[Footnote 1:
'to be overwise--to overreach ourselves'
'ambition, which o'erleaps itself,'
--_Macbeth_, act i. sc. 7.]
[Footnote 2: Polonius is a man of faculty. His courtier-life, his
self-seeking, his vanity, have made and make him the fool he is.]
[Footnote 3: He hopes now to get his daughter married to the prince.
We have here a curious instance of Shakspere's not unfrequently
excessive condensation. Expanded, the clause would be like this: 'which,
being kept close, might move more grief by the hiding of love, than to
utter love might move hate:' the grief in the one case might be greater
than the hate in the other would be. It verges on confusion, and may not
be as Shakspere wrote it, though it is like his way.
_1st Q._
Lets to the king, this madnesse may prooue,
Though wilde a while, yet more true to thy loue.]
[Footnote 4: _Not in Quarto._]
[Footnote 5: _Q._ has not _Cum alijs._]
[Footnote 6: 'Moreover that &c.': _moreover_ is here used as a
preposition, with the rest of the clause for its objective.]
[Footnote 7: Rosincrance and Guildensterne are, from the first and
throughout, the creatures of the king.]
[Footnote 8: The king's conscience makes him suspicious of Hamlet's
suspicion.]
[Footnote 9: 'from such an early age'.]
[Footnote 10: 'since then so familiar with'.]
[Footnote 11: 'to gather as much as you may glean from opportunities, of
that which, when disclosed to us, will lie within our remedial power.'
If the line of the Quarto be included, it makes plainer construction.
The line beginning with '_So much_,' then becomes parenthetical, and _to
gather_ will not immediately govern that line, but the rest of the
sentence.]
[Page 74]
_Qu._ Good Gentlemen, he hath much talk'd of you,
And sure I am, two men there are not liuing, [Sidenote: there is not]
To whom he more adheres. If it will please you
To shew vs so much Gentrie,[1] and good will,
As to expend your time with vs a-while,
For the supply and profit of our Hope,[2]
Your Visitation shall receiue such thankes
As fits a Kings remembrance.
_Rosin._ Both your Maiesties
Might by the Soueraigne power you haue of vs,
Put your dread pleasures, more into Command
Then to Entreatie,
_Guil._ We both[3] obey, [Sidenote: But we]
And here giue vp our selues, in the full bent,[4]
To lay our Seruices freely at your feete, [Sidenote: seruice]
To be commanded.
_King._ Thankes _Rosincrance_, and gentle _Guildensterne_.
_Qu._ Thankes _Guildensterne_ and gentle _Rosincrance_,[5]
And I beseech you instantly to visit
My too much changed Sonne.
Go some of ye, [Sidenote: you]
And bring the Gentlemen where _Hamlet_ is, [Sidenote: bring these]
_Guil._ Heauens make our presence and our practises
Pleasant and helpfull to him. _Exit_[6]
_Queene._ Amen. [Sidenote: Amen. _Exeunt Ros. and Guyld._]
_Enter Polonius._
[Sidenote: 18] _Pol._ Th'Ambassadors from Norwey, my good Lord,
Are ioyfully return'd.
[Footnote 1: gentleness, grace, favour.]
[Footnote 2: Their hope in Hamlet, as their son and heir.]
[Footnote 3: both majesties.]
[Footnote 4: If we put a comma after _bent_, the phrase will mean 'in
the full _purpose_ or _design_ to lay our services &c.' Without the
comma, the content of the phrase would be general:--'in the devoted
force of our faculty.' The latter is more like Shakspere.]
[Footnote 5: Is there not tact intended in the queen's reversal of her
husband's arrangement of the two names--that each might have precedence,
and neither take offence?]
[Footnote 6: _Not in Quarto._]
[Page 76]
_King._ Thou still hast bin the Father of good Newes.
_Pol._ Haue I, my Lord?[1] Assure you, my good Liege,
[Sidenote: I assure my]
I hold my dutie, as I hold my Soule,
Both to my God, one to my gracious King:[2] [Sidenote: God, and to[2]]
And I do thinke, or else this braine of mine
Hunts not the traile of Policie, so sure
As I haue vs'd to do: that I haue found [Sidenote: it hath vsd]
The very cause of _Hamlets_ Lunacie.
_King._ Oh speake of that, that I do long to heare.
[Sidenote: doe I long]
_Pol._ Giue first admittance to th'Ambassadors,
My Newes shall be the Newes to that great Feast,
[Sidenote: the fruite to that]
_King._ Thy selfe do grace to them, and bring them in.
He tels me my sweet Queene, that he hath found
[Sidenote: my deere Gertrard he]
The head[3] and sourse of all your Sonnes distemper.
_Qu._ I doubt it is no other, but the maine,
His Fathers death, and our o're-hasty Marriage.[4]
[Sidenote: our hastie]
_Enter Polonius, Voltumand, and Cornelius._
[Sidenote: _Enter_ Embassadors.]
_King._ Well, we shall sift him. Welcome good Frends:
[Sidenote: my good]
Say _Voltumand_, what from our Brother Norwey?
_Volt._ Most faire returne of Greetings, and Desires.
Vpon our first,[5] he sent out to suppresse
His Nephewes Leuies, which to him appear'd
To be a preparation 'gainst the Poleak: [Sidenote: Pollacke,]
But better look'd into, he truly found
It was against your Highnesse, whereat greeued,
That so his Sicknesse, Age, and Impotence
Was falsely borne in hand,[6] sends[7] out Arrests
On _Fortinbras_, which he (in breefe) obeyes,
[Footnote 1: To be spoken triumphantly, but in the peculiar tone of one
thinking, 'You little know what better news I have behind!']
[Footnote 2: I cannot tell which is the right reading; if the _Q.'s_, it
means, '_I hold my duty precious as my soul, whether to my God or my
king_'; if the _F.'s_, it is a little confused by the attempt of
Polonius to make a fine euphuistic speech:--'_I hold my duty as I hold
my soul,--both at the command of my God, one at the command of my
king_.']
[Footnote 3: the spring; the river-head
'The spring, the head, the fountain of your blood'
_Macbeth,_ act ii. sc. 3.]
[Footnote 4: She goes a step farther than the king in accounting for
Hamlet's misery--knows there is more cause of it yet, but hopes he does
not know so much cause for misery as he might know.]
[Footnote 5: Either 'first' stands for _first desire_, or it is a noun,
and the meaning of the phrase is, 'The instant we mentioned the
matter'.]
[Footnote 6: 'borne in hand'--played with, taken advantage of.
'How you were borne in hand, how cross'd,'
_Macbeth,_ act iii. sc. 1.]
[Footnote 7: The nominative pronoun was not _quite_ indispensable to the
verb in Shakspere's time.]
[Page 78]
Receiues rebuke from Norwey: and in fine,
Makes Vow before his Vnkle, neuer more
To giue th'assay of Armes against your Maiestie.
Whereon old Norwey, ouercome with ioy,
Giues him three thousand Crownes in Annuall Fee,
[Sidenote: threescore thousand]
And his Commission to imploy those Soldiers
So leuied as before, against the Poleak: [Sidenote: Pollacke,]
With an intreaty heerein further shewne,
[Sidenote: 190] That it might please you to giue quiet passe
Through your Dominions, for his Enterprize, [Sidenote: for this]
On such regards of safety and allowance,
As therein are set downe.
_King_. It likes vs well:
And at our more consider'd[1] time wee'l read,
Answer, and thinke vpon this Businesse.
Meane time we thanke you, for your well-tooke Labour.
Go to your rest, at night wee'l Feast together.[2]
Most welcome home. _Exit Ambass_.
[Sidenote: Exeunt Embassadors]
_Pol_. This businesse is very well ended.[3] [Sidenote: is well]
My Liege, and Madam, to expostulate[4]
What Maiestie should be, what Dutie is,[5]
Why day is day; night, night; and time is time,
Were nothing but to waste Night, Day and Time.
Therefore, since Breuitie is the Soule of Wit,
[Sidenote: Therefore breuitie]
And tediousnesse, the limbes and outward flourishes,[6]
I will be breefe. Your Noble Sonne is mad:
Mad call I it; for to define true Madnesse,
What is't, but to be nothing else but mad.[7]
But let that go.
_Qu_. More matter, with lesse Art.[8]
_Pol_. Madam, I sweare I vse no Art at all:
That he is mad, 'tis true: 'Tis true 'tis pittie, [Sidenote: hee's mad]
And pittie it is true; A foolish figure,[9]
[Sidenote: pitty tis tis true,]
[Footnote 1: time given up to, or filled with consideration; _or,
perhaps_, time chosen for a purpose.]
[Footnote 2: He is always feasting.]
[Footnote 3: Now for _his_ turn! He sets to work at once with his
rhetoric.]
[Footnote 4: to lay down beforehand as postulates.]
[Footnote 5: We may suppose a dash and pause after '_Dutie is_'. The
meaning is plain enough, though logical form is wanting.]
[Footnote 6: As there is no imagination in Polonius, we cannot look for
great aptitude in figure.]
[Footnote 7: The nature of madness also is a postulate.]
[Footnote 8: She is impatient, but wraps her rebuke in a compliment.
Art, so-called, in speech, was much favoured in the time of Elizabeth.
And as a compliment Polonius takes the form in which she expresses her
dislike of his tediousness, and her anxiety after his news: pretending
to wave it off, he yet, in his gratification, coming on the top of his
excitement with the importance of his fancied discovery, plunges
immediately into a very slough of _art_, and becomes absolutely silly.]
[Footnote 9: It is no figure at all. It is hardly even a play with the
words.]
[Page 80]
But farewell it: for I will vse no Art.
Mad let vs grant him then: and now remaines
That we finde out the cause of this effect,
Or rather say, the cause of this defect;
For this effect defectiue, comes by cause,
Thus it remaines, and the remainder thus. Perpend,
I haue a daughter: haue, whil'st she is mine, [Sidenote: while]
Who in her Dutie and Obedience, marke,
Hath giuen me this: now gather, and surmise.
_The Letter_.[1]
_To the Celestiall, and my Soules Idoll, the most
beautified Ophelia_.
That's an ill Phrase, a vilde Phrase, beautified
is a vilde Phrase: but you shall heare these in her thus in her
excellent white bosome, these.[2] [Sidenote: these, &c]
_Qu_. Came this from _Hamlet_ to her.
_Pol_. Good Madam stay awhile, I will be faithfull.
_Doubt thou, the Starres are fire_, [Sidenote: _Letter_]
_Doubt, that the Sunne doth moue;
Doubt Truth to be a Lier,
But neuer Doubt, I loue.[3]
O deere Ophelia, I am ill at these Numbers: I
haue not Art to reckon my grones; but that I loue
thee best, oh most Best beleeue it. Adieu.
Thine euermore most deere Lady, whilst this
Machine is to him_, Hamlet.
This in Obedience hath my daughter shew'd me:
[Sidenote: _Pol_. This showne]
And more aboue hath his soliciting, [Sidenote: more about solicitings]
As they fell out by Time, by Meanes, and Place,
All giuen to mine eare.
_King_. But how hath she receiu'd his Loue?
_Pol_. What do you thinke of me?
_King_. As of a man, faithfull and Honourable.
_Pol_. I wold faine proue so. But what might you think?
[Footnote 1: _Not in Quarto._]
[Footnote 2: _Point thus_: 'but you shall heare. _These, in her
excellent white bosom, these_:'
Ladies, we are informed, wore a small pocket in front of the
bodice;--but to accept the fact as an explanation of this passage, is to
cast the passage away. Hamlet _addresses_ his letter, not to Ophelia's
pocket, but to Ophelia herself, at her house--that is, in the palace of
her bosom, excellent in whiteness. In like manner, signing himself, he
makes mention of his body as a machine of which he has the use for a
time. So earnest is Hamlet that when he makes love, he is the more a
philosopher. But he is more than a philosopher: he is a man of the
Universe, not a man of this world only.
We must not allow the fashion of the time in which the play was written,
to cause doubt as to the genuine heartiness of Hamlet's love-making.]
[Footnote 3: _1st Q._
Doubt that in earth is fire,
Doubt that the starres doe moue,
Doubt trueth to be a liar,
But doe not doubt I loue.]
[Page 82]
When I had seene this hot loue on the wing,
As I perceiued it, I must tell you that
Before my Daughter told me, what might you
Or my deere Maiestie your Queene heere, think,
If I had playd the Deske or Table-booke,[1]
Or giuen my heart a winking, mute and dumbe, [Sidenote: working]
Or look'd vpon this Loue, with idle sight,[2]
What might you thinke? No, I went round to worke,
And (my yong Mistris) thus I did bespeake[3]
Lord _Hamlet_ is a Prince out of thy Starre,[4]
This must not be:[5] and then, I Precepts gaue her,
[Sidenote: I prescripts]
That she should locke her selfe from his Resort, [Sidenote: from her]
[Sidenote: 42[6], 43, 70] Admit no Messengers, receiue no Tokens:
Which done, she tooke the Fruites of my Aduice,[7]
And he repulsed. A short Tale to make, [Sidenote: repell'd, a]
Fell into a Sadnesse, then into a Fast,[8]
Thence to a Watch, thence into a Weaknesse, [Sidenote: to a wath,]
Thence to a Lightnesse, and by this declension [Sidenote: to lightnes]
Into the Madnesse whereon now he raues, [Sidenote: wherein]
And all we waile for.[9] [Sidenote: mourne for]
_King_. Do you thinke 'tis this?[10] [Sidenote: thinke this?]
_Qu_. It may be very likely. [Sidenote: like]
_Pol_. Hath there bene such a time, I'de fain know that,
[Sidenote: I would]
That I haue possitiuely said, 'tis so,
When it prou'd otherwise?
_King_. Not that I know.
_Pol_. Take this from this[11]; if this be otherwise,
If Circumstances leade me, I will finde
Where truth is hid, though it were hid indeede
Within the Center.
_King_. How may we try it further?
[Footnote 1: --behaved like a piece of furniture.]
[Footnote 2: The love of talk makes a man use many idle words, foolish
expressions, and useless repetitions.]
[Footnote 3: Notwithstanding the parenthesis, I take 'Mistris' to be the
objective to 'bespeake'--that is, _address_.]
[Footnote 4: _Star_, mark of sort or quality; brand (45). The _1st Q_.
goes on--
An'd one that is vnequall for your loue:
But it may mean, as suggested by my _Reader_, 'outside thy destiny,'--as
ruled by the star of nativity--and I think it does.]
[Footnote 5: Here is a change from the impression conveyed in the first
act: he attributes his interference to his care for what befitted
royalty; whereas, talking to Ophelia (40, 72), he attributes it entirely
to his care for her;--so partly in the speech correspondent to the
present in _1st Q_.:--
Now since which time, seeing his loue thus cross'd,
Which I tooke to be idle, and but sport,
He straitway grew into a melancholy,]
[Footnote 6: See also passage in note from _1st Q_.]
[Footnote 7: She obeyed him. The 'fruits' of his advice were her
conformed actions.]
[Footnote 8: When the appetite goes, and the sleep follows, doubtless
the man is on the steep slope of madness. But as to Hamlet, and how
matters were with him, what Polonius says is worth nothing.]
[Footnote 9: '_wherein_ now he raves, and _wherefor_ all we wail.']
[Footnote 10: _To the queen_.]
[Footnote 11: head from shoulders.]
[Page 84]
_Pol_. You know sometimes
He walkes foure houres together, heere[1]
In the Lobby.
_Qu_. So he ha's indeed. [Sidenote: he dooes indeede]
[Sidenote: 118] _Pol_. At such a time Ile loose my Daughter to him,
Be you and I behinde an Arras then,
Marke the encounter: If he loue her not,
And be not from his reason falne thereon;
Let me be no Assistant for a State,
And keepe a Farme and Carters. [Sidenote: But keepe]
_King_. We will try it.
_Enter Hamlet reading on a Booke._[2]
_Qu_. But looke where sadly the poore wretch
Comes reading.[3]
_Pol_. Away I do beseech you, both away,
He boord[4] him presently. _Exit King & Queen_[5]
Oh giue me leaue.[6] How does my good Lord _Hamlet_?
_Ham_. Well, God-a-mercy.
_Pol_. Do you know me, my Lord?
[Sidenote: 180] _Ham_. Excellent, excellent well: y'are a
Fish-monger.[7] [Sidenote: Excellent well, you are]
_Pol_. Not I my Lord.
_Ham_. Then I would you were so honest a man.
_Pol_. Honest, my Lord?
_Ham_. I sir, to be honest as this world goes, is
to bee one man pick'd out of two thousand.
[Sidenote: tenne thousand[8]]
_Pol_. That's very true, my Lord.
_Ham_.[9] For if the Sun breed Magots in a dead
dogge, being a good kissing Carrion--[10] [Sidenote: carrion. Have]
Haue you a daughter?[11]
_Pol_. I haue my Lord.
[Footnote 1: _1st Q_.
The Princes walke is here in the galery,
There let _Ofelia_, walke vntill hee comes:
Your selfe and I will stand close in the study,]
[Footnote 2: _Not in Quarto_.]
[Footnote 3: _1st Q_.--
_King_. See where hee comes poring vppon a booke.]
[Footnote 4: The same as accost, both meaning originally _go to the side
of_.]
[Footnote 5: _A line back in the Quarto_.]
[Footnote 6: 'Please you to go away.' 89, 203. Here should come the
preceding stage-direction.]
[Footnote 7: Now first the Play shows us Hamlet in his affected madness.
He has a great dislike to the selfish, time-serving courtier, who, like
his mother, has forsaken the memory of his father--and a great distrust
of him as well. The two men are moral antipodes. Each is given to
moralizing--but compare their reflections: those of Polonius reveal a
lover of himself, those of Hamlet a lover of his kind; Polonius is
interested in success; Hamlet in humanity.]
[Footnote 8: So also in _1st Q_.]
[Footnote 9: --reading, or pretending to read, the words from the book
he carries.]
[Footnote 10: When the passion for emendation takes possession of a man,
his opportunities are endless--so many seeming emendations offer
themselves which are in themselves not bad, letters and words affording
as much play as the keys of a piano. 'Being a god kissing carrion,' is
in itself good enough; but Shakspere meant what stands in both Quarto
and Folio: _the dead dog being a carrion good at kissing_. The arbitrary
changes of the editors are amazing.]
[Footnote 11: He cannot help his mind constantly turning upon women; and
if his thoughts of them are often cruelly false, it is not Hamlet but
his mother who is to blame: her conduct has hurled him from the peak of
optimism into the bottomless pool of pessimistic doubt, above the foul
waters of which he keeps struggling to lift his head.]
[Page 86]
_Ham_. Let her not walke i'th'Sunne: Conception[1]
is a blessing, but not as your daughter may [Sidenote: but as your]
conceiue. Friend looke too't.
[Sidenote: 100] _Pol_.[2] How say you by that? Still harping on
my daughter: yet he knew me not at first; he said [Sidenote: a sayd I]
I was a Fishmonger: he is farre gone, farre gone:
[Sidenote: Fishmonger, a is farre gone, and truly]
and truly in my youth, I suffred much extreamity and truly
for loue: very neere this. Ile speake to him
againe.
What do you read my Lord?
_Ham_. Words, words, words.
_Pol_. What is the matter, my Lord?
_Ham_. Betweene who?[3]
_Pol_. I meane the matter you meane, my
[Sidenote: matter that you reade my]
Lord.
_Ham_. Slanders Sir: for the Satyricall slaue
[Sidenote: satericall rogue sayes]
saies here, that old men haue gray Beards; that
their faces are wrinkled; their eyes purging thicke
Amber, or Plum-Tree Gumme: and that they haue [Sidenote: Amber, and]
a plentifull locke of Wit, together with weake
[Sidenote: lacke | with most weake]
Hammes. All which Sir, though I most powerfully,
and potently beleeue; yet I holde it not
Honestie[4] to haue it thus set downe: For you
[Sidenote: for your selfe sir shall grow old as I am:]
your selfe Sir, should be old as I am, if like a Crab
you could go backward.
_Pol_.[5] Though this be madnesse,
Yet there is Method in't: will you walke
Out of the ayre[6] my Lord?
_Ham_. Into my Graue?
_Pol_. Indeed that is out o'th'Ayre:
[Sidenote: that's out of the ayre;]
How pregnant (sometimes) his Replies are?
A happinesse,
That often Madnesse hits on,
Which Reason and Sanitie could not [Sidenote: sanctity]
So prosperously be deliuer'd of.
[Footnote 1: One of the meanings of the word, and more in use then than
now, is _understanding_.]
[Footnote 2: (_aside_).]
[Footnote 3: --pretending to take him to mean by _matter_, the _point of
quarrel_.]
[Footnote 4: Propriety.]
[Footnote 5: (_aside_).]
[Footnote 6: the draught.]
[Page 88]
[A] I will leaue him,
And sodainely contriue the meanes of meeting
Betweene him,[1] and my daughter.
My Honourable Lord, I will most humbly
Take my leaue of you.
_Ham_. You cannot Sir take from[2] me any thing,
that I will more willingly part withall, except my
[Sidenote: will not more | my life, except my]
life, my life.[3]
[Sidenote: _Enter Guyldersterne, and Rosencrans_.]
_Polon_. Fare you well my Lord.
_Ham_. These tedious old fooles.
_Polon_. You goe to seeke my Lord _Hamlet_; [Sidenote: the Lord]
there hee is.
_Enter Rosincran and Guildensterne_.[4]
_Rosin_. God saue you Sir.
_Guild_. Mine honour'd Lord?
_Rosin_. My most deare Lord?
_Ham_. My excellent good friends? How do'st [Sidenote: My extent good]
thou _Guildensterne_? Oh, _Rosincrane_; good Lads:
[Sidenote: A Rosencraus]
How doe ye both? [Sidenote: you]
_Rosin_. As the indifferent Children of the earth.
_Guild_. Happy, in that we are not ouer-happy: [Sidenote: euer happy on]
on Fortunes Cap, we are not the very Button. [Sidenote: Fortunes lap,]
_Ham_. Nor the Soales of her Shoo?
_Rosin_. Neither my Lord.
_Ham_. Then you liue about her waste, or in the
middle of her fauour? [Sidenote: fauors.]
_Guil_. Faith, her priuates, we.
_Ham_. In the secret parts of Fortune? Oh,
most true: she is a Strumpet.[5] What's the newes?
[Sidenote: What newes?]
_Rosin_. None my Lord; but that the World's [Sidenote: but the]
growne honest.
_Ham_. Then is Doomesday neere: But your
[Footnote A: _In the Quarto, the speech ends thus_:--I will leaue him
and my daughter.[6] My Lord, I will take my leaue of you.]
[Footnote 1: From 'And sodainely' _to_ 'betweene him,' _not in Quarto_.]
[Footnote 2: It is well here to recall the modes of the word _leave_:
'_Give me leave_,' Polonius says with proper politeness to the king and
queen when he wants _them_ to go--that is, 'Grant me your _departure_';
but he would, going himself, _take_ his leave, his departure, _of_ or
_from_ them--by their permission to go. Hamlet means, 'You cannot take
from me anything I will more willingly part with than your leave, or, my
permission to you to go.' 85, 203. See the play on the two meanings of
the word in _Twelfth Night_, act ii. sc. 4:
_Duke_. Give me now leave to leave thee;
though I suspect it ought to be--
_Duke_. Give me now leave.
_Clown_. To leave thee!--Now, the melancholy &c.]
[Footnote 3: It is a relief to him to speak the truth under the cloak of
madness--ravingly. He has no one to whom to open his heart: what lies
there he feels too terrible for even the eye of Horatio. He has not
apparently told him as yet more than the tale of his father's murder.]
[Footnote 4: _Above, in Quarto_.]
[Footnote 5: In this and all like utterances of Hamlet, we see what worm
it is that lies gnawing at his heart.]
[Footnote 6: This is a slip in the _Quarto_--rectified in the _Folio_:
his daughter was not present.]
[Page 90]
newes is not true.[1] [2] Let me question more in particular:
what haue you my good friends, deserued
at the hands of Fortune, that she sends you to
Prison hither?
_Guil_. Prison, my Lord?
_Ham_. Denmark's a Prison.
_Rosin_. Then is the World one.
_Ham_. A goodly one, in which there are many
Confines, Wards, and Dungeons; _Denmarke_ being
one o'th'worst.
_Rosin_. We thinke not so my Lord.
_Ham_. Why then 'tis none to you; for there is
nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it
so[3]: to me it is a prison.
_Rosin_. Why then your Ambition makes it one:
'tis too narrow for your minde.[4]
_Ham_. O God, I could be bounded in a nutshell,
and count my selfe a King of infinite space; were
it not that I haue bad dreames.
_Guil_. Which dreames indeed are Ambition:
for the very substance[5] of the Ambitious, is meerely
the shadow of a Dreame.
_Ham_. A dreame it selfe is but a shadow.
_Rosin_. Truely, and I hold Ambition of so ayry
and light a quality, that it is but a shadowes shadow.
_Ham_. Then are our Beggers bodies; and our
Monarchs and out-stretcht Heroes the Beggers
Shadowes: shall wee to th'Court: for, by my fey[6]
I cannot reason?[7]
_Both_. Wee'l wait vpon you.
_Ham_. No such matter.[8] I will not sort you
with the rest of my seruants: for to speake to you
like an honest man: I am most dreadfully attended;[9]
but in the beaten way of friendship,[10] [Sidenote: But in]
What make you at _Elsonower_?
[Footnote 1: 'it is not true that the world is grown honest': he doubts
themselves. His eye is sharper because his heart is sorer since he left
Wittenberg. He proceeds to examine them.]
[Footnote 2: This passage, beginning with 'Let me question,' and ending
with 'dreadfully attended,' is not in the _Quarto_.
Who inserted in the Folio this and other passages? Was it or was it not
Shakspere? Beyond a doubt they are Shakspere's all. Then who omitted
those omitted? Was Shakspere incapable of refusing any of his own work?
Or would these editors, who profess to have all opportunity, and who,
belonging to the theatre, must have had the best of opportunities, have
desired or dared to omit what far more painstaking editors have since
presumed, though out of reverence, to restore?]
[Footnote 3: 'but it is thinking that makes it so:']
[Footnote 4: --feeling after the cause of Hamlet's strangeness, and
following the readiest suggestion, that of chagrin at missing the
succession.]
[Footnote 5: objects and aims.]
[Footnote 6: _foi_.]
[Footnote 7: Does he choose beggars as the representatives of substance
because they lack ambition--that being shadow? Or does he take them as
the shadows of humanity, that, following Rosincrance, he may get their
shadows, the shadows therefore of shadows, to parallel _monarchs_ and
_heroes_? But he is not satisfied with his own analogue--therefore will
to the court, where good logic is not wanted--where indeed he knows a
hellish lack of reason.]
[Footnote 8: 'On no account.']
[Footnote 9: 'I have very bad servants.' Perhaps he judges his servants
spies upon him. Or might he mean that he was _haunted with bad
thoughts_? Or again, is it a stroke of his pretence of
madness--suggesting imaginary followers?]
[Footnote: 10: 'to speak plainly, as old friends.']
[Page 92]
_Rosin_. To visit you my Lord, no other occasion.
_Ham_. Begger that I am, I am euen poore in [Sidenote: am ever poore]
thankes; but I thanke you: and sure deare friends
my thanks are too deare a halfepeny[1]; were you
[Sidenote: 72] not sent for? Is it your owne inclining? Is it a
free visitation?[2] Come, deale iustly with me:
come, come; nay speake. [Sidenote: come, come,]
_Guil_. What should we say my Lord?[3]
_Ham_. Why any thing. But to the purpose;
[Sidenote: Any thing but to'th purpose:]
you were sent for; and there is a kinde confession
[Sidenote: kind of confession]
in your lookes; which your modesties haue not
craft enough to color, I know the good King and
[Sidenote: 72] Queene haue sent for you.
_Rosin_. To what end my Lord?
_Ham_. That you must teach me: but let mee
coniure[4] you by the rights of our fellowship, by
the consonancy of our youth,[5] by the Obligation
of our euer-preserued loue, and by what more
deare, a better proposer could charge you withall; [Sidenote: can]
be euen and direct with me, whether you were sent
for or no.
_Rosin_. What say you?[6]
_Ham_. Nay then I haue an eye of you[7]: if you
loue me hold not off.[8]
[Sidenote: 72] _Guil_. My Lord, we were sent for.
_Ham_. I will tell you why; so shall my anticipation
preuent your discouery of your secricie to [Sidenote: discovery, and
your secrecie to the King and Queene moult no feather,[10]]
the King and Queene[9] moult no feather, I haue
[Sidenote: 116] of late, but wherefore I know not, lost all my
mirth, forgone all custome of exercise; and indeed,
[Sidenote: exercises;]
it goes so heauenly with my disposition; that this [Sidenote: heauily]
goodly frame the Earth, seemes to me a sterrill
Promontory; this most excellent Canopy the Ayre,
look you, this braue ore-hanging, this Maiesticall
[Sidenote: orehanging firmament,]
Roofe, fretted with golden fire: why, it appeares no
[Sidenote: appeareth]
[Footnote 1: --because they were by no means hearty thanks.]
[Footnote 2: He wants to know whether they are in his uncle's employment
and favour; whether they pay court to himself for his uncle's ends.]
[Footnote 3: He has no answer ready.]
[Footnote 4: He will not cast them from him without trying a direct
appeal to their old friendship for plain dealing. This must be
remembered in relation to his treatment of them afterwards. He affords
them every chance of acting truly--conjuring them to honesty--giving
them a push towards repentance.]
[Footnote 5: Either, 'the harmony of our young days,' or, 'the
sympathies of our present youth.']
[Footnote 6: --_to Guildenstern_.]
[Footnote 7: (_aside_) 'I will keep an eye upon you;'.]
[Footnote 8: 'do not hold back.']
[Footnote 9: The _Quarto_ seems here to have the right reading.]
[Footnote 10: 'your promise of secrecy remain intact;'.]
[Page 94]
other thing to mee, then a foule and pestilent congregation
[Sidenote: nothing to me but a]
of vapours. What a piece of worke is [Sidenote: what peece]
a man! how Noble in Reason? how infinite in
faculty? in forme and mouing how expresse and [Sidenote: faculties,]
admirable? in Action, how like an Angel? in apprehension,
how like a God? the beauty of the
world, the Parragon of Animals; and yet to me,
what is this Quintessence of Dust? Man delights
not me;[1] no, nor Woman neither; though by your
[Sidenote: not me, nor women]
smiling you seeme to say so.[2]
_Rosin._ My Lord, there was no such stuffe in
my thoughts.
_Ham._ Why did you laugh, when I said, Man
[Sidenote: yee laugh then, when]
delights not me?
_Rosin._ To thinke, my Lord, if you delight not
in Man, what Lenton entertainment the Players
shall receiue from you:[3] wee coated them[4] on the
way, and hither are they comming to offer you
Seruice.
_Ham._[5] He that playes the King shall be welcome;
his Maiesty shall haue Tribute of mee: [Sidenote: on me,]
the aduenturous Knight shal vse his Foyle and
Target: the Louer shall not sigh _gratis_, the
humorous man[6] shall end his part in peace: [7] the
Clowne shall make those laugh whose lungs are
tickled a'th' sere:[8] and the Lady shall say her
minde freely; or the blanke Verse shall halt for't[9]:
[Sidenote: black verse]
what Players are they?
_Rosin._ Euen those you Were wont to take
[Sidenote: take such delight]
delight in the Tragedians of the City.
_Ham._ How chances it they trauaile? their residence
both in reputation and profit was better both
wayes.
_Rosin._ I thinke their Inhibition comes by the
meanes of the late Innouation?[10]
[Footnote 1: A genuine description, so far as it goes, of the state of
Hamlet's mind. But he does not reveal the operating cause--his loss of
faith in women, which has taken the whole poetic element out of heaven,
earth, and humanity: he would have his uncle's spies attribute his
condition to mere melancholy.]
[Footnote 2: --said angrily, I think.]
[Footnote 3: --a ready-witted subterfuge.]
[Footnote 4: came alongside of them; got up with them; apparently rather
from Fr. _côté_ than _coter_; like _accost_. Compare 71. But I suspect
it only means _noted_, _observed_, and is from _coter_.]
[Footnote 5: --_with humorous imitation, perhaps, of each of the
characters_.]
[Footnote 6: --the man with a whim.]
[Footnote 7: This part of the speech--from [7] to [8], is not in the
_Quarto_.]
[Footnote 8: Halliwell gives a quotation in which the touch-hole of a
pistol is called the _sere_: the _sere_, then, of the lungs would mean
the opening of the lungs--the part with which we laugh: those 'whose
lungs are tickled a' th' sere,' are such as are ready to laugh on the
least provocation: _tickled_--_irritable, ticklish_--ready to laugh, as
another might be to cough. 'Tickled o' the sere' was a common phrase,
signifying, thus, _propense_.
_1st Q._ The clowne shall make them laugh
That are tickled in the lungs,]
[Footnote 9: Does this refer to the pause that expresses the
unutterable? or to the ruin of the measure of the verse by an
incompetent heroine?]
[Footnote 10: Does this mean, 'I think their prohibition comes through
the late innovation,'--of the children's acting; or, 'I think they are
prevented from staying at home by the late new measures,'--such, namely,
as came of the puritan opposition to stage-plays? This had grown so
strong, that, in 1600, the Privy Council issued an order restricting the
number of theatres in London to two: by such an _innovation_ a number of
players might well be driven to the country.]
[Page 96]
_Ham_. Doe they hold the same estimation they
did when I was in the City? Are they so follow'd?
_Rosin_. No indeed, they are not. [Sidenote: are they not.]
[1]_Ham_. How comes it? doe they grow rusty?
_Rosin_. Nay, their indeauour keepes in the
wonted pace; But there is Sir an ayrie of Children,[2]
little Yases,[3] that crye out[4] on the top of question;[5]
and are most tyrannically clap't for't: these are
now the fashion, and so be-ratled the common
Stages[6] (so they call them) that many wearing
Rapiers,[7] are affraide of Goose-quils, and dare
scarse come thither.[8]
_Ham_. What are they Children? Who maintains
'em? How are they escoted?[9] Will they pursue
the Quality[10] no longer then they can sing?[11] Will
they not say afterwards if they should grow themselues
to common Players (as it is like most[12] if
their meanes are no better) their Writers[13] do them
wrong, to make them exclaim against their owne
Succession.[14]
_Rosin_. Faith there ha's bene much to do on
both sides: and the Nation holds it no sinne, to
tarre them[15] to Controuersie. There was for a
while, no mony bid for argument, vnlesse the Poet
and the Player went to Cuffes in the Question.[16]
_Ham_. Is't possible?
_Guild_. Oh there ha's beene much throwing
about of Braines.
_Ham_. Do the Boyes carry it away?[17]
_Rosin_. I that they do my Lord, _Hercules_ and
his load too.[18]
_Ham_. It is not strange: for mine Vnckle is
[Sidenote: not very strange, | my]
King of Denmarke, and those that would make
mowes at him while my Father liued; giue twenty,
[Sidenote: make mouths]
[Footnote 1: The whole of the following passage, beginning with 'How
comes it,' and ending with 'Hercules and his load too,' belongs to the
_Folio_ alone--is not in the _Quarto_.
In the _1st Quarto_ we find the germ of the passage--unrepresented in
the _2nd_, developed in the _Folio_.
_Ham_. Players, what Players be they?
_Ross_. My Lord, the Tragedians of the Citty,
Those that you tooke delight to see so often.
_Ham_. How comes it that they trauell? Do
they grow restie?
_Gil_. No my Lord, their reputation holds as it was wont.
_Ham_. How then?
_Gil_. Yfaith my Lord, noueltie carries it away,
For the principall publike audience that
Came to them, are turned to priuate playes,[19]
And to the humour[20] of children.
_Ham_. I doe not greatly wonder of it,
For those that would make mops and moes
At my vncle, when my father liued, &c.]
[Footnote 2: _a nest of children_. The acting of the children of two or
three of the chief choirs had become the rage.]
[Footnote 3: _Eyases_--unfledged hawks.]
[Footnote 4: Children _cry out_ rather than _speak_ on the stage.]
[Footnote 5: 'cry out beyond dispute'--_unquestionably_; 'cry out and no
mistake.' 'He does not top his part.' _The Rehearsal_, iii. 1.--'_He is
not up to it_.' But perhaps here is intended _above reason_: 'they cry
out excessively, excruciatingly.' 103.