I suffer'd much extremity for love; very near this. I'll speak What do you read, my lord? to him again. Ham. Words, words, words. Pol. What is the matter, my lord? Pol. I mean, the matter that you read, my lord. Ham. Slanders, sir: for the satirical rogue says here, that old men have gray beards; that their faces are wrinkled; their eyes purging thick amber and plum-tree gum; and that they have a plentiful lack of wit, together with most weak hams: all which, sir, though I most powerfully and potently believe, yet I hold it not honesty to have it thus set down; for you yourself, sir, should be as old as I am, if like a crab you could go backward. Pol. [Aside.] Though this be madness, yet there's method -Will you walk out of the air, my lord? in't. Ham. Into my grave? Pol. Indeed, that is out o' the air. [Aside.] How pregnant sometimes his replies are! a happiness that often madness hits on, which reason and sanity could not so prosperously be deliver❜d of. I will leave him, and suddenly contrive the means of meeting between him and my daughter. — My honourable lord, I will most humbly take my leave of you. Ham. You cannot, sir, take from me any thing that I will more willingly part withal;-[Aside.] except my life, except my life, except my life. Pol. Fare you well, my lord. Enter ROSEN CRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN. Pol. You go to seek the Lord Hamlet; there he is. Ros. My most dear lord! Ham. My excellent good friends! How dost thou, Guilden stern? Ah, Rosencrantz! Good lads, how do ye both? Ros. As the indifferent children of the Earth Guil. Happy, in that we are not overhappy; On Fortune's cap we're not the very button. Ros. Neither, my lord. Ham. What news ? Ros. None, my lord, but that the world's grown honest. Ham. Then is dooms-day near. But your news is not true. Let me question more in particular: What have you, my good friends, deserved at the hands of Fortune, that she sends you to prison hither? Ham. A goodly one; in which there are many confines wards, and dungeons, Denmark being one o' the worst. Ros. We think not so, my lord. Ham. Why, then 'tis none to you; for there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so: to me it is a prison. Ros. Why, then your ambition makes it one: 'tis too narrow for your mind. Ham. O God! I could be bounded in a nut-shell, and count myself a king of infinite space, were it not that I have bad dreams. Guil. Which dreams, indeed, are ambition; for the very substance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream. Ham. A dream itself is but a shadow. Ros. Truly; and I hold ambition of so airy and light a quality, that it is but a shadow's shadow. Ham. Then are our beggars bodies, and our monarchs and outstretch'd heroes the beggars' shadows.21 Shall we to the Court? for, by my fay, I cannot reason. Ros. Guil. We'll wait upon you. 22 Ham. No such matter: I will not sort you with the rest of my servants; for, to speak to you like an honest man, I am most dreadfully attended.23 But, in the beaten way of friendship, what make you at Elsinore? Ros. To visit you, my lord; no other occasion. Ham. Beggar that I am, I am even poor in thanks, but I thank you; and sure, dear friends, my thanks are too dear a half-penny. Were you not sent for? Is it your own inclining? is it a free visitation? Come, deal justly with me: come, come; nay, speak. Guil. What should we say, my lord? Ham. Why, any thing, but to the purpose. You were sent for; and there is a kind of confession in your looks, which your modesties have not craft enough to colour: I know the good King and Queen have sent for you. Ros. To what end, my lord? Ham. That you must teach me. But let me conjure you by the rights of our fellowship, by the consonancy of our 21 Hamlet is here playing or fencing with words, and loses himself in the riddles he is making. The meaning, however, seems to be, our beggars can at least dream of being kings and heroes; and if the substance of such ambitious men is but a dream, and if a dream is but a shadow, then our kings and heroes are but the shadows of our beggars. 22 Fay is merely a diminutive of faith. 23 Probably referring to the "bad dreams" already spoken of. youth, by the obligation of our ever-preserved love, and by what more dear a better proposer could charge you withal, be even and direct with me, whether you were sent for, or no. Ros. [Aside to GUIL.] What say you? Ham. [Aside.] Nay, then I have an eye of you. If you love me, hold not off. Guil. My lord, we were sent for. Ham. I will tell you why; so shall my anticipation prevent your discovery, and your secrecy to the King and Queen moult no feather.25 I have of late-but wherefore I know not lost all my mirth, foregone all custom of exercises; and indeed it goes so heavily with my disposition, that this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory; this most excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave o'erhanging firmament,26 this majestical roof fretted with golden fire, why, it appears no other thing to me than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours. What a piece of work is man! How noble in reason! how infinite in faculties! in form and moving how express and admirable! in action how like an angel! in apprehension how like a god! the beauty of the world! the paragon of animals! And yet, to me, what is this quintessence of dust? man delights not me; no, nor woman neither, though by your smiling you seem to say so. Ros. My lord, there was no such stuff in my thoughts. Ham. Why did you laugh then, when I said, man delights not me? Ros. To think, my lord, if you delight not in man, what lenten entertainment the players shall receive from you: 27 we coted them on the way, and hither are they coming to offer you service. Ham. He that plays the King shall be welcome; his Majesty shall have tribute of me: the adventurous knight shall use his foil and target; the lover shall not sigh gratis; the humorous man shall end his part in peace; 28 the clown shall 24 I will watch you sharply: of for on, a common usage. 25 Hamlet's fine sense of honour is well shown in this. He will not tempt them to any breach of confidence; and he means that, by telling them the reason, he will forestall and prevent their disclosure of it. Moult is an old word for change; used especially of birds when casting their feathers. So, in Bacon's Natural History: "Some, birds there be, that upon their moulting do turn colour; as robin-redbreasts, after their moulting, grow red again by degrees." 26 So the quartos; the folio omits firmament, and so turns o'erhanging into a substantive. It may well be thought that by the omission the language becomes more Shakespearian, without any loss of eloquence. But the passage, as it stands, is so much a household word, that it seems best not to change it. Brave is grand, splendid. 27" Lenten entertainment" is entertainment for the season of Lent, when players were not allowed to perform in public. See page 184, note 3. - To cote is to pass alongside, to pass by or overtake. 28 Humorous man here means a man made unhappy by his own crotchets. make those laugh whose lungs are tickled o' the sere; 29 and the lady shall say her mind freely, or the blank verse shall halt for't. What players are they? Ros. Even those you were wont to take such delight in, the tragedians of the city. Ham. How chances it they travel? their residence, both in reputation and profit, was better both ways.30 Ros. I think their inhibition comes by the means of the late innovation.31 Ham. Do they hold the same estimation they did when I was in the city? are they so follow'd? Ros. No, indeed, they are not. Ham. How comes it? do they grow rusty? Ros. Nay, their endeavour keeps in the wonted pace: but there is, sir, an aiery of children, little eyases,32 that cry out on the top of question,83 and are most tyrannically clapp'd for't: these are now the fashion; and so berattle the common stages, (so they call them,) that many wearing rapiers are afraid of goose quills, and dare scarce come thither." 35 34 Humour was used for any wayward, eccentric impulse causing a man to be full of ups and downs, or of flats and sharps. Such characters were favourites on the stage. The melancholy Jaques in As You Like It is an instance. 29 Hamlet is not pleased with the behaviour of the clowns, and is dispar aging them by ironical praise. "Tickled o' the sere" is tickled with dryness, or afflicted with a dry cough. So that the meaning is, the clown shall have the pleasure of thinking those to be laughing at his jokes, who are merely coughing from huskiness. 30 The London theatrical companies, when not allowed to play in the city, were wont to travel about the country, and exercise their craft in the towns. This was less reputable, and at the same time brought less pay, than residing in the city. Stratford was often visited by such strolling companies during the Poet's boyhood, and hence it was, probably, that he found his way to the stage. 81 Referring, no doubt, to an order of the Privy Council, issued in June, 1600. By this order the players were inhibited from acting in or near the city during the season of Lent, besides being very much restricted at all other seasons, and hence "chances it they travel," or stroll into the country. See page 210, note 5. 32 Aiery, from eyren, eggs, properly means a brood but sometimes a nest. Eyas is a name for an unfledged hawk. 33 There is some doubt as to the meaning of this. Mr. White thinks t means that they "assume superiority;" Mr. Dyce, that they "recite at the very highest pitch of their voice." The context infers that they are mightily "cracked up as excelling in something which a sober judgment would regard as a fault. To top, in Shakespeare, is generally to surpass; as in Coriolanus, ii. 1: " Topping all others in boasting." And in iv. 7, of this play: "So far he topp'd my thought." And a little later in this scene Hamlet has the words, "whose judgments cried in the top of mine," clearly meaning, whose judgments were better than mine. Question has repeatedly occurred in the sense of speech or conversation. 34 To berattle is to berate or squib. The sense of what follows is, that popguns outface pistols. 35 The allusion is to the children of St. Paul's and of the Revels, whose performing of plays was much in fashion at the time this play was written. From an early date, the choir-boys of St. Paul's, Westminster, Windsor, Ham. What, are they children? who maintains 'em? how are they escoted? 36 Will they pursue the quality no longer than they can sing? will they not say afterwards, if they should grow themselves to common players, (as it is most like, if their means are no better,) their writers do them wrong, to make them exclaim against their own succession ? 37 Ros. 'Faith, there has been much to-do on both sides; and the nation holds it no sin to tarre them to controversy: 38 there was, for a while, no money bid for argument, unless the poet and the player went to cuffs in the question. Ham. Is't possible? Guil. O, there has been much throwing about of brains.*9 Ham. Do the boys carry it away ? 40 Ros. Ay, that they do, my lord; Hercules and his load too." Ham. It is not very strange; for my uncle is King of Denmark, and those that would make mows at him while my father lived, give twenty, forty, fifty, an hundred ducats a-piece for his picture in little. 'Sblood, there is something in this more than natural, if philosophy could find it out. [Flourish of Trumpets within. Your Guil. There are the players. Ham. Gentlemen, you are welcome to Elsinore. hands, come: the appurtenance of welcome is fashion and ceremony: let me comply with you in this garb; 41 lest my extent to the players (which, I tell you, must show fairly outward) should more appear like entertainment than yours. You are welcome; but my uncle-father and aunt-mother are deceiv'd. Guil. In what, my dear lord? and the Chapel Royal, were engaged in such performances, and sometimes played at Court. The complaint here is, that these juveniles so abuse "the common stages," that is, the theatres, as to deter many from visiting them. In Jack Drum's Entertainment, 1601, one of the speakers says they were heard "with much applause;" and another speaks thus: "I sawe the children of Powles last night, and, troth, they pleas'd me prettie, prettie well: the apes in time will do it handsomely." 36 Escoted is paid; from the French escot, a shot or reckoning. - Quality is profession or calling; often so used.— "No longer than they can sing " means no longer than they keep the voices of boys. 87 Run down the profession to which they are themselves to succeed. - 88 To-do, commonly printed to do, is the same as ado. To tarre is to set on, or incite; a phrase borrowed from setting on dogs. I am not sure that I understand what follows. Argument was commonly used for subject or matter, but it hardly seems to mean that here. Perhaps inducement comes nearest to the meaning of it. 89 Bandying of wit, or pelting each other with words. 40 That is, carry all the world before them: there is perhaps an allusion to the Globe theatre, the sign of which is said to have been Hercules carrying the globe. 41 To comply with, as here used, evidently means to be formally civil or polite to, or to compliment. We have it again in the same sense, in v. 2 where Hamlet says of Osric," He did comply with his dug before he suck'd it." |