Laertes, even counting on Hamlet's generous freedom from suspicion as an aid in his destruction. In our notions the thing is impossible to a man with the least sense of honour; but an audience of Shakspere's day had heard of too many examples in their own time of men always accounted honourable lending themselves to assassination plots, not to recognise the possibility of Laertes' action. Had not Queen Elizabeth's palace swarmed with assassins who ate her bread while seeking her life, and yet carried themselves as honourable men to the world at large?

Ophelia's death and incomplete funeral increase Laertes' fury against the supposed author of her woes, and his determination to be revenged is only intensified when Hamlet appears at the graveside, frantic with love and passion. The sort of reconciliation which precedes the fencing-match is accepted by Laertes awkwardly enough, for he has the grace not to feel quite comfortable under it, not being an accomplished hypocrite like the King. Moreover, when the moment arrives for executing the villainous scheme, some compunctions do seize him, but they are not strong enough to turn him from his purpose. It is only when the fatal point has touched him, and he knows that his life is forfeited, that a veil seems to fall from his eyes, and he sees his offence against Hamlet, and Hamlet's against him in their true proportions, and realises that Claudius has made a tool of him in the matter. Then he does all he can to atone by full confession in the few moments left to him, and dies, leaving us half reconciled to him, after all.

From Laertes' fierce struggle to attain his own ends at whatever cost to other people, we turn with some sense of relief to Horatio's calm and steady devotion to his one friend. His is the kind of character which Shakspere repeatedly sets in the background of his plays a figure neither sparkling nor showy, but so quietly steadfast and true that the other characters come to repose their stormy excitability on his strength. He is the sort of man who is generally not quite appreciated till something removes him from his accustomed sphere, and then everybody is astonished to find what a gap he makes. We are told very little about Horatio except the facts of his poverty, his having experienced ups and downs in life, and his studentship at Wittenberg, where Hamlet was wise enough to find out his worth, and able to inspire him with that unswerving devotion. to his princely comrade, which becomes the moving spring of his life, as far as we see it. Without ever making protestations of his affection, Horatio simply devotes himself to serving and helping Hamlet as far as his power extends, and feels his doing so such an obvious and natural thing that he is quite startled when he discovers the strength of the Prince's regard for him. It comes as natural to him to feel the world unbearable if Hamlet leaves it, and this calm self-controlled man longs to fling his life away when the object of it is gone, so that he only consents to live in order to be the dead Hamlet's

champion, and defend his memory. There is no servility in his devotion; he is perfectly at his ease with Hamlet, not afraid of disagreeing with him, nor in extreme cases trying to control him, as when Hamlet will follow the Ghost; but none of this affects their friendship.

It is interesting to notice the slight touches which mark the difference between Horatio and the other two Wittenberg students, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. For instance, Hamlet puts the same question casually after each arrival, as to what has brought them to Elsinore? The wily couple glibly assure him that they have only come to see him-not true, by the way. Horatio, not wishing to recall sad memories, and not good at excuses, utters the transparent fiction A truant disposition, good, my lord,' and when Hamlet won't hear of that, falls back on the truth, that he came to the King's funeral. So throughout, even when Rosencrantz and Guildenstern speak the truth, their words ring false, Horatio is sincere and straightforward all through. Nobody could make a tool of him; so to the end he remains Hamlet's one friend and helper, the sympathising recipient of his confidence, the faithful guardian of his secrets; finally, the executor of his last wishes and defender of his memory. It is entirely in keeping with the rest of Horatio's doings that he is the only person who appears as trying to do anything for poor Ophelia in her distraction. While other people shrink from her, Horatio manages to humour her fancy for seeing the Queen, and evidently pities her from his heart.

When considering the fate of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, it looks, on the face of it, as if they get rather hard measure from Hamlet's indignation, because it is never exactly stated that they know the contents of their commission; but assuming with Hamlet that they not only know it, but willingly accept the office of conducting him to death, such cold-blooded treachery deserves the worst it could get. There is a special feature in their falsity, in that they use the old comradeship between them and Hamlet to betray him; they keep up the appearance of affection and respect while they have given themselves over to the new king. Though at first they only begin by trying to find out what ails him, they have secretly deserted Hamlet, and rapidly progress from watching and spying on him to executing Claudius' pleasure respecting him, and at last becoming his gaolers, and leading him to a violent death. From the very first, we can judge by the extent of their fawning on that wretched Claudius, that they are not inclined to stick at anything which promotes their own advantage; in Hamlet's scornful phrase, they are regular 'sponges' for profit, useful, unscrupulous instruments in the hands of a usurper.

While nearly all the characters of the play are pretty intimately connected together by the links which bind their fortunes to Hamlet's, Shakspere does not let us forget that the big outside world is going

on all the time, regardless of them and their sins and sufferings. Rumours of Fortinbras and his activity come in from time to time across the interior excitements of Elsinore. Some people will have it that this princely adventurer, always doing something, is intended to contrast with Hamlet, ever delaying his action; but surely, if Shakspere had intended to emphasise this, he would not have waited till the last instant of the play to bring Fortinbras on the stage, nor do we see that his story, as far as we know it, bears out the idea. He first begins a wild enterprise against Denmark, but abandons it at his uncle's orders; undertakes another, not much wiser, against Poland, and comes back to find the Danish throne, as it were, waiting for him. But what analogy has all this with Hamlet's history? Nevertheless, it brings a breath of the fresher, outer air into the prisonhouse atmosphere of Elsinore.

Then we are reminded of the ordinary world, with its hard and shallow judgments, its cold insensibility to the sufferings it cannot comprehend, by the Grave-diggers.

6

How their scene has been abused as spoiling the whole tragedy, inappropriate, and everything else! The lovers of the unities,' of course, fell on it tooth and nail, and plenty of critics still re-echo their shrieks. Still, we may be bold to say that Shakspere knew what he was about when he put it in, and was by no means only humouring the groundlings.' The strain and tension of Hamlet is so great that we need a momentary break and relief. But even so, the sadness is not far off, underlying the Grave-diggers' quaint speeches, as well as Hamlet's dreamy musing-is almost the saddest of thoughts: Be what you may, fair, gifted, loving, unhappy, your sorrow, your tragedy is nothing to the rest of the world, which goes on toiling, jeering, and laughing, as if you had never been.' Everything human, however heroic, must have a commonplace aspect, on which the ordinary world inevitably seizes, and Shakspere does not shrink from showing us that Hamlet and Ophelia's stories seemed to the vulgar mind as a mere case of a madman sent off out of harm's way, an ordinary suicide hidden by the privileges of rank.

Lastly, while loving hearts break and high natures struggle to the death, the world of frivolity and fashion, typified by Osric, goes on its indifferent way. Surely our modern esthetic ladies and gentlemen, and all the devotees of china and inventors of incomprehensible jargons, ought to adopt Osric as a kind of patron saint, a model which they are not likely to surpass. Though our knowledge of Osric is principally derived from one passage (for during the fencing match he has to keep tolerably quiet) we know him quite as well as if he appeared constantly. He is the embodiment, the concentrated expression of that affectation, foppery, and conceit at which Shakspere has dealt blows all through the plays whenever be had a chance to do so, and as Osric has really nothing to do with the story in this case, it seems as if Shakspere, for once, indulged himself in setting up a

ninepin, and, through Hamlet's agency, knocking it down again. Certainly poor Osric is knocked very flat, for Hamlet outdoes him in his own jargon, and forces him to fall back on plain English. While all the tragedy of the play has gone on, Osric has doubtless been airing his fine clothes and composing his elegant phrases, perfectly unconscious of anything more important than settling a bet or following the latest fashion. But perhaps Hamlet is a trifle hard on the foolish creature, who is not meant to be taken too seriously, and who has an excuse not always shared by his modern imitators— he is very young, and may get wiser in time.

Though these outside people are thus brought into the story, reminding us of the indifferent world, their very carelessness of Hamlet and his troubles helps to indicate how closely all the rest are bound to him, and how inseparable they are from him. In harmony with his dark fortunes, a shadow rests on the play from beginning to end, even the rough soldier walking his rounds on the fortress walls, is not only nipped by the biting cold, but sick at heart as well; and we may observe that there are none of those outbreaks of enjoyment of natural beauty which occur so frequently in the earlier plays, for instance, in Romeo and Juliet, relieving the sadness of the tragedy with a tender delight. But here, either the subject was too profoundly sorrowful to admit of such relief, or the poet was too sad to seek for it. The only indications of scenery which are given suggest the windswept platform before the castle, the bleak cliff towering over a wintry sea, and the barren heaths of Denmark. It may be accidental, but it is certainly curious that the only references to scenes of a softer character are inseparably connected with violence and death, the retired orchard where King Hamlet is murdered, the lonely willow where Ophelia meets her death, and the churchyard where her mutilated funeral is performed. As for the interior of Hamlet's home, no possible material brilliancy could disperse the mental gloom which hangs over it.

Yet we come back to the point from which we started. With all the sadness, all the mysteries, all the deep unanswered questions which abound in it, Hamlet remains one of the best known, if not best loved, of all the plays. Perhaps the very fact of the mystery hanging about it adds to the fascination which it and its sad-hearted, enigmatical hero have possessed and still possess for the generations which keep on coming and going, as they have done ever since the arch enchanter formed the magic circle in which Hamlet stands immortal.

CONSTANCE O'BRIEN.

HOPPING IN EAST KENT.

THE HOPPERS.

KENT being the great English hopping centre, the season no sooner sets in, than the county is inundated with hoppers from all parts. This is more especially the case in mid-Kent; gangs of roughs from the very lowest slums of London, and other large towns, arriving in whole train-loads, and pouring into the rural districts, where during their stay they often give much trouble by their unruly and riotous behaviour.

These rowdies, however, do not come much beyond Canterbury, so that we in East Kent are comparatively free from them. Indeed, the whole of the hopping in this part is done by local pickers, or by those gathered from the surrounding towns and villages, whence whole families are often engaged, who, having locked up their homes, take with them their goods and chattels, and proceed to the scene of their labours, mostly in carts or waggons sent for them by the growers. They are lodged, some in barns and in low wooden buildings erected for the purpose, whilst others (the more respectable portion) take up their quarters in adjacent villages; all hoppers, however, are obliged to find their own food.

As I write (Sept., 1886), hopping is in full swing' all round about, and the air is literally laden with the scent of the hops, and both pickers and growers are in the best of spirits, for this season in East Kent is an unusually good one, in fact, the best there has been for many years. As an instance of this, I may state that a farmer living near Canterbury has just realised £6 a cwt. for his hops, the yield of which was considerably over a ton per acre.

THE BIN-MAN.

The hops are cut down and taken to the pickers by an individual, known as the 'bin-man.' This is done in two ways: the older method being to cut the bine near the foot, and to remove it, hop-poles and all, to where the pickers are at work. The other and newer way, is for the 'bin-man' to cut the bine, and then, by means of an instrument made for the purpose, strip it from its poles, leaving them standing in their original position, whilst the bine alone is taken to the pickers. This plan seems to have its advantages, for by its adoption the binman's labour is considerably lightened, whilst the pickers find the bine much more easy to manipulate when disencumbered of its heavy poles.