those lips, that. I have kissed I know not how oft. Where be your gives now? your gambols? your songs? your flashes of merriment, that were wont to set the table on a roar? Not one now, to mock your own grinning? quite chapfallen? Now get you to my lady's chamber, and tell her, let her paint an inch thick, to this favour she must come; make her laugh at that. Pr'ythee, Horatio, tell me one thing. Hor. What's that, my lord?

Ham. Dost thou think, Alexander look'd o' this fashion i' the earth?

Hor. E'en so.

Ham. And smelt so? pali!

Hor. E'en so, my lord.

[Throws down the Skull.

Ham. To what base uses we may return, Horatio! Why may not imagination trace the noble dust of Alexander, till he find it stopping a bunghole?

Hor. "Twere to consider too curiously, to consider so.

Ham. No, faith, not a jot; but to follow him thither with modesty enough, and likelihood to lead it: As thus; Alexander died, Alexander was buried, Alexander returneth to dust; the dust is earth; of earth we make loam: And why of that loam, whereto he was converted, might they not stop a beer barrel?

Imperious Cæsar, dead, and turn'd to clay, Might stop a hole to keep the wind away: O, that the earth, which kept the world in awe, Should patch a wall to expel the winter's flaw! But soft! but soft! aside:-Here comes the king, Enter Priests, &c. in Procession; the Corpse of Ophelia, LAERTES, and Mourners, following; King, Queen, their Trains, &c.

The queen, the courtiers! Who is this they follow?

And with such maimed rites! This doth betoken, The corse, they follow, did with desperatehand Fordo its own life. 'Twas of some estate. Couch we awhile, and mark.

[Retiring with HORATIO. Laer. What ceremony else?

Ham.

A very noble youth: Mark.
Laer. What ceremony else?

That is Laertes;

1 Priest. Her obsequies have been as far enlarg'd

As we have warranty: her death was doubtful; And, but that great command o'ersways the order,

She should in ground unsanctified have lodg'd Till the last trumpet; for charitable prayers, Shards, flints, and pebbles, should be thrown on her,

Yet here she is allow'd her virgin crants,

Her maiden strewments, and the bringing home Of bell, and burial.

Laer. Must there no more be done?

1 Priest.

No more be done! We should profane the service of the dead, To sing a requiem, and such rest to her As to peace-parted souls.

Laer.
Lay her i' the earth;-
Aud from her fair and unpolluted flesh,
May violets spring!-I tell thee, churlish priest,
A minist'ring angel shall my sister be,
When thou liest howling.

Ham.
What, the fair Ophelia !
Queen. Sweets to the sweet: Farewell!

[Scattering Flowers. I hop'd, thou should'st have been my Hamlet's

wife;

I thought, thy bride-bed to have deck'd, sweet And not have strew'd thy grave.

[maid, Laer. O treble woe Fall ten times treble on that cursed head, Whose wicked deed thy most ingenious sense Depriv'd thee of!-Hold off the earth awhile, Till I have caught her once more in mine arms. [Leaps into the Grave. Now pile your dust upon the quick and dead; Till of this flat a mountain you have made To o'ertop old Pelion, or the skyish head Of blue Olympus.

Ham. [Advancing.] What is he, whose grief Bears such an emphasis? whose phrase of sorrow Conjures the wand'ring stars, and makes them

stand

Like wonder-wounded hearers? this is I,
Hamlet the Dane.
Laer.

[Leaps into the Grave.

The devil take thy soul!

[Grappling with him.

Ham. Thou pray'st not well.

I pr'ythee, take thy fingers from my throat;
For, though I am not splenetive and rash,
Yet have I in me something dangerous,
Which let thy wisdom fear: Hold off thy hand.
King. Pluck them asunder.

Queen.

All. Gentlemen,

Hor.

Hamlet, Hamlet!

Good my lord, be quiet.

[The Attendants part them, and they come out of the Grave.

Ham. Why, I will fight with him upon this Until my eyelids will no longer wag. [theme, Queen. O my son! what theme?

Ham. Ilov'd Ophelia; forty thousand brothers Could not, with all their quantity of love, Make up my sum.-What wilt thou do for her? King. O, he is mad, Laertes.

Queen. For love of God, forbear him.
Ham. Zounds, show me what thou'lt do:
Woo't weep? woo't fight? woo't fast? woo't
tear thyself?

Woo't drink up Esile, eat a crocodile ?
I'll do't.-Dost thou come here to whine?
To outface me with leaping in her grave?
Be buried quick with her, and so will I:
And, if thou prate of mountains, let them throw
Millions of acres on us; till our ground,
Singeing his pate against the burning zone,
Make Ossa like a wart! Nay, an thou'lt mouth,
I'll rant as well as thou.

Queen.
This is mere madness:
And thus a while the fit will work on him;
Anon, as patient as the female dove,

When that her golden couplets are disclosed, His silence will sit drooping.

Ham. Hear you, sir; What is the reason that you use me thus? I lov'd you ever: But it is no matter; Let Hercules himself do what he may, The cat will mew, the dog will have his day.

VOL. VIII.

U

[Exit.

King. I pray thee, good Horatio, wait upon

him.[Exit HORATIO. Strengthen your patience in our last night's speech; [To LAERTES. We'll put the matter to the present push.Good Gertrude, set some watch over yourson.This grave shall have a living monument: An hour of quiet shortly shall we see;

Till then, in patience our proceeding be.

[Exeunt.

SCENE II. A Hall in the Castle.

Enter HAMLET and HORATIO.

Ham. So much for this, sir; now shall you
see the other;

You do remember all the circumstance?
Hor. Remember it, my lord!

Ham. Sir, in my heart there was a kind of
fighting,

That would not let me sleep: methought, I lay
Worse than the mutines in the bilboes. Rashly,
Aud prais'd be rashness for't,-Let us know,
Our indiscretion sometimes serves us well,
When our deep plots do pall: and that should
teach us,

There's a divinity that shapes our ends,
Rough-hew them how we will.

Hor.

That is most certain.

Ham. Up from my cabin,
My sea-gown scarf'd about me, in the dark
Grop'd I to find out them: had my desire;
Finger'd their packet: and, in fine, withdrew
To mine own room again: making so bold,
My fears forgetting manners, to unseal
Their grand commission; where I found, Ho-
ratio,

A royal knavery; an exact command,-
Larded with many several sorts of reasons,-
Importing Denmark's health, and England's

too,

With, ho! such bugs and goblins in my life,-
That on the supervise, no leisure bated,
No, not to stay the grinding of the axe,
My head should be struck off.

Hor.

Is't possible?

Ham. Here's the commission; read it at more leisure.

But wilt thou hear now how I did proceed?
Hor. Ay, 'beseech you.
[lanies,
Ham. Being thus benetted round with vil
Or I could make a prologue to my brains,
They had begun the play;—I sat me down;
Devis'd a new commission; wrote it fair :
I once did hold it, as our statists do,

A baseness to write fair, and labour'd much
How to forget that learning; but, sir, now
It did me yeoman's service: Wilt thou know
The effect of what I wrote?

Hor.

Ay, good my lord. Ham. An earnest conjuration from the king,As England was his faithful tributary;

As love between them like the palm might flourish ;

As peace should still her wheaten garland wear,
And stand a comma 'tween their amities;
And many such like ases of great charge,-
That, on the view and knowing of these contents,
Without debatement further, more, or less,
He should the bearers put to sudden death,
Not shriving-time allow'd.

Hor.

How was this seal'd? Ham. Why, even in that was heaven ordinant; I had my father's signet in my purse,

Which was the model of that Danish seal: Folded the writ up in form of the other; Subscrib'd it; gave't the impression; plac'd it safely,

The changeling never known: Now, the next day Was our sea-fight; and what to this was sequent Thou know'st already.

Hor. So Guildenstern and Rosencrantz go to't. Ham. Why, man, they did make love to this employment;

They are not near my conscience; their defeat Does by their own insinuation grow:

'Tis dangerous, when the baser nature comes Between the pass and fell incensed points Of mighty opposites.

Hor.

Why, what a king is this! Ham. Does it not, think thee, stand me now upon?