ACT IV SCENE IV� Setting: A plain in Denmark.
Enter FORTINBRAS, a Captain, and Soldiers, marching.�
| PRINCE FORTINBRAS� |
Go, captain, from me greet the Danish king; |
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Tell him that, by his licence, Fortinbras |
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Craves the conveyance of a promised march |
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Over his kingdom. You know the rendezvous. |
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If that his majesty would aught with us, |
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We shall express our duty in his eye; |
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And let him know so. |
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| Captain� |
I will do't, my lord. |
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| PRINCE FORTINBRAS� |
Go softly on. |
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Exeunt FORTINBRAS and Soldiers. |
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Enter HAMLET, ROSENCRANTZ, GUILDENSTERN, and others. |
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| HAMLET� |
Good sir, whose powers are these? |
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| Captain� |
They are of Norway, sir. |
�10 |
| HAMLET� |
How purposed, sir, I pray you? |
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| Captain� |
Against some part of Poland. |
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| HAMLET� |
Who commands them, sir? |
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| Captain� |
The nephews to old Norway, Fortinbras. |
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| HAMLET� |
Goes it against the main of Poland, sir, |
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Or for some frontier? |
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| Captain� |
Truly to speak, and with no addition, |
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We go to gain a little patch of ground |
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That hath in it no profit but the name. |
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To pay five ducats, five, I would not farm it; |
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Nor will it yield to Norway or the Pole |
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A ranker rate, should it be sold in fee. |
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| HAMLET� |
Why, then the Polack never will defend it. |
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| Captain� |
Yes, it is already garrison'd. |
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| HAMLET� |
Two thousand souls and twenty thousand ducats |
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Will not debate the question of this straw: |
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This is the imposthume of much wealth and peace, |
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That inward breaks, and shows no cause without |
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Why the man dies. I humbly thank you, sir. |
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| Captain� |
God be wi' you, sir. |
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Exit |
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| ROSENCRANTZ� |
Will't please you go, my lord? |
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| HAMLET� |
I'll be with you straight go a little before. |
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Exeunt all except HAMLET. |
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How all occasions do inform against me, |
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And spur my dull revenge! What is a man, |
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If his chief good and market of his time |
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Be but to sleep and feed? a beast, no more. |
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Sure, he that made us with such large discourse, |
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Looking before and after, gave us not |
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That capability and god–like reason |
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To fust in us unused. Now, whether it be |
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Bestial oblivion, or some craven scruple |
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Of thinking too precisely on the event, |
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A thought which, quarter'd, hath but one part wisdom |
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And ever three parts coward, I do not know |
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Why yet I live to say 'This thing's to do;' |
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Sith I have cause and will and strength and means |
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To do't. Examples gross as earth exhort me: |
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Witness this army of such mass and charge |
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Led by a delicate and tender prince, |
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Whose spirit with divine ambition puff'd |
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Makes mouths at the invisible event, |
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Exposing what is mortal and unsure |
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To all that fortune, death and danger dare, |
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Even for an egg–shell. Rightly to be great |
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Is not to stir without great argument, |
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But greatly to find quarrel in a straw |
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When honour's at the stake. How stand I then, |
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That have a father kill'd, a mother stain'd, |
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Excitements of my reason and my blood, |
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And let all sleep? while, to my shame, I see |
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The imminent death of�twenty thousand men, |
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That, for a fantasy and trick of fame, |
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Go to their graves like beds, fight for a plot |
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Whereon the numbers cannot try the cause, |
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Which is not tomb enough and continent |
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To hide the slain? O, from this time forth, |
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My thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth! |
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Exit |
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