Was not like madness. There's something in
his soul

O'er which his melancholy sits on brood:-
He shall with speed to England,

For the demand of our neglected tribute:
Haply the seas and countries different
With variable objects shall expel

This something-settled matter in his heart,
Whereon his brains still beating puts him thus
From fashion of himself. What think you on't?
POLONIUS.

It shall do well: but yet do I believe

The origin and commencement of his grief
Sprung from neglected love.

My lord, do as you please;

But, if you hold it fit, after the play,

Let his queen mother all alone entreat him
To show his grief: let her be round with him;
And I'll be placed, so please you, in the ear
Of all their conference. If she find him not,
To England send him, or confine him where
Your wisdom best shall think.

KING.

It shall be so:

Madness in great ones must not unwatch'd go
(Exeunt.)

Enter HAMLET and PLAYERS.

HAMLET.

Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to you, trippingly on the tongue : but if you mouth it, as many of your players do, I had as lief the town-crier spoke my lines. Nor do not saw the air too much with your hand, thus; but use all gently for in the very torrent, tempest, and, as I may say, whirlwind of your passion, you must acquire and beget a temperance that may

HAMLETA TRAGEDY

give it smoothness. O, it offends me to the soul to hear a robustious periwig-pated fellow tear a passion to tatters, to very rags, to split the ears of the groundlings, who, for the most part, are capable of nothing but inexplicable dumb-shows and noise I would have such a fellow whipped for o'erdoing Termagant; it out-herods Herod: pray you, avoid it. A unagovo FIRST PLAYER.

mary

I warrant your honour.

HAMLET.

Be not too tame neither, but let your own discretion be your tutor : suit the action to the word, the word to the action; with this special observance, that you o'erstep not the modesty of nature: for anything so overdone is from the purpose of playing, whose end, both at the first and now, was and is, to hold, as 'twere, the mirror up to nature; to show virtue her own feature, scorn her own image, and the very age and body of the time his form and pressure. Now this overdone or come tardy off, though it make the unskilful laugh, cannot but make the judicious grieve; the censure of the which one must in your allowance o'erweigh a whole theatre of others. O, there be players, that I have seen play, and heard others, praise, and that highly, not to speak it profanely,) that neither having the accent of Christians nor the gait of Christian, pagan, nor man, have so strutted and bellowed, that I have thought some of nature's journeymen had made men, and not made them well, they imitated humanity so abominably.

FIRST PLAYER.

I hope we have reformed that indifferently with us, sir.

HAMLET.

O, reform it altogether. And let those that play your clowns speak no more than is set down for them: for there be of them that will themselves laugh, to set on some quantity of barren spectators to laugh too, though in the mean time some necessary question of the play be then to be considered: that's villanous, and shows a most pitiful ambition in the fool that uses it. Go, make you ready. Exeunt PLAYERS.)

What ho! Horatio!

Enter HORATIO.

HORATIO.

Here, sweet lord, at your service.

HAMLET.

Horatio, thou art e'en as just a man
As e'er my conversation coped withal.

O, my dear lord,—

HORATIO.

HAMLET.

Nay, do not think I flatter; For what advancement may I hope from thee,

That no revenue hast but thy good spirits, To feed and clothe thee? Why should the poor be flatter'd ?

No, let the candied tongue lick absurd pomp, And crook the pregnant hinges of the knee Where thrift may follow fawning. Dost thou hear?

Since my dear soul was mistress of her choice, And could of men distinguish, her election Hath seal'd thee for herself: for thou hast been As one, in suffering all, that suffers nothing;

A man that fortune's buffets and rewards

Hast ta'en with equal thanks: and blest are those Whose blood and judgment are so well commingled

That they are not a pipe for fortune's finger

To sound what stop she please. Give me that

man

That is not passion's slave, and I will wear him
In my heart's core, ay, in my heart of heart,
As I do thee. Something too much of this.
There is a play to-night before the king;
One scene of it comes near the circumstance
Which I have told thee of my father's death:
I prithee, when thou seest that act a-foot,
Even with the very comment of thy soul
Observe my uncle: if his occulted guilt
Do not itself unkennel in one speech,
It is a damned ghost that we have seen,
And my imaginations are as foul

As Vulcan's stithy. Give him heedful note;
For I mine eyes will rivet to his face,
And after we will both our judgments join
In censure of his seeming.

They are coming to the play: I must be idle:
Get you a place.

Danish march. A flourish. Enter the KING, the
QUEEN, POLONIUS, OPHELIA, ROSENCRANTZ,
GUILDENSTERN, and other LORDS attendant, with
the GUARD carrying torches.

KING.

How fares our cousin Hamlet?

HAMLET.

Excellent, i' faith; of the chameleon's dish: I eat the air, promise-crammed: you cannot feed capons so.

KING.

I have nothing with this answer, Hamlet; these

words are not mine.

HAMLET.

No, nor mine now. (To POLONIUS.) My lord, you played once i' the university, you say?

POLONIUS.

That did I, my lord, and was accounted a good

actor.

HAMLET.

What did you enact?

POLONIUS.

I did enact Julius Cæsar: I was killed i' the Capitol; Brutus killed me.

HAMLET.

It was a brute part of him to kill so capital a calf there. Be the players ready?

ROSENCRANTZ.

Ay, my lord; they stay upon your patience.

QUEEN.

Come hither, my dear Hamlet, sit by me.

HAMLET.

No, good mother, here's metal more attractive. POLONIUS. (To the KING.)

O, ho! do you mark that?

HAMLET.

Lady, shall I lie in your lap?

(Lying down at OPHELIA's feet.)

OPHELIA.

You are merry, my lord.