Hamlet (17 page)

The
counterfeit presentment
⁶²
of two brothers.

See what a grace was seated on his brow:

Hyperion
’s curls, the
front
⁶⁴
of Jove himself,

An eye like
Mars
⁶⁵
to threaten or command,

A
station
like the herald
Mercury
⁶⁶

New-lighted
⁶⁷
on a heaven-kissing hill,

A combination and a form indeed

Where every god did seem to set his
seal
⁶⁹

To give the world assurance of a man:

This was your husband. Look you now, what follows:

Here is your husband, like a mildewed
ear
⁷²
,

Blasting
⁷³
his wholesome brother. Have you eyes?

Could you on this fair mountain
leave
⁷⁴
to feed

And
batten
on this
moor
⁷⁵
? Ha! Have you eyes?

You cannot call it love, for at your age

The
heyday in the blood
⁷⁷
is tame, it’s humble,

And waits upon the judgement: and what judgement

Would step from this to this? What devil was’t

That thus hath
cozened
you at
hoodman-blind
⁸⁰
?

O, shame, where is thy blush? Rebellious hell,

If thou canst
mutine
in a
matron’s
⁸²
bones,

To flaming youth let virtue be as wax

And melt in her own fire. Proclaim no shame

When the
compulsive ardour gives the charge
⁸⁵
,

Since
frost
⁸⁶
itself as actively doth burn

And reason
panders
will
⁸⁷
.

GERTRUDE
    O Hamlet, speak no more:

Thou turn’st mine eyes into my very soul,

And there I see such black and
grainèd
⁹⁰
spots

As will not
leave their tinct
⁹¹
.

HAMLET
    Nay, but to live

In the rank sweat of an
enseamèd
⁹³
bed,

Stewed
in corruption,
honeying
and
making love
⁹⁴

Over the
nasty
sty
⁹⁵
—

GERTRUDE
    O, speak to me no more:

These words like daggers enter in mine ears.

No more, sweet Hamlet!

HAMLET
    A murderer and a villain,

A slave that is not twentieth part the
tithe
¹⁰⁰

Of your
precedent lord
, a
vice
¹⁰¹
of kings,

A
cutpurse
¹⁰²
of the empire and the rule,

That from a shelf the precious
diadem
¹⁰³
stole,

And put it in his pocket!

GERTRUDE
    No more!

HAMLET
    A king of
shreds and patches
¹⁰⁶
—

Save me, and hover o’er me with your wings,

Sees the Ghost

You heavenly guards!— What would you, gracious figure?

GERTRUDE
    Alas, he’s mad!

HAMLET
    Do you not come your tardy son to chide,

That, lapsed in time and passion, lets go by

Th’
important
¹¹²
acting of your dread command? O, say!

GHOST
    Do not forget: this visitation

Is but to whet thy almost blunted purpose.

But look, amazement on thy mother sits.

O, step between her and her fighting soul:

Conceit
¹¹⁷
in weakest bodies strongest works:

Speak to her, Hamlet.

HAMLET
    How is it with you, lady?

GERTRUDE
    Alas, how is’t with you,

That you do bend your eye on vacancy

And with
th’incorporal
¹²²
air do hold discourse?

Forth at your eyes your
spirits
¹²³
wildly peep,

And,
as the sleeping soldiers in th’alarm
¹²⁴
,

Your bedded hair,
like life in excrements
¹²⁵
,

Start up and stand on end. O gentle son,

Upon the heat and flame of thy distemper

Sprinkle cool patience. Whereon do you look?

HAMLET
    On him, on him! Look you how pale he glares!

His form and cause conjoined
¹³⁰
, preaching to stones,

Would make them capable.— Do not look upon me,

To the Ghost

Lest with this
piteous
action you
convert
¹³²

My stern effects: then what I have to do

Will
want
true
colour
¹³⁴
; tears perchance for blood.

GERTRUDE
    To who do you speak this?

HAMLET
    Do you see nothing there?

GERTRUDE
    Nothing at all, yet all that is I see.

HAMLET
    Nor did you nothing hear?

GERTRUDE
    No, nothing but ourselves.

HAMLET
    Why, look you there: look, how it steals away.

My father, in his
habit
as
¹⁴¹
he lived!

Look where he goes even now out at the portal.

GERTRUDE
    This is the very
coinage
¹⁴³
of your brain:

This bodiless creation ecstasy is very
cunning
¹⁴⁴
in.

HAMLET
    Ecstasy?

My pulse as yours doth temperately keep time,

And makes as healthful music: it is not madness

That I have uttered. Bring me to the test,

And I the matter will
reword
¹⁴⁹
, which madness

Would
gambol
¹⁵⁰
from. Mother, for love of grace,

Lay not a flattering
unction
¹⁵¹
to your soul

That not your
trespass
¹⁵²
, but my madness speaks:

It will but
skin and film
¹⁵³
the ulcerous place,

Whilst rank corruption,
mining
¹⁵⁴
all within,

Infects unseen. Confess yourself to heaven,

Repent what’s past, avoid what is to come,

And do not spread the compost o’er the weeds

To make them
ranker
. Forgive me this my
virtue
¹⁵⁸
,

For in the fatness of these
pursy
¹⁵⁹
times

Virtue itself of vice must pardon beg,

Yea,
curb and woo
¹⁶¹
for leave to do him good.

GERTRUDE
    O Hamlet, thou hast cleft my heart in twain.

HAMLET
    O, throw away the worser part of it,

And live the purer with the other half.

Goodnight. But go not to mine uncle’s bed:

Assume a virtue, if you have it not.

Refrain tonight,

And that shall lend a kind of easiness

To the next abstinence. Once more, goodnight:

And when you are desirous to be blessed,

I’ll blessing beg of you. For this same lord,

Points to the body

I do repent, but heaven hath pleased it so

To punish me with this, and this with me,

That
I must be their
scourge and minister
¹⁷⁴
.

I will
bestow
him, and will
answer well
¹⁷⁵

The death I gave him. So, again, goodnight.

I must be cruel, only to be kind:

Thus bad begins and worse remains
behind
¹⁷⁸
.

GERTRUDE
    What shall I do?

HAMLET
    Not this by no means that I bid you do:

Let the
bloat
¹⁸¹
king tempt you again to bed,

Pinch wanton
on your cheek, call you his
mouse
¹⁸²
,

And let him, for a pair of
reechy
¹⁸³
kisses,

Or paddling in your neck with his damned fingers,

Make you to
ravel all this matter out
¹⁸⁵
,

That I essentially am not in madness,

But mad
in craft
¹⁸⁷
. ’Twere good you let him know,

For who that’s but a queen, fair, sober, wise,

Would from a
paddock, from a bat, a gib
¹⁸⁹
,

Such
dear concernings
¹⁹⁰
hide? Who would do so?

No, in despite of sense and secrecy,

Unpeg
¹⁹²
the basket on the house’s top,

Let the birds fly, and like the
famous ape
¹⁹³
,

To
try conclusions
¹⁹⁴
, in the basket creep,

And break your own neck down.

GERTRUDE
    Be thou assured, if words be made of breath

And breath of life, I have no life to breathe

What thou hast said to me.

HAMLET
    I must to England: you know that?

GERTRUDE
    Alack,

I had forgot: ’tis so concluded on.

HAMLET
    This man shall
set me packing
²⁰²
:

I’ll lug the guts into the neighbour room.

Mother, goodnight. Indeed this counsellor

Is now most
still, most secret and most grave
²⁰⁵
,

Who was in life a foolish
prating
²⁰⁶
knave.—

Come, sir, to
draw toward an end with you
²⁰⁷
.—

Goodnight, mother.

KING
    There’s
matter
²⁰⁹
in these sighs, these profound heaves,

You must translate: ’tis fit we understand them.

Where is your son?

GERTRUDE
    Ah, my good lord, what have I seen tonight!

KING
    What, Gertrude? How does Hamlet?

GERTRUDE
    Mad as the seas and wind when both contend

Which is the mightier: in his lawless fit,

Behind the arras hearing something stir,

He whips his rapier out and cries, ‘A rat, a rat!’

And in his
brainish apprehension
²¹⁸
kills

The unseen good old man.

KING
    O,
heavy
²²⁰
deed!

It had been so with us, had we been there.

His liberty is full of threats to all:

To you yourself, to us, to everyone.

Alas, how shall this bloody deed be
answered
²²⁴
?

It will be laid to us, whose
providence
²²⁵

Should have kept
short
, restrained and out of
haunt
²²⁶

This mad young man: but so much was our love,

We would not understand what was most fit,

But, like the owner of a foul disease,

To keep it from
divulging
²³⁰
, lets it feed

Even on the pith of life. Where is he gone?

GERTRUDE
    To draw
apart
²³²
the body he hath killed,

O’er whom his very madness, like some
ore
²³³

Among a
mineral
²³⁴
of metals base,

Shows itself pure: he weeps for what is done.

KING
    O Gertrude, come away!

The sun no sooner shall the mountains touch,

But we will ship him hence, and this vile deed

We must with all our majesty and skill,

Both
countenance
²⁴⁰
and excuse.—

                      Ho, Guildenstern!

Friends both, go join you with some further aid.

Hamlet in madness hath Polonius slain,

And from his mother’s closet hath he dragged him:

Go seek him out, speak fair, and bring the body

Into the chapel. I pray you haste in this.

Come, Gertrude, we’ll call up our wisest friends

To let them know, both what we mean to do

And
what’s untimely done
²⁴⁸
. O, come away!

My soul is full of discord and dismay.

HAMLET
    Safely
stowed
¹
.

GENTLEMEN
    Hamlet, Lord Hamlet!

Within

HAMLET
    What noise? Who calls on Hamlet? O, here they come.