HAM. Then is dooms-day near: But your news is not true. Let me question more in particular: What have you, my good friends, deserved at the hands of fortune, that she sends you to prison hither?

GUIL. Prison, my lord!

HAM. Denmark's a prison.

Ros. Then is the world one.

HAM. A goodly one; in which there are many confines, wards and dungeons; Denmark being one of the worst.

Ros. We think not so, my lord.

HAM. Why, then 'tis none to you; for there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so: to me it is a prison.

Ros. Why, then your ambition makes it one; 'tis too narrow for your mind.

HAM. O God! I could be bounded in a nutshell, and count myself a king of infinite space; were it not that I have bad dreams.

GUIL. Which dreams, indeed, are ambition; for the very substance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream, (23)

HAM. A dream itself is but a shadow.

Ros. Truly, and I hold ambition of so airy and light a quality, that it is but a shadow's shadow.

HAM. Then are our beggars, bodies; and our monarchs, and outstretch'd heroes, the beggars' shadows: Shall we to the court? for, by my fay, I cannot reason.

a

a Then are our beggars bodies-and our outstretched heroes the beggars' shadows] At this rate, and, if it be true, that lofty aims are no more than air, our beggars only have the nature of substance; and our monarchs and those who are blazoned so far abroad, as to be thought materially to fill so much space, are in fact shadows, and in imagination only gigantic.

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?

b

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. 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?

to the pur

HAM. Why any thing-but to the purpose.* You * So, 4tos. were sent for; and there is a kind of confession in thing. But your looks, which your modesties have not craft pose, 1623, enough to colour: I know, the good king and queen have sent for you.

Ros. To what end, my lord?

C

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?

* beaten way of friendship] Plain track, open and unceremonious course.

b

too dear a halfpenny] i. e. at a halfpenny; at so small, or, indeed at any price. If valued as the return for any thing, such cost is beyond their worth.

с

rights of our fellowship and consonancy of our youth] Habits

of familiar intercourse and correspondent years.

d

a

better proposer] An advocate of more address in shaping

his aims, who could make a stronger appeal.

Ros. What say you?

1623, 32.

queen:

[To GUILDENStern.

HAM. Nay, then, I have an eye of you;* [Aside.]

-if

you

love me,

hold not off.

GUIL. My lord, we were sent for.

• So 4tos. HAM. I will tell you why; so shall my anticipa discovery of tion prevent your discovery, and your secrecy to the king and queen* moult no feather. I have of 1623, 39. late, (but, wherefore, I know not,) lost all my mirth, forgone all custom of exercises: and, inheavenly. deed, it goes so heavily* with my disposition, that 1623, 32. this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a steril promontory; this most excellent canopy, the air, firmament look you, this brave o'erhanging, this majes

4tos.

tical roof fretted with golden fire, (2) 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?

• Nay then, I have an eye of you] Upon or after you, a sharp look out.

b

so shall my anticipation prevent your discovery, and your secrecy to the king moult no feather.] Be beforehand with your discovery, and the plume and gloss of your secret pledge be in no feather shed or tarnished. The reading is from the 4tos.

express] According to pattern, justly and perfectly modelled,

d

II. 4.

paragon] Model of perfection. See Two G. of V. Prot.

Ros. To think, my lord, if you delight not in man, what lenten entertainment (25) the players shall receive from you: we coated them on the way; (26) and hither are they coming, to offer you

service.

a

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; (27) and the lady shall say her mind freely, (2) or the blank verse shall halt for't.-What players are they?

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

HAM. How chances it, they travel? their residence, both in reputation and profit, was better both ways.

Ros. I think, their inhibition comes by the means of the late innovation. (29)

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 ayrie of children, (30) little (31) yases, that cry out on the top of question," and are most tyrannically clapped for't: (3) these are now the fashion; and so berattle* the com- ⚫beratled. mon stages, (so they call them) that many, wear. 1623. ing rapiers, are afraid of goose quills, and dare scarce come thither.

с

• The humorous man shall end his part in peace] The fretful or capricious man shall vent the whole of his spleen undisturbed.

⚫ then, O.C.

*

HAM. What, are they children? who maintains them? how are they escoted? 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 like most, if their means are not better,) their writers do them wrong, to make them exclaim against their own succession?f

g

e

Ros. 'Faith, there has been much to do on both sides; and the nation holds it no sin, to tarre them 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.h

HAM. Do the boys carry it away?

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

HAM. It is not strange: for my uncle (34) is king

• escoted] Paid. From the Fr. escot, a sort of reckoning. JOHNSON.

pursue the quality] The calling. See Two G. of V. 1. Outl. IV. 1.

с

d

e

no longer than they can sing] Keep their voices.

grow themselves to] Advance themselves, shoot up to.

like most] Most like, or likely, is the modern turn of the phrase.

'exclaim against their own succession] By another sort of outcry traduce that profession, to which they must look, as an inheritance or future provision.

to turre them] Set them on. See K. John, IV. 1. Arth. throwing about of brains] Sharp and nice discussion.

i Hercules and his load too] Every thing before them. Mr. Steevens observes, "the allusion may be to the Globe playhouse on the Bankside, the sign of which was Hercules carrying the Globe; as for a time he did in ease of the labours of Atlas."