No, not to stay the grinding of the axe, HOR. Is't possible? HAM. Here's the commission; read it at more leisure. But wilt thou hear now* how I did proceed? HOR. I beseech you. HAM. Being thus benetted round with villanies †, Or I could make a prologue to my brains, They had begun the play ;-I sat me down; *First folio, hear me. + Quarto, and first folio, villaines. First folio, Ere. favour it is made, is called an allowance. Hence he takes the liberty of using bated for allowed. WARBURTON. No leisure bated-means, without any abatement or intermission of time. MALONE. 3 That, on the supervise, no leisure bated,― My head should be struck off.] From what original our author derived this incident of detecting the letter, and exchanging it for another, I am unqualified to determine. A similar stratagem, however, occurs in Andrew of Wyntown's Cronykil, b. vi. ch. xiii. "The Prest that purs opnyd swne, "And fand in it that letter dwne. "The berere of it for to be slayne. "That Letter away than pwte he qwyte, "And sone ane othir than couth he wryte "He cloysed thys Letter curywsly, "And in the purs all prewely "He pwt it quhare the tothir was." v. 188, & seq. The words of the first letter are, Visa litera, lator illius moriatur. Thus also Hamlet: "That, on the supervise, "He should the bearers put to sudden death." The story, however varied, perhaps originated from the Bellerophontis literæ. STEEVENS. 4 OR I could make-] Or in old English signified before. See King John, Act IV. Sc. III. MALONE. s Being thus benetted round with villanies, Or I could make a prologue to my brains, They had begun the play;] Hamlet is telling how luckily every thing fell out; he groped out their commission in the dark Devis'd a new commission: wrote it fair : HOR. Ay, good my lord. HAM. An earnest conjuration from the king,— As England was his faithful tributary; without waking them; he found himself doomed to immediate destruction. Something was to be done for his preservation. An expedient occurred, not produced by the comparison of one method with another, or by a regular deduction of consequences, but before he "could make a prologue to his brains, they had begun the play." Before he could summon his faculties, and propose to himself what should be done, a complete scheme of action presented itself to him. His mind operated before he had excited it. This appears to me to be the meaning. JOHNSON. 6 as our STATISTs do,] A statist is a statesman. So, in Shirley's Humorous Courtier, 1640: 66 that he is wise, a statist." Again, in Ben Jonson's Magnetick Lady: "Will screw you out a secret from a statist." STEEVENS. Most of the great men of Shakspeare's times, whose autographs have been preserved, wrote very bad hands; their secretaries very neat ones. BLACKSTONE. 7 I once did hold it, as our statists do, A baseness to write fair,] "I have in my time, (says Montaigne) seene some, who by writing did earnestly get both their titles and living, to disavow their apprentissage, marre their pen, and affect the ignorance of so vulgar a qualitie." Florio's translation, 1603, p. 125. RITSON. So, in the Woman Hater, by Fletcher : "Gent. 'Tis well and you have learned to write a bad hand, that the readers may take pains for it.-Your lordship hath a secretary that can write fair when you purpose to be understood." BOSWELL. 8 ― yeoman's service:] The meaning, I believe, is, This yeomanly qualification was a most useful servant, or yeoman, to me; i. e. did me eminent service. The ancient yeomen were famous for their military valour. "These were the good archers in times past, (says Sir Thomas Smith,) and the stable troop of footmen that affraide all France." STEEVENS. As love between them like the palm might* flourish"; As peace should still her wheaten garland wear, * First folio, As the palm should. 9- like the palm might flourish ;] This comparison is scrip tural: "The righteous shall flourish like a palm-tree." Psalm xcii. 11, STEEVENS. 'As peace should still her wheaten garland wear, And stand a coMMA 'tween their amities ;] The expression of our author is, like many of his phrases, sufficiently constrained and affected, but it is not incapable of explanation. The comma is the note of connection and continuity of sentences; the period is the note of abruption and disjunction. Shakspeare had it perhaps in his mind to write,-That unless England complied with the mandate, war should put a period to their amity; he altered his mode of diction, and thought that, in an opposite sense, he might put, that "peace should stand a comma between their amities." This is not an easy style; but is it not the style of Shakspeare? JOHNSON. 2- AS's of great charge,] Asses heavily loaded. A quibble is intended between as the conditional particle, and ass the beast of burthen. That charg'd anciently signified loaded, may be proved from the following passage in The Widow's Tears, by Chapman, 1612: "Thou must be the ass charg'd with crowns, to make way." JOHNSON. Shakspeare has so many quibbles of his own to answer for, that there are those who think it hard he should be charged with others which perhaps he never thought of. STEEVENS. Though the first and obvious meaning of these words certainly is, "many similar adjurations, or monitory injunctions, of great weight and importance," yet Dr. Johnson's notion of a quibble being also in the poet's thoughts, is supported by two other passages of Shakspeare, in which asses are introduced as usually employed in the carriage of gold, a charge of no small weight: "He shall but bear them, as the ass bears gold, Again, in Measure for Measure : 66 Julius Cæsar. like an ass, whose back with ingots bows, That, on the view and knowing* of these contents, He should the bearers put to sudden death, How was this seal'd? HAM. Why, even in that was heaven ordinant † ; I had my father's signet in my purse, Which was the model of that Danish seal *: Subscrib'd it; gave't the impression; plac'd it safely, HOR. So Guildenstern and Rosencrantz go to't. HAM. Why, man, they did make love to this employment; * First folio, know. † First folio, ordinate. In further support of his observation, it should be remembered, that the letters in the particle as in the midland counties usually pronounced hard, as in the pronoun us. Dr. Johnson himself always pronounced the particle as hard, and so I have no doubt did Shakspeare. It is so pronounced in Warwickshire at this day. The first folio acordingly has-assis. So, in The Return from Parnassus, in a dialogue between Academicus and Echo: "Acad. What is the reason that "I should not be as fortunate as he? So also, in Lilly's Mother Bombie: "Sti. But as for Regio,Memp. As for Dromio,-Half. Asse for you all four." MALONE. Again, in the Chronicle History of King Lear, signat. L. "Second Watchman. Asse for example. 66 First Watchman. I hope you do not call me Asse by craft, neighbour," BOSWELL. 3 Not SHRIVING-time allow'd.] i. e. without time for confession of their sins: another proof of Hamlet's christian-like disposition. See Romeo and Juliet, Act IV. Sc. II. STEEVENS. 4 the MODEL of that Danish seal:] The model is in old language the copy. The signet was formed in imitation of the Danish seal. See King Richard II. Act III. Sc. II. MALONE. The CHANGELING never known:] A changeling is a child which the fairies are supposed to leave in the room of that which they steal. JOHNSON. They are not near my conscience; their defeat "Tis dangerous, when the baser nature comes HOR. Why, what a king is this! HAM. Does it not, think thee, stand me now upon He that hath kill'd my king, and whor'd my mother; Popp'd in between the election and my hopes; Thrown out his angle for my proper life, And with such cozenage-is't not perfect conscience, To quit him with this arm? and is't not to be damn'd, To let this canker of our nature come In further evil? HOR. It must be shortly known to him from England, What is the issue of the business there. HAM. It will be short: the interim is mine; For by the image of my cause, I see The portraiture of his: I'll count his favours': 6 Why, man, &c.] This line is omitted in the quartos. STEEVENS. 7- by their own INSINUATION] Insinuation, for 'corruptly obtruding themselves into his service.' WARBURTON. By their having insinuated or thrust themselves into the employment. MALONE. 8 thee." THINK thee,] i. e. bethink thee; the folio reads "think'st 9 TO QUIT him—] To requite him; to pay him his due. JOHNSON. This passage, as well as the three following speeches, is not in the quartos. STEEVENS. I'll COUNT his favours :] Thus the folio. Mr. Rowe first made the alteration [reading court] which is perhaps unnecessary. |