In which he'll catch the conscience of the king. 2 First quarto-trupically. It is evident that a pun was intended.

Ham. Sir, a whole history.

Guil. The king, sir,

Ham. Ay, sir, what of him?

Guil. Is, in his retirement, marvellous distem pered.

Ham. With drink, sir?

Guil. No, my lord, with choler.

Ham. Your wisdom should show itself more richer, to signify this to the doctor; for, for me to put him to his purgation, would, perhaps, plunge him into more choler.

Guil. Good, my lord, put your discourse into some frame, and start not so wildly from my my affair. Ham. I am tame, sir:- pronounce. Guil. The queen, your mother, in most great affliction of spirit, hath sent me to you.

Ham. You are welcome.

Guil. Nay, good my lord, this courtesy is not of the right breed. If it shall please you to make me

ing that the Provincial toses took their name from Provins, in Lower Brie, and not from Provence. Razed shoes are most probably embroidered shoes. The quarto reads, rac'd. To race, or rase, was to stripe.

3 'Gonzago is the duke's name, his wife, Baptista;' 10 A cry of players. It was usual to call a pack of all the old copies read thus. Yet in the dumb show we hounds a cry; from the French meute de chiens: it is have, Enter a King and Queen ;' and at the end of here humorously applied to a troop or company of this speech, Lucianus, nephew to the King. This players. It is used again in Coriolanus: Menenius seeming inconsistency, however, may be reconciled. says to the citizens, you have made good work, you Though the interlude is the image of the murder of the and your ery. In the very curious catalogue of The duke of Vienna, or in other words, founded upon that Companyes of Bestys, given in The Boke of St. Albans, story, the poet might make the principal person in his many equally singular terms may be found, which seem fable a king. Baptista is never used singly by the Ita-to have exercised the wit and ingenuity of our ancestors; lians, being uniformly compounded with Giam and as a thrave of throshers, a scull or shoal of monks, &c. Giovanni. It is needless to remark that it is always 11 The players were paid not by salaries, but by shares the name of a man. or portions of the profit, according to merit. See Malone's Account of the Ancient Theatres, passim.

4 The use to which Shakspeare put the chorus may be seen in King Henry V. Every motion or puppetshow was accompanied by an interpreter or showman. Thur in The Two Gentlemen of Verona :

O excellent motion: O exceeding puppet! Now will he interpret for her.'

5 The first quarto-' So you must take your husband.' Hamlet puns upon the word mistake: 'So you mis-take or take your husbands amiss for better and worse.' The word was often thus misused for any thing done wrong. fully, and even for privy stealing. In one of Bastard's Epigrams, 1598, cited by Steevens

none that seeth her face and making, Will judge her stol'n but by mistaking. 6 Midnight weeds.' Thus in Macbeth:'Root of hemlock, digg'd i' the dark. 7 See note on As You Like It, Act ii. Sc. 1. 8 To turn Turk, was a familiar phrase for any lent change in condition or character.

12 A very, very-peacock,' The old copies read paiock, and paioche. The peacock was as proverbially used for a proud fool as the lapwing for a silly one. 'Pavoneggiare, to court it, to brave it, to peacockise it, to wantonise it, to get up and down fondly, gazing upon himself as a peacock does.'-Florio, Ital. Dist. 1598. Theobald proposed to read paddock; and in the last scene, Hamlet bestows this opprobrious name upon the king. Mr. Blakeway has suggested that we might read puttock, which means a base degenerate hawk, a kite, which Shakspeare does indeed contrast with the eagle in Cymbeline, Act i. Sc. 2:

"I chose an eagle, and did avoid a puttock. 13The recorders.' See note on on a Midsummer Night's Dream, Act i. Sc. 1. It is difficult to settle exactly the form of this instrument: old writers in gencral vio-make no distinction between a flute, a pipe, and a recorder; but Hawkins has shown clearly, from a pas sage in Lord Bacon's Natural History, that the flute and the recorder were distinct instruments.

9 Provincial roses, on my razed shoes.' Povincial was erroneously changed to Provençal, at th suggesion of Warton. Mr Douce rectified the error by show

14 Perdy is a corruption of the French par Dieu

a wholesome answer, I will do your mother's com-
mandment: if not, your pardon, and my return shall
be the end of my business.
Ham. Sir, I cannot.
Guil. What, my lord?

Ham. Make you a wholesome answer; my wit's
diseased: But, sir, such answer as
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,-

Ros. Then thus she says: Your behaviour hath #truck her into amazement and admiration.

Ham. O, wonderful son, that can so astonish a mother!-But is there no sequel at the heels of this mother's admiration? impart.

Ros. She desires to speak with you in her closet, ere you go to bed.

Ham. We shall obey, were she ten times our mother. Have you any further trade with us? Ros, My lord, you once did love me.

Ham. And do still, by these pickers and stealers. Ros. Good, my lord, what is your cause of distemper? you do, surely, but bar the door upon your own liberty, if you deny your griefs to your friend.

Ham. Sir, I lack advancement.

Ros. How can that be, when you have the voice of the king himself for your succession in Denmark?

Ham. Ay, sir, but While the grass grows,-the proverb is something musty.

Enter the 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?
Guil. O, my lord, if my duty be too bold, my
.ove is too unmannerly.3

Ham. I do not well understand that. Will

Will you

Guil. I know no touch of it, my lord. Ham. 'Tis as easy as lying: govern these ventages with your fingers and thumb, give it breath with your routh, and it will discourse most eloquent music. Look you, these are the stops.

Pol. Very like a whale.

Ham. Then will I come to my mother by and by.-They fool me to the top of my bent.—I will come by and by.

Pol. I will say so. [Exit POLONIus. Ham. By and by is easily said.-Leave me, friends. [Exeunt Ros. GUIL. HOR, &c. 'Tis now the very witching time of night; When churchyards yawn, and hell itself breathes out Contagion to this world: Now could I drink hot And do such bitter business as the days Would quake to look on. Soft; now to my mother,O, heart, lose not thy nature; let not ever The soul of Nero enter this firm bosom ; Let me be cruel, not unnatural :

blood,

I will speak daggers to her, but use none;
My tongue and soul in this be hypocrites:
How in my words soever she be shent,
To give them seals, never, my soul, consent! [Exu
SCENE III. A Room in the same. Enter King,

I

ROSENCRANTZ, and GUILDENSTERN.
King. I like him not: nor stands it safe with us,
To let his madness range. Therefore, prepare you;
your commission will forthwith despatch,
The terms of our estate may not endure
And he to England shall along with you:
Hazard so near us, as doth hourly grow
Out of his lunacies.
Guil.
We will ourselves provide
Most holy and religious fear it is,
To keep those many many bodies safe,
That live, and feed, upon your majesty.

Ros. The single and peculiar life is bound,
With all the strength and armour of the mind,
To keep itself from 'noyance; but much more
That spirit, upon whose weal9 depend and rest
The lives of many. The cease of majesty

Guil. But these cannot I command to any utter-Dies not alone: but, like a gulf, doth draw ance of harmony; I have not the skill.

Ham. 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, you cannot play

upon me.

1 To withdraw with you.' Malone added here a stage direction [Taking Guild. aside.] Steevens thinks it an answer to a motion Guildenstern had used, for Hamlet to withdraw with him. I think that it means no more than 'to draw back with you,' to leave that scent or trail. It is a hunting term, like that which follows. 2 To recover the wind of me.' This is a term which has been left unexplained. It is borrowed from hunting, as the context shows; and means, to take advantage of the animal pursued, by getting to the windward of it, that it may not scent its pursuers. • Observe how the wind is, that you may set the net so as the hare and wind may come together; if the wind be sideways it may do well enough, but never if it blow over the net into the hare's face, for he will scent both it and you at a distance.'— Gentleman's Recreation.

3. Hamlet may say with propriety, 'I do not well understand that. Perhaps Guildenstern means, 'If my duty to the king makes me too bold, my love to you makes me importunate even to rudeness.'

4 The ventages are the holes of the pipe. The stops means the mode of stopping those ventages to produce]

What's near it, with it: it is a massy wheel,
Fix'd on the summit of the highest mount,
To whose huge spokes ten thousand lesser things
Are mortis'd and adjoin'd; which, when it falls,
Each small annexment, petty consequence,
Attends the boist'rous ruin. Never alone
Did the king sigh, but with a general groan.
King. Arm you, I pray you, to this speedy
voyage;

For we will fetters put upon1o this fear,
Which now goes too free-footed.

Ros. Guil. We will haste us.

notes.

Thus

in

[Exeunt ROSENCRANTZ and Gurz.

Malone has made it the 'sounds produced
King Henry V. Prologue :—

'Rumour is a pipe

And of so easy and so plain a stop'

5 See note on Act ii. Sc. 2.

6 The quarto reads:

'And do such business as the bitter day,' &c. 7 They are pestilent fellows, they speak nothing but bodkins.'-Return from Parnassus. In the Aulu laria of Plautus a phrase not less singular occurs: 'Me' Quia mitri miseri cerebrum excutiunt, Tua dicta soror: lapides loqueris.' Act ii. Sc. 1.

8 To shend is to injure, whether by reproof, blows, or otherwise. Shakspeare generally uses shent for reproved, threatened with angry words. To give his words seals' is therefore to carry his punishment beyond reproof. The allusion is to the sealing a deed to render it effective. The quarto of 1603 :

"I will speak daggers; those sharp words being spent,
To do her wrong my soul shall ne'er consent.'
9 Folio reads ' spirits.'
10 Quarto-' about '

Enter POLONIUS.

Pol. My lord, he's going to his mother's closet.
Behind the arras' I'll convey myself,
To hear the process; I'll warrant, she'll tax him
home;

And, as you said, and wisely was it said,
'Tis meet, that some more audience, than a mother,
Since nature makes them partial,2 should o'erhear
The speech, of vantage.3 Fare you well, my liege;
I'll call upon you ere you go to bed,
And tell you what I know.

King.

Thanks, dear my lord.
[Exit POLONIUS.
O, my offence is rank, it smells to heaven;
It hath the primal eldest curse upon't,
A brother's murder !-Pray can I not,
Though inclination be as sharp as will ;4
My stronger guilt defeats my strong intent;
And, like a man to double business bound,
I stand in pause where I shall first begin,
And both neglect.. What if this cursed hand
Were thicker than itself with brother's blood?
Is there not rain enough in the sweet heavens,
To wash it white as snow? Whereto serves mercy,
But to confront the visage of offence?
And what's in prayer, but this two-fold force,--
To be forestalled, ere we come to fall,

Or pardon'd, being down? Then I'll look up;

My fault is past. But, O, what form of prayer

Much heat and him. I'll silence me e’en here.

Can serve my turn? Forgive me my foul murder!-'Pray you, be round with him.'1

That cannot be ; since I am still possess'd
Of those effects for which I did the murder,
My crown, mine own ambition, and my queen.
May one be pardon'd and retain the offence?
In the corruptea currents of this world,
Offence's gilded hand may shove by justice;
And oft 'tis seen, the wicked prize itself
Buys out the law: But 'tis not so above:
There is no shuffling, there the action lies
In his true nature: and we ourselves compell'd,
Even to the teeth and forehead of our faults,
To give in evidence. What then? what rests?
Try what repentance can: What can it not?
Yet what can it, when one cannot repent?
Ɔ, wretched state! O, bosom, black as death!
O, limed soul; that, struggling to be free,
Art more engag'd! Help, angels, make assay!
Bow, stubborn knees! and, heart, with strings of
steel,

Be soft as sinews of the new-born babe;
All may be well!

To heaven.

Why, this is hire and salary," not revenge.
He took my father grossly full of bread ;
With all his crimes broad blown, as flush as May
And, how his audit stands, who knows, save heaven?

1 See King Henry IV. Part I. Act ii. Sc. 4.
2 C
Matres omnes filiis

In peccato adjutrices, auxilii in paterna injuria
Solent esse'-
Mer. Heaut. Act v. Sc. 2.
3 Warburton explains of vantage, by some op-
portunity of secret observation.' I incline to think that
of vantage,' in Shakspeare's language, is for advan-
tage, commodi causa.

4 i. e. though I was not only willing, but strongly inclined to pray, my guilt prevented me.'

5 i. e. caught as with birdlime.

6 'That would be scann'd' that requires consideration, or ought to be estimated.

7. The quarto reads, base and silly.

8 Shakspeare has used the verb to hent, to take, to lay hold on, elsewhere; but the word is here used as a substantive, for hold or opportunity.

Queen.

I'll warrant you,

Fear me not :—withdraw, I hear him coming.
[POLONIUS hides himself

Enter HAMLET.

Ham. Now, mother; what's the matter?
Queen. Hamlet, thou hast thy father much of-

fended.

Ham. Mother, you have my father much offended.
Queen. Come, come, you answer with an idle

tongue.

Ham. Go, go, you question with a wicked tongue.
Queen. Why, how now, Hamlet?
Ham.
What's the matter now?

Queen. Have you forgot me?

Ham.

No, by the rood, not so: You are the queen, your husband's brother's wife; And,-'would it were not so!—you are my mother. Queen. Nay, then I'll set those to you that can

speak.

Ham. Come, come, and sit you down; you shall
not budge;

Where you may see the inmost part of you.
You go not, till I set you up a glass
Queen. What wilt thou do? thou wilt not mur-
der me?

Help, help, ho!

Pol. [Behind.] What, ho! help!

Ham.

Dead, for a ducat, dead.

How now! a rat? ¡Draws

[HAMLET makes a pass through the Arras. Pol. [Behind.] O, I am slain.

[Falls, and dies.

horrifying to the ears of our ancestors. In times of less civilization, revenge was held almost a sacred duty · and the purpose of the appearance of the ghost in this play is chiefly to excite Hamlet to it. The more feli and terrible the retributive act, the more meritorious it seems to have been held. The King himself in a future scene, when stimulating Laertes to kill Hamlet, says, 'Revenge should have no bounds.' Mason has ob served that, horrid as this resolution of Hamlet's is, yet some moral may be extracted from it, as all his subsequent misfortunes were owing to this savage refinement of revenge.'

9 Johnson has justly exclaimed against the horrible nature of this desperate revenge; but the quotations of The circumstance of Polonius hiding himself behind the :he commentators from other plays contemporary witharras and the manner of his death are found in the old and succeeding this, show tha' it could »“ have been so | black letter prose Hystory of Hamblett.

Is apoplex'd: for madness would not err;
Nor sense to ecstasy was ne'er so thrall'd,
But it reserv'd some quantity of choice,

To serve in such a difference.] What devil was

Queen. What have I done, that thou dar'st wag That thus hath cozen'd you at hoodman blind?

None wed the second but who kill'd the first.and now manifests the surprise of conscious innocence upon the subject. It should also be observed that Hamlet never directly accuses her of any guilty participation in that crime. I am happy to find my opinion, so expressed in December, 1823, confirmed by the newly dis-Warburton, misunderstanding the passage, proposed to covered quarto copy of 1603; in which the Queen in a future speech is made to say