Few passages have been more discussed than this wild challenge of Hamlet
to Laertes at the grave of Ophelia:
"Ham. I lov'd Ophelia! forty thousand brothers
Could not, with all their quantity of love,
Make up my sum. What wilt thou do for her?
--Zounds! show me what thou'lt do?
Woo't weep? Woo't fight? Woo't fast? Woo't tear
thyself?
_Woo't drink up Eisell?_ eat a crocodile?
I'll do't".
The sum of what has been said may be given in the words of Archdeacon
Nares:
"There is no doubt that eisell meant vinegar, nor even that
Shakspeare has used it in that sense; but in this passage it
seems that it must be put for the name of a Danish river.... The
question was much disputed between Messrs. Steevens and Malone:
the former being for the river, the latter for the vinegar; and
he endeavored even to get over the drink up, which stood much in
his way. But after all, the challenge to drink vinegar, in such
a rant, is so inconsistent, and even ridiculous, that we must
decide for the river, whether its name be exactly found or not.
To drink up a river, and eat a crocodile with his impenetrable
scales, are two things equally impossible. There is no kind of
comparison between the others."
I must confess that I was formerly led to adopt this view of the
passage, but on more mature investigation I find that it is wrong. I see
no necessary connection between eating a crocodile and drinking up
eysell; and to drink up was commonly used for simply to drink. Eisell or
Eysell certainly signified vinegar, but it was certainly not used in
that sense by Shakspeare, who may in this instance be his own expositor;
the word occurring again in his CXIth sonnet.
"Whilst, like a willing patient, I will drink
Potions of eysell, 'gainst my strong infection;
No bitterness that I will bitter think,
Nor double penance, to correct correction."
Here we see that it was a bitter potion which it was a penance to drink.
Thus also in the Troy Book of Lydgate:
"Of bitter eysell, and of eager wine."
Now numerous passages in our old dramatic writers show that it was a
fashion with the gallants of the time to do some extravagant feat, as a
proof of their love, in honour of their mistresses; and among others the
swallowing some nauseous potion was one of the most frequent; but
vinegar would hardly have been considered in this light; wormwood might.
In Thomas's Italian Dictionary, 1562, we have "Assentio, Eysell" and
Florio renders that word by vinegar. What is meant, however, is
Absinthites or Wormwood wine, a nauseously bitter medicament then much
in use; and this being evidently {242} the _bitter potion of Eysell_ in
the poet's sonnet, was certainly the nauseous draught proposed to be
taken by Hamlet among the other extravagant feats as tokens of love. The
following extracts will show that in the poet's age this nauseous bitter
potion was in frequent use medicinally.
"ABSINTHIUM, [Greek: apsinthion, aspinthion], Comicis, ab
insigni amarore quo bibeates illud aversantur."-_Junius,
Nomenclator ap. Nicot_.
"ABSINTHITES, _wormwood wine_.--_Hutton's Dict_.
"Hujus modi autem propomatum _hodie_ apud Christianos quoque
_maximus est et frequentissimus usus_, quibus potatores maximi
ceu proemiis quibusdam atque prÊludiis utuntur, ad dirum illud
suum propinandi certamen. _Ae maxime quidem commune est proponia
absynthites_, quod vim habet stomachum corroborandi et
extenuandi, expellendique excrementa quÊ in eo continentur. Hoc
fere propomate potatores hodie maxime ab initio coenÊ utuntur
ceu pharmaco cum hesternÊ, atque prÊteritÊ, tum futurÊ
ebrietatis, atque crapulÊ.... _amarissimÊ sunt potiones
medicatÊ_, quibus tandem stomachi cruditates immoderato cibo
potuque collectas expurgundi cause uti coguntur."--Stuckius,
_AntiquitatÊ Corviralium. Tiguri_, 1582, fol. 327.
Of the two latest editors, Mr. Knight decides for the _river_, and Mr.
Collier does not decide at all. Our northern neighbours think us almost
as much deficient in philological illustration as in enlarged
philosophical criticism on the poet, in which they claim to have shown
us the way.