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Act 5, page 0

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ACT V SCENE I� Setting:A churchyard. Setting:� Setting:�Enter two Clowns, with spades, &c.�

First Clown� Is she to be buried in Christian burial that � � wilfully seeks her own salvation? � Second Clown� I tell thee she is: and therefore make her grave � � straight: the crowner hath sat on her, and finds it � Christian burial. � First Clown� How can that be, unless she drowned herself in her � � own defence? � Second Clown� Why, 'tis found so. � First Clown� 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, to act, to do, to perform: argal, she drowned � � herself wittingly. � Second Clown� Nay, but hear you, goodman delver,–– First Clown� Give me leave. Here lies the water; good: here � � stands the man; good; if the man go to this water, � � and drown himself, it is, will he, nill he, he � � goes,––mark you that; but if the water come to him � � and drown him, he drowns not himself: argal, he � that is not guilty of his own death shortens not his own life. � Second Clown� But is this law? �20 First Clown� Ay, marry, is't; crowner's quest law. � Second Clown� Will you ha' the truth on't? If this had not been � � a gentlewoman, she should have been buried out o' � Christian burial. � First Clown� Why, there thou say'st: and the more pity that � � great folk should have countenance in this world to � � drown or hang themselves, more than their even � � Christian. Come, my spade. There is no ancient � gentleman but gardeners, ditchers, and grave–makers: � � they hold up Adam's profession. � Second Clown� Was he a gentleman? �30 First Clown� He was the first that ever bore arms. � Second Clown� Why, he had none. First Clown� What, art a heathen? How dost thou understand the � � Scripture? The Scripture says 'Adam digged:' � � could he dig without arms? I'll put another question to thee: if thou answerest me not to the � purpose, confess thyself–– Second Clown� Go to. � First Clown� What is he that builds stronger than either the � � mason, the shipwright, or the carpenter? � Second Clown� The gallows–maker; for that frame outlives a �40 � thousand tenants. First Clown� I like thy wit well, in good faith: the gallows � � does well; but how does it well? it does well to � � those that do in: now thou dost ill to say the � � gallows is built stronger than the church: argal, � � the gallows may do well to thee. To't again, come. Second Clown� Who builds stronger than a mason, a shipwright, or � � a carpenter?' � First Clown� Ay, tell me that, and unyoke. � Second Clown� Marry, now I can tell. �50 First Clown� To't. Second Clown� Mass, I cannot tell. � � Enter HAMLET and HORATIO, at a distance. � First Clown� Cudgel thy brains no more about it, for your dull � � ass will not mend his pace with beating; and, when � � you are asked this question next, say 'a � � grave–maker: 'the houses that he makes last till � doomsday. Go, get thee to Yaughan: fetch me a � � stoup of liquor. � � Exit Second Clown � � He�digs�and�sings � � In youth, when I did love, did love, � � Methought it was very sweet, � � To contract, O, the time, for, ah, my behove, � O, methought, there was nothing meet. �61 HAMLET� Has this fellow no feeling of his business, that he � � sings at grave–making? � HORATIO� Custom hath made it in him a property of easiness. � HAMLET� Tis e'en so: the hand of little employment hath � the daintier sense. � First Clown� Sings. � � But age, with his stealing steps, � � Hath claw'd me in his clutch, � � And hath shipped me intil the land, �69 � As if I had never been such. � Throws up a skull. � HAMLET� That skull had a tongue in it, and could sing once: � � how the knave jowls it to the ground, as if it were � � Cain's jaw–bone, that did the first murder! It � � might be the pate of a politician, which this ass � � now o'er–reaches; one that would circumvent God, � might it not? � HORATIO� It might, my lord. � HAMLET� Or of a courtier; which could say 'Good morrow, � � sweet lord! How dost thou, good lord?' This might � � be my lord such–a–one, that praised my lord � such–a–one's horse, when he meant to beg it; might it not? �80 HORATIO� Ay, my lord. � HAMLET� Why, e'en so: and now my Lady Worm's; chapless, and � � knocked about the mazzard with a sexton's spade: � � here's fine revolution, an we had the trick to � see't. Did these bones cost no more the breeding, � � but to play at loggats with 'em? mine ache to think on't. � First Clown: [Sings.]� A pick–axe, and a spade, a spade, � � For and a shrouding sheet: � � O, a pit of clay for to be made � For such a guest is meet. �90 � Throws up another skull. � HAMLET� There's another: why may not that be the skull of a � � lawyer? Where be his quiddities now, his quillets, � � his cases, his tenures, and his tricks? why does he � � suffer this rude knave now to knock him about the � sconce with a dirty shovel, and will not tell him of � � his action of battery? Hum! This fellow might be � � in's time a great buyer of land, with his statutes, � � his recognizances, his fines, his double vouchers, � � his recoveries: is this the fine of his fines, and � the recovery of his recoveries, to have his fine � � pate full of fine dirt? will his vouchers vouch him � � no more of his purchases, and double ones too, than � � the length and breadth of a pair of indentures? The � � very conveyances of his lands will hardly lie in � this box; and must the inheritor himself have no more, ha? � HORATIO� Not a jot more, my lord. � HAMLET� Is not parchment made of sheepskins? � HORATIO� Ay, my lord, and of calf–skins too. � HAMLET� They are sheep and calves which seek out assurance � in that. I will speak to this fellow. Whose � � grave's this, sirrah? � First Clown� Mine, sir. �115 � Sings. � � O, a pit of clay for to be made � � For such a guest is meet. HAMLET� I think it be thine, indeed; for thou liest in't. � First Clown� You lie out on't, sir, and therefore it is not � � yours: for my part, I do not lie in't, and yet it is mine. � HAMLET� Thou dost lie in't, to be in't and say it is thine: � � tis for the dead, not for the quick; therefore thou liest. First Clown� Tis a quick lie, sir; 'twill away gain, from me to � � you. � HAMLET� What man dost thou dig it for? �120 First Clown� For no man, sir. � HAMLET� What woman, then? First Clown� For none, neither. � HAMLET� Who is to be buried in't? � First Clown� One that was a woman, sir; but, rest her soul, she's dead. � HAMLET� How absolute the knave is! we must speak by the � � card, or equivocation will undo us. By the Lord, � Horatio, these three years I have taken a note of � � it; the age is grown so picked that the toe of the � � peasant comes so near the heel of the courtier, he � � gaffs his kibe. How long hast thou been a � � grave–maker? First Clown� Of all the days i' the year, I came to't that day � � that our last king Hamlet overcame Fortinbras. � HAMLET� How long is that since? � First Clown� Cannot you tell that? every fool can tell that: it � � was the very day that young Hamlet was born; he that � is mad, and sent into England. � HAMLET� Ay, marry, why was he sent into England? � First Clown� Why, because he was mad: he shall recover his wits � � there; or, if he do not, it's no great matter there. �141 HAMLET� Why? First Clown� Twill, a not be seen in him there; there the men � � are as mad as he. � HAMLET� How came he mad? � First Clown� Very strangely, they say. � HAMLET� How strangely? First Clown� Faith, e'en with losing his wits. � HAMLET� Upon what ground? � First Clown� Why, here in Denmark: I have been sexton here, man � � and boy, thirty years. �151 HAMLET� How long will a man lie i' the earth ere he rot? First Clown� I' faith, if he be not rotten before he die––as we � � have many pocky corses now–a–days, that will scarce � � hold the laying in––he will last you some eight year � � or nine year: a tanner will last you nine year. � HAMLET� Why he more than another? First Clown� Why, sir, his hide is so tanned with his trade, that � � he will keep out water a great while; and your water � � is a sore decayer of your whoreson dead body. � � Here's a skull now; this skull has lain in the earth � � three and twenty years. HAMLET� Whose was it? �162 First Clown� A whoreson mad fellow's it was: whose do you think it was? � HAMLET� Nay, I know not. � First Clown� A pestilence on him for a mad rogue! a' poured a � � flagon of Rhenish on my head once. This same skull, � sir, was Yorick's skull, the king's jester. � HAMLET� This? � First Clown� E'en that. �170 HAMLET� Let me see. � � Takes the skull. � � Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio: a fellow � of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy: he hath � � borne me on his back a thousand times; and now, how � � abhorred in my imagination it is! my gorge rises at � � it. Here hung those lips that I have kissed I know � � not how oft. Where be your gibes now? your � gambols? your songs? your flashes of merriment, � � that were wont to set the table on a roar? Not one � � now, to mock your own grinning? quite chap–fallen. � � Now get you to my lady's chamber, and tell her, let � � her paint an inch thick, to this favour she must � come; make her laugh at that. Prithee, Horatio, tell � � me one thing. � HORATIO� What's that, my lord? � HAMLET� Dost thou think Alexander looked o' this fashion i' � � the earth? HORATIO� E'en so. � HAMLET� And smelt so? pah! � � Puts down the skull. � HORATIO� E'en so, my lord. � HAMLET� To what base uses we may return, Horatio! Why may � � not imagination trace the noble dust of Alexander, � till he find it stopping a bung–hole? �191 HORATIO� Twere to consider too curiously, to consider so. � HAMLET� No, faith, not a jot; but to follow him thither with � � modesty enough, and likelihood to lead it: as � � thus: Alexander died, Alexander was buried, � Alexander returneth into dust; the dust is earth; of � � earth we make loam; and why of that loam, whereto he � � was converted, might they not stop a beer–barrel? � � Imperious Caesar, dead and turn'd to clay, � � Might stop a hole to keep the wind away. � O, that that earth, which kept the world in awe, � � Should patch a wall to expel the winter flaw! � � But soft! but soft! aside: here comes the king. � � Enter Priest, the Corpse of OPHELIA, LAERTES and Mourners following; KING CLAUDIUS, QUEEN GERTRUDE, their trains, &c. � � The queen, the courtiers: who is this they follow? � � And with such maimed rites? This doth betoken � The corse they follow did with desperate hand � � Fordo its own life: 'twas of some estate. � � Couch we awhile, and mark. � � Retiring with HORATIO. � LAERTES� What ceremony else? � HAMLET� That is Laertes, � A very noble youth: mark. �210 LAERTES� What ceremony else? � First Priest� Her obsequies have been as far enlarged � � As we have warranty: her death was doubtful; � � And, but that great command o'ersways the order, � She should in ground unsanctified have lodg'd � � Till the last trumpet: for charitable prayers, � � Shards, flints and pebbles should be thrown on her; � � Yet here she is allow'd her virgin crants, � � Her maiden strewments and the bringing home � Of bell and burial. �220 LAERTES� Must there no more be done? � First Priest� No more be done! � � We should profane the service of the dead � � To sing a requiem and such rest to her � As to peace–parted souls. � LAERTES� Lay her i' the earth: � � And from her fair and unpolluted flesh � � May violets spring! I tell thee, churlish priest, � � A ministering angel shall my sister be, � When thou liest howling. � HAMLET� What, the fair Ophelia! � QUEEN GERTRUDE� Sweets to the sweet: farewell! � � Scattering flowers. � � I hoped thou shouldst have been my Hamlet's wife; �230 � I thought thy bride–bed to have deck'd, sweet maid, � And not have strew'd thy grave. � LAERTES� O, treble woe � � Fall ten times treble on that cursed head, � � Whose wicked deed thy most ingenious sense � � Deprived thee of! Hold off the earth awhile, � Till I have caught her once more in mine arms: � � Leaps into the grave. � � Now pile your dust upon the quick and dead, � � Till of this flat a mountain you have made, � � To o'ertop old Pelion, or the skyish head � � Of blue Olympus. HAMLET� Advancing.�What is he whose grief � � Bears such an emphasis? whose phrase of sorrow � � Conjures the wandering stars, and makes them stand � � Like wonder–wounded hearers? This is I, � � Hamlet the Dane. � � Leaps into the grave. � LAERTES� The devil take thy soul! � Grappling with him. � HAMLET� Thou pray'st not well. � � I prithee, take thy fingers from my throat; � � For, though I am not splenitive and rash, � � Yet have I something in me dangerous, � � Which let thy wiseness fear: hold off thy hand. KING CLAUDIUS� Pluck them asunder. � QUEEN GERTRUDE� Hamlet, Hamlet! �250 All� Gentlemen,–– � HORATIO� Good my lord, be quiet. � � The Attendants part them, and they come out of the grave. � HAMLET� Why I will fight with him upon this theme � Until my eyelids will no longer wag. � QUEEN GERTRUDE� O my son, what theme? � HAMLET� I loved Ophelia: forty thousand brothers � � Could not, with all their quantity of love, � � Make up my sum. What wilt thou do for her? KING CLAUDIUS� O, he is mad, Laertes. � QUEEN GERTRUDE� For love of God, forbear him. � HAMLET� Swounds, show me what thou'lt do: �260 � Woo't weep? woo't fight? woo't fast? woo't tear thyself? � � Woo't drink up eisel? eat a crocodile? � I'll do't. Dost thou come here to whine? � � To outface me with leaping in her grave? � � Be buried quick with her, and so will I: � � And, if thou prate of mountains, let them throw � � Millions of acres on us, till our ground, � Singeing his pate against the burning zone, � � Make Ossa like a wart! Nay, an thou'lt mouth, � � I'll rant as well as thou. � QUEEN GERTRUDE� This is mere madness: �270 � And thus awhile the fit will work on him; � Anon, as patient as the female dove, � � When that her golden couplets are disclosed, � � His silence will sit drooping. � HAMLET� Hear you, sir; � � What is the reason that you use me thus? � I loved you ever: but it is no matter; � � Let Hercules himself do what he may, � � The cat will mew and dog will have his day. � � Exit � KING CLAUDIUS� I pray you, good Horatio, wait upon him. � � Exit HORATIO. � � To LAERTES. � � Strengthen your patience in our last night's speech; � We'll put the matter to the present push. � � Good Gertrude, set some watch over your son. � � This grave shall have a living monument: � � An hour of quiet shortly shall we see; � � Till then, in patience our proceeding be. � Exeunt �

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Act 1, page 0

Table of Contents

ACT I SCENE I� Setting: Elsinore. A platform before the castle.

[FRANCISCO at his post. Enter to him BERNARDO]

BERNARDO Who's there? FRANCISCO Nay, answer me: stand, and unfold yourself. BERNARDO Long live the king! FRANCISCO Bernardo? BERNARDO He. FRANCISCO You come most carefully upon your hour. BERNARDO Tis now struck twelve; get thee to bed, Francisco. FRANCISCO For this relief much thanks: 'tis bitter cold, And I am sick at heart. BERNARDO Have you had quiet guard? FRANCISCO Not a mouse stirring. 10 BERNARDO Well, good night. If you do meet Horatio and Marcellus, The rivals of my watch, bid them make haste. FRANCISCO I think I hear them. Stand, ho! Who's there? [Enter HORATIO and MARCELLUS] HORATIO Friends to this ground. MARCELLUS And liegemen to the Dane. FRANCISCO Give you good night. MARCELLUS O, farewell, honest soldier: Who hath relieved you? FRANCISCO Bernardo has my place. Give you good night. [Exit] MARCELLUS Holla! Bernardo! BERNARDO Say, What, is Horatio there? HORATIO A piece of him. BERNARDO Welcome, Horatio: welcome, good Marcellus. 20 MARCELLUS What, has this thing appear'd again to–night? BERNARDO I have seen nothing. MARCELLUS Horatio says 'tis but our fantasy, And will not let belief take hold of him Touching this dreaded sight, twice seen of us: Therefore I have entreated him along With us to watch the minutes of this night; That if again this apparition come, He may approve our eyes and speak to it. HORATIO Tush, tush, 'twill not appear. BERNARDO Sit down awhile; 30 And let us once again assail your ears, That are so fortified against our story What we have two nights seen. HORATIO Well, sit we down, And let us hear Bernardo speak of this. BERNARDO Last night of all, When yond same star that's westward from the pole Had made his course to illume that part of heaven Where now it burns, Marcellus and myself, The bell then beating one,–– [Enter Ghost] MARCELLUS Peace, break thee off; look, where it comes again! 40 BERNARDO In the same figure, like the king that's dead. MARCELLUS Thou art a scholar; speak to it, Horatio. BERNARDO Looks it not like the king? mark it, Horatio. HORATIO Most like: it harrows me with fear and wonder. BERNARDO It would be spoke to. MARCELLUS Question it, Horatio. HORATIO What art thou that usurp'st this time of night, Together with that fair and warlike form In which the majesty of buried Denmark Did sometimes march? by heaven I charge thee, speak! MARCELLUS It is offended. BERNARDO See, it stalks away! 50 HORATIO Stay! speak, speak! I charge thee, speak! [Exit Ghost] MARCELLUS Tis gone, and will not answer. BERNARDO How now, Horatio! you tremble and look pale: Is not this something more than fantasy? What think you on't? HORATIO Before my God, I might not this believe Without the sensible and true avouch Of mine own eyes. MARCELLUS Is it not like the king? HORATIO As thou art to thyself: Such was the very armour he had on 60 When he the ambitious Norway combated; So frown'd he once, when, in an angry parle, He smote the sledded Polacks on the ice. Tis strange. MARCELLUS Thus twice before, and jump at this dead hour, With martial stalk hath he gone by our watch. HORATIO In what particular thought to work I know not; But in the gross and scope of my opinion, This bodes some strange eruption to our state. MARCELLUS Good now, sit down, and tell me, he that knows, 70 Why this same strict and most observant watch So nightly toils the subject of the land, And why such daily cast of brazen cannon, And foreign mart for implements of war; Why such impress of shipwrights, whose sore task Does not divide the Sunday from the week; What might be toward, that this sweaty haste Doth make the night joint–labourer with the day: Who is't that can inform me? HORATIO That can I; At least, the whisper goes so. Our last king, 80 Whose image even but now appear'd to us, Was, as you know, by Fortinbras of Norway, Thereto prick'd on by a most emulate pride, Dared to the combat; in which our valiant Hamlet–– For so this side of our known world esteem'd him–– Did slay this Fortinbras; who by a seal'd compact, Well ratified by law and heraldry, Did forfeit, with his life, all those his lands Which he stood seized of, to the conqueror: Against the which, a moiety competent 90 Was gaged by our king; which had return'd To the inheritance of Fortinbras, Had he been vanquisher; as, by the same covenant, And carriage of the article design'd, His fell to Hamlet. Now, sir, young Fortinbras, Of unimproved mettle hot and full, Hath in the skirts of Norway here and there Shark'd up a list of lawless resolutes, For food and diet, to some enterprise That hath a stomach in't; which is no other–– 100 As it doth well appear unto our state–– But to recover of us, by strong hand And terms compulsatory, those foresaid lands So by his father lost: and this, I take it, Is the main motive of our preparations, The source of this our watch and the chief head Of this post–haste and romage in the land. BERNARDO I think it be no other but e'en so: Well may it sort that this portentous figure Comes armed through our watch; so like the king 110 That was and is the question of these wars. HORATIO A mote it is to trouble the mind's eye. In the most high and palmy state of Rome, A little ere the mightiest Julius fell, The graves stood tenantless and the sheeted dead Did squeak and gibber in the Roman streets: As stars with trains of fire and dews of blood, Disasters in the sun; and the moist star Upon whose influence Neptune's empire stands Was sick almost to doomsday with eclipse: 120 And even the like precurse of fierce events, As harbingers preceding still the fates And prologue to the omen coming on, Have heaven and earth together demonstrated Unto our climatures and countrymen.–– But soft, behold! lo, where it comes again! [Re–enter Ghost] I'll cross it, though it blast me. Stay, illusion! If thou hast any sound, or use of voice, Speak to me: If there be any good thing to be done, 130 That may to thee do ease and grace to me, Speak to me: [Cock crows] If thou art privy to thy country's fate, Which, happily, foreknowing may avoid, O, speak! Or if thou hast uphoarded in thy life Extorted treasure in the womb of earth, For which, they say, you spirits oft walk in death, Speak of it: stay, and speak! Stop it, Marcellus. MARCELLUS Shall I strike at it with my partisan? 140 HORATIO Do, if it will not stand. BERNARDO Tis here! HORATIO Tis here! MARCELLUS Tis gone! [Exit Ghost] We do it wrong, being so majestical, To offer it the show of violence; For it is, as the air, invulnerable, And our vain blows malicious mockery. BERNARDO It was about to speak, when the cock crew. HORATIO And then it started like a guilty thing Upon a fearful summons. I have heard, The cock, that is the trumpet to the morn, 150 Doth with his lofty and shrill–sounding throat Awake the god of day; and, at his warning, Whether in sea or fire, in earth or air, The extravagant and erring spirit hies To his confine: and of the truth herein This present object made probation. MARCELLUS It faded on the crowing of the cock. Some say that ever 'gainst that season comes Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated, The bird of dawning singeth all night long: 160 And then, they say, no spirit dares stir abroad; The nights are wholesome; then no planets strike, No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm, So hallow'd and so gracious is the time. HORATIO So have I heard and do in part believe it. But, look, the morn, in russet mantle clad, Walks o'er the dew of yon high eastward hill: Break we our watch up; and by my advice, Let us impart what we have seen to–night Unto young Hamlet; for, upon my life, 170 This spirit, dumb to us, will speak to him. Do you consent we shall acquaint him with it, As needful in our loves, fitting our duty? MARCELLUS Let's do't, I pray; and I this morning know Where we shall find him most conveniently. [Exeunt]