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Laer. Farewell, Ophelia; and remember well What I have said to you.

Oph. "Tis in my memory lock'd,

And you yourself shall keep the key of it.

Laer. Farewell.

Pol. What is't, Ophelia, he hath said to you?

[Exit LAERTES.

Oph. So please you, something touching the lord Hamlet.

Pol. Marry, well bethought:

'Tis told me, he hath very oft of late

Given private time to you: and you yourself

Have of your audience been most free and bounteous,

If it be so (as so 'tis put on me,

And that in way of caution), I must tell you,
You do not understand yourself so clearly,
As it behoves my daughter, and your honour:
What is between you? give me up the truth.

Oph. He hath, my lord, of late, made many tenders
Of his affection to me.

Pol. Affection? puh! you speak like a green girl, Unsifted in such perilous circumstance.

Do you believe his tenders, as you call them?

Oph. I do not know, my lord, what I should think.
Pol. Marry, I'll teach you: think yourself a baby;
That you have ta'en these tenders for true pay,

Which are not sterling. Tendert yourself more dearly;
Or (not to crack the wind of the poor phrase,
Wronging it thus), you'll tender me a fool.

Oph. My lord he hath impórtuned me with love,

In honourable fashion.

Pol. Ay, fashion you may call it; go to, go to.

Oph. And hath given countenance to his speech, my lord,

With almost all the holy vows of heaven.

Pol. Ay, springes to catch woodcocks. I do know,

When the blood burns, how prodigal the soul
Lends the tongue vows: these blazes, daughter,
Giving more light than heat,-extinct in both,
Even in their promise, as it is a making,-
You must not take for fire. From this time,
Be somewhat scanter of your maiden presence;
Set your entreatments at a higher rate,
Than a command to parley. For lord Hamlet,
Believe so much in him, that he is young;
And with a larger tether § may he walk,
Than may be given you: In few, Ophelia,
Do not believe his vows: for they are brokers, ||
Not of that die which their investments show,
But mere implorators of unholy suits,
Breathing like sanctified and pious bonds,**
The better to beguile. This is for all,-

I would not in plain terms, from this time forth,

* Untempted. § Line.

+ Esteem.

|| Pimps.
**Engagements.

Favours entreated. ¶ Implorers.

X with weaving shrubs,

Have you so slander any moment's leisure,
As to give words or talk with the lord Hamlet.
Look to't, I charge you; come your ways.

Oph. I shall obey, my lord.

SCENE IV-The Platform.

Enter HAMLET, HORATIO, and MARCELLUS.

Ham. The air bites shrewdly; it is very cold.

Hor. It is a nipping and an eager* air.

Ham. What hour now?

Hor. I think, it lacks of twelve.

Mar. No, it is struck.

[Exeunt.

Hor. Indeed? I heard it not; it then draws near the season, Wherein the spirit held is wont to walk.

[A flourish of trumpets and ordnance shot off, within. What does this mean, my lord?

Ham. The king doth wake+ to-night, and takes his rouse,+ Keeps wassel, and the swaggering upspring reels; §

And, as he drains his draughts of Rhenish down,

The kettle-drum and trumpet thus bray out

The triumph of his pledge.

Hor. Is it a custom ?

Ham. Ay, marry, is't:

But 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 traduced, 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. T

So, oft it chances in particular men,

That, for some vicious mode of nature in them,
As, in their birth (wherein they are not guilty,
Since nature cannot choose his origin),

X By the 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 base
Doth all the noble substance often dout,++

To his own scandal.

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* Sharp.

Upstart revels.

+ Revel.
I Call.

Jovial draught.

The most valuable part of what should be attributed to us.

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Enter GHOST.

Hor. Look, my lord, it comes!

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,
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 canonized bones, hearsed in death,
Have burst their cerements: why the sepulchre,
Wherein we saw thee quietly inurn'd,
Hath op'd his ponderous and marble jaws,
To cast thee up again! What may this mean,
That thou, dead corse, again, in cómplete steel,
Revisit'st thus the glimpses of the moon,
Making night hideous; and we fools of nature,
So horribly 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.

Mar. Look, with what courteous action It waves you to a more removed‡ ground:

But do not go with it.

Hor. No, by no means.

Ham. It will not speak; then I will follow it.

Hor. Do not, my lord.

Ham. 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 reason,

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.

Ham. It waves me still:

Go on, I'll follow thee.

Mar. You shall not go, my lord.

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[GHOST beckons. [Breaking from them.

And makes each petty artery in this body
As hardy as the Némean lion's nerve.-
Still am I call'd;-unhand me, gentlemen;
By heaven, I'll make a ghost of him that lets me :-
I say, away :-Go on, I'll follow thee.

[Exeunt GHOST and HAMLET.

Hor. He waxes desperate with imagination.
Mar. Let's follow; 'tis not fit thus to obey him.
Hor. Have after :-To what issue will this come?
Mar. Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.
Hor. Heaven will direct it.

Mar. Nay, let's follow him.

[Exeunt.

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

Ham. Whither wilt thou lead me? Speak; I'll go no further.
Ghost. Mark me.

Ham. I will.

Ghost. My hour is almost come,

When I to sulphurous and tormenting flames

Must render up myself.

Ham. Alas, poor ghost!

Ghost. Pity me not, but lend thy serious hearing

To what I shall unfold.

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;

And, for the day, confined to fast in fires,

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

Are burn'd and purged 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 on end,
Like quills upon the fretful porpentine:†

But this eternal blazon‡ must not be

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

If thou didst ever thy dear father love,

Ham. O heaven!

Ghost. Revenge his foul and most unnatural murder.

Ham. Murder?

Ghost. Murder 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.

Ghost. I find thee apt;

* Hinders.

† Porcupine.

+ Display.

he had suspect is it

And duller shouldst thou be than the fat weed
That rots itself in ease on Lethe's 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 abused: but know, thou noble youth,
The serpent that did sting thy father's life,
Now wears his crown.

Ham. O, my prophetic soul! my 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 that of 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 moved,

Though lewdness court it in a shape of heaven;
So lust, though to a radiant angel link'd,
Will satet itself in a celestial bed,

And prey on garbage.

But, soft! methinks, I scent the morning air;
Brief let me be :-Sleeping within mine orchard,
My custom always of 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 eager § droppings into milk,
The thin and wholesome blood: so did it mine;
And a most instant tetter || bark'd about,

Most lazar T-like, with vile and loathsome crust,
All my smooth body.

Thus was I, sleeping, by a brother's hand,

Of life, of crown, of queen, at once despatch'd :**
Cut off even in the blossoms of my sin,
Unhousel'd, disappointed, unanel'd;++
No reckoning made, but sent to my account
With all my imperfections on my head:
O, horrible! O, horrible! most horrible!
If thou hast nature in thee, bear it not;

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¶ Leper.

+ Henbane.

** Bereft.

of that

†† Without the sacrament, preparation, or extreme unction.

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