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But even his mother shall uncharge the practice
And call it accident.

LAER.
My lord, I will be ruled;
The rather, if you could devise it so
That I might be the organ.

KING.

It falls right.

You have been talk'd 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
As did that one, and that, in my regard,

Of the unworthiest siege.

LAER.
What part is that, my lord?
KING. A very riband in the cap of youth,
Yet needful too; for youth no less becomes
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've seen myself, and served against, the French,
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 he had been incorpsed and demi-natured
With the brave beast: so far he topp'd my thought,
That I, in forgery of shapes and tricks,

Come short of what he did.

LAER.

KING. A Norman.

A Norman was 't!

The very same.

LAER. Upon my life, Lamond.

KING.

LAER. 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 For art and exercise in your defence, And for your rapier most especially,

That he cried out, 'twould be a sight indeed,

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77 Of the unworthiest siege: of the least worthy seat or level. 82 Health and graveness. Warburton proposes the emenda

tion 'wealth,' which gives better sense.

90 In forgery of shapes: in imagining all his feats.

If one could match you: the scrimers of their nation,
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 him.
Now, out of this,-

LAER.

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?

LAER.

Why ask you this?

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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. 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 plurisy,

Dies in his own too much that we would do,

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,

That hurts by easing. But, to the quick o' the ulcer :-
Hamlet comes back: what would you undertake,

IOI Scrimers: escrimeurs, fencers.

121

112 Love is begun by time. As love begins at some given point of time, so I see by passages of experience that time also abates it.

118 A plurisy. The Cambridge editors shew that other writers besides Shakspere imagine that 'pleurisy' is connected with 'plus;' using such expressions as 'a plurisy of people.' The true connexion is of course with πλɛʊpά, a side.

119 His own too much. Like 'a great amiss,' 'the why and wherefore,' and the like. English had at this time something like the flexibility of Greek; and had no difficulty in throwing out phrases like τὸ ἄγαν and τὸ πρίν.

120 This would' changes. Our will to the enterprise is apt to abate of itself from a hundred causes. Then there remains the 'should,' the duty, neglected and undone; and he who vainly acknowledges that he 'should' have done a thing is like a spendthrift sighing for his squandered estate.

To show yourself your father's son in deed
More than in words?

LAER.

To cut his throat i' the church.
KING. 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
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,
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.

LAER.
I will do't:
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
Under the moon, can save the thing from death
That is but scratch'd 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;
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 assay'd: therefore this project
Should have a back or second that might hold,
If this should blast in proof. Soft! let me see :

130

140

150

130 Will you do this. If you are determined to do this. 136 Generous and free from all contriving. Oliver, in As You Like It, while plotting his brother's death, cannot help saying, "Yet he's gentle; never schooled and yet learned; full of noble device," &c. He has not got so far in his wickedness as the king here, who only thinks of Hamlet's generosity as an implement for his overthrow. But Laertes shews by his horrid suggestion of the poison how little need there was for the king to prepare the temptation as carefully as he had done.

We'll make a solemn wager on your cunnings:
I ha't :

When in your motion you are hot and dry—
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 venom'd stuck,
Our purpose may hold there.

Enter QUEEN.

How now, sweet queen!
QUEEN. One woe doth tread upon another's heel,
So fast they follow: your sister's drown'd, Laertes.
LAER. Drown'd! O, where ?

QUEEN. There is a willow grows aslant a brook,
That shows his hoar leaves in the glassy stream;
There with fantastic garlands did she come
Of crow-flowers, nettles, daisies, and long purples
That liberal shepherds give a grosser name,

But our cold maids do dead men's fingers call them :
There, on the pendent boughs her coronet weeds
Clambering to hang, an envious sliver broke;
When down her weedy trophies and herself

Fell in the weeping brook. Her clothes spread wide;
And, mermaid-like, awhile they bore her up:
Which time she chanted snatches of old tunes;
As one incapable of her own distress,
Or like a creature native and indued
Unto that element: but long it could not be
Till that her garments, heavy with their drink,
Pull'd the poor wretch from her melodious lay
To muddy death.

LAER.

Alas, then, she is drown'd?

QUEEN. Drown'd, drown'd.'

LAER. Too much of water hast thou, poor Ophelia, And therefore I forbid my tears: but yet

It is our trick; nature her custom holds,

162 Stuck: stoccata, thrust.

160

170

180

170 Purples. Supposed to be the purple-flowered 'Orchis mascula.'

174 Clambering to hang. See Desdemona's song in Othello, which gives the key to poor Ophelia's action

iv. 32

"The fresh stream ran by her and murmured her moans, Sing willow, willow, willow."

I

Let shame say what it will: when these are gone,
The woman will be out. Adieu, my lord:.
I have a speech of fire, that fain would blaze,
But that this folly douts it.

KING.
Let's follow, Gertrude:
How much I had to do to calm his rage!
Now fear I this will give it start again;

Therefore let's follow.

190

[Exit.

[Exeunt.

ACT V.

SCENE I-A churchyard.

Enter two Clowns, with spades, &c.

FIRST CLO. Is she to be buried in Christian burial that wilfully seeks her own salvation?

SEC. CLO. I tell thee she is: and therefore make her grave straight: the crowner hath sat on her, and finds it Christian burial.

FIRST CLO. How can that be, unless she drowned herself in her own defence?

SEC. CLO. Why, 'tis found so.

FIRST CLO. It must be 'se offendendo;' it cannot be else. For here lies the point: if I drown myself wittingly, it argues an act: and an act hath three branches; it is,

189 When these are gone. When once my tears are shed I shall have got the woman out of me.

4 Make her grave straight.

Not the mere holé in which a person should be buried on whom a 'felo de se' verdict has been found. See the note on line 200 below.

6

9 Se offendendo. He means se defendendo.'

II It argues an act. This seems to be a reference to the celebrated case of Sir E. Hales in 1553. Having narrowly escaped death for the Lady Jane Grey plot, this eminent lawyer had drowned himself, while apparently in a state of insanity from terror. A verdict of 'felo de se' was found upon him, involving forfeiture of goods and attainder. As there was some property in which his widow had a right immediately upon his death, the legal question arose whether it did not become hers before the 'verdict of attainder and forfeiture. She lost her cause on the ground that an act has three branches, imagination, resolution, and execution,' and that consequently her husband's attainder

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