HAM. The king doth wake to-night, and takes his rouse,
Keeps wassels, and the swaggering up-spring reels;
And, as he drains his draughts of Rhenish down,
The kettle-drum and trumpet thus bray out

And to my mind, though I am native here,

And to the manner born, it is a custom

More honour'd in the breach than the observance.

[This heavy-headed revel, east and west,

Makes us traduc'd, and tax'd of other nations:
They clepe us drunkards, and with swinish phrase
Soil our addition; and, indeed, it takes

From our achievements, though perform'd at height,
The pith and marrow of our attribute.
So, oft it chances in particular men,

That for some vicious mole of nature in them,
As, in their birth, (wherein they are not guilty,
Since nature cannot choose his origin,)
By their o'ergrowth of some complexion,
Oft breaking down the pales and forts of reason;
Or by some habit, that too much o'er-leavens
The form of plausive manners; that these men,
Carrying, I say, the stamp of one defect;
Being nature's livery, or fortune's star,
Their virtues else (be they as pure as grace,
As infinite as man may undergo,)
Shall in the general censure take corruption
From that particular fault: The dram of ill
Doth all the noble substance often dout,

HAM. Angels and ministers of grace defend us!

Be thou a spirit of health, or goblin damn'd,

Bring with thee airs from heaven, or blasts from hell,

• The twenty-two lines in brackets are not in the folio, but are found in quarto (B). In the quarto (B), this difficult passage is found thus:

"The dram of eale

Doth all the noble substance of a doubt
To his own scandal."

In another quarto we have, "The dram of ease." The original text is certainly corrupt; and, amongst many conjectural emendations, the lines as we print them seem to give the clearest meaning. To dout is to put out, to extinguish. Perhaps we might read, "The dram of bale."

Be thy intents wicked, or charitable,

Thou com'st in such a questionable shape,

That I will speak to thee; I'll call thee, Hamlet,

King, father, royal Dane: O, answer me.

Let me not burst in ignorance! but tell,

Why thy canoniz'd bones, hearsed in death,
Have burst their cerements! why the sepulchre,
Wherein we saw thee quietly in-urn'd,
Hath op'd his ponderous and marble jaws,
To cast thee up again! What may this mean,
That thou, dead corse, again, in complete steel,
Revisit'st thus the glimpses of the moon,
Making night hideous; and we fools of nature,
So horridly to shake our disposition,
With thoughts beyond the reaches of our souls?
Say, why is this? wherefore? what should we do?

HOR. It beckons you to go away with it,
As if it some impartment did desire
To you alone.

HAM. It will not speak;
HOR. Do not, my lord.
HAM.

No, by no means. then will I follow it.

Why, what should be the fear?

I do not set my life at a pin's fee;
And, for my soul, what can it do to that,
Being a thing immortal as itself?

It waves me forth again;-I 'll follow it.

HOR. What, if it tempt you toward the flood, my lord,

Or to the dreadful summit of the cliff,

That beetles o'er his base into the sea?

And there assume some other horrible form,

Which might deprive your sovereignty of reasons,

• Questionable. The general interpretation is, doubtful. In the first scene where the Ghost appears, Marcellus says, "Question it." The questionable shape is a shape capable of being ques

And draw you into madness? think of it:
[The very place puts toys of desperation,
Without more motive, into every brain,
That looks so many fathoms to the sea,
And hears it roar beneath a.]

HAM. It wafts me still :-Go on, I 'll follow thee.

MAR. You shall not go, my lord.

HAM.

HOR. Be rul'd, you shall not go.
HAM.

Hold off your hand.

My fate cries out,

And makes each petty artery in this body
As hardy as the Nemean lion's nerve.-

Still am I call'd; -unhand me, gentlemen;

By heaven, I 'll make a ghost of him that lets meb:

I say, away:-Go on, I 'll follow thee.

HOR. He waxes desperate with imagination.

[GHOST beckons. [Breaking from them.

[Exeunt Ghost and HAMLET.

SCENE V.-A more remote Part of the Platform.
Re-enter GHOST and HAMLET.

HAM. Where wilt thou lead me? speak, I'll go no further.
GHOST. Mark me.

HAM.

Speak, I am bound to hear. GHOST. So art thou to revenge, when thou shalt hear. HAM. What?

GHOST. I am thy father's spirit;

Doom'd for a certain term to walk the night;

[Exeunt.

And, for the day, confin'd to fast in fires,

Till the foul crimes, done in my days of nature,

Are burnt and purg'd away. But that I am forbid
To tell the secrets of my prison-house,

I could a tale unfold, whose lightest word

Would harrow up thy soul; freeze thy young blood;

Make thy two eyes, like stars, start from their spheres; Thy knotted and combined locks to part,

And each particular hair to stand an end,

Like quills upon the fretful porpentinea;

But this eternal blazon must not be

To ears of flesh and blood:- List, Hamlet, O list!

If thou didst ever thy dear father love,

HAM. O heaven!

GHOST. Revenge his foul and most unnatural murther.
HAM. Murther ?

GHOST. Murther most foul, as in the best it is;

But this most foul, strange, and unnatural.

HAM. Haste me to know it; that I, with wings as swift

As meditation, or the thoughts of love,

May sweep to my revenge.

And duller shouldst thou be than the fat weed
That rots itself in ease on Lethe wharf,

Wouldst thou not stir in this. Now Hamlet, hear:
'Tis given out, that, sleeping in mine orchard,
A serpent stung me; so the whole ear of Denmark
Is by a forged process of my death

Rankly abus'd: but know, thou noble youth,
The serpent that did sting thy father's life,
Now wears his crown.

HAM. O my prophetic soul! mine uncle!
GHOST. Ay, that incestuous, that adulterate beast,
With witchcraft of his wit, with traitorous gifts,
(O wicked wit, and gifts, that have the power
So to seduce!) won to his shameful lust

The will of my most seeming virtuous queen:

O, Hamlet, what a falling-off was there!

From me, whose love was of that dignity,
That it went hand in hand even with the vow
I made to her in marriage; and to decline
Upon a wretch, whose natural gifts were poor
To those of mine!

But virtue, as it never will be mov'd,
Though lewdness court it in a shape of heaven;
So lust, though to a radiant angel link'd,

Will sate itself in a celestial bed,

And prey on garbage.

But soft! methinks, I scent the morning's air;
Brief let me be :-Sleeping within mine orchard,
My custom always in the afternoon,
Upon my secure hour thy uncle stole,
With juice of cursed hebenon in a vial,
And in the porches of mine ears did pour
The leperous distilment; whose effect
Holds such an enmity with blood of man,
That, swift as quicksilver, it courses through
The natural gates and alleys of the body;
And, with a sudden vigour, it doth posset
And curd, like eagera droppings into milk,
The thin and wholesome blood: so did it mine;
And a most instant tetter bark'd about,
Most lazar-like, with vile and loathsome crust,
All my smooth body.

Thus was I, sleeping, by a brother's hand,
Of life, of crown, and queen, at once despatch'd;
Cut off even in the blossoms of my sin,
Unhousel'd, disappointed, unanel'de:
No reckoning made, but sent to my account
With all my imperfections on my head:
O, horrible! O, horrible! most horribled!
If thou hast nature in thee, bear it not;
Let not the royal bed of Denmark be
A couch for luxury and damned incest.
But, howsoever thou pursu'st this act,
Taint not thy mind, nor let thy soul contrive

• Eager, in the quartos, -the folio, aigre.

Bark'd, in quartos; in folio, bak'd.

• These words describe the last offices which were performed to the dying. To housel, is to "minister the communion to one who lyeth on his death bed." Disappointed, is, not appointed, not prepared. Unanel'd, is, without the administration of extreme unction, which was called anoiling.

• This line, in all the old copies, is given to the Ghost; but it was always spoken by Garrick, in his character of Hamlet, as belonging to the Prince according to stage tradition.