HAMLET,

PRINCE OF DENMARK.

ACT I.

SCENE 1.-Elsinore. A platform before the castle. Francisco on his post. Enter to him Bernardo.

WHO'S there?

Bernardo.

Fran. Nay, answer me: stand, and unfold Yourself.

Ber. Long live the king!

Fran.

Ber.

Bernardo?

He.

Fran. You come most carefully upon your hour. Ber. 'Tis now struck twelve; get thee to bed, Francisco.

Fran. For this relief, much thanks: 'tis bitter

cold,

And I am sick at heart.

If

Ber. Have you had quiet guard?

Fran.

Ber. Well, good night.

Not a mouse stirring.

you do meet Horatio and Marcellus,

The rivals of my watch, bid them make haste.

Enter Horatio and Marcellus.

Fran. I think, I hear them.-Stand, ho! Who is there?

VOL. VIII.

(1) Partners.

P

A piece of him.

What, is Horatio there?

Hor.

Ber. Welcome, Horatio; welcome, good Mar

cellus.

Hor. What, has this thing appear'd again tonight?

Ber. I have seen nothing.

Mar. Horatio says, 'tis but our fantasy;
And will not let belief take hold of him,
Touching this dreaded sight, twice seen of us;
Therefore I have entreated him, along
With us to watch the minutes of this night;
That, if again this apparition come,
He may approve1 our eyes, and speak to it.
Hor. Tush! tush! 'twill not appear.
Ber.
And let us once again assail your ears,
That are so fortified against our story,
What we two nights have seen.

Hor.

Sit down a while;

Well, sit we down, And let us hear Bernardo speak of this. Ber. Last night of all,

When yon same star, that's westward from the pole,

Had made his course to illume that part of heaven Where now it burns, Marcellus, and myself,

The bell then beating one,

Mar. Peace, break thee off; look, where it comes again!

(1) Make good, or establish.

Enter Ghost.

Ber. In the same figure like the king that's dead.
Mar. Thou art a scholar, speak to it, Horatio.
Ber. Looks it not like the king? mark it, Horatio.
Hor. Most like it harrows1 me with fear, and
wonder.

Ber. It would be spoke to.

Mar.

Speak to it, Horatio. Hor. What art thou, that usurp'st this time of

night,

Together with that fair and warlike form

In which the majesty of buried Denmark

Did. sometimes march? by heaven I charge thee,

speak.

Mar. It is offended.

Ber.

See! it stalks away.

[Exit Ghost.

Hor. Stay; speak: speak I charge thee, speak.

Mar. 'Tis gone, and will not answer.

Ber. How now, Horatio? you tremble, and look
pale:

Is not this something more than fantasy?
What think you of it?

Hor. Before my God, I might not this believe,
Without the sensible and true avouch

Of mine own eyes,

Mar.

Is it not like the king?

Hor. As thou art to thyself:
Such was the very armour he had on,
When he the ambitious Norway combated:
So frown'd he once, when, in angry parle,2
He smote the sledded3 Polack4 on the ice.
'Tis strange.

Mar. Thus, twice before, and jumps at this dead hour,

With martial stalk hath he gone by our watch.

(1) Conquers.

(2) Dispute. (3) Sledged.

(4) Polander, an inhabitant of Poland.
(5) Just.

Hor. In what particular thought to work, I know

not;

But, in the gross and scope of mine opinion,
This bodes some strange eruption to our state.
Mar. Good now, sit down, and tell

knows,

me,

he that

Why this same strict and most observant watch
So nightly toils the subject of the land;
And why such daily cast of brazen cannon,
And foreign mart for implements of war;
Why such impress of shipwrights, whose sore task
Does not divide the Sunday from the week:
What might be toward, that this sweaty haste
Doth make the night joint-labourer with the day;
Who is't, that can inform me?
That can I;
At least, the whisper goes so. Our last king,
Whose image even but now appear'd to us,
Was, as you know, by Fortinbras of Norway,
Thereto prick'd on by a most emulate pride,
Dar'd to the combat; in which our valiant Hamlet
(For so this side of our known world esteem'd him,)
Did slay this Fortinbras; who, by a seal'd compact,
Well ratified by law and heraldry,

Hor.

Did forfeit, with his life, all those his lands
Which he stood seiz'd of, to the conqueror:
Against the which, a moiety competent
Was gaged by our king; which had return'd
To the inheritance of Fortinbras,

Had he been vanquisher; as, by the same co-mart,1
And carriage of the article design'd,2

His fell to Hamlet: Now, sir, young Fortinbras,
Of unimproved mettle hot and full,3

Hath in the skirts of Norway, here and there,
Shark'd4 up a list of landless resolutes,

(1) Joint bargain.

(2) The covenant to confirm that bargain. (3) Full of spirit without experience.

Picked.

For food and diet, to some enterprise

That hath a stomach in't: which is no other
(As it doth well appear unto our state,)
But to recover of us, by strong hand,
And terms compulsatory, those 'foresaid lands
So by his father lost: And this, I take it,
Is the main motive of our preparations;
The source of this our watch; and the chief head
Of this post-haste and romage2 in the land.
[Ber. I think, it be no other, but even so:
Well may it sort,3 that this portentous figure
Comes armed through our watch; so like the king
That was, and is, the question of these wars.
Hor. A mote it is, to trouble the mind's eye.
In the most high and palmy4 state of Rome,
A little ere the mightiest Julius fell,

The graves stood tenantless, and the sheeted dead
Did squeak and gibber in the Roman streets.

* * *****

*

* * * * * *

As, stars with trains of fire and dews of blood,
Disasters in the sun; and the moist star,5
Upon whose influence Neptune's empire stands,
Was sick almost to doomsday with eclipse.
And even the like precurse of fierce events,-
As harbingers preceding still the fates,
And prologue to the omen6 coming on,
Have heaven and earth together démonstrated
Unto our climatures and countrymen.-]
Re-enter Ghost.

But, soft; behold! lo, where it comes again!
I'll cross it, though it blast me.-Stay, illusion!
If thou hast any sound, or use of voice,

Speak to me:

If there be any good thing to be done,

That may to thee do ease, and grace to me,

Speak to me:

(1) Resolution.

(2) Search.

(4) Victorious.

(3) Suit.

(5) The moon.

(6) Event.