My lord, you played once i' the university, you say?" "That did I, my lord, and was accounted a good actor." " What did you enact?" " I did enact Julius Caesar." "I was killed i' the Capitol." "Brutus killed me." "It was a brute part of him to kill so capital a calf there." " Be the players ready?" " Ay, my lord." "They stay upon your patience." "Come hither, my dear Hamlet." "Sit by me." "No, good mother, here's metal more attractive." "O, ho!" "Do you mark that?" "Lady, shall I lie in your lap?" "No, my lord." " I mean, my head upon your lap?" " Ay, my lord." " Think you I meant country matters?" " I think nothing, my lord." "That's a fair thought to lie between maid's legs." " What is, my lord?" " Nothing." " You are merry, my lord." " Who, I?" " Ay, my lord." " O God, your only jig maker." "What should a man do but be merry?" "Look you how merrily my mother looks and my father died within these two hours." "Nay, 'tis twice two months, my lord." "So long?" "Nay then, let the devil wear black, for I'll have a suit of sables." "Died two months ago, and not forgotten yet?" "Then there's hope a mars memory may outlive his life half a year." "For us, and for our tragedy, here stooping to your clemency, we beg your hearing patiently." "Is this a prologue, or the posy of a ring?" "'T is brief, my lord." "As womars love." "You are keen, my lord, you are keen." "It would cost you a groaning to take off mine edge." "Give me some light!" "Light!" "Light!" "Light!" "Why, let the stricken deer go weep, the hart ungalled play, for some must watch, while some must sleep, so runs the world away." "I'll take the ghost's word for a thousand pounds." "Didst perceive?" " Very well, my lord." " Upon the act of poisoning?" " I did very well note him." " God bless you, sir." " Good my lord, a word with you." " Sir, a whole history." " The King, sir..." " Ay, sir, what of him?" " Is in his retirement distempered." " With drink, sir?" "No, my lord, rather with choler." "Your wisdom should show itself more richer to tell this to his doctor." "For me to put him to his purgation would plunge him into more choler." "Put your discourse into some frame and start not wildly from my affair." "I am tame, sir." "Pronounce." "The Queen, in most great affliction of spirit, hath sent me to you." " You are welcome." " This courtesy's not of right breed." "Make me a wholesome answer and I'll do your mother's commandment." "If not, your pardon and my return shall be the end of my business." " Sir, I cannot." " What, my lord?" "Make you a wholesome answer." "My wit's diseased." "But such answer as I can make, you shall command or, rather, my mother." "Therefore no more but to the matter." "My mother, you say..." "She desires to speak with you in her closet ere you go to bed." "We shall obey." "Have you any further trade with us?" "My lord, the Queen would speak with you, and presently." "Do you see yonder cloud that's almost in shape of a camel?" "By the mass, and 'tis like a camel indeed." "Methinks it is like a weasel." " It is backed like a weasel." " Or like a whale?" "Very like a whale." "Then I will come to my mother by and by." "I will say so." ""By and by" is easily said." "Leave me, friend." "'T is now the very witching time of night, when churchyards yawn and hell itself breathes out contagion to this world." "Now could I drink hot blood, and do such bitter business as the day would quake to look on." "Soft!" "Now to my mother." "O heart, lose not thy nature." "Let not ever the soul of Nero enter this firm bosom." "Let me be cruel, not unnatural." "I will speak daggers to her, but use none." "My lord." "He's going to his mother's closet." "Behind the arras I'll conceal myself, to hear the process." "I'll warrant she'll tax him home, and, as you said, and wisely was it said, 'tis meet that some more audience than a mother, as nature makes them partial, should o'erhear the speech, of vantage." "I'll call upon you ere you go to bed and tell you what I know." "Thanks, dear my lord." "O, my offence is rank." "It smells to heaven." "It hath the primal eldest curse upon it." "A brother's murder." "Pray can I not, though inclination be as sharp as will." "What if this hand were thicker than itself with brother's blood, is there not rain enough in the sweet heavens to wash it white as snow?" "Oh, what form of prayer can serve my turn?" ""Forgive me my foul murder"?" "But I am still possess' of those effects for which I did the murder:" "my crown, mine own ambition and my queen." "O wretched state!" "O bosom black as death!" "Help angels!" "All may yet be well." "Now might I do it pat, now he is praying." "And now I'll do't." "And so he goes to heaven, and so am I revenged." "That would be thought on." "A villain kills my father and for that, I, his sole son, do this same villain send to heaven." "Oh, this is hire and salary, not revenge." "He took my father, with all his crimes full blown, as flush as May, and how his audit stands who knows save heaven?" "But in our circumstance and course of thought, 'tis heavy with him, and am I then revenged, to take him in the purging of his soul when he is fit and seasord for his passage?" "No!" "Up, sword, and know thou a more dark intent." "When he is drunk asleep, or in his rage, or in the incestuous pleasure of his bed, at gaming, swearing, or about some act that has no salvation in't, then trip him, that his heels may kick at heaven and that his soul" "may be as damrd and black as hell, whereto it goes." "My mother stays." "This physic but prolongs thy sickly days." "My words fly up, my thoughts remain below." "Words without thoughts never to heaven go." "He will come straight." "Look you lay home to him." "Tell him his pranks have been too broad to bear with, and that your grace hath screer and stood between much heat and him." "I'll silence me even here." "Pray you, be round with him." "Mother!" "Mother." "Mother." "I'll warrant you." "Fear me not." "Withdraw, I hear him coming." "Now, mother, what's the matter?" "Hamlet, thou hast thy father much offended." "Mother, you have my father much offended." "Come, come, you answer with an idle tongue." "Go, go, you question with a wicked tongue." " Why, how now, Hamlet?" " What's the matter now?" " Have you forgot me?" " No, by the rood, not so." "You are the Queen, your husband's brother's wife." "And, would it were not so, you are my mother." " I'll set you those that can speak." " Come, come, and sit you down." "You shall not budge." "You go not till I set you up a glass where you may see your inmost part." "What wilt thou do?" "Thou wilt not murder me?" " Help!" " How now!" "A rat?" "Dead for a ducat!" "Dead!" "O me, what hast thou done?" "Nay, I know not!" "Is it the King?" "And what a rash and bloody deed is this?" "A bloody deed!" "Almost as bad, good mother, as kill a king, and marry with his brother." "As kill a King?" "Ay, lady." "'T was my word." "Thou wretched, rash, intruding fool, farewell!" "I took thee for thy better." "Take thy fortune, thou find'st to be too busy is some danger." "Leave wringing of the hands." "Let me wring your heart, for so I shall, if it be of penetrable stuff." "What have I done, that thou darest wag thy tongue so rude against me?" "Such an act that blurs the grace and blush of modesty, calls virtue hypocrite, takes off the rose from the forehead of an innocent love, and sets a blister there, makes marriage-vows as false as dicers' oaths." " Ay me, what act?" " Look here, upon this picture, and on this, the counterfeit presentment of two brothers." "See, what a grace was seated on this brow:" "an eye like Mars, to threaten and command, a stature like the herald Mercury new-lighted on a heaven-kissed hill." "A combination and a form where every god did seem to set his seal, to give the world assurance of a man." "This was your husband." "Look you now, what follows." "Here is your husband, blasting his wholesome brother." "Have you eyes." "You cannot call it love, for at your age the heyday in the blood is tame, and waits upon the judgement." "And what judgment would step from this to this?" "What devil was't that thus has hoodwinked you?" "O shame!" "Where is thy blush?" "If hell rise up in a matrors bones, to youth let virtue be as wax!" "O Hamlet, speak no more." "Thou turrst mine eyes into my very soul, and there I see such black engrained spots as will not lose their stain." "Nay, but to live in the rank sweat of a lascivious bed, stew' in corruption, honeying and making love over the nasty sty." "These words, like daggers, enter in mine ears." "No more, sweet Hamlet!" "A murderer, a slave that is not 20th part the won'th of your true lord." "A cutpurse of the throne, that from a shelf the precious diadem stole," " and put it in his pocket." " No more!" "A king of shreds and patches." "Save me, and hover o'er me with your wings, you heavenly guards!" "What would your gracious figure?" "Alas, he's mad!" "Do you not come your tardy son to chide, that, lapsed in time and passion, lets go by the important acting of your dread command?" "Oh say!" "Do not forget;" "this visitation is but to whet thy almost blunted purpose." "But, look, amazement on thy mother sits." "Oh, step between her and her fighting soul." "Speak to her, Hamlet." "How is it with you, lady?" "Alas, how is't with you, that you do bend your eye on vacancy and with the incorporal air do hold discourse?" "O gentle son, upon the heat and flame of thy distemper sprinkle cool patience." "Whereon do you look?" "On him, on him!" "Look you, how pale he glares!" "His form and cause joir, preaching to the stones' make them sensitive." "Do not look upon me, lest with this piteous action you convert my stern intents so I shed tears not blood." "To whom do you speak this?" "Do you see nothing there?" "No, nothing at all, yet all there is, I see." " Nor do you nothing hear?" " No, nothing but ourselves." "Why, look you there!" "Look, where it steals away!" "My father, in his habit as he lived!" "Look, where he goes, even now, out at the portal!" "This is the very coinage of your brain, this bodiless creation madness is very cunning in." "Madness?" "My pulse doth temperately keep time and makes as healthful music." "Mother, for love of grace, lay not that flattering unction to your soul that not your trespass, but my madness speaks." "Confess yourself to heaven, repent what's past, avoid what is to come, and do not spread the compost on the weeds, to make them ranker." "Forgive me this my virtue." "O Hamlet, thou hast cleft my heart in twain." "O, throw away the worser part of it, and live the purer with the other half." "Goodnight, but... go not to my uncle's bed." "Assume a virtue, if you have it not." "Refrain to-night, and that shall lend a kind of easiness to the next abstinence, the next more easy, for use almost can change the stamp of nature." "Once more, goodnight." "And when you are desirous to be bless'," "I'll blessing beg of you." "I must be cruel, only to be kind." "I must to England, you know that?" "Alack, I had forgot." "'T is so concluded on?" "There's letters seal'." "This man shall send me packing." "I'll lug the guts into the neighbour room." "Indeed this counsellor is now most still, most secret, and most grave, that was in life a foolish prating knave." "Come, sir, to draw toward an end with you." "Goodnight, mother." " Now, Hamlet, where's Polonius?" " At supper." "At supper!" "Where?" "Not where he eats, but where he is eaten." "A certain convocation of politic worms are e'en at him." "Your worm is your only emperor for diet." "We fat all creatures else to fat us, and we fat ourselves for worms." "Your fat king and your lean beggar is but variable service, two dishes, but to one table, that's the end." "Alas, alas!" "A man may fish with the worm that hath eat of a king, and eat of the fish that hath fed of that worm." " What dost you mean by this?" " Nothing, but to show you how a king may go a progress through a beggar's guts." " Where is Polonius?" " In heaven." "If your messenger find him not there, seek him i' the other place." "But indeed, if you find him not within this month, you shall nose him as you go up the stairs into the lobby." "Go seek him there." "He will stay till you come." "Hamlet, for thine especial safety, which we do tender, as we do deeply grieve for that which thou hast done, this deed must send thee hence with fiery quickness." "Therefore prepare thyself." "The bark is ready, the wind fair, and everything is bent for England." " For England?" " Ay, Hamlet." "Good." "So is it, if thou knew'st our purposes." "I see a cherub that sees them." "But, come." "For England." "Farewell, dear mother." "Thy loving father, Hamlet." "My mother," "Father and mother is man and wife, man and wife is one flesh." "And so... my mother." "Come," "for England!" "Follow him, tempt him with speed aboard." "Delay it not." "I'll have him hence to-night." "Away!" "For everything is seal' and done that else leans on the affair." "Pray you, make haste." "And, England, if my love thou hold'st at aught, thou mayst not coldly treat our sovereign order, which imports at full the present death of Hamlet." "Do it, England, for like the fever in my blood he rages, and thou must cure me." "Till I know 'tis done, howe'er my haps, my joys were ne'er begun." "Where is the beauteous majesty of Denmark?" "Why how now, Ophelia." "Say you?" "Nay, pray you, mark!" "He is dead and gone, lady, he is dead and gone." "At his head a grass-green turf, at his heels a... stone." "Nay, but, Ophelia." "Pray you, mark." "White his shroud as the mountain snow..." "Alas, look here, my lord." "...which bewept to the grave did go with true-love showers." "How do you, pretty lady?" "Well, God'ild you!" "They say the owl was a baker's daughter." "Lord, we know what we are, but know not what we may be." "God be at your table." "Distraction upon her father." "I hope all will be well." "We must be patient, but I cannot choose but weep, to think they should lay him in the cold ground." "My brother shall know of it," "and so I thank you for your good counsel." "Come, my coach!" "Goodnight, ladies." "Sweet ladies, goodnight." "Goodnight." "Follow her close." "Give her good watch, I pray you." "O Gertrude, Gertrude, when sorrows come, they come not single spies but in battalions." "First, her father slain, next, our son gone, the people muddied, thick and unwholesome in their thoughts and whispers." "Poor Ophelia, divided from herself and her fair judgement." "Last, and more dangerous, her brother is in secret come from France and wants not to infect his ear with speeches of his father's death, while he himself not hesitates to threaten our own person." "O my dear Gertrude, this, like to a murdering-piece, in many places gives me superfluous death." "How now!" "What news?" " Letters, my lord, from Hamlet." " From Hamlet?" "This to your majesty." "This to the Queen." " Who brought them?" " Sailors, my lord." "They say." "Leave us." "God bless you, sir." " Let Him bless thee too." " He shall, sir, if it please Him." "A letter for you from the ambassador that was bound for England, if your name be Horatio, as I am let to know it is." "Horatio, e're we were two days old at sea," "a pirate of very warlike appointment gave us chase." "Finding ourselves too slow of sail, we put on a compelled valour... and in the grapple I boarded them." "On the instant they got clear of our ship," "so I alone became their prisoner." "They have dealt with me like thieves of mercy, but they knew what they did." "I am to do a good turn for them." "Repair thou to me with as much speed as thou wouldst fly death." "These good fellows will bring thee where I am." "Farewell." "He that thou knowest thine," "Hamlet." "By Gis and by Saint Charity, alack, and fie for shame, young men will do't, if they come to't." "By cock, they are to blame." "Quoth she, before you tumbled me, you promised me to wed." "So would I ha' done, by yonder sun." "Come, that you may direct me to him from whom you brought this." "How came he dead?" "I'll not be juggled with." "To hell, allegiance, vows!" "Conscience to the profoundest pit!" "Only I'll be revenged most thoroughly for my father." "If you desire to know the certainty of your dear father's death, is't writ in your revenge that you will draw both friend and foe?" " None but his enemies." " Will you know them then?" "To his good friends thus wide I'll ope' my arms." "Why, now you speak like a good child and a true gentleman." "That I am guiltless of his death and am most sensible in grief for it, it shall as appear as clear to your judgement as day does to your eyes." " You must sing." " How now, what noise is this?" "A- down a-down" " they bore him..." " Kind sister." "Sweet Ophelia." "It is the false steward that stole his master's daughter." "Oh heat, dry up my brains!" "O rose of May!" "Is't possible a maid's wits should be as mortal as an old mars life?" "By heaven, thy madness shall be paid by weight, till our scale turn the beam." "Fare you well, my dove!" "There's rosemary." "That's for remembrance." "Pray you love, remember." "There is pansies." "That's for thoughts." "There's fennel for you, and columbines." "There's rue for you, and here's some for me." "We may call it herb of grace o'Sundays." "O you must wear your rue with a difference." "There's a daisy." "I would give you some violets, but they withered all when my father died." "They say he made a good end." "For bonny sweet Robin is all my joy." " Do you see this, O God?" "And will he not come again?" "And will he not come again?" "No, no, he is dead." "Go to thy death bed." "He will never come again." "God ha' mercy on his soul!" "And of all Christian souls, I pray God." "God be with you." "There is a willow grows aslant a brook, that shows his hoar leaves in the glassy stream." "There with fantastic garlands did she come of crow-flowers, nettles, daisies, and long purples." "There, on the pendent boughs her coronet weeds clambering to hang, an envious sliver broke," "when down her weedy trophies and herself fell in the weeping brook." "Her clothes spread wide, and, mermaid-like, awhile they bore her up." "But long it could not be till that her garments, heavy with their drink, pull'd the poor wretch from her melodious lay to muddy death." "Alas... and she is drowned." "Drowrd." "Drowrd." "In youth, when I did love, did love, methought it was very sweet to contract, O, the time, for, ah, my behove," "Methought there was nothing meet." "But age, with his stealing steps," " hath claw' me in his clutch..." " Whose grave's this, sirrah?" "Mine, sir." "I think it be thine, indeed, for thou liest in't." "out on't and therefore it is not yours." "For my part, I do" " in't and yet it is mine." " You liest in't and say it is thine." "'T is for the dead, not for the quick." "Therefore thou liest." "'T is a quick lie, sir." "'Twill away again, from me to you." " What man dost thou dig it for?" " For no man, sir." " For what woman, then?" " For none, neither." "Who is to be buried in't?" "One that was a woman, sir, but, rest her soul, she's dead." "We must speak by the card, or equivocation will undo us." "How long hast thou been a gravemaker?" "Of all the days in the year, I came to it that day that our last King Hamlet o'ercame Fortinbras." " How long is that since?" " Cannot you tell that?" "Every fool can tell that." "It was the very day that young Hamlet was born." "He that is mad and sent into England." "Ay, marry." " Why was he sent into England?" " Why?" "Because he was mad." "He shall recover his wits there." " If he do not, 'tis no matter there." " Why?" "It will not be seen in him there." "There the men are as mad as he." " How came he mad?" " Very strangely, they say." " How strangely?" " Faith." " E'en by losing his wits." " Upon what ground?" "Why, here in Denmark." "How long will a man lie in the earth ere he rot?" "If he be not rotten before he die, he will last some 8 year, 9 year." " A tanner will last you nine year." " Why he more than another?" "Why, sir, his hide is so tanned with his trade, it will keep out water a great while." "And your water is a sore decayer of your whoreson dead body." "'Ere, 'ere's a skull now." "This skull has lain in the earth three and twenty years." "Whose was it?" "Oh some mad fellow's it was." "Whose do you think it was?" "I know not." "A pestilence on him for a mad rogue!" "He poured a flagon of Rhenish on my head once." "This same skull, sir, was Yorick's skull, the King's jester." "This?" "E'en that." "Let me see." "Alas, poor Yorick!" "I knew him, Horatio." "A fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy." "He hath borne me on his back a thousand times." "Now, how abhorred in my imagination it is!" "My gorge rises at it." "Here hung those lips that I have kissed I know not how oft." "Where be your gibes now?" "Your songs?" "Your gambols?" "Your flashes of merriment, that were wont to set the table on a roar?" "Not one now, to mock your own grinning?" "Quite chop-fallen?" "Now get you to my lady's chamber and tell her, let her paint an inch thick, to this favour she must come." "Make her laugh at that." "But soft!" "The King!" "The Queen, the courtiers." "Who is this they follow and with such meagre rites?" "This betokens that the corpse with desperate hand took its own life." "Mark!" "What ceremony else?" "That is Laertes, a very noble youth." "Mark!" "What ceremony else?" "Her obsequies have been as far enlarged as we have warranty." "Her death was doubtful, and but that great command o'ersways the order, she should in ground unsanctified have lodged till the last trumpet." "Must there no more be done?" "No more be done?" "We should profane the service of the dead to sing a requiem and such rest to her as to peace-parted souls?" "Lay her in the earth." "And from her fair and unpolluted flesh may violets spring." "I tell thee, churlish priest, a ministering angel shall my sister be when thou liest howling." "What!" "The fair Ophelia!" "Sweets to the sweet!" "Farewell!" "I hoped thou shouldst have been my Hamlet's wife." "I thought thy bride-bed to have deck', sweet maid, and not have strew' thy grave." "Oh, treble woe, fall ten times treble on that cursed head whose wicked deed thy most ingenious sense deprived thee of!" "Hold off the earth till I have caught her once more in my arms." "Now pile your dust upon the quick and dead, till of this flat a mountain you have made." "What is he whose grief bears such an emphasis?" "It is I, Hamlet the Dane." " The devil take thy soul!" " Thou pray'st not well." "I prithee, take thy fingers from my throat." "Hold off thy hands." "Pluck them asunder." "I'll fight with him upon this theme until my eyelids will no longer wag." "O my son, what theme?" "I loved Ophelia." "Forty thousand brothers could not, with all their love, make up my sum." " What wilt thou do for her?" " He is mad, Laertes." "'Swounds, show me what thou'It do!" "Woo't weep?" "Woo't fight?" "Woo't fast?" "Woo't tear thyself?" "Woo't drink up poison?" "Eat a crocodile?" "I'll do't." "Dost thou come here to whine?" "To outface me leaping in her grave?" "Be buried quick with her, and so will I, or if thou prate of mountains, let them throw millions of acres on us." "Nay, an thou'It mouth, I'll rant as well as thou." "This is mere madness." "And thus awhile the fit will work in him, anon, as patient as the female dove, his silence will sit drooping." "Hear you, sir." "What is the reason that you use me thus?" "I loved you ever, but it is no matter." "Let Hercules himself do what he may." "The cat will mew and dog will have his day." "I pray you, good Horatio, wait upon him." "Good Gertrude, set some watch o'er your son." "Laertes, I must commune with your grief, or you deny me right." "And you must put me in your heart for friend." "Where the offence is, let the great axe fall." "It shall be so." "But tell me, why you have proceeded not against him?" "Oh, for two special reasons, which may to you seem much unsinew', yet to me they are strong." "The Queen, his mother, lives almost by his looks, and for myself, my virtue or my plague, be it either way, she's so conjunctive to my life and soul that, as the star moves not but in his sphere," "I could not but by her." "The other motive is the great love the general people bear him, who, dipping all his faults in their affections, convert his sins to graces." "And so have I a noble father lost, a sister driven to a desperate end." "Whose won'th, if praises may go back again, stood challenger on mount of all the age for her perfections." "But my revenge will come." "Break not your sleeps for that." "You must not think that we are made of stuff so flat and dull that we can let our beard be shook with danger and think it pastime." "And he be now returr, I'll work him to an exploit, now ripe in my device, under the which he shall not choose but fall." "And for his death no wind of blame shall breathe, but even his mother shall uncharge the practice and call it accident." "I will be ruled." "Willingly if you devise it that I'm the instrument." "It falls right." "You have been talk' of since your travel, and in Hamlet's hearing, for a quality wherein, they say, you shine." "Two months since, here was a gentleman of Normandy." "He made confession of you, and gave you such a masterly report for art and exercise in your defence and for your rapier most especially, that he cried out 'twould be a sight indeed, if one could match you." "Sir, this report of his did Hamlet so envenom with his envy that he could nothing do but wish your coming o'er, to fence with him." "Now, out of this..." "What out of this, my lord?" "Laertes, was your father dear to you?" "Or are you like the painting of a sorrow, a face without a heart?" "Why ask you this?" "That we would do we should do when we would." "For this "would" changes and hath abatements and delays as many as there are words, are thoughts, are accidents." "And then this "should" is like a spendthrift sigh." "But, to the quick o' the ulcer." "We'll put on those shall praise your excellence, bring you in short together and wager on your heads." "Hamlet, being guileless will not peruse the swords, so that, with ease or with a little shuffling, you may choose a sword unbated and in a pass of practice requite him for your father." "I will do't." "And for that purpose I'll anoint my sword." "I bought an unction of a mountebank so mortal that, but dip a knife in it, where it draws blood no medicine so rare can save the thing from death that is but scratch' withal." "If this should fail..." "Soft!" "Let me see." "We'll make a solemn wager on your cunning." "I have it." "When in the action you are hot and dry and that he calls for drink," "I'll have prepared him a chalice for the nonce, whereon but sipping, if he by chance escape your venom' point, our purpose may hold there." "Horatio, thou art e'en as just a man as e'er my conversation coped withal." " O, my dear lord!" " Nay, do not think I flatter." "For thou hast been as one, in suffering all, that suffers nothing, a man that fortune's buffets and rewards has ta'en with equal thanks," "and blest are those whose blood and judgement are so well commingled that they are not a pipe for fortune's finger to sound." "Give me that man that is not passiors slave and I will wear him in my heart's core." "Ay, in my heart of heart, as I do thee." "Something too much of this." "But I am very sorry, good Horatio, that to Laertes I forgot myself." "For, by the image of my cause, I see the portraiture of his." "But, sure, the bravery of his grief did put me into a towering passion." "Peace!" "Who comes here?" "Your lordship is right welcome back to Denmark." "I humbly thank you, sir." "Dost know this water-fly?" " No, my good lord." " Thy state is the more gracious." "Sweet lord, if your lordship were at leisure, I' impart a thing from his majesty." "We shall receive it, sir, with all diligence of spirit." "Put your bonnet to its right use." "'Tis for the head." " I thank you, it is very hot." " 'T is cold; the wind is northerly." " It is indifferent cold, my lord." " Yet sultry for my complexion." "Exceedingly, it is very sultry, as 'twere, I cannot tell how." "But, my lord, his majesty bade me signify to you that he's laid a wager on your head." " Sir, this is the matter..." " I beseech you, remember." "Nay, good my lord." "For mine ease, in good faith." "Sir!" "Here is newly come to court Laertes, who, an absolute gentleman, from the most excellent differences of soft society and great showing." "Indeed, to speak feelingly of him, he is the card of gentry." "The concernancy, sir?" "Why do we wrap the gentleman in our more rarer breath?" " Sir?" " Is't possible in another tongue?" "You will do better, sir, really." "What imports the nomination of this gentleman?" " Of Laertes?" " Of him, sir." "I know you are not ignorant of what excellence Laertes is." "I mean, sir, for his weapon." " What is his weapon?" " Rapier and dagger." "That's two of his weapons, but, well." "The king, sir, hath wagered with him six Barbary horses against the which he has impawned six French rapiers and poniards with their assigns, as girdle, hangers, and so." "Three of the carriages in faith are very dear to fancy, very responsive to the hilts, most delicate carriages, and of very liberal design." " What call you the carriages?" " The carriages, sir, are the... hangers." "The phrase would be more germane if we could carry cannon by our sides." "I would it might be hangers till then." "But, on." "The king hath laid that in 12 passes he shall not exceed you three hits." "He hath laid on twelve for nine." "It would come to immediate trial, if you would vouchsafe the answer." "How if I answer no?" "I mean, my lord, the opposition of your person in trial." "Sir, I will walk here in the hall." "If it please his majesty, it is the breathing time of day with me." "The gentleman willing, and the king hold his purpose," "I will win for him if I can." "If not, I shall gain nothing but my shame and the odd hits." "Shall I re-deliver you e'en so?" "To this effect, sir." "After what flourish your nature will." " I commend my duty to your lordship." " Yours." "Yours." "You will lose this wager, my lord." "I do not think so." "Since he went into France, I have been in continual practice." "I shall win at the odds." "But thou wouldst not think how ill all's here about my heart." " But it is no matter." " Nay, good my lord." "It is but foolery." "But it is just such a kind of misgiving as would trouble a woman." "If your mind dislike any thing, obey it." "I'll forestall their coming hither and say you are not fit." "Not a whit." "We defy augury." "There's a special providence in the fall of a sparrow." "If it be now, 'tis not to come." "If it be not to come, it will be now." "If it be not now, yet it will come." "The readiness is all." "There's a divinity that shapes our ends, rough-hew them how we will." "Let be." "Come, Hamlet, come, and take this hand from me." "Give me your pardon, sir." "I've done you wrong, but pardon it, as you are a gentleman." "This presence knows, and you must needs have heard, how I am punished with sore distraction." "What I have done, that might your honour and exception roughly awake," "I here proclaim was madness." "Wast Hamlet wronged Laertes?" "Never Hamlet." "If Hamlet from himself be ta'en away and does wrong Laertes, then Hamlet does it not, Hamlet denies it." "Who does it, then?" "His madness." "If't be so, Hamlet is of the faction that is wrong'." "His madness is poor Hamlet's enemy." "Sir, in this audience, let my disclaiming from a purposed evil free me so far in your most generous thoughts that I have shot my arrow o'er the house and hurt my brother." "Give us the foils." "Come on." "I'll be your foil, Laertes." "In my ignorance your skill shall, like a star, shine fiery indeed." " You mock me, sir!" " No, by this hand." "Give them the foils, young Osric." "Cousin Hamlet, you know the wager?" "Very well, my lord." "Your grace hath laid the odds o' the weaker side." "I do not fear it." "I have seen you both." "But since he is better', we have therefore odds." "This is too heavy, let me see another." "This likes me well." "These swords have all a length?" "Ay, my good lord." "Set me the stoops of wine upon that table." "If Hamlet give the first or second hit, let all the battlements their ordnance fire." "The King shall drink to Hamlet's better breath, and in the cup a jewel shall he throw, richer than that which four successive kings in Denmark's crown have worn." "Give me the cup." "And let the kettle to the trumpet speak, the trumpet to the cannoneer without, the cannons to the heavens, and heavens to earth," ""Now the King drinks to Hamlet. "" "Now the King drinks to Hamlet." "Come, begin." "And you, the judges, bear a wary eye." " Come on, sir." " Come, my lord." " One!" " No." " Judgement." " A hit, a very palpable hit." " Well." "Again." " Stay." "Give me drink." "Hamlet, this pearl is thine." "Here's to thy health." "Give him the cup." "I'll play this bout first." "Set it by awhile." "Come." " Another hit." "What say you?" " A touch, a touch, I do confess." "Our son shall win." "He's hot and scant of breath." "Here, Hamlet, take my napkin, rub thy brow." "Good Gertrude, do not drink!" "I will, my lord." "I pray you, pardon me." "The Queen carouses to thy fortune, Hamlet." "Good madam!" " It is too late." " My lord, I'll hit him now." "I do not think it." "And yet 'tis almost 'gainst my conscience." "Let us wipe thy face." "Come, for the third, Laertes." "You do but dally." "Pass with your best violence." "I am afeard you make a wanton of me." "Say you so?" "Come on!" "Nothing, neither way." "Have at you now!" "Part them, they are incensed." "Nay, come again!" "How is't, Laertes?" "I am justly kill' with mine own treachery." " How is it, my lord?" " How does the Queen?" " She swoons to see them bleed." " No!" "No." "The drink..." "The drink..." "My dear Hamlet." "O villainy!" "Ho!" "Let the door be locked!" "Treachery!" "Seek it out!" "It is here, Hamlet." "Hamlet, thou art slain." "In thee there is not half an hour of life." "The treacherous instrument is in thy hand, unbated and envenom'." "The foul practice hath turr itself on me." "Lo, here I lie, never to rise again." "Thy mother's poisor." "I can no more." "The King..." "The King's to blame." "The point envenom' too!" "Then, venom, to thy work." "Exchange forgiveness with me, noble Hamlet." "Mine and my father's death come not upon thee." "Nor thine on me." "Heaven make thee free of it." "I follow thee." "I am dead, Horatio." "Wretched Queen, adieu!" "You that look pale and tremble at this chance, that are but mutes or audience to this act," "had I but time..." "As this fell sergeant, death, is strict in his arrest," "O, I could tell you..." "But let it be." "I die, Horatio." "The potent poison quite o'er-crows my spirit." "If thou didst ever hold me in thy heart, absent thee from felicity awhile," "and in this harsh world draw thy breath in pain, to tell my story." "The rest... is silence." "Let four captains bear Hamlet like a soldier to the stage." "For he was likely, had he been put on, to have proved most royally." "And for his passage the soldiers' music and the rites of war speak loudly for him." "Go, bid the soldiers shoot." "Good night sweet prince." "And flights of angels."