Queen embracing him, and he her. She kneels,
and makes show of protestation unto him. He
takes her up, and declines his head upon her neck:
lays him down upon a bank of flowers; she,
seeing him asleep, leaves him. Anon comes in
a fellow, takes off his crown, kisses it, and pours
poison in the King's ears, and exit. The Queen
returns; finds the King dead, and makes pas-
sionate action. The poisoner, with some two or
three Mutes, comes in again, seeming to lament
with her. The dead body is carried away. The
poisoner woos the Queen with gifts; she seems
loath and unwilling awhile, but, in the end, ac-
cepts his love.
[Exeunt.

Oph. What means this, my lord?
Ham. Marry, this is miching mallecho;1 it means

mischief.

Oph. Belike, this show imports the argument of the play. Enter Prologue.

Ham. We shall know by this fellow the players cannot keep counsel; they'll tell all.

Oph. Will he tell us what this show meant? Ham. Ay, or any show that you'll show him: Be not you ashamed to show, he'll not shame to tell you what it means.

Oph. You are naught, you are naught; I'll mark the play.

Pro. For us, and for our tragedy,
Here stooping to your clemency,

We beg your hearing patiently.

Ham. Is this a prologue, or the posy of a ring?
Oph. 'Tis brief,2 my lord.

Ham. As woman's love.

Enter a King and a Queen.

P. King. Full thirty times hath Phoebus' cart gone round

(1) Secret wickedness. (2) Short. (3) Car, cuariot.

Neptune's salt wash, and Tellus' orbed ground; And thirty dozen moons, with borrow'd sheen,2 About the world have times twelve thirties been; Since love our hearts, and Hymen did our hands, Unite commutual in most sacred bands.

P. Queen. So many journeys may the sun and

inoon

Make us again count o'er, ere love be done!
But, wo is me, you are so sick of late,
So far from cheer, and from your former state,
That I distrust you. Yet, though I distrust,
Discomfort you, my lord, it nothing must:
For women fear too much, even as they love;
And women's fear and love hold quantity;
In neither aught, or in extremity.

Now, what my love is, proof hath made you know:
And as my love is siz'd,3 my fear is so.

Where love is great, the littlest doubts are fear; Where little fears grow great, great love grows

there.

P. King. 'Faith, I must leave thee, love, and shortly too;

My operant powers their functions leave to do:
And thou shalt live in this fair world behind,
Honour'd, belov'd; and, haply, one as kind
For husband shalt thou-

P. Queen.

O, confound the rest!
Such love must needs be treason in my breast:
In second husband let me be accurst!

None wed the second, but who kill'd the first.
Ham. That's wormwood.

P. Queen. The instances,5 that second marriage

move,

Are base respects of thrift, but none of love;
A second time I kill my husband dead,
When second husband kisses me in bed.

(1) The earth's.

(2) Shining, lustre.
(4) Active.

(3) Magnitude, proportion. (5) Motives.

P. King. I do believe, you think what now you

speak:

But, what we do determine, oft we break.
Purpose is but the slave to memory;
Of violent birth, but poor validity:

Which now, like fruit unripe, sticks on the tree;
But fall, unshaken, when they mellow be.
Most necessary 'tis, that we forget

To pay ourselves what to ourselves is debt:
What to ourselves in passion we propose,
The passion ending, doth the purpose lose.
The violence of either grief or joy

Their own enactures! with themselves destroy:
Where joy most revels, grief doth most lament;
Grief joys, joy grieves, on slender accident.
This world is not for aye 2 nor 'tis not strange,
That even our loves should with our fortunes change,
For 'tis a question left us yet to prove,

Whether love lead fortune, or else fortune love.
The great man down, you mark his favourite flies;
The poor advanc'd makes friends of enemies.
And hitherto doth love on fortune tend:
For who not needs, shall never lack a friend;
And who in want a hollow friend doth try,
Directly seasons him his enemy.
But, orderly to end where I begun,-
Our wills, and fates, do so contráry run,
That our devices still are overthrown;

Our thoughts are ours, their ends none of our own:
So think thou wilt no second husband wed;
But die thy thoughts, when thy first lord is dead.
P. Queen. Nor earth to give me food, nor heaven
light!

Sport and repose lock from me, day and night!
To desperation turn my trust and hope!
An anchor's cheer in prison be my scope!
Each opposite, that blanks the face of joy,
Meet what I would have well, and it destroy!

(1) Determinations.

(2) Ever. (3) Anchoret's

Both here, and hence, pursue me lasting strife,
If, once a widow, ever I be wife!

Ham. If she should break it now,

[To Ophelia. P. King. 'Tis deeply sworn. Sweet, leave me here a while;

My spirits grow dull, and fain I would beguile
The tedious day with sleep.

P. Queen.

[Sleeps.

Sleep rock thy brain; And never come mischance between us twain!

[Exit.

Ham. Madam, how like you this play?
Queen. The lady doth protest too much, methinks.
Ham. O, but she'll keep her word.

King. Have you heard the argument? Is there no offence in't?

Ham. No, no, they do but jest, poison in jest; no offence i'the world.

King. What do you call the play? Ham. The Mouse-trap. Marry, how? Tropically. This play is the image of a murder done in Vienna: Gonzago is the duke's name; his wife, Baptista: you shall see anon; 'tis a knavish piece of work: But what of that? your majesty, and we that have free souls, it touches us not: Let the galled jade wince,2 our withers are unwrung.—

Enter Lucianus.

This is one Lucianus, nephew to the king. Oph. You are as good as a chorus, my lord. Ham. I could interpret between you and your love, if I could see the puppets dallying. Oph. You are keen, my lord, you are keen. Ham. It would cost you a groaning, to take off my edge.

Oph. Still better, and worse.

(1)

-the thing

In which he'll catch the conscience of the king. (2) This is a proverbial saying.

Ham. So you mistake your husbands.—Begin, murderer ;-leave thy damnable faces, and begin. Come;

-The croaking raven

Doth bellow for revenge.

Luc. Thoughts black, hands apt, drugs fit, and time agreeing;

Confederate season, else no creature seeing;
Thou mixture rank, of midnight weeds collected,
With Hecate's ban1 thrice blasted, thrice infected,
Thy natural magic and dire property,
On wholesome life usurp immediately.

[Pours the poison into the sleeper's ears. Ham. He poisons him i'the garden for his estate. His name's Gonzago: the story is extant, and written in very choice Italian: You shall see anon, how the murderer gets the love of Gonzago's wife. Oph. The king rises.

Ham. What! frighted with false fire?
Queen. How fares my lord?

Pol. Give o'er the play.

King. Give me some light :-away!

Pol. Lights, lights, lights!

[Exeunt all but Hamlet and Horatio.

Ham. Why, let the strucken deer go weep,
The hart ungalled play:

For some must watch, while some must sleep;
Thus runs the world away.-

Would not this, sir, and a forest of feathers2 (if the rest of my fortunes turn Turk3 with me,) with two Provencial roses on my razed4 shoes, get me a fellowship in a cry5 of players, sir?

Hor. Half a share.

Ham. A whole one, I.

For thou dost know, O Damon dear,
This realm dismantled was

(1) Curse.

(2) For his head.

(3) Change conditions.

(5) Pack, company.

(4) Slashed.