Hamlet (19 page)
Authors: William Shakespeare
Exit
To Horatio
KING
Follow her close: give her good watch,
I pray you.
[
Exit Horatio
]
O, this is the poison of deep grief: it springs
All from her father’s death. O Gertrude, Gertrude,
When sorrows come, they come not single
spies
76
But in battalions. First, her father slain:
Next, your son gone, and he most violent author
Of his own just
remove
: the people
muddied
79
,
Thick and unwholesome in their thoughts and whispers
For good Polonius’ death, and we have done but
greenly
81
In
hugger-mugger
82
to inter him: poor Ophelia
Divided from herself and her fair judgement,
Without the which we are pictures or mere beasts:
Last, and
as much containing
85
as all these,
Her brother is in secret come from France,
Feeds on his
wonder
, keeps himself
in clouds
87
,
And
wants
not
buzzers
88
to infect his ear
With pestilent speeches of his father’s death,
Wherein necessity,
of matter beggared
90
,
Will
nothing stick our persons to arraign
91
In ear and ear. O, my dear Gertrude, this,
Like to a
murdering-piece
93
, in many places
A noise within
Enter a Messenger
GERTRUDE
Alack, what noise is this?
KING
Where are my
Switzers
96
? Let them guard the door.—
What is the matter?
MESSENGER
Save yourself, my lord.
The ocean,
overpeering of his list
99
,
Eats not the
flats
100
with more impiteous haste
Than young Laertes, in a riotous
head
101
,
O’erbears your officers. The rabble call him lord,
And,
as
103
the world were now but to begin,
Antiquity
104
forgot, custom not known,
The ratifiers and props of every word
105
,
They cry ‘Choose we! Laertes shall be king.’
Caps
107
, hands and tongues, applaud it to the clouds:
‘Laertes shall be king, Laertes king!’
GERTRUDE
How cheerfully on the false trail they cry!
Noise within
Enter Laertes
His followers remain at the door
KING
The doors are broke.
LAERTES
Where is the king?— Sirs, stand you all
without
112
.
ALL FOLLOWERS
No, let’s come in.
At the door
LAERTES
I pray you give me leave.
ALL
We will, we will.
LAERTES
I thank you:
keep
116
the door.— O thou vile king,
Give me my father!
Restrains him or blocks his way
GERTRUDE
Calmly, good Laertes.
LAERTES
That drop of blood that’s calm proclaims me bastard,
Cries
cuckold
120
to my father, brands the harlot
Even here,
between
the chaste
unsmirchèd
121
brow
Of my
true
122
mother.
KING
What is the cause, Laertes,
That thy rebellion looks so giant-like?—
Let him go, Gertrude: do not
fear
125
our person:
There’s such divinity doth
hedge
126
a king
That treason can
but peep to what it would
127
,
Acts little of his will.— Tell me, Laertes,
Why thou art thus incensed.— Let him go, Gertrude.—
Speak, man.
LAERTES
Where’s my father?
KING
Dead.
GERTRUDE
But not by him.
KING
Let him demand his fill.
LAERTES
How came he dead? I’ll not be
juggled with
135
:
To hell, allegiance! Vows, to the blackest devil!
Conscience and grace, to the profoundest pit!
I dare damnation.
To this point I stand
138
,
That
both the worlds I give to negligence
139
,
Let come what comes, only I’ll be revenged
Most
throughly
141
for my father.
KING
Who shall
stay
142
you?
LAERTES
My will, not all the world
143
:
And for my means, I’ll
husband
144
them so well,
They shall go far with little.
KING
Good Laertes,
If you desire to know the certainty
Of your dear father’s death, is’t writ in your revenge,
That,
sweepstake
, you will
draw
149
both friend and foe,
Winner and loser?
LAERTES
None but his enemies.
KING
Will you know them then?
LAERTES
To his good friends thus wide I’ll ope my arms,
And like the kind life-rend’ring
pelican
154
,
Repast
155
them with my blood.
KING
Why, now you speak
Like a good child and a true gentleman.
That I am guiltless of your father’s death,
And am most
sensible
159
in grief for it,
It shall as
level
160
to your judgement pierce
As day does to your eye.
A noise within
ALL FOLLOWERS
Let her come in!
Enter Ophelia
LAERTES
How now? What noise is that?
Sees Ophelia
O, heat dry up my brains, tears seven times salt
Burn out the sense and
virtue
165
of mine eye!
By heaven, thy madness shall be paid by weight,
Till our scale
turns the beam
167
. O rose of May,
Dear maid, kind sister, sweet Ophelia!
O heavens, is’t possible a young maid’s wits
Should be as mortal as an old man’s life?
Nature
is
fine in
171
love, and where ’tis fine,
It sends some precious
instance
172
of itself
Sings
OPHELIA
They bore him barefaced on the
bier
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,
Hey non nonny, nonny, hey nonny
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,
And on his grave rains many a tear—
Fare you well, my dove.
LAERTES
Hadst thou thy wits and didst persuade revenge,
It could not
move
179
thus.
OPHELIA
You
180
must sing ‘a-down a-down’, and you call him
‘a-down-a’. O, how the
wheel
becomes it! It is the
false
181
steward that stole his master’s daughter.
LAERTES
This nothing’s more than matter
183
.
OPHELIA
There’s
rosemary
184
, that’s for remembrance: pray,
Gives real or imaginary flowers
love, remember: and there is
pansies
185
, that’s for thoughts.
LAERTES
A
document
186
in madness, thoughts and remem-
brance
fitted
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.
OPHELIA
There’s
fennel
for you, and
columbines
: there’s
rue
188
for you, and here’s some for me: we may call it herb-grace
o’Sundays
: O, you must wear your rue with a
difference
190
.
There’s a
daisy
: I would give you some
violets
191
, but they
withered all when my father died: they say he made a good
end—
Sings
For bonny sweet Robin is all my joy
194
.
LAERTES
Thought
and affliction,
passion
195
, hell itself,
She turns to
favour
196
and to prettiness.
Sings
OPHELIA
And will he not come again?
And will he not come again?
No, no, he is dead:
Go to thy death-bed,
He never will come again.
His beard as white as snow,
He is gone, he is gone,
And we
cast away moan
205
.
Gramercy
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on his soul!
And of all Christian souls, I pray God.
God buy ye
207
.
Exeunt Ophelia
[
and Gertrude?
]
LAERTES
Do you see this, you gods?
KING
Laertes, I must commune with your grief,
Or you deny me right. Go but apart,
Make choice of
whom
211
your wisest friends you will,
And they shall hear and judge
’twixt
212
you and me:
If by direct or by
collateral
213
hand
They find us
touched
214
, we will our kingdom give,
Our crown, our life, and all that we call ours
To you in satisfaction. But if not,
Be you content to lend your patience to us,
And we shall jointly labour with your soul
To give it due content.
LAERTES
Let this be so:
His means of death, his obscure burial —
No
trophy
, sword, nor
hatchment
222
o’er his bones,
No noble rite nor formal
ostentation
223
—
Cry to be heard, as ’twere from heaven to earth,
That
I must
call in question
225
.
KING
So you shall,
And where th’offence is, let the great axe fall.
I pray you go with me.
Exeunt
running scene 14
Enter Horatio with an Attendant
HORATIO
What are they that would speak with me?
SERVANT
Sailors, sir: they say they have letters for you.
HORATIO
Let them come in.
[
Exit Servant
]
I do not know from what part of the world
I should be greeted, if not from Lord Hamlet.
Enter Sailor
SAILOR
God bless you, sir.
HORATIO
Let him bless thee too.
SAILOR
He shall, sir,
an’t
8
please him. There’s a
Gives a letter
letter for you, sir: it comes from th’ambassador that was
bound for England, if your name be Horatio, as I am let to
know it is.
HORATIO
Reads the letter
‘Horatio, when thou shalt have
overlooked
this, give these fellows some
means
13
to the king:
they have letters for him. Ere we were two days old at sea, a
pirate of very warlike
appointment
15
gave us chase. Finding
ourselves too slow of sail, we put on a
compelled
16
valour, in
the
grapple
17
I boarded them: on the instant they got clear of
our ship, so I alone became their prisoner. They have dealt
with me like
thieves of mercy
19
, but they knew what they did: I
am to do a good turn for them. Let the king have the letters I
have sent, and
repair
21
thou to me with as much haste as thou
wouldst fly death. I have words to speak in your ear will
make thee dumb, yet are they much
too light for the
bore
23
of
the matter. These good fellows will bring thee where I am.
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern hold their course for England:
of them I have much to tell thee. Farewell. He that thou
knowest thine, Hamlet.’—
Come, I will give you
way
28
for these your letters,
And do’t the speedier that you may direct me
To him from whom you brought them.