sand ducats,

Will not debate the question of this straw: This is the imposthume of much wealth and peace;

That inward breaks, and shows no cause without Why the man dies.-I humbly thank you, sir. Cap. God be wi' you, sir. [Exit Captain. Ros. Will't please you go, my lord?

Ham. I will be with you straight. Go a little
before.
[Exeunt Ros. and Guil.
How all occasions do inform against me,
And spur my dull revenge! What is a man,
If his chief good, and market of his time,
Be but to sleep, and feed? a beast, no more.
Sure, he, that made us with such large discourse,
Looking before, and after, gave us not
That capability and godlike reason

To fust in us unus'd. Now, whether it be
Bestial oblivion, or some craven scruple
Of thinking too precisely on the event,-
A thought, which, quarter'd, hath but one part
wisdom,

And, ever, three parts coward,-I do not know
Why yet I live to say, This thing's to do;
Sith I have cause, and will, and strength, and

means,

To do't. Examples, gross as earth, exhort me:
Witness, this army of such mass, and charge,
Led by a delicate and tender prince;
Whose spirit, with divine ambition puff'd,
Makes mouths at the invisible event;
Exposing what is mortal, and unsure,

To all that fortune, death, and danger, dare,
Even for an egg-shell. Rightly to be great,
Is, not to stir without great argument;
But greatly to find quarrel in a straw,
When honour's at the stake. How stand I

then,

That have a father kill'd, a mother stain'd,
Excitements of my reason, and
my blood,
And let all sleep? while, to my shame, I see
The imminent death of twenty thousand men,
That, for a fantasy, and trick of fame,
Go to their graves like beds; fight for a plot
Whereon the numbers cannot try the cause,
Which is not tomb enough, and continent,
To hide the slain ?-O, from this time forth,
My thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth!

SCENE V.-Elsinore.

[Exit.

A room in the castle.

Enter Queen and HORATIO.

Queen. -I will not speak with her.
Hor. She is importunate; indeed, distract;

Her mood will needs be pitied.
Queen. What would she have?

Hor. She speaks much of her father; says, she hears,

There's tricks i'the world; and hems, and beats her heart;

doubt,

That carry but half sense: her speech is nothing,

Yet the unshaped use of it doth move
The hearers to collection; they aim at it,
And botch the words up fit to their own
thoughts;

Which, as her winks, and nods, and gestures yield them,

Indeed would make one think, there might be thought,

Though nothing sure, yet much unhappily.

Queen. "Twere good, she were spoken with; for she may strew

Dangerous conjectures in ill-breeding minds:
Let her come in.
[Exit Horatio.

To my sick soul, as sin's true nature is,
Each toy seems prologue to some great amiss:
So full of artless jealousy is guilt,
It spills itself in fearing to be spilt.

Re-enter HORATIO, with OPHELIA. Oph. Where is the beauteous majesty of Denmark?

Queen. How now, Ophelia ?

Oph. How should I your true love know
From another one?

By his cockle hat and staff,
And his sandal shoon.

Singing.

King. Who shall stay you?

Laer. My will, not all the world's:

They shall go far with little.

King. Good Laertes,

If you desire to know the certainty

Of your dear father's death, is't writ in your

my arms;

And, like the kind life-rend'ring pelican,
Repast them with my blood.

King. Why, now you speak

Like a good child, and a true gentleman.
That I am guiltless of your father's death,
And am most sensibly in grief for it,
It shall as level to your judgment 'pear,
As day does to your eye.

Danes. [Within.] Let her come in.
Laer. How now? what noise is that?

Enter OPHELIA, fantastically dressed with straws and flowers.

O heat, dry up my brains! tears seven times salt,

Burn out the sense and virtue of mine eye!— By heaven, thy madness shall be paid with weight,

Till our scale turn the beam. O rose of May!
Dear maid, kind sister, sweet Ophelia !—
O heavens! is't possible, a young maid's wits
Should be as mortal as an old man's life?
Nature is fine in love: and, where 'tis fine,
It sends some precious instance of itself
After the thing it loves.

Oph. They bore him barefac'd on the bier;

Hey no nonny, nonny hey nonny :
And in his grave rain'd many a tear ;—

Fare you well, my dove!

Laer. Hadst thou thy wits, and didst persuade revenge,

It could not move thus.

Oph. You must sing, Down a-down, an you call him a-down-a. O, how the wheel becomes it! It is the false steward, that stole his master's daughter.

Laer. This nothing's more than matter. Oph. There's rosemary, that's for remembrance; pray you, love, remember: and there is pansies, that's for thoughts.

Laer. Á document in madness; thoughts and remembrance fitted.

Oph. 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-you may wear your rue with a differ

Hor. Let him bless thee too.

1 Sail. 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.

Hor. [Reads. Horatio, when thou shalt have overlooked this, give these fellows some means to the king; they have letters for him. Ere 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. Let the king have the letters I have sent; and repair thou to me with as much haste as thou wouldst fly death. I have words to speak in thine ear, will make thee dumb; yet are they much too light for the bore of the matter. These good fellows will bring thee where I am. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern hold their course for England; of them I have much to tell thee. Farewell.

He that thou knowest thine, Hamlet.

Come, I will give you way for these your letters; And do't the speedier, that you may direct me To him, from whom you brought them.

[Exeunt.

SCENE VII.-Another room in the same.

Enter King and LAERTES.

King. Now must your conscience my acquittance seal,

And you must put me in your heart for friend; Sith you have heard, and with a knowing ear, That he, which hath your noble father slain, Pursu'd my life.

Laer. It well appears :-But tell me, Why you proceeded not against these feats, So crimeful and so capital in nature,

As by your safety, greatness, wisdom, all things else,

You mainly were stirr'd up.

King. O, for two special reasons; Which may to you, perhaps, seem much unsinew'd,

But 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 which,)
She is 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,
Why to a public count I might not go,
Is, the great love the general gender bear him:
Who, dipping all his faults in their affection,
Work like the spring that turneth wood to stone,
Convert his gyves to graces; so that my arrows,
Too slightly timber'd for so loud a wind,

Mess. Letters, my lord, from Hamlet: This to your majesty; this to the queen. King. From Hamlet! who brought them? Mess. Sailors, my lord, they say: I saw them not; They were given me by Claudio, he receiv'd them Of him that brought them.

King. Laertes, you shall hear them: Leave us. [Exit Messenger.

[Reads. High and mighty, you shall know, I am set naked on your kingdom. To-morrow shall I beg leave to see your kingly eyes: when I shall, first asking your pardon thereunto, recount the occasion of my sudden and more strange return.

Hamlet.

Laer. Ay, my lord;

So you will not o'er-rule me to a peace.
King. To thine own peace. If he be now re-
turn'd,-

As checking at his voyage, and that he means
No more to undertake it,-I will 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.

Laer. My lord, I will be rul'd

The rather, if you could devise it so, That I might be the organ.

King. It falls right.

You have been talk'd of since your travel much,
And that in Hamlet's hearing, for a quality,
Wherein, they say, you shine: your sum of parts
Did not together pluck such envy from him,
As did that one; and that, in my regard,
Of the unworthiest siege.

Laer. What part is that, my lord?

King. A very ribband in the cap of youth, Yet needful too; for youth no less becomes The light and careless livery that it wears, Than settled age his sables, and his weeds, Importing health and graveness.-Two months since,

Here was a gentleman of Normandy,

I have seen myself, and serv'd against, the French,
And they can well on horseback: but this gallant
Had witchcraft in't; he grew unto his seat;
And to such wond'rous doing brought his horse,
As he had been incorps'd and demi-natur'd
With the brave beast: so far he topp'd my thought,
That I, in forgery of shapes and tricks,
Come short of what he did.

Laer. A Norman, was't?

King. A Norman.

Laer. Upon my life, Lamord.

King. The very same.

As there are tongues, are hands, are accidents; And then this should is like a spendthrift sigh, That hurts by easing. But, to the quick o' the ulcer:

Hamlet comes back; What would you undertake, To show yourself in deed your father's son, More than in words?

Laer. To cut his throat i'the church.

King. No place, indeed, should murder sanctuarize;

Revenge should have no bounds. But, good
Laertes,

Will you do this, keep close within your chamber:
Hamlet, return'd, shall know you are come home:
We'll put on those shall praise your excellence,
And set a double varnish on the fame
The Frenchman gave you; bring you, in fine,
together,

And wager o'er your heads: he, being remiss,
Most generous, and free from all contriving,
Will not peruse the foils; 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.

Laer. I will do't:

And, for the 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 cataplasm so rare,

deed,

And gem of all the nation.

King. He made confession of you ;
And gave you such a masterly report,
For art and exercise in your defence,
And for your rapier most especial,
That he cried out, 'twould be a sight indeed,
If one could match you: the scrimers of their
nation,

He swore, had neither motion, guard, nor eye,
If you oppos'd them: Sir, this report of his
Did Hamlet so envenom with his envy,
That he could nothing do, but wish and beg
Your sudden coming o'er, to play with you.
Now, out of this,-

Laer. What out of this, my lord?

King. Laertes, was your father dear to you? Or are you like the painting of a sorrow, A face without a heart?

Laer. Why ask you this?

King. Not that I think, you did not love your

father;

A chalice for the nonce; whereon but sipping, If he by chance escape your venom'd stuck, Our purpose may hold there. But stay, what noise?

Enter Queen.

How now, sweet queen?

Queen. One woe doth tread upon another's heel,

So fast they follow:-Your sister's drown'd, Laertes.

Laer. Drown'd! O, where?