dows: Shall we to the court? for, by my fay, I cannot

reason.

Ros. Guil. We'll wait upon you.

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. 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 halfpenny 2. Were you not sent for? Is it your own inclining? Is it a free visitation? Come, come; deal justly with me: come, come; nay, speak. Guil. What should we say, my lord?

Ham. 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 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?

if

Ros. What say you?

[To GUILDENSTERN. Ham. Nay, then I have an eye of you3; [aside.] 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. I have of late, (but,

2

too dear, a halfpenny.] i.e. a halfpenny too dear: they are worth nothing.

3. Nay, then I have an eye of you;] An eye of you means, I have a glimpse of your meaning.

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 steril promontory; this most excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave o'erhanging firmament, 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 a 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, nor woman neither; though, by your smiling, you seem to

say so.

Ros. My lord, there is 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: 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: the clown shall make those laugh, whose lungs are tickled o'the sere; and the lady shall say her mind freely, or the blank verse shall halt for't. What players are they?

† “faculty!” — Malone.

4

lenten entertainment -] i. e. sparing, like the entertainments given in Lent.

6

5 - we coted them on the way ;] To cote is to overtake.

the lady shall say her mind, &c.] The lady shall mar the measure of the verse, rather than not express herself freely or fully.

Ros. Even those you were wont to take such delight in, the tragedians of the city.

Ham. How chances it, they travel 7? their residence, both in reputation and profit, was better both ways. Ros. I think, their inhibition comes by the means of the late innovation.

Ham. Do they hold the same estimation they did when I was in the city? Are they so followed?

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, that cry out on the top of question, and are most tyrannically clapped 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.

Ham. What, are they children? who maintains them? how are they escoted1? 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 wrong3, to make them exclaim against their own succession?

7 How chances it, they travel?] To travel in Shakspeare's time was the technical word, for which we have substituted to stroll.

8an aiery of children, &c.] Relating to the playhouses then contending, the Bankside, the Fortune, &c. played by the children of his majesty's chapel.

9 little eyases, that cry out on the top of question,] Little eyases; i. e. young nestlings, creatures just out of the egg. The meaning seems to allude to boys who ask a common question in the highest note of the voice, and declaim in common conversation.

1 escoted?] Paid. From the French escot, a shot or reckoning. 2 Will they pursue the quality no longer than they can sing?] Will they follow the profession of players no longer than they keep the voices of boys, and sing in the choir?

3

their writers do them wrong, &c.] I should have been very much surprised if I had not found Ben Jonson among the writers here alluded to. STEEVENS.

Ros, 'Faith, there has been much to do on both sides; and the nation holds it no sin, to tarre them on to controversy: there was, for a while, no money bid for argument, unless the poet and the player went to cuffs in the question.

Ham. Is it possible?

Guil. O, there has been much throwing about of brains.

Ham. Do the boys carry it away?

Ros. Ay, that they do, my lord; Hercules and his load too. 5

6

Ham. It is not very strange: for my uncle is king of Denmark; and those, that would make mouths at him while my father lived, give twenty, forty, fifty, an hundred ducats a-piece, for his picture in little.7 'Sblood, there is something in this more than natural, if philosophy could find it out.

[Flourish of Trumpets within. Guil. There are the players.

Ham, Gentlemen, you are welcome to Elsinore. Your hands. Come then: the appurtenance of welcome is fashion and ceremony: let me comply with you in this garb; 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 deceived.

4 -to tarre them on to controversy:] To provoke any animal to rage, is to tarre him. The word is said to come from the Greek word

ταράσσω.

5 Hercules and his load too.] The allusion may be to the Globe playhouse on the Bankside, the sign of which was Hercules carrying the globe.

6 It is not very strange: for my uncle-] I do not wonder that the new players have so suddenly risen to reputation, my uncle supplies another example of the facility with which honour is conferred upon new claimants. JOHNSON.

7

8

in little.] i. e. in miniature.

let me comply, &c.] To comply is apparently used in the sense of-to compliment.

Guil. In what, my dear lord?

Ham. I am but mad north-north-west: when the wind is southerly, I know a hawk from a hand-saw."

Enter POLONIUS.

Pol. Well be with you, gentlemen!

-

Ham. Hark you, Guildenstern, and you too ;-at each ear a hearer; that great baby, you see there, is not yet out of his swaddling clouts.

Ros. Happily, he's the second time come to them; for, they say, an old man is twice a child.

Ham. I will prophecy, he comes to tell me of the players; mark it. You say right, sir: o'Monday morning; 'twas then, indeed.

-

Pol. My lord, I have news to tell you.

Ham. My lord, I have news to tell you. When Roscius was an actor in Rome,

Pol. The actors are come hither, my lord.

Ham. Buz, buz!

Pol. Upon my honour,

Ham. Then came each actor on his ass,

Pol. The best actors in the world, either for tragedy, comedy, history, pastoral, pastoral-comical, historicalpastoral, tragical-historical, tragical-comical, historicalpastoral, scene individable, or poem unlimited: Seneca cannot be too heavy, nor Plautus too light. For the law of writ1, and the liberty, these are the only men. Ham. O Jephthah, judge of Israel,- what a treasure hadst thou!

Pol. What a treasure had he, my lord?

Ham. Why-One fair daughter, and no more,

The which he loved passing well.

Pol. Still on my daughter.

Ham. Am I not i'the right, old Jephthah?

[Aside.

9

I know a hawk from a hand-saw.] A proverbial speech. 1 For the law of writ,] Writ, for writing, composition.