13.3: Hamlet Act IV

⌜ACT 4⌝

⌜Scene 1⌝

Enter King and Queen, with Rosencrantz and
Guildenstern.

KING
There’s matter in these sighs; these profound heaves
You must translate; ’tis fit we understand them.
Where is your son?
QUEEN
[Bestow this place on us a little while.]
⌜Rosencrantz and Guildenstern exit.⌝
5 Ah, mine own lord, what have I seen tonight!
KING What, Gertrude? How does Hamlet?
QUEEN
Mad as the sea and wind when both contend
Which is the mightier. In his lawless fit,
Behind the arras hearing something stir,
10 Whips out his rapier, cries “A rat, a rat,”
And in this brainish apprehension kills
The unseen good old man.
KING O heavy deed!
It had been so with us, had we been there.
15 His liberty is full of threats to all—
To you yourself, to us, to everyone.
Alas, how shall this bloody deed be answered?
It will be laid to us, whose providence

Should have kept short, restrained, and out of haunt
20 This mad young man. But so much was our love,
We would not understand what was most fit,
But, like the owner of a foul disease,
To keep it from divulging, let it feed
Even on the pith of life. Where is he gone?
QUEEN
25 To draw apart the body he hath killed,
O’er whom his very madness, like some ore
Among a mineral of metals base,
Shows itself pure: he weeps for what is done.
KING O Gertrude, come away!
30 The sun no sooner shall the mountains touch
But we will ship him hence; and this vile deed
We must with all our majesty and skill
Both countenance and excuse.—Ho, Guildenstern!

Enter Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.

Friends both, go join you with some further aid.
35 Hamlet in madness hath Polonius slain,
And from his mother’s closet hath he ⟨dragged⟩ him.
Go seek him out, speak fair, and bring the body
Into the chapel. I pray you, haste in this.
⟨Rosencrantz and Guildenstern exit.⟩
Come, Gertrude, we’ll call up our wisest friends
40 And let them know both what we mean to do
And what’s untimely done. ⌜…⌝
[Whose whisper o’er the world’s diameter,
As level as the cannon to his blank
Transports his poisoned shot, may miss our name
45 And hit the woundless air.] O, come away!
My soul is full of discord and dismay.
They exit.

⌜Scene 2⌝

⟨Enter Hamlet.⟩

HAMLET Safely stowed.
⟨GENTLEMEN, within Hamlet! Lord Hamlet!⟩
HAMLET But soft, what noise? Who calls on Hamlet?
O, here they come.

Enter Rosencrantz, ⟨Guildenstern,⟩ and others.

ROSENCRANTZ
5 What have you done, my lord, with the dead body?
HAMLET
⟨Compounded⟩ it with dust, whereto ’tis kin.
ROSENCRANTZ
Tell us where ’tis, that we may take it thence
And bear it to the chapel.
HAMLET Do not believe it.
ROSENCRANTZ 10Believe what?
HAMLET That I can keep your counsel and not mine
own. Besides, to be demanded of a sponge, what
replication should be made by the son of a king?
ROSENCRANTZ Take you me for a sponge, my lord?
HAMLET 15Ay, sir, that soaks up the King’s countenance,
his rewards, his authorities. But such officers do the
King best service in the end. He keeps them like ⟨an
ape⟩ an apple in the corner of his jaw, first mouthed,
to be last swallowed. When he needs what you have
20 gleaned, it is but squeezing you, and, sponge, you
shall be dry again.
ROSENCRANTZ I understand you not, my lord.
HAMLET I am glad of it. A knavish speech sleeps in a
foolish ear.
ROSENCRANTZ 25My lord, you must tell us where the
body is and go with us to the King.
HAMLET The body is with the King, but the King is not
with the body. The King is a thing—

GUILDENSTERN A “thing,” my lord?
HAMLET 30Of nothing. Bring me to him. ⟨Hide fox, and
all after!⟩
They exit.

⌜Scene 3⌝

Enter King and two or three.

KING
I have sent to seek him and to find the body.
How dangerous is it that this man goes loose!
Yet must not we put the strong law on him.
He’s loved of the distracted multitude,
5 Who like not in their judgment, but their eyes;
And, where ’tis so, th’ offender’s scourge is weighed,
But never the offense. To bear all smooth and even,
This sudden sending him away must seem
Deliberate pause. Diseases desperate grown
10 By desperate appliance are relieved
Or not at all.

Enter Rosencrantz.

How now, what hath befallen?
ROSENCRANTZ
Where the dead body is bestowed, my lord,
We cannot get from him.
KING 15 But where is he?
ROSENCRANTZ
Without, my lord; guarded, to know your pleasure.
KING
Bring him before us.
ROSENCRANTZ Ho! Bring in the lord.

They enter ⌜with Hamlet.⌝

KING Now, Hamlet, where’s Polonius?
HAMLET 20At supper.

KING At supper where?
HAMLET Not where he eats, but where he is eaten. A
certain convocation of politic worms are e’en at
him. Your worm is your only emperor for diet. We
25 fat all creatures else to fat us, and we fat ourselves
for maggots. Your fat king and your lean beggar is
but variable service—two dishes but to one table.
That’s the end.
[KING Alas, alas!
HAMLET 30A man may fish with the worm that hath eat
of a king and eat of the fish that hath fed of that
worm.]
KING What dost thou mean by this?
HAMLET Nothing but to show you how a king may go a
35 progress through the guts of a beggar.
KING Where is Polonius?
HAMLET In heaven. Send thither to see. If your messenger
find him not there, seek him i’ th’ other
place yourself. But if, indeed, you find him not
40 within this month, you shall nose him as you go up
the stairs into the lobby.
KING, ⌜to Attendants.⌝ Go, seek him there.
HAMLET He will stay till you come.⌜Attendants exit.⌝
KING
Hamlet, this deed, for thine especial safety
45 (Which we do tender, as we dearly grieve
For that which thou hast done) must send thee
hence
⟨With fiery quickness.⟩ Therefore prepare thyself.
The bark is ready, and the wind at help,
50 Th’ associates tend, and everything is bent
For England.
HAMLET For England?
KING Ay, Hamlet.
HAMLET Good.
KING
55 So is it, if thou knew’st our purposes.

HAMLET
I see a cherub that sees them. But come, for
England.
Farewell, dear mother.
KING Thy loving father, Hamlet.
HAMLET
60 My mother. Father and mother is man and wife,
Man and wife is one flesh, ⟨and⟩ so, my mother.—
Come, for England.He exits.
KING
Follow him at foot; tempt him with speed aboard.
Delay it not. I’ll have him hence tonight.
65 Away, for everything is sealed and done
That else leans on th’ affair. Pray you, make haste.
⌜All but the King exit.⌝
And England, if my love thou hold’st at aught
(As my great power thereof may give thee sense,
Since yet thy cicatrice looks raw and red
70 After the Danish sword, and thy free awe
Pays homage to us), thou mayst not coldly set
Our sovereign process, which imports at full,
By letters congruing to that effect,
The present death of Hamlet. Do it, England,
75 For like the hectic in my blood he rages,
And thou must cure me. Till I know ’tis done,
Howe’er my haps, my joys will ne’er begin.
He exits.

⌜Scene 4⌝

Enter Fortinbras with his army over the stage.

FORTINBRAS
Go, Captain, from me greet the Danish king.
Tell him that by his license Fortinbras
Craves the conveyance of a promised march
Over his kingdom. You know the rendezvous.

5 If that his Majesty would aught with us,
We shall express our duty in his eye;
And let him know so.
CAPTAIN I will do ’t, my lord.
FORTINBRAS Go softly on.⌜All but the Captain exit.⌝

[Enter Hamlet, Rosencrantz, ⌜Guildenstern,⌝ and others.

HAMLET 10Good sir, whose powers are these?
CAPTAIN They are of Norway, sir.
HAMLET How purposed, sir, I pray you?
CAPTAIN Against some part of Poland.
HAMLET Who commands them, sir?
CAPTAIN
15 The nephew to old Norway, Fortinbras.
HAMLET
Goes it against the main of Poland, sir,
Or for some frontier?
CAPTAIN
Truly to speak, and with no addition,
We go to gain a little patch of ground
20 That hath in it no profit but the name.
To pay five ducats, five, I would not farm it;
Nor will it yield to Norway or the Pole
A ranker rate, should it be sold in fee.
HAMLET
Why, then, the Polack never will defend it.
CAPTAIN
25 Yes, it is already garrisoned.
HAMLET
Two thousand souls and twenty thousand ducats
Will not debate the question of this straw.
This is th’ impostume of much wealth and peace,
That inward breaks and shows no cause without
30 Why the man dies.—I humbly thank you, sir.
CAPTAIN God be wi’ you, sir.⌜He exits.⌝
ROSENCRANTZ Will ’t please you go, my lord?

HAMLET
I’ll be with you straight. Go a little before.
⌜All but Hamlet exit.⌝
How all occasions do inform against me
35 And spur my dull revenge. What is a man
If his chief good and market of his time
Be but to sleep and feed? A beast, no more.
Sure He that made us with such large discourse,
Looking before and after, gave us not
40 That capability and godlike reason
To fust in us unused. Now whether it be
Bestial oblivion or some craven scruple
Of thinking too precisely on th’ event
(A thought which, quartered, hath but one part
45 wisdom
And ever three parts coward), I do not know
Why yet I live to say “This thing’s to do,”
Sith I have cause, and will, and strength, and means
To do ’t. Examples gross as Earth exhort me:
50 Witness this army of such mass and charge,
Led by a delicate and tender prince,
Whose spirit with divine ambition puffed
Makes mouths at the invisible event,
Exposing what is mortal and unsure
55 To all that fortune, death, and danger dare,
Even for an eggshell. Rightly to be great
Is not to stir without great argument,
But greatly to find quarrel in a straw
When honor’s at the stake. How stand I, then,
60 That have a father killed, a mother stained,
Excitements of my reason and my blood,
And let all sleep, while to my shame I see
The imminent death of twenty thousand men
That for a fantasy and trick of fame
65 Go to their graves like beds, fight for a plot
Whereon the numbers cannot try the cause,

Which is not tomb enough and continent
To hide the slain? O, from this time forth
My thoughts be bloody or be nothing worth!
He exits.]

⌜Scene 5⌝

Enter Horatio, ⟨Queen,⟩ and a Gentleman.

QUEEN I will not speak with her.
GENTLEMAN She is importunate,
Indeed distract; her mood will needs be pitied.
QUEEN What would she have?
GENTLEMAN
5 She speaks much of her father, says she hears
There’s tricks i’ th’ world, and hems, and beats her
heart,
Spurns enviously at straws, speaks things in doubt
That carry but half sense. Her speech is nothing,
10 Yet the unshapèd use of it doth move
The hearers to collection. They ⟨aim⟩ at it
And botch the words up fit to their own thoughts;
Which, as her winks and nods and gestures yield
them,
15 Indeed would make one think there might be
thought,
Though nothing sure, yet much unhappily.
HORATIO
’Twere good she were spoken with, for she may
strew
20 Dangerous conjectures in ill-breeding minds.
⌜QUEEN⌝ Let her come in.⌜Gentleman exits.⌝
⌜Aside.⌝ To my sick soul (as sin’s true nature is),
Each toy seems prologue to some great amiss.
So full of artless jealousy is guilt,
25 It spills itself in fearing to be spilt.

⟨Enter Ophelia distracted.⟩

OPHELIA
Where is the beauteous Majesty of Denmark?
QUEEN How now, Ophelia?
OPHELIA ⌜sings⌝
How should I your true love know
From another one?
30 By his cockle hat and staff
And his sandal shoon.
QUEEN
Alas, sweet lady, what imports this song?
OPHELIA Say you? Nay, pray you, mark.
⌜Sings.⌝ He is dead and gone, lady,
35 He is dead and gone;
At his head a grass-green turf,
At his heels a stone.
Oh, ho!
QUEEN Nay, but Ophelia—
OPHELIA 40Pray you, mark.
⌜Sings.⌝ White his shroud as the mountain snow—

Enter King.

QUEEN Alas, look here, my lord.
OPHELIA ⌜sings⌝
Larded all with sweet flowers;
Which bewept to the ground did not go
45 With true-love showers.
KING How do you, pretty lady?
OPHELIA Well, God dild you. They say the owl was a
baker’s daughter. Lord, we know what we are but
know not what we may be. God be at your table.
KING 50Conceit upon her father.
OPHELIA Pray let’s have no words of this, but when
they ask you what it means, say you this:

⌜Sings.⌝ Tomorrow is Saint Valentine’s day,
All in the morning betime,
55 And I a maid at your window,
To be your Valentine.
Then up he rose and donned his clothes
And dupped the chamber door,
Let in the maid, that out a maid
60 Never departed more.
KING Pretty Ophelia—
OPHELIA
Indeed, without an oath, I’ll make an end on ’t:
⌜Sings.⌝ By Gis and by Saint Charity,
Alack and fie for shame,
65 Young men will do ’t, if they come to ’t;
By Cock, they are to blame.
Quoth she “Before you tumbled me,
You promised me to wed.”
He answers:
70 “So would I ’a done, by yonder sun,
An thou hadst not come to my bed.”
KING How long hath she been thus?
OPHELIA I hope all will be well. We must be patient,
but I cannot choose but weep to think they would
75 lay him i’ th’ cold ground. My brother shall know of
it. And so I thank you for your good counsel. Come,
my coach! Good night, ladies, good night, sweet
ladies, good night, good night.⟨She exits.⟩
KING
Follow her close; give her good watch, I pray you.
⌜Horatio exits.⌝
80 O, this is the poison of deep grief. It springs
All from her father’s death, and now behold!
O Gertrude, Gertrude,
When sorrows come, they come not single spies,
But in battalions: first, her father slain;
85 Next, your son gone, and he most violent author
Of his own just remove; the people muddied,

Thick, and unwholesome in ⟨their⟩ thoughts and
whispers
For good Polonius’ death, and we have done but
90 greenly
In hugger-mugger to inter him; poor Ophelia
Divided from herself and her fair judgment,
Without the which we are pictures or mere beasts;
Last, and as much containing as all these,
95 Her brother is in secret come from France,
Feeds on ⟨his⟩ wonder, keeps himself in clouds,
And wants not buzzers to infect his ear
With pestilent speeches of his father’s death,
Wherein necessity, of matter beggared,
100 Will nothing stick our person to arraign
In ear and ear. O, my dear Gertrude, this,
Like to a murd’ring piece, in many places
Gives me superfluous death.
A noise within.
⟨QUEEN Alack, what noise is this?⟩
KING 105Attend!
Where is my Switzers? Let them guard the door.

Enter a Messenger.

What is the matter?
MESSENGER Save yourself, my lord.
The ocean, overpeering of his list,
110 Eats not the flats with more impiteous haste
Than young Laertes, in a riotous head,
O’erbears your officers. The rabble call him “lord,”
And, as the world were now but to begin,
Antiquity forgot, custom not known,
115 The ratifiers and props of every word,
⟨They⟩ cry “Choose we, Laertes shall be king!”
Caps, hands, and tongues applaud it to the clouds,
“Laertes shall be king! Laertes king!”
A noise within.

QUEEN
How cheerfully on the false trail they cry.
120 O, this is counter, you false Danish dogs!
KING The doors are broke.

Enter Laertes with others.

LAERTES
Where is this king?—Sirs, stand you all without.
ALL No, let’s come in!
LAERTES I pray you, give me leave.
ALL 125We will, we will.
LAERTES
I thank you. Keep the door. ⌜Followers exit.⌝ O, thou
vile king,
Give me my father!
QUEEN Calmly, good Laertes.
LAERTES
130 That drop of blood that’s calm proclaims me
bastard,
Cries “cuckold” to my father, brands the harlot
Even here between the chaste unsmirchèd brow
Of my true mother.
KING 135 What is the cause, Laertes,
That thy rebellion looks so giant-like?—
Let him go, Gertrude. Do not fear our person.
There’s such divinity doth hedge a king
That treason can but peep to what it would,
140 Acts little of his will.—Tell me, Laertes,
Why thou art thus incensed.—Let him go,
Gertrude.—
Speak, man.
LAERTES Where is my father?
KING 145Dead.
QUEEN
But not by him.
KING Let him demand his fill.

LAERTES
How came he dead? I’ll not be juggled with.
To hell, allegiance! Vows, to the blackest devil!
150 Conscience and grace, to the profoundest pit!
I dare damnation. To this point I stand,
That both the worlds I give to negligence,
Let come what comes, only I’ll be revenged
Most throughly for my father.
KING 155Who shall stay you?
LAERTES My will, not all the ⟨world.⟩
And for my means, I’ll husband them so well
They shall go far with little.
KING Good Laertes,
160 If you desire to know the certainty
Of your dear father, is ’t writ in your revenge
That, swoopstake, you will draw both friend and
foe,
Winner and loser?
LAERTES 165None but his enemies.
KING Will you know them, then?
LAERTES
To his good friends thus wide I’ll ope my arms
And, like the kind life-rend’ring pelican,
Repast them with my blood.
KING 170 Why, now you speak
Like a good child and a true gentleman.
That I am guiltless of your father’s death
And am most sensibly in grief for it,
It shall as level to your judgment ’pear
175 As day does to your eye.
A noise within: ⟨“Let her come in!”
LAERTES⟩ How now, what noise is that?

Enter Ophelia.

O heat, dry up my brains! Tears seven times salt
Burn out the sense and virtue of mine eye!

180 By heaven, thy madness shall be paid with weight
Till our scale turn the beam! O rose of May,
Dear maid, kind sister, sweet Ophelia!
O heavens, is ’t possible a young maid’s wits
Should be as mortal as ⟨an old⟩ man’s life?
185 ⟨Nature is fine in love, and, where ’tis fine,
It sends some precious instance of itself
After the thing it loves.⟩
OPHELIA ⌜sings⌝
They bore him barefaced on the bier,
⟨Hey non nonny, nonny, hey nonny,⟩
190 And in his grave rained many a tear.
Fare you well, my dove.
LAERTES
Hadst thou thy wits and didst persuade revenge,
It could not move thus.
OPHELIA You must sing “A-down a-down”—and you
195 “Call him a-down-a.”—O, how the wheel becomes
it! It is the false steward that stole his master’s
daughter.
LAERTES This nothing’s more than matter.
OPHELIA There’s rosemary, that’s for remembrance.
200 Pray you, love, remember. And there is pansies,
that’s for thoughts.
LAERTES A document in madness: thoughts and remembrance
fitted.
OPHELIA There’s fennel for you, and columbines.
205 There’s rue for you, and here’s some for me; we
may call it herb of grace o’ Sundays. You ⟨must⟩ wear
your rue with a difference. There’s a daisy. I would
give you some violets, but they withered all when
my father died. They say he made a good end.
210 ⌜Sings.⌝ For bonny sweet Robin is all my joy.
LAERTES
Thought and afflictions, passion, hell itself
She turns to favor and to prettiness.

OPHELIA ⌜sings⌝
And will he not come again?
And will he not come again?
215 No, no, he is dead.
Go to thy deathbed.
He never will come again.

His beard was as white as snow,
⟨All⟩ flaxen was his poll.
220 He is gone, he is gone,
And we cast away moan.
God ’a mercy on his soul.
And of all Christians’ souls, ⟨I pray God.⟩ God be wi’
you.⟨She exits.⟩
LAERTES 225Do you ⟨see⟩ this, O God?
KING
Laertes, I must commune with your grief,
Or you deny me right. Go but apart,
Make choice of whom your wisest friends you will,
And they shall hear and judge ’twixt you and me.
230 If by direct or by collateral hand
They find us touched, we will our kingdom give,
Our crown, our life, and all that we call ours,
To you in satisfaction; but if not,
Be you content to lend your patience to us,
235 And we shall jointly labor with your soul
To give it due content.
LAERTES Let this be so.
His means of death, his obscure funeral
(No trophy, sword, nor hatchment o’er his bones,
240 No noble rite nor formal ostentation)
Cry to be heard, as ’twere from heaven to earth,
That I must call ’t in question.
KING So you shall,
And where th’ offense is, let the great ax fall.
245 I pray you, go with me.
They exit.


⌜Scene 6⌝

Enter Horatio and others.

HORATIO What are they that would speak with me?
GENTLEMAN Seafaring men, sir. They say they have
letters for you.
HORATIO Let them come in. ⌜Gentleman exits.⌝ I do not
5 know from what part of the world I should be
greeted, if not from Lord Hamlet.

Enter Sailors.

SAILOR God bless you, sir.
HORATIO Let Him bless thee too.
SAILOR He shall, sir, ⟨an ’t⟩ please Him. There’s a letter
10 for you, sir. It came from th’ ambassador that was
bound for England—if your name be Horatio, as I
am let to know it is.⌜He hands Horatio a letter.⌝
HORATIO ⟨reads the letter⟩ Horatio, when thou shalt have
overlooked this, give these fellows some means to the
15 King. They have letters for him. Ere we were two days
old at sea, a pirate of very warlike appointment gave
us chase. Finding ourselves too slow of sail, we put on
a compelled valor, and in the grapple I boarded them.
On the instant, they got clear of our ship; so I alone
20 became their prisoner. They have dealt with me like
thieves of mercy, but they knew what they did: I am to
do a ⟨good⟩ turn for them. Let the King have the letters
I have sent, and repair thou to me with as much speed
as thou wouldst fly death. I have words to speak in
25 thine ear will make thee dumb; yet are they much too
light for the ⟨bore⟩ of the matter. These good fellows
will bring thee where I am. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern
hold their course for England; of them I have
much to tell thee. Farewell.
30 ⟨He⟩ that thou knowest thine,
Hamlet.

Come, I will ⟨give⟩ you way for these your letters
And do ’t the speedier that you may direct me
To him from whom you brought them.
They exit.

⌜Scene 7⌝

Enter King and Laertes.

KING
Now must your conscience my acquittance seal,
And you must put me in your heart for friend,
Sith you have heard, and with a knowing ear,
That he which hath your noble father slain
5 Pursued my life.
LAERTES It well appears. But tell me
Why you ⟨proceeded⟩ not against these feats,
So criminal and so capital in nature,
As by your safety, greatness, wisdom, all things else,
10 You mainly were stirred up.
KING O, for two special reasons,
Which may to you perhaps seem much unsinewed,
But yet to me they’re strong. The Queen his mother
Lives almost by his looks, and for myself
15 (My virtue or my plague, be it either which),
She is so ⟨conjunctive⟩ to my life and soul
That, as the star moves not but in his sphere,
I could not but by her. The other motive
Why to a public count I might not go
20 Is the great love the general gender bear him,
Who, dipping all his faults in their affection,
Work like the spring that turneth wood to stone,
Convert his gyves to graces, so that my arrows,
Too slightly timbered for so ⟨loud a wind,⟩
25 Would have reverted to my bow again,
But not where I have aimed them.
LAERTES
And so have I a noble father lost,

A sister driven into desp’rate terms,
Whose worth, if praises may go back again,
30 Stood challenger on mount of all the age
For her perfections. But my revenge will come.
KING
Break not your sleeps for that. You must not think
That we are made of stuff so flat and dull
That we can let our beard be shook with danger
35 And think it pastime. You shortly shall hear more.
I loved your father, and we love ourself,
And that, I hope, will teach you to imagine—

Enter a Messenger with letters.

⟨How now? What news?
MESSENGER Letters, my lord, from
40 Hamlet.⟩
These to your Majesty, this to the Queen.
KING From Hamlet? Who brought them?
MESSENGER
Sailors, my lord, they say. I saw them not.
They were given me by Claudio. He received them
45 [Of him that brought them.]
KING Laertes, you shall hear
them.—
Leave us.⟨Messenger exits.⟩
⌜Reads.⌝ High and mighty, you shall know I am set
50 naked on your kingdom. Tomorrow shall I beg leave to
see your kingly eyes, when I shall (first asking ⟨your⟩
pardon) thereunto recount the occasion of my sudden
⟨and more strange⟩ return. ⟨Hamlet.⟩
What should this mean? Are all the rest come back?
55 Or is it some abuse and no such thing?
LAERTES Know you the hand?
KING ’Tis Hamlet’s character. “Naked”—
And in a postscript here, he says “alone.”
Can you ⟨advise⟩ me?

LAERTES
60 I am lost in it, my lord. But let him come.
It warms the very sickness in my heart
That I ⟨shall⟩ live and tell him to his teeth
“Thus didst thou.”
KING If it be so, Laertes
65 (As how should it be so? how otherwise?),
Will you be ruled by me?
LAERTES Ay, my lord,
So you will not o’errule me to a peace.
KING
To thine own peace. If he be now returned,
70 As ⟨checking⟩ at his voyage, and that he means
No more to undertake it, I will work him
To an exploit, now ripe in my device,
Under the which he shall not choose but fall;
And for his death no wind of blame shall breathe,
75 But even his mother shall uncharge the practice
And call it accident.
[LAERTES My lord, I will be ruled,
The rather if you could devise it so
That I might be the organ.
KING 80 It falls right.
You have been talked of since your travel much,
And that in Hamlet’s hearing, for a quality
Wherein they say you shine. Your sum of parts
Did not together pluck such envy from him
85 As did that one, and that, in my regard,
Of the unworthiest siege.
LAERTES What part is that, my lord?
KING
A very ribbon in the cap of youth—
Yet needful too, for youth no less becomes
90 The light and careless livery that it wears
Than settled age his sables and his weeds,
Importing health and graveness.] Two months since

Here was a gentleman of Normandy.
I have seen myself, and served against, the French,
95 And they can well on horseback, but this gallant
Had witchcraft in ’t. He grew unto his seat,
And to such wondrous doing brought his horse
As had he been encorpsed and demi-natured
With the brave beast. So far he topped ⟨my⟩ thought
100 That I in forgery of shapes and tricks
Come short of what he did.
LAERTES A Norman was ’t?
KING A Norman.
LAERTES
Upon my life, Lamord.
KING 105 The very same.
LAERTES
I know him well. He is the brooch indeed
And gem of all the nation.
KING He made confession of you
And gave you such a masterly report
110 For art and exercise in your defense,
And for your rapier most especial,
That he cried out ’twould be a sight indeed
If one could match you. [The ’scrimers of their
nation
115 He swore had neither motion, guard, nor eye,
If you opposed them.] Sir, this report of his
Did Hamlet so envenom with his envy
That he could nothing do but wish and beg
Your sudden coming-o’er, to play with you.
120 Now out of this—
LAERTES What out of this, my lord?
KING
Laertes, was your father dear to you?
Or are you like the painting of a sorrow,
A face without a heart?
LAERTES 125 Why ask you this?

KING
Not that I think you did not love your father,
But that I know love is begun by time
And that I see, in passages of proof,
Time qualifies the spark and fire of it.
130 [There lives within the very flame of love
A kind of wick or snuff that will abate it,
And nothing is at a like goodness still;
For goodness, growing to a pleurisy,
Dies in his own too-much. That we would do
135 We should do when we would; for this “would”
changes
And hath abatements and delays as many
As there are tongues, are hands, are accidents;
And then this “should” is like a ⌜spendthrift⌝ sigh,
140 That hurts by easing. But to the quick of th’ ulcer:]
Hamlet comes back; what would you undertake
To show yourself indeed your father’s son
More than in words?
LAERTES To cut his throat i’ th’ church.
KING
145 No place indeed should murder sanctuarize;
Revenge should have no bounds. But, good Laertes,
Will you do this? Keep close within your chamber.
Hamlet, returned, shall know you are come home.
We’ll put on those shall praise your excellence
150 And set a double varnish on the fame
The Frenchman gave you; bring you, in fine,
together
And wager ⟨on⟩ your heads. He, being remiss,
Most generous, and free from all contriving,
155 Will not peruse the foils, so that with ease,
Or with a little shuffling, you may choose
A sword unbated, and in a ⟨pass⟩ of practice
Requite him for your father.

LAERTES I will do ’t,
160 And for ⟨that⟩ purpose I’ll anoint my sword.
I bought an unction of a mountebank
So mortal that, but dip a knife in it,
Where it draws blood no cataplasm so rare,
Collected from all simples that have virtue
165 Under the moon, can save the thing from death
That is but scratched withal. I’ll touch my point
With this contagion, that, if I gall him slightly,
It may be death.
KING Let’s further think of this,
170 Weigh what convenience both of time and means
May fit us to our shape. If this should fail,
And that our drift look through our bad
performance,
’Twere better not assayed. Therefore this project
175 Should have a back or second that might hold
If this did blast in proof. Soft, let me see.
We’ll make a solemn wager on your cunnings—
I ha ’t!
When in your motion you are hot and dry
180 (As make your bouts more violent to that end)
And that he calls for drink, I’ll have prepared
him
A chalice for the nonce, whereon but sipping,
If he by chance escape your venomed stuck,
185 Our purpose may hold there.—But stay, what
noise?

Enter Queen.

QUEEN
One woe doth tread upon another’s heel,
So fast they follow. Your sister’s drowned, Laertes.
LAERTES Drowned? O, where?
QUEEN
190 There is a willow grows askant the brook

That shows his ⟨hoar⟩ leaves in the glassy stream.
Therewith fantastic garlands did she make
Of crowflowers, nettles, daisies, and long purples,
That liberal shepherds give a grosser name,
195 But our cold maids do “dead men’s fingers” call
them.
There on the pendant boughs her coronet weeds
Clamb’ring to hang, an envious sliver broke,
When down her weedy trophies and herself
200 Fell in the weeping brook. Her clothes spread wide,
And mermaid-like awhile they bore her up,
Which time she chanted snatches of old lauds,
As one incapable of her own distress
Or like a creature native and endued
205 Unto that element. But long it could not be
Till that her garments, heavy with their drink,
Pulled the poor wretch from her melodious lay
To muddy death.
LAERTES Alas, then she is drowned.
QUEEN 210Drowned, drowned.
LAERTES
Too much of water hast thou, poor Ophelia,
And therefore I forbid my tears. But yet
It is our trick; nature her custom holds,
Let shame say what it will. When these are gone,
215 The woman will be out.—Adieu, my lord.
I have a speech o’ fire that fain would blaze,
But that this folly drowns it.He exits.
KING Let’s follow, Gertrude.
How much I had to do to calm his rage!
220 Now fear I this will give it start again.
Therefore, let’s follow.
They exit.