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QUEEN. No, no, the drink, the drink,- my dear Hamlet!

The drink, the drink; I am poison'd! [Dies.

HAM. O villainy! Ho! let the door be lock'd: Treachery! seek it out. [LAERTES falls.

LAER. It is here, Hamlet: Hamlet, thou art

slain;

No medicine in the world can do thee good,
In thee there is not half an hour's life;
The treacherous instrument is in thy hand,
Unbated, and envenom'd: the foul practice"
Hath turn'd itself on me; lo, here I lie,
Never to rise again: Thy mother's poison'd;
I can no more; the king, the king's to blame.
HAM. The point
Envenom'd too! Then, venom, to thy work.
[Stabs the King.

OSR. & LORDS. Treason! treason!

KING. O, yet defend me, friends, I am but hurt.
HAM. Here, thou incestuous, murd'rous, damned

Dane,

the onixe, Drink off this potion: Is thy union* here? Follow my mother."

4tos.

LAER.

[King dies.

He is justly serv'd;
It is a poison temper'd by himself.-
Exchange forgiveness with me, noble Hamlet:
Mine and my father's death come not upon thee;
Nor thine on me! (62)

C

[Dies.

HAM. Heaven make thee free of it! I follow thee.

unbated] See IV. 7. King.

the foul practice] See "pass of practice," IV. 7. King.

Is thy union here? follow my mother]

A bitter sarcasm.

Take this as thy lot or portion! the richly prepared cup! D'ye

find here an union? Go with, follow the queen!

temper'] Prepared, having the ingredients mixed.

I am dead, Horatio: Wretched queen, adieu!
You that look pale and tremble at this chance,
That are but mutes or audience to this act,"
Had I but time, (as this fell sergeant, death,
Is strict in his arrest,) (63) O, I could tell you,-
But let it be: Horatio, I am dead;

Thou liv'st; report me and my cause aright
To the unsatisfied.

HOR.

Never believe it;

I am more an antique Roman than a Dane,
Here's yet some liquor left.

HAM.

Give me the

As thou'rt a man,cup; let go; by heaven I'll have it. O God! Horatio, what a wounded name,

Things standing thus unknown, shall live behind me ?b

If thou didst ever hold me in thy heart,
Absent thee from felicity awhile,

And in this harsh world draw thy breath in pain,
To tell my story.—

[March afar off, and Shot within.

What warlike noise is this?

OSR. Young Fortinbras, with conquest come from Poland,

To the ambassadors of England gives

This warlike volley.

HAM.

O, I die, Horatio;

• That are but mutes or audience to this act] That are either auditors of this catastrophe, or at most only mute performers, that fill the stage without any part in the action. JOHNSON.

blive behind me] Survive me.

If thou didst ever-to tell my story] There is hardly a bosom that can be unmoved by the interest and feeling excited in this passage: but it is its ease, that constitutes its felicity; it is its unlaboured, simple beauties that give the character of sublimity to this solemn and dignified farewel.

Kent, though not indeed with so high an interest and such exquisite feeling, utters a similar sentiment, when Lear expires.

"Would not upon the rack of this rough world
"Stretch him out longer." End of the play.

The potent poison quite o'er-crows my spirit;
I cannot live to hear the news from England:•
But I do prophecy the election lights
On Fortinbras; he has my dying voice;

(64)

So tell him, with the occurrents, (65) more or less,
Which have solicited,The rest is silence. [Dies.
HOR. Now cracks a noble heart: (66)-Good
night, sweet prince;

And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest!
Why does the drum come hither? [March within.

Enter FORTINBRAS, the English Ambassadors, and Others.

FORT. Where is this sight?

HOR.

What is it, you would see? If aught of woe, or wonder, cease your search. FORT. This quarry cries on havock!-O proud

death!

What feast is toward in thine eternal cell,()
That thou so many princes, at a shot,

So bloodily hast struck?

1 AMB.

The sight is dismal; And our affairs from England come too late: The ears are senseless, that should give us hearing, To tell him, his commandment is fulfill'd, That Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead: Where should we have our thanks?

the news from England] i. e. the fate of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.

the occurrents, more or less, which have solicited] Which have importunately and irresistibly urged on-he would have said, "this sad catastrophe."

• This quarry cries on havock] This heap of prey (see quarry, Macb. IV. 3. Rosse) proclaims that, which is the signal of desolation in war, havoc. The phrase, cries on, is much in the same way applied to murder in Othello;

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"Whose noise is this, that cries on murder?"

V. 1. Iago.

our affairs from England] Matters of our embassage.

HOR.

Not from his mouth,

Had it the ability of life to thank you;
He never gave commandment for their death."
But since, so jump upon this bloody question,"
You from the Polack wars, and you from England,
Are here arriv'd; give order, that these bodies
High on a stage be placed to the view; (6)
And let me speak, to the yet unknowing world,
How these things come about: So shall you hear
Of carnal, bloody, and unnatural acts;
Of accidental judgments, casual slaughters;
Of deaths put on by cunning, and forc'd cause;
And, in this upshot, purposes mistook
Fall'n on the inventors' heads: all this can I
Truly deliver.

[blocks in formation]

(69)

⚫ for no, 4tos.

• So 4tos.

And call the noblest to the audience.
For me, with sorrow I embrace my fortune;
I have some rights of memory in this kingdom,
Which are* to claim, my vantage doth invite me. 32.
HOR. Of that I shall have always cause to speak,

Not from his mouth,

Had it the ability of life

He never gave commandment for their death] Had it the means, that life affords, not from the mouth of the king; from whom they, as the creatures and spies of his villanies, would have received protection, and whose more atrocious aims, when disclosed to them, would appear to have been directed against the life of his nephew, Hamlet. This obscure intimation, this mystery thrown over the transaction, would heighten curiosity and the interest of the communications, presently expected from Horatio.

jump upon this bloody question] Close upon, and as if by a spring or bound reaching it. "Just or jump at this dead hour," are the different readings of the folios and quartos in I. 1. Marc.

с

* put on by cunning] Produced.

rights of memory, &c.] Borne in memory, not forgotten; and thence to have effect given them.

rites, 1623,

⚫ now, 4tos.

And from his mouth whose voice will draw on

more:a

But let this same be presently perform'd,

Even while men's minds are wild," lest more mis

chance,

On plots, and errors, happen.

FORT.

Let four captains

Bear Hamlet, like a soldier, to the stage;
For he was likely, had he been put on,

d

To have prov'd most royally: and, for his passage,
The soldier's musick, and the rites of war,
Speak loudly for him.

Take up the bodies: Such a sight as this
Becomes the field, but here shows much amiss.
Go, bid the soldiers shoot.

[A dead March. [Exeunt, bearing off the dead Bodies; after which, a Peal of Ordnance is shot off."

f

• I shall have always cause—whose voice shall draw on more] From Hamlet's, whose dying voice or suffrage will produce or draw in its train many more. For always, the quartos read also.

The fo. of 1632 gives the line

"Of that I shall alwayes cause to speak."

bare wild] Unsettled.

e

On plots and errors happen] i. e. in consequence, the effect of.

d put on] Put to the proof, tried.

for his passage] As to order taken for the ceremony of conveying him.

If the dramas of Shakespeare were to be characterised, each by the particular excellence which distinguishes it from the rest, we must allow to the tragedy of Hamlet the praise of variety. The incidents are so numerous, that the argument of the play would make a long tale. The scenes are interchangeably diversified with merriment and solemnity: with merriment that includes judicious and instructive observations; and solemnity not strained by poetical violence above the natural sentiments of man. New characters appear from time to time in continual succession, exhibiting various forms of life and particular modes of conversation. The pretended madness of Hamlet causes much mirth, the mournful distraction of Ophelia fills the heart with tenderness, and every personage produces the effect intended, from the apparition that in the first Act chills the blood

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