Enter a King and a Queen.

P. King. Full thirty times hath Phoebus' cart gone round
Neptune's salt wash and Tellus' orbed ground,

And thirty dozen moons with borrow'd sheen
About the world have times twelve thirties been,
Since love our hearts, and Hymen did our hands,
Unite commutual in most sacred bands.

P. Queen. So many journeys may the sun and moon
Make us again count o'er ere love be done!

But, woe is me, you are so sick of late,

So far from cheer and from your former state,
That I distrust you. Yet, though I distrust,
Discomfort you, my lord, it nothing must:
For women's fear and love holds quantity;
In neither aught, or in extremity.

Now, what my love is, proof hath made you know;
And as my love is siz'd, my fear is so:

Where love is great, the littlest doubts are fear;

Where little fears grow great, great love grows there.

P. King. Faith, I must leave thee, love, and shortly

too;

My operant powers their functions leave to do:

And thou shalt live in this fair world behind,
Honour'd, belov'd; and haply one as kind

For husband shalt thou

P. Queen.

O, confound the rest!

Such love must needs be treason in my breast:

In second husband let me be accurst!

None wed the second but who kill'd the first.

Ham. [aside] Wormwood, wormwood.

P. Queen. The instances that second marriage move Are base respects of thrift, but none of love:

A second time I kill my husband dead,

When second husband kisses me in bed.

P. King. I do believe you think what now you speak;

But what we do determine oft we break.

Purpose is but the slave to memory;

Of violent birth, but poor validity:

Which now, like fruit unripe, sticks on the tree;
But fall, unshaken, when they mellow be.

Most necessary 'tis that we forget

Το pay ourselves what to ourselves is debt:
What to ourselves in passion we propose,
The passion ending, doth the purpose lose.
The violence of either grief or joy

Their own enactures with themselves destroy:
Where joy most revels, grief doth most lament;
Grief joys, joy grieves, on slender accident.
This world is not for aye; nor 'tis not strange
That even our loves should with our fortunes change;
For 'tis a question left us yet to prove,

Whether love lead fortune, or else fortune love.
The great man down, you mark his favourite flies;
The
poor advanc'd makes friends of enemies.

And hitherto doth love on fortune tend:

For who not needs shall never lack a friend;
And who in want a hollow friend doth try,
Directly seasons him his enemy.

But, orderly to end where I begun,—
Our wills and fates do so contráry run,

That our devices still are overthrown;

Our thoughts are ours, their ends none of our own:
So think thou wilt no second husband wed;

But die thy thoughts when thy first lord is dead.

P. Queen. Nor earth to me give food, nor heaven light!

Sport and repose lock from me day and night!

To desperation turn my trust and hope!
An anchor's cheer in prison be my scope!
Each opposite, that blanks the face of joy,
Meet what I would have well, and it destroy!
Both here and hence, pursue me lasting strife,
If, once a widow, ever I be wife !

Ham. If she should break it now!

P. King. 'Tis deeply sworn. Sweet, leave me here awhile; My spirits grow dull, and fain I would beguile

The tedious day with sleep.

P. Queen.

[Sleeps.

Sleep rock thy brain;

[Exit.

Ham. Madam, how like you this play?

And never come mischance between us twain!

Queen. The lady protests too much, methinks.

Ham. O, but she'll keep her word.

King. Have you heard the argument? Is there no offence in 't?

Ham. No, no, they do but jest, poison in jest; no offence i' the world.

King. What do you call the play?

Ham. The Mouse-trap. Marry, how? Tropically. This play is the image of a murder done in Vienna: Gonzago is the duke's name; his wife, Baptista: you shall see anon; 'tis a knavish piece of work: but what o' that? your majesty, and we that have free souls, it touches us not: let the galled jade wince, our withers are unwrung.

Enter LUCIANUS.

This is one Lucianus, nephew to the king.
Oph. You are a good chorus, my lord.

Ham. I could interpret between you and your love, if I could see the puppets dallying.

Oph. You are keen, my lord, you are keen.

Ham. It would cost you a groaning to take off my edge.
Oph. Still better, and worse.

Ham. So you must take(52) your husbands.-Begin, murderer; pox, (53) leave thy damnable faces, and begin. Come:the croaking raven doth bellow for revenge.(54)

Luc. Thoughts black, hands apt, drugs fit, and time

agreeing;

Confederate season, else no creature seeing;

Thou mixture rank, of midnight weeds collected,

With Hecate's ban thrice blasted, thrice infected,

Thy natural magic and dire property,

On wholesome life usurp immediately.

[Pours the poison into the sleeper's ears. Ham. He poisons him i'the garden for's estate. His name's Gonzago: the story is extant, and writ in choice Italian: you shall see anon how the murderer gets the love of Gonzago's wife.

Pol. Give o'er the play.

King. Give me some light:-away!

All. Lights, lights, lights!

[Exeunt all except Hamlet and Horatio.

Ham. Why, let the strucken deer go weep,(55)

The hart ungallèd play;

For some must watch, while some must sleep:

So runs the world away.

Would not this, sir, and a forest of feathers (if the rest of my fortunes turn Turk with me), with two Provincial roses on my razed shoes, get me a fellowship in a cry of players, sir?

Hor. Half a share.

Ham. A whole one, I.

For thou dost know, O Damon dear,

This realm dismantled was

Of Jove himself; and now reigns here

A very, very-pajock.(56)

Hor. You might have rhymed.

Ham. O good Horatio, I'll take the ghost's word for a thousand pound. Didst perceive?

Hor. Very well, my lord.

Ham. Upon the talk of the poisoning,

Hor. I did very well note him.

Ham. Ah, ha!-Come, some music! come, the record

ers!

For if the king like not the comedy,(57)

Why, then, belike,—he likes it not, perdy.

Come, some music!

Re-enter ROSENCRANTZ and Guildenstern.

Guil. Good my lord, vouchsafe me a word with you.
Ham. Sir, a whole history.

Guil. The king, sir,—

Ham. Ay, sir, what of him?

Guil. Is, in his retirement, marvellous distempered.

Ham. With drink, sir?

Guil. No, my lord, rather with choler.

Ham. Your wisdom should show itself more richer to signify this to his doctor; for, for me to put him to his purgation would perhaps plunge him into far more choler.

Guil. Good my lord, put your discourse into some frame, and start not so wildly from my affair.

Ham. I am tame, sir:-pronounce.

Guil. The queen, your mother, in most great affliction of spirit, hath sent me to you.

Ham. You are welcome.

Guil. Nay, good my lord, this courtesy is not of the right breed. If it shall please you to make me a wholesome answer, I will do your mother's commandment: if not, your pardon and my return shall be the end of my business.

Ham. Sir, I cannot.

Guil. What, my lord?

Ham. Make you a wholesome answer; my wit's diseased: but, sir, such answer as I can make, you shall command; or, rather, as you say, my mother: therefore no more, but to the matter: my mother, you say,

Ros. Then thus she says; your behaviour hath struck her into amazement and admiration.

Ham. O wonderful son, that can so astonish a mother!— But is there no sequel at the heels of this mother's admiration?

Ros. She desires to speak with you in her closet, ere you go to bed.

Ham. We shall obey, were she ten times our mother. Have you any further trade with us?

Ros. My lord, you once did love me.

Ham. So I do still, by these pickers and stealers.

Ros. Good my lord, what is your cause of distemper? you do, surely, bar the door upon your own liberty, if you deny your griefs to your friend.

Ham. Sir, I lack advancement.

Ros. How can that be, when you have the voice of the king himself for your succession in Denmark?

Ham. Ay, but "While the grass grows," the proverb is something musty.