In mincing with his sword her husband's limbs;
The inftant burst of clamour that she made,
(Unless things mortal move them not at all)
Would have made milch the burning eyes of Heaven,
And paffion in the gods.
Pol. Look whether he has not turned his colour, and has tears in's eyes. Pr'ythee, no more.
Ham. 'Tis well. I'll have thee speak out the reft of this foon. Good my Lord, will you fee the players well bestowed? Do ye hear, let them be well used; for they are the abstract and brief chroniclers of the time. After your death, you were better have a bad epitaph, than their ill report while you lived.
Pol. My Lord, I will use them according to their defert.
Ham. God's bodikins, man, much better. Ufe every man after his defert, and who shall 'scape whipping? use them after your own honour and dignity. The less they deferve, the more merit is in your hounty. Take them in.
Ham. Follow him, friends: we'll have a play tomorrow. Dost thou hear me, old friend, can you play the murder of Gonzago?
Ham. We'll ha't to-morrow night. You could, for a need, study a speech of some dozen or fixteen lines, which I would fet down and infert in't? could ye not?
Ham Very well. Follow that Lord, and look you mock him not. My good friends, I'll leave
you 'till night: you are welcome to Elfinoor.
Ham. Ay, fo, God b'w'ye. Now I am alone, A
Oh, what a rogue and peafant flave am I!
Is it not monstrous that this player here,
But in a fiction, in a dream of paffion,
Could force his foul so to his own conceit,
That, from her working, all his visage warmed
Tears in his eyes, distraction in his aspect,
A broken voice, and his whole function fuiting,
With forms to his conceit? and all for nothing?
For Hecuba?
What's Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba,
That he should weep for her? what would he do,
Had he the motive and the cue for paffion
That I have? he would drown the stage with tears,
And cleave the general ear with horrid speech,
Make mad the guilty, and appal the free;
Confound the ignorant, and amaze, indeed,
The very faculty of eyes and ears.--------Yet I,
A dull and muddy-mettled rascal, peak,
Like John-a-dreams, unpregnant of my caufe,
And can fay nothing-----no, not for a King,
Upon whose property and most dear life
A damned defeat was made. Am I a coward?
Who calls me villain, breaks my pate a-cross,
Plucks off my beard, and blows it in my face?
Tweaks me by th' nose, gives me the lye i' th' throat,
As deep as to the lungs? who does me this?
Yet I should take it-----for it cannot be
But I am pigeon-livered, and lack gali
To make oppression bitter; or, ere this,
I should have fatted all the region kites
With this flave's offal. Bloody, bawdy villain!
Remorfeleis, treacherous, letcherous, kindless vil
Why, what an ass am I? this is most brave, [lain!
That I, the fon of a dear father murdered,
Prompted to my revenge by Heaven and hell,
Muft, like a whore, unpack my heart with words,
And fall a curfing like a very drab-(32)
A cullion,---fy upon't! foh!-about, my brain!---
I've heard, that guilty creatures, at a play,
Have, by the very cunning of the scene,
Been struck so to the foul, that presently
They have proclaimed their malefactions.
For murder, though it have no tongue, will speak
With most miraculous organ. I'll have these players
Play fomething like the murder of my father,
Before mine uncle. I'll observe his looks;
I'll tent him to the quick; if he but blench,
I know my course. This spirit, that I have seen,
May be the devil; and the devil hath power
T'assume a pleasing shape; yea, and, perhaps,
Out of my weakness and my melancholy,
(As he is very potent with fuch spirits)
Abuses me to damn me. I'll have grounds
More relative than this: the play's the thing,
Wherein I'll catch the confcience of the King. [Exit.
(32) And fall a curfing like a very drab
A ftallion. But why a ftellion? The two old Folios
have it, a Scullion; but that too is wrong. I am perfuaded
Shakespeare wrote as I have reformed the text, a cullion,
i. t. a stupid, heartless, faint-hearted, white-livered fellow;
one good for nothing, but curfing and talking big.
So, in King Lear ;
I'll make a sop o'th' moonshine of you, you whorfon,
cullionly barbermonger, draw.
Away, base cullions!-Suffolk, Icet 'em go.
The word is of Italian extraction, from coglione; which, in its metaphorical fignification, (as La Crusca defines it) dicefi ancor coglione per ingiuria in fenso di balardo, is faid by way of reproach to a stupid, good-for-nothing blockhead.
Enter King, Queen, POLONIUS, OPHELIA, ROSINCRANTZ, GUILDENSTERN, and Lords.
AND can you by no drift of conference
Get from him why he puts on this confufion,
Grating fo harshly all his days of quiet,
With turbulent and dangerous lunacy?
Rof. He does confefs, he feels himself distracted; But from what cause he will by no means fpeak.
Guil. Nor do we find him forward to be founded; But with a crafty madness keeps aloof, When we would bring him on to some confeffion Of his true frate.
Qufen. Did he receive you well?
Rof. Most like a gentleman.
Guil. But with much forcing of his difpofition.
Rof. Niggard of question, but of our demands
Moft free in his reply.
Queen. Did you aflay him to any pastime?
Rof. Madam, it fo fell out that certain players We o'er-took on the way; of these we told him; And there did feem in him a kind of joy To hear of it: they are about the court; And (as I think) they have already order This night to play before him.
And he beseeched me to intreat your Majesties
To hear and fee the matter.
King. With all my heart, and it doth much con-
[tent me
To hear him so inclined.
Good gentlemen, give him a further edge,
And drive his purpose into these delights.
Rof. We shall, my Lord.
King. Sweet Gertrude, leave us too;
For we have clofely fent for Hamlet hither,
That he, as 'twere by accident, may here
Affront Ophelia. Her father and myfelf
Will fo bestow ourselves, that, feeing, unfeen,
We may of their encounter frankly judge;
And gather by him, as he is behaved,
If't be th' affliction of his love, or no,
That thus he fuffers for.
Queen. I shall obey you:
And for my part, Ophelia, I do with,
That your good beauties be the happy caufe
Of Hamlet's wildness! So thall I hope, your virtues
May bring him to his wonted way again,
To both your honours.
Oph. Madam, I wish it may.
Pol. Ophelia, walk you here.-Gracious, fo
We will bestow ourselves. - Read on this book;
That shew of fuch an exercise may colour
Your loneliness. We're oft to blame in this,
'Tis too much proved, that with devotion's visage,
And pious action, we do fugar o'er
The devil himfelf.
King Oh, 'tis too true.
How fimart a lash that speech doth give my con
The harlot's cheek, beautied with plaistring art,
Is not more ugly to the thing that helps it,
Than is my deed to my moit painted word.
Oh heavy burden!
Pol. I hear him coming; let's withdraw, my Lord.
[Exeunt all but Ophelia.
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