SCENE II.

The fame. A Room of State in the fame.

Enter the King, Queen, HAMLET, POLONIUS, LAERTES, VOLTIMAND, CORNELIUS, Lords, and Attendants.

KING. Though yet of Hamlet our dear brother's

death

The memory be green; and that it us befitted
To bear our hearts in grief, and our whole kingdom
To be contracted in one brow of woe;
Yet so far hath discretion fought with nature,
That we with wisest forrow think on him,
Together with remembrance of ourselves,
Therefore our fometime fifter, now our queen,
The imperial jointress of this warlike state,
Have we, as 'twere, with a defeated joy,-
With one aufpicious, and one dropping eye;*

9 - and that it us befitted] Perhaps our author elliptically

wrote,

- and us befitted-.

i. e. and that it befitted us. STEEVENS,

With one auspicious, and one dropping eye;) Thus the folio. The quarto, with fomewhat less of quaintness:

With an auspicious, and a dropping eye.

The fame thought, however, occurs in The Winter's Tale: "She had one eye declined for the loss of her husband; another elevated that the oracle was fulfilled."

After all, perhaps, we have here only the ancient proverbial phrafe " To cry with one eye and laugh with the other," buckram'd by our author for the service of tragedy. See Ray's Collection, edit. 1768, p. 188. STEEVENS.

Dropping in this line probably means depressed or caft downwards: an interpretation which is strongly supported by the passage already quoted from The Winter's Tale. It may, however, signify weeping.

With mirth in funeral, and with dirge in marriage,
In equal scale weighing delight and dole,-
Taken to wife: nor have we herein barr'd
Your better wisdoms, which have freely gone
With this affair along :-For all, our thanks.

Now follows, that you know, young Fortinbras,—
Holding a weak fuppofal of our worth;
Or thinking, by our late dear brother's death,
Our state to be disjoint and out of frame,
Colleagued with this dream of his advantage,
He hath not fail'd to pester us with message,
Importing the furrender of those lands
Loft by his father, with all bands of law,
To our most valiant brother.-So much for him.
Now for ourself, and for this time of meeting.
Thus much the business is: We have here writ
To Norway, uncle of young Fortinbras,-
Who, impotent and bed-rid, scarcely hears
Of this his nephew's purpose, -to fupprefs
His further gait herein; in that the levies,

"Dropping of the eyes" was a technical expreffion in our author's time." If the spring be wet with much fouth wind, -the next fummer will happen agues and blearness, dropping of the eyes, and pains of the bowels." Hopton's Concordance of years, 8vo. 1616.

Again, in Montaigne's Effaies, 1603: "-they never faw any man there with eyes dropping, or crooked and stooping through age." MALONE.

3 Colleagued with this dream of his advantage, The meaning is, He goes to war so indiscreetly, and unprepared, that he has no allies to fupport him but a dream, with which he is colleagued or confederated. WARBURTON.

Mr. Theobald, in his Shakspeare Restored, proposed to readcollogued, but in his edition very properly adhered to the ancient copies. MALONE.

This dream of his advantage (as Mr. M. Mason observes) means only "this imaginary advantage, which Fortinbras hoped to derive from the unfettled state of the kingdom." STEEVENS.

His further gait herein,] Gate or gait is here used in the

The lifts, and full proportions, are all made
Out of his subject:---and we here despatch
You, good Cornelius, and you, Voltimand,
For bearers of this greeting to old Norway;
Giving to you no further personal power
To business with the king, more than the scopes
Of these dilated articles allow.

Farewell; and let your hafte commend your duty.
COR. VOL. In that, and all things, will we show
our duty.

KING. We doubt it nothing; heartily farewell.
[Exeunt VOLTIMAND and CORNELIUS.

And now, Laertes, what's the news with you?
You told us of some fuit; What is't, Laertes?
You cannot speak of reason to the Dane,
And lose your voice: What would'st thou beg,

Laertes,

That shall not be my offer, not thy asking?
The head is not more native to the heart,
The hand more instrumental to the mouth,

northern sense, for proceeding, passage; from the A. S. verb gat. A gate for a path, passage, or street, is still current in the north.

5

PERCY.

more than the scope - More is comprized in the general defign of these articles, which you may explain in a more diffuse and dilated style. JOHNSON.

6

- thefe dilated articles &c.] i. e. the articles when dilated. MUSGRAVE. The poet should have written allows. Many writers fall into this error, when a plural noun immediately precedes the verb; as I have had occafion to observe in a note on a controverted passage in Love's Labour's Loft. So, in Julius Cæfar:

"The posture of your blows are yet unknown."

Again, in Cymbeline:

and the approbation of those are

wonderfully to extend him," &c. MALONE.

Surely, all such defects in our author, were merely the errors of

illiterate tranfcribers or printers. STEEVENS.

1

Than is the throne of Denmark to thy father."
What would'st thou have, Laertes?

LAER.

My dread lord, Your leave and favour to return to France; From whence though willingly I came to Den

mark,

To show my duty in your coronation;

Yet now, I must confefs, that duty done,
My thoughts and wishes bend again toward France,
And bow them to your gracious leave and pardon.

KING. Have you your father's leave? What fays
Polonius?

POL. He hath, my lord, [wrung from me my flow

leave,

By laboursome petition; and, at last,
Upon his will I feal'd my hard confent:]
I do befeech you, give him leave to go.

KING. Take thy fair hour, Laertes; time be thine,

And thy best graces: spend it at thy will.

The head is not more native to the heart,
The hand more inftrumental to the mouth,

Than is the throne of Denmark to thy father.] The sense seems to be this: The head is not formed to be more useful to the heart, the hand is not more at the service of the mouth, than my power is at your father's service. That is, he may command me to the utmost, he may do what he pleases with my kingly authority.

STEEVENS.

By native to the heart Dr. Johnfon understands, " natural and congenial to it, born with it, and co-operating with it."

Formerly the heart was fuppofed the feat of wisdom; and hence the poet fpeaks of the close connexion between the heart and head. See Vol. XII. p. 12, n. 9. MALONE.

8

[wrung from me my flow leave,] These words and the two following lines are omitted in the folio. MALONE. Take thy fair hour, Laertes; time be thine,

And thy best graces: Spend it at thy will.] The sense is, - You have my leave to go, Laertes; make the faireft ufe you please of your time, and spend it at your will with the faireft graces you are mafter of." THEOBALD.

But now, my cousin Hamlet, and my fon,
HAM. A little more than kin, and less than kind."

I rather think this line is in want of emendation. I read : time is thine,

And my best graces: spend it at thy will. JOHNSON. * Ham. A little more than kin, and less than kind.] Kind is the Teutonick word for child. Hamlet therefore anfwers with propriety, to the titles of cousin and fon, which the king had given him, that he was fomewhat more than coufin, and less than fon.

JOHNSON.

In this line, with which Shakspeare introduces Hamlet, Dr. Johnson has perhaps pointed out a nicer distinction than it can justly boast of. To establish the sense contended for, it should have been proved that kind was ever used by any English writer for child. A little more than kin, is a little more than a common relation. The king was certainly fomething less than kind, by having betrayed the mother of Hamlet into an indecent and incestuous marriage, and obtained the crown by means which he fufpects to be unjustifiable. In the fifth act, the prince accuses his uncle of having popp'd in between the election and his hopes, which obviates Dr. Warburton's objection to the old reading, viz. that " the king had given no occafion for such a reflection."

A jingle of the fame fort is found in Mother Bombie, 1594, and feems to have been proverbial, as I have met with it more than once: "the nearer we are in blood, the further we must be from love; the greater the kindred is, the less the kindness must be."

Again, in Gorboduc, a tragedy, 1561:

" In kinde a father, but not kindelyness." As kind, however, fignifies nature, Hamlet may mean that his relationship was become an unnatural one, as it was partly founded upon inceft. Our author's Julius Cæfar, Antony and Cleopatra, King Richard II. and Titus Andronicus, exhibit instances of kind being used for nature; and so too in this play of Hamlet, Act II. fc. the laft:

"Remorseless, treacherous, lecherous, kindless villain." Dr. Farmer, however, observes that kin, is still used for coufin in the midland counties. STEEVENS.

Hamlet does not, I think, mean to say, as Mr. Steevens supposes,