Hamlet
By William Shakespeare.
Imprint
This ebook is the product of many hours of hard work by volunteers for Standard Ebooks, and builds on the hard work of other literature lovers made possible by the public domain.
This particular ebook is based on a transcription from Massachusetts Institute of Technology and on digital scans from the HathiTrust Digital Library.
The source text and artwork in this ebook are believed to be in the United States public domain; that is, they are believed to be free of copyright restrictions in the United States. They may still be copyrighted in other countries, so users located outside of the United States must check their local laws before using this ebook. The creators of, and contributors to, this ebook dedicate their contributions to the worldwide public domain via the terms in the CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication. For full license information, see the Uncopyright at the end of this ebook.
Standard Ebooks is a volunteer-driven project that produces ebook editions of public domain literature using modern typography, technology, and editorial standards, and distributes them free of cost. You can download this and other ebooks carefully produced for true book lovers at standardebooks.org.
Dramatis Personae
-
Claudius, king of Denmark
-
Hamlet, son to the late, and nephew to the present king
-
Polonius, lord chamberlain
-
Horatio, friend to Hamlet
-
Laertes, son to Polonius
-
Voltimand, courtier
-
Cornelius, courtier
-
Rosencrantz, courtier
-
Guildenstern, courtier
-
Osric, courtier
-
A gentleman, courtier
-
A priest
-
Marcellus, officer
-
Bernardo, officer
-
Francisco, a soldier
-
Reynaldo, servant to Polonius
-
Players
-
Two clowns, grave-diggers
-
Fortinbras, prince of Norway
-
A Captain
-
English Ambassadors
-
Gertrude, queen of Denmark, and mother to Hamlet
-
Ophelia, daughter to Polonius
-
Lords, ladies, officers, soldiers, sailors, messengers, and other attendants
-
Ghost of Hamlet’s father
Scene: Denmark.
Hamlet
Act I
Scene I
Elsinore. A platform before the castle.
Francisco at his post. Enter to him Bernardo. | |
Bernardo | Who’s there? |
Francisco | Nay, answer me: stand, and unfold yourself. |
Bernardo | Long live the king! |
Francisco | Bernardo? |
Bernardo | He. |
Francisco | You come most carefully upon your hour. |
Bernardo | ’Tis now struck twelve; get thee to bed, Francisco. |
Francisco |
For this relief much thanks: ’tis bitter cold,
|
Bernardo | Have you had quiet guard? |
Francisco | Not a mouse stirring. |
Bernardo |
Well, good night.
|
Francisco | I think I hear them. Stand, ho! Who’s there? |
Enter Horatio and Marcellus. | |
Horatio | Friends to this ground. |
Marcellus | And liegemen to the Dane. |
Francisco | Give you good night. |
Marcellus |
O, farewell, honest soldier:
|
Francisco |
Bernardo has my place.
|
Marcellus | Holla! Bernardo! |
Bernardo |
Say,
|
Horatio | A piece of him. |
Bernardo | Welcome, Horatio: welcome, good Marcellus. |
Marcellus | What, has this thing appear’d again to-night? |
Bernardo | I have seen nothing. |
Marcellus |
Horatio says ’tis but our fantasy,
|
Horatio | Tush, tush, ’twill not appear. |
Bernardo |
Sit down awhile;
|
Horatio |
Well, sit we down,
|
Bernardo |
Last night of all,
|
Enter Ghost. | |
Marcellus | Peace, break thee off; look, where it comes again! |
Bernardo | In the same figure, like the king that’s dead. |
Marcellus | Thou art a scholar; speak to it, Horatio. |
Bernardo | Looks it not like the king? mark it, Horatio. |
Horatio | Most like: it harrows me with fear and wonder. |
Bernardo | It would be spoke to. |
Marcellus | Question it, Horatio. |
Horatio |
What art thou that usurp’st this time of night,
|
Marcellus | It is offended. |
Bernardo | See, it stalks away! |
Horatio | Stay! speak, speak! I charge thee, speak! Exit Ghost. |
Marcellus | ’Tis gone, and will not answer. |
Bernardo |
How now, Horatio! you tremble and look pale:
|
Horatio |
Before my God, I might not this believe
|
Marcellus | Is it not like the king? |
Horatio |
As thou art to thyself:
|
Marcellus |
Thus twice before, and jump at this dead hour,
|
Horatio |
In what particular thought to work I know not;
|
Marcellus |
Good now, sit down, and tell me, he that knows,
|
Horatio |
That can I;
|
Bernardo |
I think it be no other but e’en so:
|
Horatio |
A mote it is to trouble the mind’s eye.
|
Re-enter Ghost. | |
I’ll cross it, though it blast me. Stay, illusion!
|
|
Marcellus | Shall I strike at it with my partisan? |
Horatio | Do, if it will not stand. |
Bernardo | ’Tis here! |
Horatio | ’Tis here! |
Marcellus |
’Tis gone! Exit Ghost.
|
Bernardo | It was about to speak, when the cock crew. |
Horatio |
And then it started like a guilty thing
|
Marcellus |
It faded on the crowing of the cock.
|
Horatio |
So have I heard and do in part believe it.
|
Marcellus |
Let’s do’t, I pray; and I this morning know
|
Scene II
A room of state in the castle.
Enter King, Queen, Hamlet, Polonius, Laertes, Voltimand, Cornelius, Lords, and Attendants. | |
King |
Though yet of Hamlet our dear brother’s death
|
Cornelius Voltimand |
In that and all things will we show our duty. |
King |
We doubt it nothing: heartily farewell. Exeunt Voltimand and Cornelius.
|
Laertes |
My dread lord,
|
King | Have you your father’s leave? What says Polonius? |
Polonius |
He hath, my lord, wrung from me my slow leave
|
King |
Take thy fair hour, Laertes; time be thine,
|
Hamlet | Aside. A little more than kin, and less than kind. |
King | How is it that the clouds still hang on you? |
Hamlet | Not so, my lord; I am too much i’ the sun. |
Queen |
Good Hamlet, cast thy nighted colour off,
|
Hamlet | Ay, madam, it is common. |
Queen |
If it be,
|
Hamlet |
Seems, madam! nay, it is; I know not “seems.”
|
King |
’Tis sweet and commendable in your nature, Hamlet,
|
Queen |
Let not thy mother lose her prayers, Hamlet:
|
Hamlet | I shall in all my best obey you, madam. |
King |
Why, ’tis a loving and a fair reply:
|
Hamlet |
O, that this too too solid flesh would melt,
|
Enter Horatio, Marcellus, and Bernardo. | |
Horatio | Hail to your lordship! |
Hamlet |
I am glad to see you well:
|
Horatio | The same, my lord, and your poor servant ever. |
Hamlet |
Sir, my good friend; I’ll change that name with you:
|
Marcellus | My good lord— |
Hamlet |
I am very glad to see you. Good even, sir.
|
Horatio | A truant disposition, good my lord. |
Hamlet |
I would not hear your enemy say so,
|
Horatio | My lord, I came to see your father’s funeral. |
Hamlet |
I pray thee, do not mock me, fellow-student;
|
Horatio | Indeed, my lord, it follow’d hard upon. |
Hamlet |
Thrift, thrift, Horatio! the funeral baked meats
|
Horatio | Where, my lord? |
Hamlet | In my mind’s eye, Horatio. |
Horatio | I saw him once; he was a goodly king. |
Hamlet |
He was a man, take him for all in all,
|
Horatio | My lord, I think I saw him yesternight. |
Hamlet | Saw? who? |
Horatio | My lord, the king your father. |
Hamlet | The king my father! |
Horatio |
Season your admiration for a while
|
Hamlet | For God’s love, let me hear. |
Horatio |
Two nights together had these gentlemen,
|
Hamlet | But where was this? |
Marcellus | My lord, upon the platform where we watch’d. |
Hamlet | Did you not speak to it? |
Horatio |
My lord, I did;
|
Hamlet | ’Tis very strange. |
Horatio |
As I do live, my honour’d lord, ’tis true;
|
Hamlet |
Indeed, indeed, sirs, but this troubles me.
|
Marcellus Bernardo |
We do, my lord. |
Hamlet | Arm’d, say you? |
Marcellus Bernardo |
Arm’d, my lord. |
Hamlet | From top to toe? |
Marcellus Bernardo |
My lord, from head to foot. |
Hamlet | Then saw you not his face? |
Horatio | O, yes, my lord; he wore his beaver up. |
Hamlet | What, look’d he frowningly? |
Horatio | A countenance more in sorrow than in anger. |
Hamlet | Pale or red? |
Horatio | Nay, very pale. |
Hamlet | And fix’d his eyes upon you? |
Horatio | Most constantly. |
Hamlet | I would I had been there. |
Horatio | It would have much amazed you. |
Hamlet | Very like, very like. Stay’d it long? |
Horatio | While one with moderate haste might tell a hundred. |
Marcellus Bernardo |
Longer, longer. |
Horatio | Not when I saw’t. |
Hamlet | His beard was grizzled—no? |
Horatio |
It was, as I have seen it in his life,
|
Hamlet |
I will watch to-night;
|
Horatio | I warrant it will. |
Hamlet |
If it assume my noble father’s person,
|
All | Our duty to your honour. |
Hamlet |
Your loves, as mine to you: farewell. Exeunt all but Hamlet.
|
Scene III
A room in Polonius’ house.
Enter Laertes and Ophelia. | |
Laertes |
My necessaries are embark’d: farewell:
|
Ophelia | Do you doubt that? |
Laertes |
For Hamlet and the trifling of his favour,
|
Ophelia | No more but so? |
Laertes |
Think it no more:
|
Ophelia |
I shall the effect of this good lesson keep,
|
Laertes |
O, fear me not.
|
Enter Polonius. | |
A double blessing is a double grace;
|
|
Polonius |
Yet here, Laertes! aboard, aboard, for shame!
|
Laertes | Most humbly do I take my leave, my lord. |
Polonius | The time invites you; go; your servants tend. |
Laertes |
Farewell, Ophelia; and remember well
|
Ophelia |
’Tis in my memory lock’d,
|
Laertes | Farewell. Exit. |
Polonius | What is’t, Ophelia, he hath said to you? |
Ophelia | So please you, something touching the Lord Hamlet. |
Polonius |
Marry, well bethought:
|
Ophelia |
He hath, my lord, of late made many tenders
|
Polonius |
Affection! pooh! you speak like a green girl,
|
Ophelia | I do not know, my lord, what I should think. |
Polonius |
Marry, I’ll teach you: think yourself a baby;
|
Ophelia |
My lord, he hath importuned me with love
|
Polonius | Ay, fashion you may call it; go to, go to. |
Ophelia |
And hath given countenance to his speech, my lord,
|
Polonius |
Ay, springes to catch woodcocks. I do know,
|
Ophelia | I shall obey, my lord. Exeunt. |
Scene IV
The platform.
Enter Hamlet, Horatio, and Marcellus. | |
Hamlet | The air bites shrewdly; it is very cold. |
Horatio | It is a nipping and an eager air. |
Hamlet | What hour now? |
Horatio | I think it lacks of twelve. |
Hamlet | No, it is struck. |
Horatio |
Indeed? I heard it not: then it draws near the season
|
Hamlet |
The king doth wake to-night and takes his rouse,
|
Horatio | Is it a custom? |
Hamlet |
Ay, marry, is’t:
|
Horatio | Look, my lord, it comes! |
Enter Ghost. | |
Hamlet |
Angels and ministers of grace defend us!
|
Horatio |
It beckons you to go away with it,
|
Marcellus |
Look, with what courteous action
|
Horatio | No, by no means. |
Hamlet | It will not speak; then I will follow it. |
Horatio | Do not, my lord. |
Hamlet |
Why, what should be the fear?
|
Horatio |
What if it tempt you toward the flood, my lord,
|
Hamlet |
It waves me still.
|
Marcellus | You shall not go, my lord. |
Hamlet | Hold off your hands. |
Horatio | Be ruled; you shall not go. |
Hamlet |
My fate cries out,
|
Horatio | He waxes desperate with imagination. |
Marcellus | Let’s follow; ’tis not fit thus to obey him. |
Horatio | Have after. To what issue will this come? |
Marcellus | Something is rotten in the state of Denmark. |
Horatio | Heaven will direct it. |
Marcellus | Nay, let’s follow him. Exeunt. |
Scene V
Another part of the platform.
Enter Ghost and Hamlet. | |
Hamlet | Where wilt thou lead me? speak; I’ll go no further. |
Ghost | Mark me. |
Hamlet | I will. |
Ghost |
My hour is almost come,
|
Hamlet | Alas, poor ghost! |
Ghost |
Pity me not, but lend thy serious hearing
|
Hamlet | Speak; I am bound to hear. |
Ghost | So art thou to revenge, when thou shalt hear. |
Hamlet | What? |
Ghost |
I am thy father’s spirit,
|
Hamlet | O God! |
Ghost | Revenge his foul and most unnatural murder. |
Hamlet | Murder! |
Ghost |
Murder most foul, as in the best it is;
|
Hamlet |
Haste me to know’t, that I, with wings as swift
|
Ghost |
I find thee apt;
|
Hamlet |
O my prophetic soul!
|
Ghost |
Ay, that incestuous, that adulterate beast,
|
Hamlet |
O all you host of heaven! O earth! what else?
|
Marcellus Horatio |
Within. My lord, my lord— |
Marcellus | Within. Lord Hamlet— |
Horatio | Within. Heaven secure him! |
Hamlet | So be it! |
Horatio | Within. Hillo, ho, ho, my lord! |
Hamlet | Hillo, ho, ho, boy! come, bird, come. |
Enter Horatio and Marcellus. | |
Marcellus | How is’t, my noble lord? |
Horatio | What news, my lord? |
Hamlet | O, wonderful! |
Horatio | Good my lord, tell it. |
Hamlet | No; you’ll reveal it. |
Horatio | Not I, my lord, by heaven. |
Marcellus | Nor I, my lord. |
Hamlet |
How say you, then; would heart of man once think it?
|
Horatio Marcellus |
Ay, by heaven, my lord. |
Hamlet |
There’s ne’er a villain dwelling in all Denmark
|
Horatio |
There needs no ghost, my lord, come from the grave
|
Hamlet |
Why, right; you are i’ the right;
|
Horatio | These are but wild and whirling words, my lord. |
Hamlet |
I’m sorry they offend you, heartily;
|
Horatio | There’s no offence, my lord. |
Hamlet |
Yes, by Saint Patrick, but there is, Horatio,
|
Horatio | What is’t, my lord? we will. |
Hamlet | Never make known what you have seen to-night. |
Horatio Marcellus |
My lord, we will not. |
Hamlet | Nay, but swear’t. |
Horatio |
In faith,
|
Marcellus | Nor I, my lord, in faith. |
Hamlet | Upon my sword. |
Marcellus | We have sworn, my lord, already. |
Hamlet | Indeed, upon my sword, indeed. |
Ghost | Beneath. Swear. |
Hamlet |
Ah, ha, boy! say’st thou so? art thou there, truepenny?
|
Horatio | Propose the oath, my lord. |
Hamlet |
Never to speak of this that you have seen,
|
Ghost | Beneath. Swear. |
Hamlet |
Hic et ubique? then we’ll shift our ground.
|
Ghost | Beneath. Swear. |
Hamlet |
Well said, old mole! canst work i’ the earth so fast?
|
Horatio | O day and night, but this is wondrous strange! |
Hamlet |
And therefore as a stranger give it welcome.
|
Ghost | Beneath. Swear. |
Hamlet |
Rest, rest, perturbed spirit! They swear. So, gentlemen,
|
Act II
Scene I
A room in Polonius’ house.
Enter Polonius and Reynaldo. | |
Polonius | Give him this money and these notes, Reynaldo. |
Reynaldo | I will, my lord. |
Polonius |
You shall do marvellous wisely, good Reynaldo,
|
Reynaldo | My lord, I did intend it. |
Polonius |
Marry, well said; very well said. Look you, sir,
|
Reynaldo | Ay, very well, my lord. |
Polonius |
“And in part him; but” you may say “not well:
|
Reynaldo | As gaming, my lord. |
Polonius |
Ay, or drinking, fencing, swearing, quarrelling,
|
Reynaldo | My lord, that would dishonour him. |
Polonius |
’Faith, no; as you may season it in the charge.
|
Reynaldo | But, my good lord— |
Polonius | Wherefore should you do this? |
Reynaldo |
Ay, my lord,
|
Polonius |
Marry, sir, here’s my drift;
|
Reynaldo | Very good, my lord. |
Polonius | And then, sir, does he this—he does—what was I about to say? By the mass, I was about to say something: where did I leave? |
Reynaldo | At “closes in the consequence,” at “friend or so,” and “gentleman.” |
Polonius |
At “closes in the consequence,” ay, marry;
|
Reynaldo | My lord, I have. |
Polonius | God be wi’ you; fare you well. |
Reynaldo | Good my lord! |
Polonius | Observe his inclination in yourself. |
Reynaldo | I shall, my lord. |
Polonius | And let him ply his music. |
Reynaldo | Well, my lord. |
Polonius | Farewell! Exit Reynaldo. |
Enter Ophelia. | |
How now, Ophelia! what’s the matter? | |
Ophelia | O, my lord, my lord, I have been so affrighted! |
Polonius | With what, i’ the name of God? |
Ophelia |
My lord, as I was sewing in my closet,
|
Polonius | Mad for thy love? |
Ophelia |
My lord, I do not know;
|
Polonius | What said he? |
Ophelia |
He took me by the wrist and held me hard;
|
Polonius |
Come, go with me: I will go seek the king.
|
Ophelia |
No, my good lord, but, as you did command,
|
Polonius |
That hath made him mad.
|
Scene II
A room in the castle.
Enter King, Queen, Rosencrantz, Guildenstern, and Attendants. | |
King |
Welcome, dear Rosencrantz and Guildenstern!
|
Queen |
Good gentlemen, he hath much talk’d of you;
|
Rosencrantz |
Both your majesties
|
Guildenstern |
But we both obey,
|
King | Thanks, Rosencrantz and gentle Guildenstern. |
Queen |
Thanks, Guildenstern and gentle Rosencrantz:
|
Guildenstern |
Heavens make our presence and our practices
|
Queen | Ay, amen! Exeunt Rosencrantz, Guildenstern, and some Attendants. |
Enter Polonius. | |
Polonius |
The ambassadors from Norway, my good lord,
|
King | Thou still hast been the father of good news. |
Polonius |
Have I, my lord? I assure my good liege,
|
King | O, speak of that; that do I long to hear. |
Polonius |
Give first admittance to the ambassadors;
|
King |
Thyself do grace to them, and bring them in. Exit Polonius.
|
Queen |
I doubt it is no other but the main;
|
King | Well, we shall sift him. |
Re-enter Polonius, with Voltimand and Cornelius. | |
Welcome, my good friends!
|
|
Voltimand |
Most fair return of greetings and desires.
|
King |
It likes us well;
|
Polonius |
This business is well ended.
|
Queen | More matter, with less art. |
Polonius |
Madam, I swear I use no art at all.
That’s an ill phrase, a vile phrase; “beautified” is a vile phrase: but you shall hear. Thus: Reads.
|
Queen | Came this from Hamlet to her? |
Polonius |
Good madam, stay awhile; I will be faithful. Reads.
This, in obedience, hath my daughter shown me,
|
King |
But how hath she
|
Polonius | What do you think of me? |
King | As of a man faithful and honourable. |
Polonius |
I would fain prove so. But what might you think,
|
King | Do you think ’tis this? |
Queen | It may be, very likely. |
Polonius |
Hath there been such a time—I’d fain know that—
|
King | Not that I know. |
Polonius |
Pointing to his head and shoulder. Take this from this, if this be otherwise:
|
King | How may we try it further? |
Polonius |
You know, sometimes he walks four hours together
|
Queen | So he does indeed. |
Polonius |
At such a time I’ll loose my daughter to him:
|
King | We will try it. |
Queen | But, look, where sadly the poor wretch comes reading. |
Polonius |
Away, I do beseech you, both away:
|
Enter Hamlet, reading. | |
O, give me leave:
|
|
Hamlet | Well, God-a-mercy. |
Polonius | Do you know me, my lord? |
Hamlet | Excellent well; you are a fishmonger. |
Polonius | Not I, my lord. |
Hamlet | Then I would you were so honest a man. |
Polonius | Honest, my lord! |
Hamlet | Ay, sir; to be honest, as this world goes, is to be one man picked out of ten thousand. |
Polonius | That’s very true, my lord. |
Hamlet | For if the sun breed maggots in a dead dog, being a god kissing carrion—Have you a daughter? |
Polonius | I have, my lord. |
Hamlet | Let her not walk i’ the sun: conception is a blessing: but not as your daughter may conceive. Friend, look to’t. |
Polonius | Aside. 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: and truly in my youth I suffered much extremity for love; very near this. I’ll speak to him again. What do you read, my lord? |
Hamlet | Words, words, words. |
Polonius | What is the matter, my lord? |
Hamlet | Between who? |
Polonius | I mean, the matter that you read, my lord. |
Hamlet | 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 and that they have a plentiful lack of wit, together with most weak hams: all which, sir, though I most powerfully and potently believe, yet I hold it not honesty to have it thus set down, for yourself, sir, should be old as I am, if like a crab you could go backward. |
Polonius | Aside. Though this be madness, yet there is method in’t. Will you walk out of the air, my lord? |
Hamlet | Into my grave. |
Polonius | Indeed, that is out o’ the air. Aside. How pregnant sometimes his replies are! a happiness that often madness hits on, which reason and sanity could not so prosperously be delivered of. I will leave him, and suddenly contrive the means of meeting between him and my daughter.—My honourable lord, I will most humbly take my leave of you. |
Hamlet | You cannot, sir, take from me any thing that I will more willingly part withal: except my life, except my life, except my life. |
Polonius | Fare you well, my lord. |
Hamlet | These tedious old fools! |
Enter Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. | |
Polonius | You go to seek the Lord Hamlet; there he is. |
Rosencrantz | To Polonius. God save you, sir! Exit Polonius. |
Guildenstern | My honoured lord! |
Rosencrantz | My most dear lord! |
Hamlet | My excellent good friends! How dost thou, Guildenstern? Ah, Rosencrantz! Good lads, how do ye both? |
Rosencrantz | As the indifferent children of the earth. |
Guildenstern |
Happy, in that we are not over-happy;
|
Hamlet | Nor the soles of her shoe? |
Rosencrantz | Neither, my lord. |
Hamlet | Then you live about her waist, or in the middle of her favours? |
Guildenstern | ’Faith, her privates we. |
Hamlet | In the secret parts of fortune? O, most true; she is a strumpet. What’s the news? |
Rosencrantz | None, my lord, but that the world’s grown honest. |
Hamlet | Then is doomsday near: but your news is not true. Let me question more in particular: what have you, my good friends, deserved at the hands of fortune, that she sends you to prison hither? |
Guildenstern | Prison, my lord! |
Hamlet | Denmark’s a prison. |
Rosencrantz | Then is the world one. |
Hamlet | A goodly one; in which there are many confines, wards and dungeons, Denmark being one o’ the worst. |
Rosencrantz | We think not so, my lord. |
Hamlet | Why, then, ’tis none to you; for there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so: to me it is a prison. |
Rosencrantz | Why then, your ambition makes it one; ’tis too narrow for your mind. |
Hamlet | O God, I could be bounded in a nut-shell and count myself a king of infinite space, were it not that I have bad dreams. |
Guildenstern | Which dreams indeed are ambition, for the very substance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream. |
Hamlet | A dream itself is but a shadow. |
Rosencrantz | Truly, and I hold ambition of so airy and light a quality that it is but a shadow’s shadow. |
Hamlet | Then are our beggars bodies, and our monarchs and outstretched heroes the beggars’ shadows. Shall we to the court? for, by my fay, I cannot reason. |
Rosencrantz Guildenstern |
We’ll wait upon you. |
Hamlet | No such matter: I will not sort you with the rest of my servants, for, to speak to you like an honest man, I am most dreadfully attended. But, in the beaten way of friendship, what make you at Elsinore? |
Rosencrantz | To visit you, my lord; no other occasion. |
Hamlet | Beggar that I am, I am even poor in thanks; but I thank you: and sure, dear friends, my thanks are too dear a halfpenny. Were you not sent for? Is it your own inclining? Is it a free visitation? Come, deal justly with me: come, come; nay, speak. |
Guildenstern | What should we say, my lord? |
Hamlet | Why, any thing, but to the purpose. You were sent for; and there is a kind of confession in your looks which your modesties have not craft enough to colour: I know the good king and queen have sent for you. |
Rosencrantz | To what end, my lord? |
Hamlet | That you must teach me. But let me conjure you, by the rights of our fellowship, by the consonancy of our youth, by the obligation of our ever-preserved love, and by what more dear a better proposer could charge you withal, be even and direct with me, whether you were sent for, or no? |
Rosencrantz | Aside to Guildenstern. What say you? |
Hamlet | Aside. Nay, then, I have an eye of you.—If you love me, hold not off. |
Guildenstern | My lord, we were sent for. |
Hamlet | I will tell you why; so shall my anticipation prevent your discovery, and your secrecy to the king and queen moult no feather. I have of late—but wherefore I know not—lost all my mirth, forgone all custom of exercises; and indeed it goes so heavily with my disposition that this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory, this most excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave o’erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted with golden fire, why, it appears no other thing to me than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours. What a piece of work is a man! how noble in reason! how infinite in faculty! in form and moving how express and admirable! in action how like an angel! in apprehension how like a god! the beauty of the world! the paragon of animals! And yet, to me, what is this quintessence of dust? man delights not me: no, nor woman neither, though by your smiling you seem to say so. |
Rosencrantz | My lord, there was no such stuff in my thoughts. |
Hamlet | Why did you laugh then, when I said “man delights not me”? |
Rosencrantz | To think, my lord, if you delight not in man, what lenten entertainment the players shall receive from you: we coted them on the way; and hither are they coming, to offer you service. |
Hamlet | He that plays the king shall be welcome; his majesty shall have tribute of me; the adventurous knight shall use his foil and target; the lover shall not sigh gratis; the humourous man shall end his part in peace; the clown shall make those laugh whose lungs are tickled o’ the sere; and the lady shall say her mind freely, or the blank verse shall halt for’t. What players are they? |
Rosencrantz | Even those you were wont to take delight in, the tragedians of the city. |
Hamlet | How chances it they travel? their residence, both in reputation and profit, was better both ways. |
Rosencrantz | I think their inhibition comes by the means of the late innovation. |
Hamlet | Do they hold the same estimation they did when I was in the city? are they so followed? |
Rosencrantz | No, indeed, are they not. |
Hamlet | How comes it? do they grow rusty? |
Rosencrantz | Nay, their endeavour keeps in the wonted pace: but there is, sir, an aery of children, little eyases, that cry out on the top of question, and are most tyrannically clapped for’t: these are now the fashion, and so berattle the common stages—so they call them—that many wearing rapiers are afraid of goose-quills and dare scarce come thither. |
Hamlet | What, are they children? who maintains ’em? how are they escoted? Will they pursue the quality no longer than they can sing? will they not say afterwards, if they should grow themselves to common players—as it is most like, if their means are no better—their writers do them wrong, to make them exclaim against their own succession? |
Rosencrantz | ’Faith, there has been much to do on both sides; and the nation holds it no sin to tarre them to controversy: there was, for a while, no money bid for argument, unless the poet and the player went to cuffs in the question. |
Hamlet | Is’t possible? |
Guildenstern | O, there has been much throwing about of brains. |
Hamlet | Do the boys carry it away? |
Rosencrantz | Ay, that they do, my lord; Hercules and his load too. |
Hamlet | It is not very strange; for mine uncle is king of Denmark, and those that would make mows at him while my father lived, give twenty, forty, fifty, an hundred ducats a-piece for his picture in little. ’Sblood, there is something in this more than natural, if philosophy could find it out. Flourish of trumpets within. |
Guildenstern | There are the players. |
Hamlet | Gentlemen, you are welcome to Elsinore. Your hands, come then: the appurtenance of welcome is fashion and ceremony: let me comply with you in this garb, lest my extent to the players, which, I tell you, must show fairly outward, should more appear like entertainment than yours. You are welcome: but my uncle-father and aunt-mother are deceived. |
Guildenstern | In what, my dear lord? |
Hamlet | I am but mad north-north-west: when the wind is southerly I know a hawk from a handsaw. |
Re-enter Polonius. | |
Polonius | Well be with you, gentlemen! |
Hamlet | Hark you, Guildenstern; and you too: at each ear a hearer: that great baby you see there is not yet out of his swaddling-clouts. |
Rosencrantz | Happily he’s the second time come to them; for they say an old man is twice a child. |
Hamlet | I will prophesy he comes to tell me of the players; mark it. You say right, sir: o’ Monday morning; ’twas so indeed. |
Polonius | My lord, I have news to tell you. |
Hamlet | My lord, I have news to tell you. When Roscius was an actor in Rome— |
Polonius | The actors are come hither, my lord. |
Hamlet | Buz, buz! |
Polonius | Upon mine honour— |
Hamlet | Then came each actor on his ass— |
Polonius | The best actors in the world, either for tragedy, comedy, history, pastoral, pastoral-comical, historical-pastoral, tragical-historical, tragical-comical-historical-pastoral, scene individable, or poem unlimited: Seneca cannot be too heavy, nor Plautus too light. For the law of writ and the liberty, these are the only men. |
Hamlet | O Jephthah, judge of Israel, what a treasure hadst thou! |
Polonius | What a treasure had he, my lord? |
Hamlet |
Why,
“One fair daughter and no more,
|
Polonius | Aside. Still on my daughter. |
Hamlet | Am I not i’ the right, old Jephthah? |
Polonius | If you call me Jephthah, my lord, I have a daughter that I love passing well. |
Hamlet | Nay, that follows not. |
Polonius | What follows, then, my lord? |
Hamlet |
Why, “As by lot, God wot,” and then, you know, “It came to pass, as most like it was,”— the first row of the pious chanson will show you more; for look, where my abridgement comes. |
Enter four or five Players. | |
You are welcome, masters; welcome, all. I am glad to see thee well. Welcome, good friends. O, my old friend! thy face is valanced since I saw thee last: comest thou to beard me in Denmark? What, my young lady and mistress! By’r lady, your ladyship is nearer to heaven than when I saw you last, by the altitude of a chopine. Pray God, your voice, like apiece of uncurrent gold, be not cracked within the ring. Masters, you are all welcome. We’ll e’en to’t like French falconers, fly at any thing we see: we’ll have a speech straight: come, give us a taste of your quality; come, a passionate speech. | |
First Player | What speech, my lord? |
Hamlet |
I heard thee speak me a speech once, but it was never acted; or, if it was, not above once; for the play, I remember, pleased not the million; ’twas caviare to the general: but it was—as I received it, and others, whose judgments in such matters cried in the top of mine—an excellent play, well digested in the scenes, set down with as much modesty as cunning. I remember, one said there were no sallets in the lines to make the matter savoury, nor no matter in the phrase that might indict the author of affectation; but called it an honest method, as wholesome as sweet, and by very much more handsome than fine. One speech in it I chiefly loved: ’twas Aeneas’ tale to Dido; and thereabout of it especially, where he speaks of Priam’s slaughter: if it live in your memory, begin at this line: let me see, let me see— “The rugged Pyrrhus, like the Hyrcanian beast,” —it is not so:—it begins with Pyrrhus:—
So, proceed you. |
Polonius | ’Fore God, my lord, well spoken, with good accent and good discretion. |
First Player |
|
Polonius | This is too long. |
Hamlet | It shall to the barber’s, with your beard. Prithee, say on: he’s for a jig or a tale of bawdry, or he sleeps: say on: come to Hecuba. |
First Player | “But who, O, who had seen the mobled queen—” |
Hamlet | “The mobled queen?” |
Polonius | That’s good; “mobled queen” is good. |
First Player |
|
Polonius | Look, whether he has not turned his colour and has tears in’s eyes. Pray you, no more. |
Hamlet | ’Tis well; I’ll have thee speak out the rest soon. Good my lord, will you see the players well bestowed? Do you hear, let them be well used; for they are the abstract and brief chronicles of the time: after your death you were better have a bad epitaph than their ill report while you live. |
Polonius | My lord, I will use them according to their desert. |
Hamlet | God’s bodykins, man, much better: use every man after his desert, and who should ’scape whipping? Use them after your own honour and dignity: the less they deserve, the more merit is in your bounty. Take them in. |
Polonius | Come, sirs. |
Hamlet | Follow him, friends: we’ll hear a play to-morrow. Exit Polonius with all the Players but the First. Dost thou hear me, old friend; can you play the Murder of Gonzago? |
First Player | Ay, my lord. |
Hamlet | We’ll ha’t to-morrow night. You could, for a need, study a speech of some dozen or sixteen lines, which I would set down and insert in’t, could you not? |
First Player | Ay, my lord. |
Hamlet | Very well. Follow that lord; and look you mock him not. Exit First Player. My good friends, I’ll leave you till night: you are welcome to Elsinore. |
Rosencrantz | Good my lord! |
Hamlet |
Ay, so, God be wi’ ye; Exeunt Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. Now I am alone.
|
Act III
Scene I
A room in the castle.
Enter King, Queen, Polonius, Ophelia, Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern. | |
King |
And can you, by no drift of circumstance,
|
Rosencrantz |
He does confess he feels himself distracted;
|
Guildenstern |
Nor do we find him forward to be sounded,
|
Queen | Did he receive you well? |
Rosencrantz | Most like a gentleman. |
Guildenstern | But with much forcing of his disposition. |
Rosencrantz |
Niggard of question; but, of our demands,
|
Queen |
Did you assay him
|
Rosencrantz |
Madam, it so fell out, that certain players
|
Polonius |
’Tis most true:
|
King |
With all my heart; and it doth much content me
|
Rosencrantz | We shall, my lord. Exeunt Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. |
King |
Sweet Gertrude, leave us too;
|
Queen |
I shall obey you.
|
Ophelia | Madam, I wish it may. Exit Queen. |
Polonius |
Ophelia, walk you here. Gracious, so please you,
|
King |
Aside. O, ’tis too true!
|
Polonius | I hear him coming: let’s withdraw, my lord. Exeunt King and Polonius. |
Enter Hamlet. | |
Hamlet |
To be, or not to be: that is the question:
|
Ophelia |
Good my lord,
|
Hamlet | I humbly thank you; well, well, well. |
Ophelia |
My lord, I have remembrances of yours,
|
Hamlet |
No, not I;
|
Ophelia |
My honour’d lord, you know right well you did;
|
Hamlet | Ha, ha! are you honest? |
Ophelia | My lord? |
Hamlet | Are you fair? |
Ophelia | What means your lordship? |
Hamlet | That if you be honest and fair, your honesty should admit no discourse to your beauty. |
Ophelia | Could beauty, my lord, have better commerce than with honesty? |
Hamlet | Ay, truly; for the power of beauty will sooner transform honesty from what it is to a bawd than the force of honesty can translate beauty into his likeness: this was sometime a paradox, but now the time gives it proof. I did love you once. |
Ophelia | Indeed, my lord, you made me believe so. |
Hamlet | You should not have believed me; for virtue cannot so inoculate our old stock but we shall relish of it: I loved you not. |
Ophelia | I was the more deceived. |
Hamlet | Get thee to a nunnery: why wouldst thou be a breeder of sinners? I am myself indifferent honest; but yet I could 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 earth and heaven? We are arrant knaves, all; believe none of us. Go thy ways to a nunnery. Where’s your father? |
Ophelia | At home, my lord. |
Hamlet | Let the doors be shut upon him, that he may play the fool nowhere but in’s own house. Farewell. |
Ophelia | O, help him, you sweet heavens! |
Hamlet | If thou dost marry, I’ll give thee this plague for thy dowry: be thou as chaste as ice, as pure as snow, thou shalt not escape calumny. Get thee to a nunnery, go: farewell. Or, if thou wilt needs marry, marry a fool; for wise men know well enough what monsters you make of them. To a nunnery, go, and quickly too. Farewell. |
Ophelia | O heavenly powers, restore him! |
Hamlet | I have heard of your paintings too, well enough; God has given you one face, and you make yourselves another: you jig, you amble, and you lisp, and nick-name God’s creatures, and make your wantonness your ignorance. Go to, I’ll no more on’t; 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 keep as they are. To a nunnery, go. Exit. |
Ophelia |
O, what a noble mind is here o’erthrown!
|
Re-enter King and Polonius. | |
King |
Love! his affections do not that way tend;
|
Polonius |
It shall do well: but yet do I believe
|
King |
It shall be so:
|
Scene II
A hall in the castle.
Enter Hamlet and Players. | |
Hamlet | Speak the speech, I pray you, 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, as I may say, the whirlwind of passion, you must acquire and beget a temperance that may give it smoothness. O, it offends me to the soul to hear a robustious periwig-pated fellow tear a passion to tatters, to very rags, 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 for o’erdoing Termagant; it out-herods Herod: pray you, avoid it. |
First Player | I warrant your honour. |
Hamlet | 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 special observance, that you o’erstep not the modesty of nature: for any thing 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, or come tardy off, though it make the unskilful laugh, cannot but make the judicious grieve; the censure of the which one must in your allowance o’erweigh a whole theatre of others. O, there be players that I have seen play, and heard others praise, and that highly, not to speak it profanely, that, neither having the accent of Christians nor the gait of Christian, pagan, nor man, have so strutted and bellowed that I have thought some of nature’s journeymen had made men and not made them well, they imitated humanity so abominably. |
First Player | I hope we have reformed that indifferently with us, sir. |
Hamlet | O, reform it altogether. And let those that play your clowns speak no more than is set down for them; for there be of them that will themselves laugh, to set on some quantity of barren spectators to laugh too; though, in the mean time, some necessary question of the play be then to be considered: that’s villainous, and shows a most pitiful ambition in the fool that uses it. Go, make you ready. Exeunt Players. |
Enter Polonius, Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern. | |
How now, my lord! I will the king hear this piece of work? | |
Polonius | And the queen too, and that presently. |
Hamlet | Bid the players make haste. Exit Polonius. Will you two help to hasten them? |
Rosencrantz Guildenstern |
We will, my lord. Exeunt Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. |
Hamlet | What ho! Horatio! |
Enter Horatio. | |
Horatio | Here, sweet lord, at your service. |
Hamlet |
Horatio, thou art e’en as just a man
|
Horatio | O, my dear lord— |
Hamlet |
Nay, do not think I flatter;
|
Horatio |
Well, my lord:
|
Hamlet |
They are coming to the play; I must be idle:
|
Danish march. A flourish. Enter King, Queen, Polonius, Ophelia, Rosencrantz, Guildenstern, and others. | |
King | How fares our cousin Hamlet? |
Hamlet | Excellent, i’ faith; of the chameleon’s dish: I eat the air, promise-crammed: you cannot feed capons so. |
King | I have nothing with this answer, Hamlet; these words are not mine. |
Hamlet | No, nor mine now. To Polonius. My lord, you played once i’ the university, you say? |
Polonius | That did I, my lord; and was accounted a good actor. |
Hamlet | What did you enact? |
Polonius | I did enact Julius Caesar: I was killed i’ the Capitol; Brutus killed me. |
Hamlet | It was a brute part of him to kill so capital a calf there. Be the players ready? |
Rosencrantz | Ay, my lord; they stay upon your patience. |
Queen | Come hither, my dear Hamlet, sit by me. |
Hamlet | No, good mother, here’s metal more attractive. |
Polonius | To the King. O, ho! do you mark that? |
Hamlet | Lady, shall I lie in your lap? Lying down at Ophelia’s feet. |
Ophelia | No, my lord. |
Hamlet | I mean, my head upon your lap? |
Ophelia | Ay, my lord. |
Hamlet | Do you think I meant country matters? |
Ophelia | I think nothing, my lord. |
Hamlet | That’s a fair thought to lie between maids’ legs. |
Ophelia | What is, my lord? |
Hamlet | Nothing. |
Ophelia | You are merry, my lord. |
Hamlet | Who, I? |
Ophelia | Ay, my lord. |
Hamlet | O God, your only jig-maker. What should a man do but be merry? for, look you, how cheerfully my mother looks, and my father died within these two hours. |
Ophelia | Nay, ’tis twice two months, my lord. |
Hamlet | So long? Nay then, let the devil wear black, for I’ll have a suit of sables. O heavens! die two months ago, and not forgotten yet? Then there’s hope a great man’s memory may outlive his life half a year: but, by’r lady, he must build churches, then; or else shall he suffer not thinking on, with the hobby-horse, whose epitaph is “For, O, for, O, the hobby-horse is forgot.” |
Hautboys play. The dumb-show enters. | |
Enter a King and a Queen very lovingly; the Queen embracing him, and he her. She kneels, and makes show of protestation unto him. He takes her up, and declines his head upon her neck: lays him down upon a bank of flowers: she, seeing him asleep, leaves him. Anon comes in a fellow, takes off his crown, kisses it, and pours poison in the King’s ears, and exit. The Queen returns; finds the King dead, and makes passionate action. The Poisoner, with some two or three Mutes, comes in again, seeming to lament with her. The dead body is carried away. The Poisoner wooes the Queen with gifts: she seems loath and unwilling awhile, but in the end accepts his love. Exeunt. | |
Ophelia | What means this, my lord? |
Hamlet | Marry, this is miching mallecho; it means mischief. |
Ophelia | Belike this show imports the argument of the play. |
Enter Prologue. | |
Hamlet | We shall know by this fellow: the players cannot keep counsel; they’ll tell all. |
Ophelia | Will he tell us what this show meant? |
Hamlet | Ay, or any show that you’ll show him: be not you ashamed to show, he’ll not shame to tell you what it means. |
Ophelia | You are naught, you are naught: I’ll mark the play. |
Prologue |
For us, and for our tragedy,
|
Hamlet | Is this a prologue, or the posy of a ring? |
Ophelia | ’Tis brief, my lord. |
Hamlet | As woman’s love. |
Enter two Players, King and Queen. | |
Player King |
Full thirty times hath Phoebus’ cart gone round
|
Player Queen |
So many journeys may the sun and moon
|
Player King |
’Faith, I must leave thee, love, and shortly too;
|
Player Queen |
O, confound the rest!
|
Hamlet | Aside. Wormwood, wormwood. |
Player Queen |
The instances that second marriage move
|
Player King |
I do believe you think what now you speak;
|
Player Queen |
Nor earth to me give food, nor heaven light!
|
Hamlet | If she should break it now! |
Player King |
’Tis deeply sworn. Sweet, leave me here awhile;
|
Player Queen |
Sleep rock thy brain;
|
Hamlet | Madam, how like you this play? |
Queen | The lady doth protest too much, methinks. |
Hamlet | O, but she’ll keep her word. |
King | Have you heard the argument? Is there no offence in’t? |
Hamlet | No, no, they do but jest, poison in jest; no offence i’ the world. |
King | What do you call the play? |
Hamlet | The Mouse-trap. Marry, how? Tropically. This play is the image of a murder done in Vienna: Gonzago is the duke’s name; his wife, Baptista: you shall see anon; ’tis a knavish piece of work: but what o’ that? your majesty and we that have free souls, it touches us not: let the galled jade wince, our withers are unwrung. |
Enter Lucianus. | |
This is one Lucianus, nephew to the king. | |
Ophelia | You are as good as a chorus, my lord. |
Hamlet | I could interpret between you and your love, if I could see the puppets dallying. |
Ophelia | You are keen, my lord, you are keen. |
Hamlet | It would cost you a groaning to take off my edge. |
Ophelia | Still better, and worse. |
Hamlet | So you must take your husbands. Begin, murderer; pox, leave thy damnable faces, and begin. Come: “the croaking raven doth bellow for revenge.” |
Lucianus |
Thoughts black, hands apt, drugs fit, and time agreeing;
|
Hamlet | He poisons him i’ the garden for’s estate. His name’s Gonzago: the story is extant, and writ in choice Italian: you shall see anon how the murderer gets the love of Gonzago’s wife. |
Ophelia | The king rises. |
Hamlet | What, frighted with false fire! |
Queen | How fares my lord? |
Polonius | Give o’er the play. |
King | Give me some light: away! |
All | Lights, lights, lights! Exeunt all but Hamlet and Horatio. |
Hamlet |
Why, let the stricken deer go weep,
Would not this, sir, and a forest of feathers—if the rest of my fortunes turn Turk with me—with two Provincial roses on my razed shoes, get me a fellowship in a cry of players, sir? |
Horatio | Half a share. |
Hamlet |
A whole one, I.
For thou dost know, O Damon dear,
|
Horatio | You might have rhymed. |
Hamlet | O good Horatio, I’ll take the ghost’s word for a thousand pound. Didst perceive? |
Horatio | Very well, my lord. |
Hamlet | Upon the talk of the poisoning? |
Horatio | I did very well note him. |
Hamlet |
Ah, ha! Come, some music! come, the recorders!
|
Re-enter Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. | |
Guildenstern | Good my lord, vouchsafe me a word with you. |
Hamlet | Sir, a whole history. |
Guildenstern | The king, sir— |
Hamlet | Ay, sir, what of him? |
Guildenstern | Is in his retirement marvellous distempered. |
Hamlet | With drink, sir? |
Guildenstern | No, my lord, rather with choler. |
Hamlet | Your wisdom should show itself more richer to signify this to his doctor; for, for me to put him to his purgation would perhaps plunge him into far more choler. |
Guildenstern | Good my lord, put your discourse into some frame and start not so wildly from my affair. |
Hamlet | I am tame, sir: pronounce. |
Guildenstern | The queen, your mother, in most great affliction of spirit, hath sent me to you. |
Hamlet | You are welcome. |
Guildenstern | Nay, good my lord, this courtesy is not of the right breed. If it shall please you to make me a wholesome answer, I will do your mother’s commandment: if not, your pardon and my return shall be the end of my business. |
Hamlet | Sir, I cannot. |
Guildenstern | What, my lord? |
Hamlet | Make you a wholesome answer; my wit’s diseased: but, sir, such answer as I can make, you shall command; or, rather, as you say, my mother: therefore no more, but to the matter: my mother, you say— |
Rosencrantz | Then thus she says; your behavior hath struck her into amazement and admiration. |
Hamlet | O wonderful son, that can so astonish a mother! But is there no sequel at the heels of this mother’s admiration? Impart. |
Rosencrantz | She desires to speak with you in her closet, ere you go to bed. |
Hamlet | We shall obey, were she ten times our mother. Have you any further trade with us? |
Rosencrantz | My lord, you once did love me. |
Hamlet | So I do still, by these pickers and stealers. |
Rosencrantz | Good my lord, what is your cause of distemper? you do, surely, bar the door upon your own liberty, if you deny your griefs to your friend. |
Hamlet | Sir, I lack advancement. |
Rosencrantz | How can that be, when you have the voice of the king himself for your succession in Denmark? |
Hamlet | Ay, but sir, “While the grass grows,”—the proverb is something musty. |
Re-enter Players with recorders. | |
O, the recorders! let me see one. To withdraw with you:—why do you go about to recover the wind of me, as if you would drive me into a toil? | |
Guildenstern | O, my lord, if my duty be too bold, my love is too unmannerly. |
Hamlet | I do not well understand that. Will you play upon this pipe? |
Guildenstern | My lord, I cannot. |
Hamlet | I pray you. |
Guildenstern | Believe me, I cannot. |
Hamlet | I do beseech you. |
Guildenstern | I know no touch of it, my lord. |
Hamlet | ’Tis as easy as lying: govern these ventages with your fingers and thumb, give it breath with your mouth, and it will discourse most eloquent music. Look you, these are the stops. |
Guildenstern | But these cannot I command to any utterance of harmony; I have not the skill. |
Hamlet | Why, look you now, how unworthy a thing you make of me! You would play upon me; you would seem to know my stops; you would pluck out the heart of my mystery; you would sound me from my lowest note to the top of my compass: and there is much music, excellent voice, in this little organ; yet cannot you make it speak. ’Sblood, do you think I am easier to be played on than a pipe? Call me what instrument you will, though you can fret me, yet you cannot play upon me. |
Enter Polonius. | |
God bless you, sir! | |
Polonius | My lord, the queen would speak with you, and presently. |
Hamlet | Do you see yonder cloud that’s almost in shape of a camel? |
Polonius | By the mass, and ’tis like a camel, indeed. |
Hamlet | Methinks it is like a weasel. |
Polonius | It is backed like a weasel. |
Hamlet | Or like a whale? |
Polonius | Very like a whale. |
Hamlet | Then I will come to my mother by and by. They fool me to the top of my bent. I will come by and by. |
Polonius | I will say so. |
Hamlet |
By and by is easily said. Exit Polonius. Leave me, friends. Exeunt all but Hamlet.
|
Scene III
A room in the castle.
Enter King, Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern. | |
King |
I like him not, nor stands it safe with us
|
Guildenstern |
We will ourselves provide:
|
Rosencrantz |
The single and peculiar life is bound,
|
King |
Arm you, I pray you, to this speedy voyage;
|
Rosencrantz Guildenstern |
We will haste us. Exeunt Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. |
Enter Polonius. | |
Polonius |
My lord, he’s going to his mother’s closet:
|
King |
Thanks, dear my lord. Exit Polonius.
|
Enter Hamlet. | |
Hamlet |
Now might I do it pat, now he is praying;
|
King |
Rising. My words fly up, my thoughts remain below:
|
Scene IV
The Queen’s closet.
Enter Queen and Polonius. | |
Polonius |
He will come straight. Look you lay home to him:
|
Hamlet | Within. Mother, mother, mother! |
Queen |
I’ll warrant you,
|
Enter Hamlet. | |
Hamlet | Now, mother, what’s the matter? |
Queen | Hamlet, thou hast thy father much offended. |
Hamlet | Mother, you have my father much offended. |
Queen | Come, come, you answer with an idle tongue. |
Hamlet | Go, go, you question with a wicked tongue. |
Queen | Why, how now, Hamlet! |
Hamlet | What’s the matter now? |
Queen | Have you forgot me? |
Hamlet |
No, by the rood, not so:
|
Queen | Nay, then, I’ll set those to you that can speak. |
Hamlet |
Come, come, and sit you down; you shall not budge;
|
Queen |
What wilt thou do? thou wilt not murder me?
|
Polonius | Behind. What, ho! help, help, help! |
Hamlet | Drawing. How now! a rat? Dead, for a ducat, dead! Makes a pass through the arras. |
Polonius | Behind. O, I am slain! Falls and dies. |
Queen | O me, what hast thou done? |
Hamlet |
Nay, I know not:
|
Queen | O, what a rash and bloody deed is this! |
Hamlet |
A bloody deed! almost as bad, good mother,
|
Queen | As kill a king! |
Hamlet |
Ay, lady, ’twas my word. Lifts up the arras and discovers Polonius.
|
Queen |
What have I done, that thou darest wag thy tongue
|
Hamlet |
Such an act
|
Queen |
Ay me, what act,
|
Hamlet |
Look here, upon this picture, and on this,
|
Queen |
O Hamlet, speak no more:
|
Hamlet |
Nay, but to live
|
Queen |
O, speak to me no more;
|
Hamlet |
A murderer and a villain;
|
Queen | No more! |
Hamlet | A king of shreds and patches— |
Enter Ghost. | |
Save me, and hover o’er me with your wings,
|
|
Queen | Alas, he’s mad! |
Hamlet |
Do you not come your tardy son to chide,
|
Ghost |
Do not forget: this visitation
|
Hamlet | How is it with you, lady? |
Queen |
Alas, how is’t with you,
|
Hamlet |
On him, on him! Look you, how pale he glares!
|
Queen | To whom do you speak this? |
Hamlet | Do you see nothing there? |
Queen | Nothing at all; yet all that is I see. |
Hamlet | Nor did you nothing hear? |
Queen | No, nothing but ourselves. |
Hamlet |
Why, look you there! look, how it steals away!
|
Queen |
This the very coinage of your brain:
|
Hamlet |
Ecstasy!
|
Queen | O Hamlet, thou hast cleft my heart in twain. |
Hamlet |
O, throw away the worser part of it,
|
Queen | What shall I do? |
Hamlet |
Not this, by no means, that I bid you do:
|
Queen |
Be thou assured, if words be made of breath,
|
Hamlet | I must to England; you know that? |
Queen |
Alack,
|
Hamlet |
There’s letters seal’d: and my two schoolfellows,
|
Act IV
Scene I
A room in the castle.
Enter King, Queen, Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern. | |
King |
There’s matter in these sighs, these profound heaves:
|
Queen |
Bestow this place on us a little while. Exeunt Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.
|
King | What, Gertrude? How does Hamlet? |
Queen |
Mad as the sea and wind, when both contend
|
King |
O heavy deed!
|
Queen |
To draw apart the body he hath kill’d:
|
King |
O Gertrude, come away!
|
Re-enter Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. | |
Friends both, go join you with some further aid:
|
Scene II
Another room in the castle.
Enter Hamlet. | |
Hamlet | Safely stowed. |
Rosencrantz Guildenstern |
Within. Hamlet! Lord Hamlet! |
Hamlet | But soft, what noise? who calls on Hamlet? O, here they come. |
Enter Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. | |
Rosencrantz | What have you done, my lord, with the dead body? |
Hamlet | Compounded it with dust, whereto ’tis kin. |
Rosencrantz |
Tell us where ’tis, that we may take it thence
|
Hamlet | Do not believe it. |
Rosencrantz | Believe what? |
Hamlet | That I can keep your counsel and not mine own. Besides, to be demanded of a sponge! what replication should be made by the son of a king? |
Rosencrantz | Take you me for a sponge, my lord? |
Hamlet | Ay, sir, that soaks up the king’s countenance, his rewards, his authorities. But such officers do the king best service in the end: he keeps them, like an ape, in the corner of his jaw; first mouthed, to be last swallowed: when he needs what you have gleaned, it is but squeezing you, and, sponge, you shall be dry again. |
Rosencrantz | I understand you not, my lord. |
Hamlet | I am glad of it: a knavish speech sleeps in a foolish ear. |
Rosencrantz | My lord, you must tell us where the body is, and go with us to the king. |
Hamlet | The body is with the king, but the king is not with the body. The king is a thing— |
Guildenstern | A thing, my lord! |
Hamlet | Of nothing: bring me to him. Hide fox, and all after. Exeunt. |
Scene III
Another room in the castle.
Enter King, attended. | |
King |
I have sent to seek him, and to find the body.
|
Enter Rosencrantz. | |
How now! what hath befall’n? | |
Rosencrantz |
Where the dead body is bestow’d, my lord,
|
King | But where is he? |
Rosencrantz | Without, my lord; guarded, to know your pleasure. |
King | Bring him before us. |
Rosencrantz | Ho, Guildenstern! bring in my lord. |
Enter Hamlet and Guildenstern. | |
King | Now, Hamlet, where’s Polonius? |
Hamlet | At supper. |
King | At supper! where? |
Hamlet | 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 maggots: your fat king and your lean beggar is but variable service, two dishes, but to one table: that’s the end. |
King | Alas, alas! |
Hamlet | A man may fish with the worm that hath eat of a king, and eat of the fish that hath fed of that worm. |
King | What dost you mean by this? |
Hamlet | Nothing but to show you how a king may go a progress through the guts of a beggar. |
King | Where is Polonius? |
Hamlet | In heaven; send hither to see: if your messenger find him not there, seek him i’ the other place yourself. But indeed, if you find him not within this month, you shall nose him as you go up the stairs into the lobby. |
King | Go seek him there. To some Attendants. |
Hamlet | He will stay till ye come. Exeunt Attendants. |
King |
Hamlet, this deed, for thine especial safety—
|
Hamlet | For England! |
King | Ay, Hamlet. |
Hamlet | Good. |
King | So is it, if thou knew’st our purposes. |
Hamlet | I see a cherub that sees them. But, come; for England! Farewell, dear mother. |
King | Thy loving father, Hamlet. |
Hamlet | My mother: father and mother is man and wife; man and wife is one flesh; and so, my mother. Come, for England! Exit. |
King |
Follow him at foot; tempt him with speed aboard;
|
Scene IV
A plain in Denmark.
Enter Fortinbras, a Captain, and Soldiers, marching. | |
Prince Fortinbras |
Go, captain, from me greet the Danish king;
|
Captain | I will do’t, my lord. |
Prince Fortinbras | Go softly on. Exeunt Fortinbras and Soldiers. |
Enter Hamlet, Rosencrantz, Guildenstern, and others. | |
Hamlet | Good sir, whose powers are these? |
Captain | They are of Norway, sir. |
Hamlet | How purposed, sir, I pray you? |
Captain | Against some part of Poland. |
Hamlet | Who commands them, sir? |
Captain | The nephews to old Norway, Fortinbras. |
Hamlet |
Goes it against the main of Poland, sir,
|
Captain |
Truly to speak, and with no addition,
|
Hamlet | Why, then the Polack never will defend it. |
Captain | Yes, it is already garrison’d. |
Hamlet |
Two thousand souls and twenty thousand ducats
|
Captain | God be wi’ you, sir. Exit. |
Rosencrantz | Will’t please you go, my lord? |
Hamlet |
I’ll be with you straight. Go a little before. Exeunt all except Hamlet.
|
Scene V
Elsinore. A room in the castle.
Enter Queen, Horatio, and a Gentleman. | |
Queen | I will not speak with her. |
Gentleman |
She is importunate, indeed distract:
|
Queen | What would she have? |
Gentleman |
She speaks much of her father; says she hears
|
Horatio |
’Twere good she were spoken with; for she may strew
|
Queen |
Let her come in. Exit Horatio.
|
Re-enter Horatio, with Ophelia. | |
Ophelia | Where is the beauteous majesty of Denmark? |
Queen | How now, Ophelia! |
Ophelia |
Sings.
How should I your true love know
|
Queen | Alas, sweet lady, what imports this song? |
Ophelia |
Say you? nay, pray you, mark. Sings.
He is dead and gone, lady,
|
Queen | Nay, but, Ophelia— |
Ophelia |
Pray you, mark. Sings. White his shroud as the mountain snow— |
Enter King. | |
Queen | Alas, look here, my lord. |
Ophelia |
Sings.
Larded with sweet flowers;
|
King | How do you, pretty lady? |
Ophelia | 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! |
King | Conceit upon her father. |
Ophelia |
Pray you, let’s have no words of this; but when they ask you what it means, say you this: Sings.
To-morrow is Saint Valentine’s day,
|
King | Pretty Ophelia! |
Ophelia |
Indeed, la, without an oath, I’ll make an end on’t: Sings.
By Gis and by Saint Charity,
|
King | How long hath she been thus? |
Ophelia | I hope all will be well. We must be patient: but I cannot choose but weep, to think they should lay him i’ the cold ground. My brother shall know of it: and so I thank you for your good counsel. Come, my coach! Good night, ladies; good night, sweet ladies; good night, good night. Exit. |
King |
Follow her close; give her good watch, I pray you. Exit Horatio.
|
Queen | Alack, what noise is this? |
King | Where are my Switzers? Let them guard the door. |
Enter another Gentleman. | |
What is the matter? | |
Gentleman |
Save yourself, my lord:
|
Queen |
How cheerfully on the false trail they cry!
|
King | The doors are broke. Noise within. |
Enter Laertes, armed; Danes following. | |
Laertes | Where is this king? Sirs, stand you all without. |
Danes | No, let’s come in. |
Laertes | I pray you, give me leave. |
Danes | We will, we will. They retire without the door. |
Laertes |
I thank you: keep the door. O thou vile king,
|
Queen | Calmly, good Laertes. |
Laertes |
That drop of blood that’s calm proclaims me bastard,
|
King |
What is the cause, Laertes,
|
Laertes | Where is my father? |
King | Dead. |
Queen | But not by him. |
King | Let him demand his fill. |
Laertes |
How came he dead? I’ll not be juggled with:
|
King | Who shall stay you? |
Laertes |
My will, not all the world:
|
King |
Good Laertes,
|
Laertes | None but his enemies. |
King | Will you know them then? |
Laertes |
To his good friends thus wide I’ll ope my arms;
|
King |
Why, now you speak
|
Danes | Within. Let her come in. |
Laertes | How now! what noise is that? |
Re-enter Ophelia. | |
O heat, dry up my brains! tears seven times salt,
|
|
Ophelia |
Sings.
They bore him barefaced on the bier;
Fare you well, my dove! |
Laertes |
Hadst thou thy wits, and didst persuade revenge,
|
Ophelia |
Sings.
You must sing a-down a-down,
O, how the wheel becomes it! It is the false steward, that stole his master’s daughter. |
Laertes | This nothing’s more than matter. |
Ophelia | There’s rosemary, that’s for remembrance; pray, love, remember: and there is pansies, that’s for thoughts. |
Laertes | A document in madness, thoughts and remembrance fitted. |
Ophelia |
There’s fennel for you, and columbines: there’s rue for you; and here’s some for me: we may call it herb-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—Sings. For bonny sweet Robin is all my joy. |
Laertes |
Thought and affliction, passion, hell itself,
|
Ophelia |
Sings.
And will he not come again?
His beard was as white as snow,
And of all Christian souls, I pray God. God be wi’ ye. Exit. |
Laertes | Do you see this, O God? |
King |
Laertes, I must commune with your grief,
|
Laertes |
Let this be so;
|
King |
So you shall;
|
Scene VI
Another room in the castle.
Enter Horatio and a Servant. | |
Horatio | What are they that would speak with me? |
Servant | Sailors, sir: they say they have letters for you. |
Horatio | Let them come in. Exit Servant. I do not know from what part of the world I should be greeted, if not from Lord Hamlet. |
Enter Sailors. | |
First Sailor | God bless you, sir. |
Horatio | Let him bless thee too. |
First Sailor | He shall, sir, an’t please him. There’s a letter for you, sir; it comes from the ambassador that was bound for England; if your name be Horatio, as I am let to know it is. |
Horatio |
Reads.
Come, I will make you way for these your letters;
|
Scene VII
Another room in the castle.
Enter King and Laertes. | |
King |
Now must your conscience my acquittance seal,
|
Laertes |
It well appears: but tell me
|
King |
O, for two special reasons;
|
Laertes |
And so have I a noble father lost;
|
King |
Break not your sleeps for that: you must not think
|
Enter a Messenger. | |
How now! what news? | |
Messenger |
Letters, my lord, from Hamlet:
|
King | From Hamlet! who brought them? |
Messenger |
Sailors, my lord, they say; I saw them not:
|
King |
Laertes, you shall hear them. Leave us. Exit Messenger. Reads.
What should this mean? Are all the rest come back?
|
Laertes | Know you the hand? |
King |
’Tis Hamlet’s character. “Naked!”
|
Laertes |
I’m lost in it, my lord. But let him come;
|
King |
If it be so, Laertes—
|
Laertes |
Ay, my lord;
|
King |
To thine own peace. If he be now return’d,
|
Laertes |
My lord, I will be ruled;
|
King |
It falls right.
|
Laertes | What part is that, my lord? |
King |
A very riband in the cap of youth,
|
Laertes | A Norman was’t? |
King | A Norman. |
Laertes | Upon my life, Lamond. |
King | The very same. |
Laertes |
I know him well: he is the brooch indeed
|
King |
He made confession of you,
|
Laertes | What out of this, my lord? |
King |
Laertes, was your father dear to you?
|
Laertes | Why ask you this? |
King |
Not that I think you did not love your father;
|
Laertes | To cut his throat i’ the church. |
King |
No place, indeed, should murder sanctuarize;
|
Laertes |
I will do’t:
|
King |
Let’s further think of this;
|
Enter Queen. | |
How now, sweet queen! | |
Queen |
One woe doth tread upon another’s heel,
|
Laertes | Drown’d! O, where? |
Queen |
There is a willow grows aslant a brook,
|
Laertes | Alas, then, she is drown’d? |
Queen | Drown’d, drown’d. |
Laertes |
Too much of water hast thou, poor Ophelia,
|
King |
Let’s follow, Gertrude:
|
Act V
Scene I
A churchyard.
Enter two Clowns, with spades, etc. | |
First Clown | Is she to be buried in Christian burial that wilfully seeks her own salvation? |
Second Clown | I tell thee she is: and therefore make her grave straight: the crowner hath sat on her, and finds it Christian burial. |
First Clown | How can that be, unless she drowned herself in her own defence? |
Second Clown | Why, ’tis found so. |
First Clown | It must be “se offendendo;” it cannot be else. For here lies the point: if I drown myself wittingly, it argues an act: and an act hath three branches; it is, to act, to do, to perform: argal, she drowned herself wittingly. |
Second Clown | Nay, but hear you, goodman delver— |
First Clown | Give me leave. Here lies the water; good: here stands the man; good: if the man go to this water, and drown himself, it is, will he, nill he, he goes—mark you that; but if the water come to him and drown him, he drowns not himself: argal, he that is not guilty of his own death shortens not his own life. |
Second Clown | But is this law? |
First Clown | Ay, marry, is’t; crowner’s quest law. |
Second Clown | Will you ha’ the truth on’t? If this had not been a gentlewoman, she should have been buried out o’ Christian burial. |
First Clown | Why, there thou say’st: and the more pity that great folk should have countenance in this world to drown or hang themselves, more than their even Christian. Come, my spade. There is no ancient gentleman but gardeners, ditchers, and grave-makers: they hold up Adam’s profession. |
Second Clown | Was he a gentleman? |
First Clown | A’ was the first that ever bore arms. |
Second Clown | Why, he had none. |
First Clown | What, art a heathen? How dost thou understand the Scripture? The Scripture says “Adam digged:” could he dig without arms? I’ll put another question to thee: if thou answerest me not to the purpose, confess thyself— |
Second Clown | Go to. |
First Clown | What is he that builds stronger than either the mason, the shipwright, or the carpenter? |
Second Clown | The gallows-maker; for that frame outlives a thousand tenants. |
First Clown | I like thy wit well, in good faith: the gallows does well; but how does it well? it does well to those that do ill: now thou dost ill to say the gallows is built stronger than the church: argal, the gallows may do well to thee. To’t again, come. |
Second Clown | “Who builds stronger than a mason, a shipwright, or a carpenter?” |
First Clown | Ay, tell me that, and unyoke. |
Second Clown | Marry, now I can tell. |
First Clown | To’t. |
Second Clown | Mass, I cannot tell. |
Enter Hamlet and Horatio, at a distance. | |
First Clown |
Cudgel thy brains no more about it, for your dull ass will not mend his pace with beating; and, when you are asked this question next, say “a grave-maker:” the houses that he makes last till doomsday. Go, get thee to Yaughan: fetch me a stoup of liquor. Exit Second Clown. He digs and sings.
In youth, when I did love, did love,
|
Hamlet | Has this fellow no feeling of his business, that he sings at grave-making? |
Horatio | Custom hath made it in him a property of easiness. |
Hamlet | ’Tis e’en so: the hand of little employment hath the daintier sense. |
First Clown |
Sings.
But age, with his stealing steps,
Throws up a skull. |
Hamlet | That skull had a tongue in it, and could sing once: how the knave jowls it to the ground, as if it were Cain’s jaw-bone, that did the first murder! It might be the pate of a politician, which this ass now o’er-reaches; one that would circumvent God, might it not? |
Horatio | It might, my lord. |
Hamlet | Or of a courtier; which could say “Good morrow, sweet lord! How dost thou, good lord?” This might be my lord such-a-one, that praised my lord such-a-one’s horse, when he meant to beg it; might it not? |
Horatio | Ay, my lord. |
Hamlet | Why, e’en so: and now my Lady Worm’s; chapless, and knocked about the mazzard with a sexton’s spade: here’s fine revolution, an we had the trick to see’t. Did these bones cost no more the breeding, but to play at loggats with ’em? mine ache to think on’t. |
First Clown |
Sings.
A pick-axe, and a spade, a spade,
Throws up another skull. |
Hamlet | There’s another: why may not that be the skull of a lawyer? Where be his quiddities now, his quillets, his cases, his tenures, and his tricks? why does he suffer this rude knave now to knock him about the sconce with a dirty shovel, 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 vouchers, his recoveries: is this the fine of his fines, and the recovery of his recoveries, to have his fine pate full of fine dirt? will his vouchers vouch him no more of his purchases, and double ones too, than the length and breadth of a pair of indentures? The very conveyances of his lands will hardly lie in this box; and must the inheritor himself have no more, ha? |
Horatio | Not a jot more, my lord. |
Hamlet | Is not parchment made of sheepskins? |
Horatio | Ay, my lord, and of calf-skins too. |
Hamlet | They are sheep and calves which seek out assurance in that. I will speak to this fellow. Whose grave’s this, sirrah? |
First Clown |
Mine, sir. Sings.
O, a pit of clay for to be made
|
Hamlet | I think it be thine, indeed; for thou liest in’t. |
First Clown | You lie out on’t, sir, and therefore it is not yours: for my part, I do not lie in’t, and yet it is mine. |
Hamlet | Thou dost lie in’t, to be in’t and say it is thine: ’tis for the dead, not for the quick; therefore thou liest. |
First Clown | ’Tis a quick lie, sir; ’twill away again, from me to you. |
Hamlet | What man dost thou dig it for? |
First Clown | For no man, sir. |
Hamlet | What woman, then? |
First Clown | For none, neither. |
Hamlet | Who is to be buried in’t? |
First Clown | One that was a woman, sir; but, rest her soul, she’s dead. |
Hamlet | How absolute the knave is! we must speak by the card, or equivocation will undo us. By the Lord, Horatio, these three years I have taken a note of it; the age is grown so picked that the toe of the peasant comes so near the heel of the courtier, he galls his kibe. How long hast thou been a grave-maker? |
First Clown | Of all the days i’ the year, I came to’t that day that our last king Hamlet overcame Fortinbras. |
Hamlet | How long is that since? |
First Clown | 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. |
Hamlet | Ay, marry, why was he sent into England? |
First Clown | Why, because he was mad: he shall recover his wits there; or, if he do not, it’s no great matter there. |
Hamlet | Why? |
First Clown | ’Twill not be seen in him there; there the men are as mad as he. |
Hamlet | How came he mad? |
First Clown | Very strangely, they say. |
Hamlet | How strangely? |
First Clown | Faith, e’en with losing his wits. |
Hamlet | Upon what ground? |
First Clown | Why, here in Denmark: I have been sexton here, man and boy, thirty years. |
Hamlet | How long will a man lie i’ the earth ere he rot? |
First Clown | I’ faith, if he be not rotten before he die—as we have many pocky corses now-a-days, that will scarce hold the laying in—he will last you some eight year or nine year: a tanner will last you nine year. |
Hamlet | Why he more than another? |
First Clown | Why, sir, his hide is so tanned with his trade, that he will keep out water a great while; and your water is a sore decayer of your whoreson dead body. Here’s a skull now; this skull has lain in the earth three and twenty years. |
Hamlet | Whose was it? |
First Clown | A whoreson mad fellow’s it was: whose do you think it was? |
Hamlet | Nay, I know not. |
First Clown | A pestilence on him for a mad rogue! a’ poured a flagon of Rhenish on my head once. This same skull, sir, was Yorick’s skull, the king’s jester. |
Hamlet | This? |
First Clown | E’en that. |
Hamlet | Let me see. Takes the skull. Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio: a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy: he hath borne me on his back a thousand times; and 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 gambols? your songs? your flashes of merriment, that were wont to set the table on a roar? Not one now, to mock your own grinning? quite chap-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. Prithee, Horatio, tell me one thing. |
Horatio | What’s that, my lord? |
Hamlet | Dost thou think Alexander looked o’ this fashion i’ the earth? |
Horatio | E’en so. |
Hamlet | And smelt so? pah! Puts down the skull. |
Horatio | E’en so, my lord. |
Hamlet | To what base uses we may return, Horatio! Why may not imagination trace the noble dust of Alexander, till he find it stopping a bung-hole? |
Horatio | ’Twere to consider too curiously, to consider so. |
Hamlet |
No, faith, not a jot; but to follow him thither with modesty enough, and likelihood to lead it: as thus: Alexander died, Alexander was buried, Alexander returneth into dust; the dust is earth; of earth we make loam; and why of that loam, whereto he was converted, might they not stop a beer-barrel?
Imperious Caesar, dead and turn’d to clay,
|
Enter Priests, etc. in procession; the Corpse of Ophelia, Laertes and Mourners following; King, Queen, their trains, etc. | |
The queen, the courtiers: who is this they follow?
|
|
Laertes | What ceremony else? |
Hamlet |
That is Laertes,
|
Laertes | What ceremony else? |
First Priest |
Her obsequies have been as far enlarged
|
Laertes | Must there no more be done? |
First Priest |
No more be done:
|
Laertes |
Lay her i’ the earth:
|
Hamlet | What, the fair Ophelia! |
Queen |
Sweets to the sweet: farewell! Scattering flowers.
|
Laertes |
O, treble woe
|
Hamlet |
Advancing. What is he whose grief
|
Laertes | The devil take thy soul! Grappling with him. |
Hamlet |
Thou pray’st not well.
|
King | Pluck them asunder. |
Queen | Hamlet, Hamlet! |
All | Gentlemen— |
Horatio | Good my lord, be quiet. The Attendants part them, and they come out of the grave. |
Hamlet |
Why, I will fight with him upon this theme
|
Queen | O my son, what theme? |
Hamlet |
I loved Ophelia: forty thousand brothers
|
King | O, he is mad, Laertes. |
Queen | For love of God, forbear him. |
Hamlet |
’Swounds, show me what thou’lt do:
|
Queen |
This is mere madness:
|
Hamlet |
Hear you, sir;
|
King |
I pray you, good Horatio, wait upon him. Exit Horatio.
|
Scene II
A hall in the castle.
Enter Hamlet and Horatio. | |
Hamlet |
So much for this, sir: now shall you see the other;
|
Horatio | Remember it, my lord? |
Hamlet |
Sir, in my heart there was a kind of fighting,
|
Horatio | That is most certain. |
Hamlet |
Up from my cabin,
|
Horatio | Is’t possible? |
Hamlet |
Here’s the commission: read it at more leisure.
|
Horatio | I beseech you. |
Hamlet |
Being thus be-netted round with villainies—
|
Horatio | Ay, good my lord. |
Hamlet |
An earnest conjuration from the king,
|
Horatio | How was this seal’d? |
Hamlet |
Why, even in that was heaven ordinant.
|
Horatio | So Guildenstern and Rosencrantz go to’t. |
Hamlet |
Why, man, they did make love to this employment;
|
Horatio | Why, what a king is this! |
Hamlet |
Does it not, think’st thee, stand me now upon—
|
Horatio |
It must be shortly known to him from England
|
Hamlet |
It will be short: the interim is mine;
|
Horatio | Peace! who comes here? |
Enter Osric. | |
Osric | Your lordship is right welcome back to Denmark. |
Hamlet | I humbly thank you, sir. Dost know this water-fly? |
Horatio | No, my good lord. |
Hamlet | Thy state is the more gracious; for ’tis a vice to know him. He hath much land, and fertile: let a beast be lord of beasts, and his crib shall stand at the king’s mess: ’tis a chough; but, as I say, spacious in the possession of dirt. |
Osric | Sweet lord, if your lordship were at leisure, I should impart a thing to you from his majesty. |
Hamlet | I will receive it, sir, with all diligence of spirit. Put your bonnet to his right use; ’tis for the head. |
Osric | I thank your lordship, it is very hot. |
Hamlet | No, believe me, ’tis very cold; the wind is northerly. |
Osric | It is indifferent cold, my lord, indeed. |
Hamlet | But yet methinks it is very sultry and hot for my complexion. |
Osric | Exceedingly, my lord; it is very sultry—as ’twere—I cannot tell how. But, my lord, his majesty bade me signify to you that he has laid a great wager on your head: sir, this is the matter— |
Hamlet | I beseech you, remember—Hamlet moves him to put on his hat. |
Osric | Nay, good my lord; for mine ease, in good faith. Sir, here is newly come to court Laertes; believe me, an absolute gentleman, full of most excellent differences, of very soft society and great showing: indeed, to speak feelingly of him, he is the card or calendar of gentry, for you shall find in him the continent of what part a gentleman would see. |
Hamlet | Sir, his definement suffers no perdition in you; though, I know, to divide him inventorially would dizzy the arithmetic of memory, and yet but yaw neither, in respect of his quick sail. But, in the verity of extolment, I take him to be a soul of great article; and his infusion of such dearth and rareness, as, to make true diction of him, his semblable is his mirror; and who else would trace him, his umbrage, nothing more. |
Osric | Your lordship speaks most infallibly of him. |
Hamlet | The concernancy, sir? why do we wrap the gentleman in our more rawer breath? |
Osric | Sir? |
Horatio | Is’t not possible to understand in another tongue? You will do’t, sir, really. |
Hamlet | What imports the nomination of this gentleman? |
Osric | Of Laertes? |
Horatio | His purse is empty already; all’s golden words are spent. |
Hamlet | Of him, sir. |
Osric | I know you are not ignorant— |
Hamlet | I would you did, sir; yet, in faith, if you did, it would not much approve me. Well, sir? |
Osric | You are not ignorant of what excellence Laertes is— |
Hamlet | I dare not confess that, lest I should compare with him in excellence; but, to know a man well, were to know himself. |
Osric | I mean, sir, for his weapon; but in the imputation laid on him by them, in his meed he’s unfellowed. |
Hamlet | What’s his weapon? |
Osric | Rapier and dagger. |
Hamlet | That’s two of his weapons: but, well. |
Osric | The king, sir, hath wagered with him six Barbary horses: against the which he has imponed, as I take it, 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 conceit. |
Hamlet | What call you the carriages? |
Horatio | I knew you must be edified by the margent ere you had done. |
Osric | The carriages, sir, are the hangers. |
Hamlet | The phrase would be more german to the matter, if we could carry cannon by our sides: I would it might be hangers till then. But, on: six Barbary horses against six French swords, their assigns, and three liberal-conceited carriages; that’s the French bet against the Danish. Why is this “imponed,” as you call it? |
Osric | The king, sir, hath laid, that in a dozen passes between yourself and him, he shall not exceed you three hits: he hath laid on twelve for nine; and it would come to immediate trial, if your lordship would vouchsafe the answer. |
Hamlet | How if I answer “no”? |
Osric | I mean, my lord, the opposition of your person in trial. |
Hamlet | Sir, I will walk here in the hall: if it please his majesty, ’tis the breathing time of day with me; let the foils be brought, the gentleman willing, and the king hold his purpose, I will win for him an I can; if not, I will gain nothing but my shame and the odd hits. |
Osric | Shall I re-deliver you e’en so? |
Hamlet | To this effect, sir; after what flourish your nature will. |
Osric | I commend my duty to your lordship. |
Hamlet | Yours, yours. Exit Osric. He does well to commend it himself; there are no tongues else for’s turn. |
Horatio | This lapwing runs away with the shell on his head. |
Hamlet | He did comply with his dug, before he sucked it. Thus has he—and many more of the same bevy that I know the drossy age dotes on—only got the tune of the time and outward habit of encounter; a kind of yesty collection, which carries them through and through the most fond and winnowed opinions; and do but blow them to their trial, the bubbles are out. |
Enter a Lord. | |
Lord | My lord, his majesty commended him to you by young Osric, who brings back 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. |
Hamlet | I am constant to my purpose; they follow the king’s pleasure: if his fitness speaks, mine is ready; now or whensoever, provided I be so able as now. |
Lord | The king and queen and all are coming down. |
Hamlet | In happy time. |
Lord | The queen desires you to use some gentle entertainment to Laertes before you fall to play. |
Hamlet | She well instructs me. Exit Lord. |
Horatio | You will lose this wager, my lord. |
Hamlet | I do not think so: since he went into France, 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. |
Horatio | Nay, good my lord— |
Hamlet | It is but foolery; but it is such a kind of gain-giving, as would perhaps trouble a woman. |
Horatio | If your mind dislike any thing, obey it: I will forestall their repair hither, and say you are not fit. |
Hamlet | 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: since no man has aught of what he leaves, what is’t to leave betimes? |
Enter King, Queen, Laertes, Lords, Osric, and Attendants with foils, etc. | |
King | Come, Hamlet, come, and take this hand from me. |
The King puts Laertes’ hand into Hamlet’s. | |
Hamlet |
Give me your pardon, sir: I’ve done you wrong;
|
Laertes |
I am satisfied in nature,
|
Hamlet |
I embrace it freely;
|
Laertes | Come, one for me. |
Hamlet |
I’ll be your foil, Laertes: in mine ignorance
|
Laertes | You mock me, sir. |
Hamlet | No, by this hand. |
King |
Give them the foils, young Osric. Cousin Hamlet,
|
Hamlet |
Very well, my lord;
|
King |
I do not fear it; I have seen you both:
|
Laertes | This is too heavy, let me see another. |
Hamlet | This likes me well. These foils have all a length? They prepare to play. |
Osric | Ay, my good lord. |
King |
Set me the stoups of wine upon that table.
|
Hamlet | Come on, sir. |
Laertes | Come, my lord. They play. |
Hamlet | One. |
Laertes | No. |
Hamlet | Judgment. |
Osric | A hit, a very palpable hit. |
Laertes | Well; again. |
King |
Stay; give me drink. Hamlet, this pearl is thine;
|
Hamlet | I’ll play this bout first; set it by awhile. Come. They play. Another hit; what say you? |
Laertes | A touch, a touch, I do confess. |
King | Our son shall win. |
Queen |
He’s fat, and scant of breath.
|
Hamlet | Good madam! |
King | Gertrude, do not drink. |
Queen | I will, my lord; I pray you, pardon me. |
King | Aside. It is the poison’d cup: it is too late. |
Hamlet | I dare not drink yet, madam; by and by. |
Queen | Come, let me wipe thy face. |
Laertes | My lord, I’ll hit him now. |
King | I do not think’t. |
Laertes | Aside. And yet ’tis almost ’gainst my conscience. |
Hamlet |
Come, for the third, Laertes: you but dally;
|
Laertes | Say you so? come on. They play. |
Osric | Nothing, neither way. |
Laertes | Have at you now! Laertes wounds Hamlet; then, in scuffling, they change rapiers, and Hamlet wounds Laertes. |
King | Part them; they are incensed. |
Hamlet | Nay, come, again. The Queen falls. |
Osric | Look to the queen there, ho! |
Horatio | They bleed on both sides. How is it, my lord? |
Osric | How is’t, Laertes? |
Laertes |
Why, as a woodcock to mine own springe, Osric;
|
Hamlet | How does the queen? |
King | She swounds to see them bleed. |
Queen |
No, no, the drink, the drink—O my dear Hamlet—
|
Hamlet |
O villany! Ho! let the door be lock’d:
|
Laertes |
It is here, Hamlet: Hamlet, thou art slain;
|
Hamlet |
The point envenom’d too!
|
All | Treason! treason! |
King | O, yet defend me, friends; I am but hurt. |
Hamlet |
Here, thou incestuous, murderous, damned Dane,
|
Laertes |
He is justly served;
|
Hamlet |
Heaven make thee free of it! I follow thee.
|
Horatio |
Never believe it:
|
Hamlet |
As thou’rt a man,
|
Osric |
Young Fortinbras, with conquest come from Poland,
|
Hamlet |
O, I die, Horatio;
|
Horatio |
Now cracks a noble heart. Good night, sweet prince;
|
Enter Fortinbras, the English Ambassadors, and others. | |
Prince Fortinbras | Where is this sight? |
Horatio |
What is it ye would see?
|
Prince Fortinbras |
This quarry cries on havoc. O proud death,
|
First Ambassador |
The sight is dismal;
|
Horatio |
Not from his mouth,
|
Prince Fortinbras |
Let us haste to hear it,
|
Horatio |
Of that I shall have also cause to speak,
|
Prince Fortinbras |
Let four captains
|
Endnotes
-
In an effort to create a complete form of Hamlet, William George Clark and William Aldis Wright combined parts of Hamlet from both the Second Quarto and First Folio. This portion of dialogue originates from the Second Quarto but the verse line is missing a word. The printing of the Second Quarto skips a word making the line read “And either the devil, or throw him out.” Shakespeare’s original intent has been lost, and modern scholars have a variety of theories on what it might have been. Scholars have proposed “master” as a possible emendation. Other guesses made by scholars include “curb,” “lodge,” “reign,” and “seize.” —Emma Sweeney ↩
-
Here we encounter another complication due to combining two versions of Hamlet. In the First Folio, the text is missing almost four lines of verse. These lines have been restored from the Second Quarto but the print was not perfect: a portion of a verse line was not completed. Scholars have proposed “So haply slander—” as a possible emendation. Another guess made by scholars is “So dreaded slander—.” —Emma Sweeney ↩
Colophon
Hamlet
was published in 1600 by
William Shakespeare.
This ebook was produced for
Standard Ebooks
by
Emma Sweeney,
and is based on a transcription produced in 1993 by
Jeremy Hylton
for the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
and on digital scans from the
HathiTrust Digital Library.
Emendations to the text are provided by
Open Source Shakespeare.
The cover page is adapted from
Ophelia,
a painting completed in 1851 by
John Everett Millais.
The cover and title pages feature the
League Spartan and Sorts Mill Goudy
typefaces created in 2014 and 2009 by
The League of Moveable Type.
The first edition of this ebook was released on
February 16, 2021, 6:26 p.m.
You can check for updates to this ebook, view its revision history, or download it for different ereading systems at
standardebooks.org/ebooks/william-shakespeare/hamlet.
The volunteer-driven Standard Ebooks project relies on readers like you to submit typos, corrections, and other improvements. Anyone can contribute at standardebooks.org.
Uncopyright
May you do good and not evil.
May you find forgiveness for yourself and forgive others.
May you share freely, never taking more than you give.
Copyright pages exist to tell you that you can’t do something. Unlike them, this Uncopyright page exists to tell you that the writing and artwork in this ebook are believed to be in the United States public domain; that is, they are believed to be free of copyright restrictions in the United States. The United States public domain represents our collective cultural heritage, and items in it are free for anyone in the United States to do almost anything at all with, without having to get permission.
Copyright laws are different all over the world, and the source text or artwork in this ebook may still be copyrighted in other countries. If you’re not located in the United States, you must check your local laws before using this ebook. Standard Ebooks makes no representations regarding the copyright status of the source text or artwork in this ebook in any country other than the United States.
Non-authorship activities performed on items that are in the public domain—so-called “sweat of the brow” work—don’t create a new copyright. That means that nobody can claim a new copyright on an item that is in the public domain for, among other things, work like digitization, markup, or typography. Regardless, the contributors to this ebook release their contributions under the terms in the CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication, thus dedicating to the worldwide public domain all of the work they’ve done on this ebook, including but not limited to metadata, the titlepage, imprint, colophon, this Uncopyright, and any changes or enhancements to, or markup on, the original text and artwork. This dedication doesn’t change the copyright status of the source text or artwork. We make this dedication in the interest of enriching our global cultural heritage, to promote free and libre culture around the world, and to give back to the unrestricted culture that has given all of us so much.