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HAMLET,

PRINCE OF DENMARK

ACT I.

SCENE I. Elsinore. A platform before the
castle.

FRANCISCO at his post. Enter to him BERNARDO. Ber. Who's there?

Fran. Nay, answer me: stand, and unfold yourself.

Ber. Long live the king!

Fran. Bernardo ?

Ber. He.

Fran. You come most carefully upon your hour.
Ber. 'Tis now struck twelve; get thee to bed,
Francisco.

Fran. For this relief much thanks: 'tis bitter

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The rivals of my watch, bid them make haste. Fran. I think I hear them. Stand, ho! Who's there ?

Enter HORATIO and MARCELLUS.

Hor. Friends to this ground.
Mar.

And liegemen to the Dane.

Fran. Give you good night.
Mar.

Who hath relieved you?

Fran.

Give you good night.

Mar.

Ber.

What, is Horatio there?

Hor.

O, farewell, honest soldier :

Bernardo has my place.
[Exit.

Holla! Bernardo !

Say,

A piece of him.

Ber. Welcome, Horatio: welcome, good Mar

cellus.

Mar. What, has this thing appeared again tonight?

Ber. I have seen nothing.

Mar. Horatio says 'tis but our fantasy,

And will not let belief take hold of him

Touching this dreaded sight, twice seen of us :
Therefore I have entreated him along

With us to watch the minutes of this night;
That if again this apparition come,

He may approve our eyes and speak to it.
Hor. Tush, tush, 'twill not appear.
Ber.

20

Sit down awhile; 30

And let us once again assail your ears,
That are so fortified against our story
What we have two nights seen.

Hor.

Well, sit we down,

13. rivals, partners.

29. approve, confirm the evidence of.

40

And let us hear Bernardo speak of this.

Ber. Last night of all,

When yond same star that's westward from the
pole

Had made his course to illume that part of heaven
Where now it burns, Marcellus and myself,
The bell then beating one,-

Enter Ghost.

Mar. Peace, break thee off; look, where it comes again!

Ber. In the same figure, like the king that's dead.

Mar. Thou art a scholar; speak to it, Horatio.
Ber. Looks it not like the king? mark it,
Horatio.

Hor. Most like it harrows me with fear and
wonder.

Ber. It would be spoke to.

Mar.

Question it, Horatio.

Hor. What art thou that usurp'st this time of

night,

Together with that fair and warlike form

In which the majesty of buried Denmark

Did sometimes march? by heaven I charge thee, speak!

Mar. It is offended.

Ber.

See, it stalks away!

[Exit Ghost.

Hor. Stay! speak, speak! I charge thee, speak!

Mar. 'Tis gone, and will not answer.

Ber. How now, Horatio! you tremble and look pale:

Is not this something more than fantasy?

42. a scholar, i.e. one.

50

What think you on't?

Hor. Before my God, I might not this believe Without the sensible and true avouch

Of mine own eyes.

Mar.

Is it not like the king?

Hor. As thou art to thyself:

Such was the very armour he had on

When he the ambitious Norway combated;
So frown'd he once, when, in an angry parle,
He smote the sledded pole-axe on the ice.

'Tis strange.

Mar. Thus twice before, and jump at this dead
hour,

With martial stalk hath he gone by our watch.
Hor. In what particular thought to work I
know not;

But in the gross and scope of my opinion,
This bodes some strange eruption to our state.
Mar. Good now, sit down, and tell me, he that
knows,

Why this same strict and most observant watch
So nightly toils the subject of the land,
And why such daily cast of brazen cannon,

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60

70

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And foreign mart for implements of war;
Why such impress of shipwrights, whose sore task
Does not divide the Sunday from the week;
What might be toward, that this sweaty haste
Doth make the night joint-labourer with the day:
Who is 't that can inform me?

Hor.

That can I;
Our last king,

At least the whisper goes so.
Whose image even but now appear'd to us,
Was, as you know, by Fortinbras of Norway,
Thereto prick'd on by a most emulate pride,
Dared to the combat; in which our valiant Hamlet—
For so this side of our known world esteem'd

him

Did slay this Fortinbras; who, by a seal'd compact,
Well ratified by law and heraldry,

Did forfeit, with his life, all those his lands
Which he stood seized of, to the conqueror :
Against the which, a moiety competent
Was gaged by our king; which had return'd
To the inheritance of Fortinbras,

Had he been vanquisher; as, by the same covenant
And carriage of the article design'd,

His fell to Hamlet. Now, sir, young Fortinbras,

Of unimproved mettle hot and full,

Hath in the skirts of Norway here and there
Shark'd up a list of lawless resolutes,

For food and diet, to some enterprise

That hath a stomach in 't; which is no other

74. mart, traffic.

87. by law and heraldry, by the code of chivalry as well as of civil law.

89. seized of, possessed of. 90. a moiety competent, an equivalent slice of territory. 91. gaged, pledged.

80

90

100

94. carriage of the article design'd, tenor of the agreement drawn up.

96. unimproved, not turned to account. Q1 has 'inapproved,' untried.

100. That hath a stomach in't, that promises adventure.

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