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And found no course of breath with.n your majesty, How cold it struck my heart! if I do feign,

O let me in my present wildness die,

And never live to show th' incredulous world
The noble change that I have purposed.
Coming to look on you, thinking you dead,
(And dead almost, my liege, to think you were,)
I spake unto the crown, as having sense,

And thus upbraided it: "The care on thee depending
Hath fed upon the body of my father,

Therefore, thou best of gold, art worst of gold:
Other, less fine in carat, is more precious,

Preserving life in medicine potable:

But thou, most fine, most honour'd, most renown'd, Hast eat thy bearer up." Thus, my most royal liege, Accusing it, I put it on my head,

To try with it (as with an enemy,

That had before my face murder'd my father)

The quarrel of a true inheritor.

But if it did infect my blood with joy,

Or swell my thoughts to any strain of pride,
If any rebel or vain spirit of mine

Did with the least affection of a welcome
Give entertainment to the might of it,
Let Heaven for ever keep it from my head,
And make me as the poorest vassal is,
That doth with awe and terror kneel to it!
K. HEN. O my son!

Heaven put it in thy mind to take it hence,
That thou might'st win the more thy father's love,
Pleading so wisely in excuse of it.

Come hither, Harry, sit thou by my bed;

And hear, I think, the very latest counsel
That ever I shall breathe.

Heaven knows, my son,

By what by-paths, and indirect crook'd ways,
I met this crown; and I myself know well
How troublesome it sat upon my head.
To thee it shall descend with better quiet,
Better opinion, better confirmation :
For all the soil of the achievement goes

D

And vanish'd from our sight.

HAM.

'Tis very strange!

HOR. As I do live, my honour'd lord, 'tis true.
And we did think it writ down in our duty
To let you know of it.

HOR. We do, my

HAM. Indeed, indeed, Sir, but this troubles me.
Hold you the watch to-night?
HAM. Arm'd, say you u?

HAM. From top to toe?

lord.

HOR. Arm'd, my lord.

HOR. My lord, from head

HAM. Then saw you not his face?

HOR. O yes, my lord; he wore his beaver up.
HAM What, look'd he frowningly ?

[to foot.

HOR. A countenance more in sorrow than in anger. HAM. Pale or red.

HOR. Nay, very pale.

HAM. And fixed his eyes upon you? HOR. Most conHAM. I would I had been there!

HOR. It would have much amaz'd you.

HAM. Very like, very like. Staid it long?

[stantly.

HOR. While one with moderate haste might tell a HAM. His beard was grizzled ?-no

HOR. It was as I have seen it in his life,

A sable silver'd.

hundred.

HAM. I'll watch to-night; perchance 'twill walk again. HOR. I warrant you it will.

HAM. If it assume my noble father's person, I'll speak to it, though hell itself should gape, And bid me hold my peace. I pray you all,

If

you have hitherto conceal'd this sight,

Let it be tenable in your silence still;
And whatsoever shall befall to-night,
Give it an understanding, but no tongue;
I will requite your love: so fare ye well.
Upon the platform 'twixt eleven and twelve
I'll visit you.

10. QUEEN MAB.

Other, I see Queen Mab hath been with you.
She is the fairies' midwife, and she comes
In shape no bigger than an agate-stone
On the fore-finger of an alderman;

Drawn with a team of little atomies,
Athwart men's noses as they lie asleep :
Her waggon spokes made of long spinners' legs;
The cover, of the wings of grasshoppers;
The traces, of the smallest spider's web;
The collars, of the moonshine's watery beams;
Her whip, of cricket's bone; the lash, of film;
Her waggoner a small grey-coated gnat,
Not half so big as a round little worm,
Pricked from the lazy finger of a maid.
Her chariot is an empty hazel nut,
Made by the joiner squirrel, or old grub,
Time out of mind the fairies' coachmakers.
And in this state she gallops night by night
Through lovers' brains, and then they dream of love:
O'er courtiers' knees, that dream of courtesies straight:
O'er lawyers' fingers, who straight dream on fees:
O'er ladies' lips, who straight on kisses dream;
Sometimes she gallops o'er a courtier's nose,
And then dreams he of smelling out a suit :
And sometimes comes she with a tithe-pig's tail,
Tickling a parson as he lies asleep;

Then dreams he of another benefice.
Sometimes she driveth o'er a soldier's neck,
And then he dreams of cutting foreign throats,
Of breaches, ambuscadoes, Spanish blades,
Of healths five fathom deep, and them anon
Drums in his ear, at which he starts and wakes;
And being thus irighted, swears a prayer or two,
And sleeps again.

11. THE APOTHECARY.

I do remember an apothecary,

And hereabouts he dwells, whom late I noted
In tattered weeds, with overwhelming brows,
Culling of simples: meagre were his looks;
Sharp misery had worn him to the bones:
And in his needy shop a tortoise hung,
An alligator stuffed, and other skins
Of ill-shaped fishes; and about his shelves

A beggarly account of empty boxes;

Green earthen pots, bladders, and musty seeds,
Remnants of packthread, and old cakes of roses,
Were thinly scattered to make up a show.
Noting this penury, to myself I said,
An' if a man did need a poison now,
Whose sale is present death in Mantua,
Here lives a caitiff wretch would sell it him.
Oh, this same thought did but fore-run my need,
And this same needy man must sell it me.
As I remember, this should be the house.

12. HOTSPUR'S DESCRIPTION OF A FOP.

I remember, when the fight was done,
When I was dry with rage and extreme toil,
Breathless and faint, leaning upon my sword,
Came there a certain lord, neat, trimly drest;
Fresh as a bridegroom, and his chin, new reaped,
Showed like a stubble land at harvest home.
He was perfuméd like a milliner;

And 'twixt his finger and his thumb he held
A pouncet-box, which ever and anon

He gave his nose, and took it away again;

Who, therewith angry, when it next came there,
Took it in snuff.—And still he smiled and talked;
And as the soldiers bare dead bodies by,

He called them untaught knaves, unmannerly,
To bring a slovenly unhandsome corse
Betwixt the wind and his nobility.

With many holiday and lady-terms

He questioned me: amongst the rest demanded
My prisoners in your majesty's behalf.

I then, all smarting with my wounds, being galled
To be so pestered with a popinjay,

Out of my grief, and my impatience,

Answer'd neglectingly, I know not what :

He should, or should not: for he made me mad,
To see him shine so brisk, and smell so sweet,

And talk so like a waiting gentlewoman,

Of guns and drums, and wounds: (God save the mark !)

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