ART. XVIII.-Remarks on the conduct of Hamlet towards Ophelia.

The conduct of Hamlet towards Ophelia has been so generally condemned by the readers of Shakespeare as useless and wanton cruelty, that to attempt any extenuation of it may appear presumptuous; yet the hope of success in such a cause will, I trust, afford an excuse for the following remarks, even should the reasons adduced not be deemed sufficient to warrant the conclusion. The idea originally suggested itself while reading an old history of Denmark, abridged from Saxo Grammaticus; and the story, as there related, tends to prove, if proof were wanting, how the basest materials were purified and turned to gold by the poet's magic touch.

In referring to the play, act ii., scene 2, we shall find the first arrangement for this interview between Hamlet and Ophelia made by Polonius, and proposed by him to the King, who has scarcely acceded to it before Hamlet enters, reading, the Queen and Polonius even continuing their discourse after he has made his appearance, probably concluding, from his apparent insanity, that their words will pass unnoted. But let us remember that Hamlet was more than a match for the crafty and crooked policy of the court of Denmark, as we find more particularly in the latter part of the play, when Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are "hoist with their own petar Hamlet having declared that "he would delve a yard below their mines, and blow them at the moon "-may he not, therefore, on the present occasion, have assumed a studious aspect, in order to seem as if he heeded them not, when, in reality, he had overheard that part of the conversation which immediately preceded his appearance? This conclusion gains strength when we read what immediately follows; for, on Polonius saying,

"Do you know me?" he replies, "Excellent well; you are a fishmonger." And that this word was used in a figurative sense, perhaps somewhat as we should now apply the word ferret, or as a dealer in baits, is evident from Johnson's quotation from Carew, a writer contemporary with our author-" I could well play the fishmonger," which seems to indicate that Hamlet was aware of Polonius's being engaged in some underhand policy; and that he knew Ophelia was to play her part in it is evident from the caution which follows respecting her, which the old man loses sight of in his joy at hearing his daughter alluded to. At the conclusion of this scene, we find Polonius speaking, apparently not aside, but openly, of “suddenly contriving the means of meeting between Hamlet and his daughter," still under the common, but very erroneous impression that deranged persons neither hear nor understand what is uttered in their presence.

In the next scene, when Polonius, in a pompous speech, announces the arrival of the players, Hamlet exclaims, quoting the old song, "O, Jephthah, Judge of Israel,' what a treasure hadst thou!

"Pol. What a treasure had he, my lord?

"Ham. Why, 'One fair daughter and no more;

The which he loved passing well.'

"Pol. Still on my daughter.

“Ham. Am I not i̇' the right, old Jephthah?

“Pol. If you call me Jephthah, my lord, I have a daughter that I love passing well.

"Ham. Nay, that follows not.”

Is not the interpretation of this passage, that it follows not that you are like Jephthah, in loving your daughter but in your shameful sacrifice of her; and afterwards Hamlet, by saying that "the first row of the pious chanson will show further," makes us anxiously turn to it for an explanation of

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his meaning: it has been preserved, and is thus given by Bishop Percy;

"Great wars there should be,

And who should be the chief but he."

Is this intended to point to Polonius as a great cause of mischief, while he receives all these allusions with the same blindness as before?

Then follows the scene in question, in which the King is so great a bungler, that one far less acute than Hamlet would immediately perceive that some secret design was at work; for when Hamlet arrives at the place appointed by the King, there is no one present but Ophelia.

It is remarkable that in the two quarto editions I have had an opportunity of referring to, (those of 1605 and 1611) Hamlet enters before Polonius says, "I hear him coming, let's withdraw, my lord," instead of entering after it, as in the usually received text. This appears to me to have escaped the notice of the commentators. May not Hamlet be supposed to have seen them on his entrance?

This circumstance, added to his previous knowledge of their schemes, was sufficient to convince him that it was the prearranged meeting; and when we recall all the foregoing circumstances, we should rather have been amazed had he treated her with any show of affection, than at the apparently coldhearted and cruel manner in which he addresses her. First, let us suppose him aware that the King and Polonius were listening behind the arras-but this is by no means all: he has found that Ophelia, who had been to him as a bright green spot in the desert of his existence, whom he had regarded as pure and innocent amid the surrounding corruptions of the court, that she too has lent herself to play a part in this scheme, and has submitted to become a tool and a bait in the hands of his enemies; for he could neither be aware how far

she was not an artful and a willing tool, nor that her previously assumed coldness had been merely the result of her father's advice. Would not this conduct be indeed sufficient to convince him that he had been utterly deceived in her, and to render any love she might profess for him worse than worthless. Though we must pity Ophelia, and regard her as having been drawn into such an act without being aware that she was playing the part of a traitress, yet we cannot entirely acquit her; and we must feel assured that, had she really loved Hamlet, she would have resisted to the utmost the commands of her father, instead of sitting down calmly with the book of prayers in her hand, "that show of such an exercise might colour her loneliness." Even Polonius, in the lines that follow, expresses his opinion of such hypocrisy :

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We are oft to blame in this.

'Tis too much proved that with devotion's visage,
And pious action we do sugar o'er

The devil himself."

We may therefore feel assured that Shakespeare never intended Ophelia to be held utterly blameless, but rather as one so early trained in habits of implicit obedience to her father, as to follow his dictates without looking to any higher principle. Even after Hamlet has quitted her, she has no compunctious visitings, when she laments in such pathetic terms his apparent aberration of mind; and we feel she is not one who would exclaim with Viola

"Disguise, I see thou art a wickedness”

Can we then wonder that Hamlet should disclaim all love for her? No! our surprise would rather have been excited had he followed an opposite course; and the bitter disappointment he has experienced in her is expressed when she remarks on the prologue, ""Tis brief, my lord," and he rejoins, "As woman's love." This is, I believe, generally supposed to refer

to the Queen, yet the passage can scarcely admit of such an interpretation; for, however disgraceful and sudden was her for getfulness of her husband, the term "brief" could not apply to a love which was said to have lasted thirty years. The offensive conversation addressed by Hamlet to Ophelia in this scene is no doubt intended to show how much she was lowered in his estimation. And what that disappointment must have been to such a heart as Hamlet's, we are shown in his beautiful and touching address to Horatio, (act iii., scene 2) whom he seems at this moment to seize hold of, as some object by which to relieve the overflowings of his heart.

"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-

Though it is not until after the death of Ophelia that by his passionate conduct over her grave he gives full expression to the sentiments he had really entertained for her :

"I loved Ophelia: forty thousand brothers,
Could not, with all their quantity of love,

Since the above paper was written, I have met with an interpretation of Hamlet's conduct to Ophelia, in some respects similar to the explanation here offered. It is in the edition of Shakespeare by the Rev. W. Harness. The passage is as follows:

"The severity displayed by Hamlet to Ophelia has been the occasion of much discussion. It appears to me, that, on first perceiving her, he approaches her with gentleness and affection- Nymph, in thy orisons be all my sins remembered." On her returning his gifts, he begins to suspect that, like his schoolfellows, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, she is also an