Like wonder-wounded hearers? this is I,

Hamlet the Dane.
Laer.

[Leaping into the Grave.

The devil take thy soul!

[Grappling with him.

Ham. Thou pray'st not well.

I pr'ythee, take thy fingers from my throat;
For though I am not splenetive and rash,
Yet have I in me something dangerous,

Which let thy wisdom fear. Hold off thy hand.
King. Pluck them asunder.

[The Attendants part them, and they come out of the Grave.

Ham. Why, I will fight with him upon this theme,

Until my eyelids will no longer wag.

Queen. O my son! what theme?

Ham. I lov'd Ophelia: forty thousand brothers

Could not, with all their quantity of love,

Make

up my sum. What wilt thou do for her?

King. O! he is mad, Laertes.

Queen. For love of God, forbear him.

Ham.

'Swounds! show me what thou 'It do:

Woul't weep? woul't fight? woul't fast? woul't tear thyself?
Woul't drink up Esill? eat a crocodile?

I'll do 't. Dost thou come here to whine?

To outface me with leaping in her grave?

Be buried quick with her, and so will I:

And, if thou prate of mountains, let them throw
Millions of acres on us; till our ground,

Singeing his pate against the burning zone,

Make Ossa like a wart!

I'll rant as well as thou.

Nay, an thou 'It mouth,

Queen.
And thus a while the fit will work on him;
Anon, as patient as the female dove,

This is mere madness:

When that her golden couplets are disclos'd,
His silence will sit drooping.

Ham.

Hear you, Sir:

What is the reason that you use me thus?

I lov'd you ever: but it is no matter;

Let Hercules himself do what he may,

The cat will mew, and dog will have his day.

King. I pray you, good Horatio, wait upon him.

[Exit.

[Exit HORATIO.

[To LAERTES.] Strengthen your patience in our last night's

speech;

We'll put the matter to the present push.
Good Gertrude, set some watch over your son.
This grave shall have a living monument:
An hour of quiet thereby shall we see;
Till then, in patience our proceeding be.

SCENE II.

A Hall in the Castle.

Enter HAMLET and HORATIO

[Exeunt.

Ham. So much for this, Sir: now shall you see the other. You do remember all the circumstance.

Hor. Remember it, my lord!

Ham. Sir, in my heart there was a kind of fighting,
That would not let me sleep: methought, I lay
Worse than the mutines in the bilboes. Rashly,

And prais'd be rashness for it, - let us know,

Our indiscretion sometimes serves us well,

When our deep plots do pall; and that should teach us,
There's a divinity that shapes our ends,

Rough-hew them how we will.

Hor.

Ham. Up from my cabin,

That is most certain.

My sea-gown scarf'd about me, in the dark
Grop'd I to find out them; had my desire;
Finger'd their packet; and, in fine, withdrew

To mine own room again: making so bold,

My fears forgetting manners, to unfold

Their grand commission; where I found, Horatio,
O royal knavery! an exact command,

Larded with many several sorts of reasons,
Importing Denmark's health, and England's too,
With, ho! such bugs and goblins in my life, –
That on the supervise, no leisure bated,
No, not to stay the grinding of the axe,

My head should be struck off.

Hor.

Is 't possible?

-

Ham. Here's the commission: read it at more leisure. But wilt thou hear me how I did proceed?

Hor. I beseech you.

Ham. Being thus benetted round with villains,

Ere I could make a prologue to my brains,

--

They had begun the play, I sat me down,
Devis'd a new commission; wrote it fair.
I once did hold it, as our statists do,

A baseness to write fair, and labour'd much
How to forget that learning; but, Sir, now
It did me yeoman's service. Wilt thou know
The effect of what I wrote?

Hor.

Ay, good my lord. Ham. An earnest conjuration from the king, As England was his faithful tributary,

As love between them like the palm might flourish,
As peace should still her wheaten garland wear,
And stand a comma 'tween their amities,
And many such like as 's of great charge,
That on the view and know of these contents,
Without debatement farther, more or less,
He should the bearers put to sudden death,
Not shriving-time allow'd.

Hor.

How was this seal'd?

Ham. Why, even in that was heaven ordinant. I had my father's signet in my purse,

Which was the model of that Danish seal;
Folded the writ up in form of the other;

Subscrib'd it; gave 't th' impression; plac'd it safely,
The changeling never known. Now, the next day
Was our sea-fight, and what to this was sequent
Thou know'st already.

Hor. So Guildenstern and Rosencrantz go to 't.

Ham. Why, man, they did make love to this employment: They are not near my conscience; their defeat

Does by their own insinuation grow.

'Tis dangerous, when the baser nature comes Between the pass and fell incensed points

Of mighty opposites.

Hor.

Why, what a king is this!

Ham. Does it not, think thee, stand me now upon He that hath kill'd my king, and whor'd my mother; Popp'd in between th' election and my hopes;

Thrown out his angle for my proper life,

And with such cozenage

is 't not perfect conscience,

To quit him with this arm? and is 't not to be damn'd,
To let this canker of our nature come

In farther evil?

Hor. It must be shortly known to him from England, What is the issue of the business there.

Ham. It will be short: the interim is mine;

And a man's life no more than to say, one.

But I am very sorry, good Horatio,

That to Laertes I forgot myself,

For by the image of my cause I see

The portraiture of his: I'll count his favours:
But, sure, the bravery of his grief did put me
Into a towering passion.

Hor.

Peace! who comes here?

Enter OSRICK.

Your lordship is right welcome back to Denmark.

Osr.
Ham. I humbly thank you, Sir. - Dost know this water-fly?

Hor. No, my good lord.

Ham. Thy state is the more gracious, for 't is a vice to know him. He hath much land, and fertile: let a beast be lord of beasts, and his crib shall stand at the king's mess: 't is a chough; but, as I say, spacious in the possession of dirt.

Osr. Sweet lord, if your lordship were at leisure, I should impart a thing to you from his majesty.

Ham. I will receive it, Sir, with all diligence of spirit. Your bonnet to his right use; 't is for the head.

Osr. I thank your lordship, 't is very hot.

Ham. No, believe me, 't is very cold: the wind is northerly. Osr. It is indifferent cold, my lord, indeed.

Ham. But yet, methinks, it is very sultry, and hot for my complexion.

as 't were,

Osr. Exceedingly, my lord; it is very sultry, I cannot tell how. But my lord, his majesty bade me signify to you, that he has laid a great wager on your head. Sir, this is the

-

Ham. I beseech you, remember

[HAMLET moves him to put on his Hat. Osr. Nay, in good faith; for mine ease, in good faith. Sir, here is newly come to court, Laertes; believe me, an absolute gentleman, full of most excellent differences, of very soft society, and great showing: indeed, to speak feelingly of him, he is the card or calendar of gentry, for you shall find in him the continent of what part a gentleman would see.

Ham. Sir, his definement suffers no perdition in you; though, I know, to divide him inventorially, would dizzy the arithmetic of memory; and yet but raw neither, in respect of his quick sail. But, in the verity of extolment, I take him to be a soul of great article; and his infusion of such dearth and rareness, as, to make true diction of him, his semblable is his mirror; and who else would trace him, his umbrage, nothing more.

Osr. Your lordship speaks most infallibly of him.

Ham. The concernancy, Sir? why do we wrap the gentleman in our more rawer breath?