The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark Part 35

[Footnote 12: I am willing to believe she thinks so.]

[Footnote 13: Whether he trusts Ophelia or not, he does not take her statement for correct, and says this in the hope that Polonius is not too far off to hear it. The speech is for him, not for Ophelia, and will seem to her to come only from his madness.]

[Footnote 14: _Exit_.]

[Footnote 15: (_re-entering_)]

[Footnote 16: 'So many are bad, that your virtue will not be believed in.']

[Footnote 17: 'Go' _not in Q._]

[Footnote 18: _Exit, and re-enter._]

[Footnote 19: _Cornuti._]

[Footnote 20: _Exit._]

[Footnote 21: 'O' _not in Q._]

[Footnote 22: (_re-entering_)]

[Footnote 23: I suspect _pratlings_ to be a corruption, not of the printed _paintings_, but of some word subst.i.tuted for it by the Poet, perhaps _prancings_, and _pace_ to be correct.]

[Footnote 24: 'your' _not in Q._]

[Footnote 25: As the present type to him of womankind, he a.s.sails her with such charges of lightness as are commonly brought against women. He does not go farther: she is not his mother, and he hopes she is innocent. But he cannot make her speak!]

[Page 128]

too, Ile no more on't, it hath made me mad. I say, we will haue no more Marriages.[1] Those that are [Sidenote: no mo marriage,]

married already,[2] all but one shall liue, the rest shall keep as they are. To a Nunnery, go.

_Exit Hamlet_. [Sidenote: _Exit_]

[3]_Ophe._ O what a n.o.ble minde is heere o're-throwne?

The Courtiers, Soldiers, Schollers: Eye, tongue, sword, Th'expectansie and Rose[4] of the faire State, [Sidenote: Th' expectation,]

The gla.s.se of Fashion,[5] and the mould of Forme,[6]

Th'obseru'd of all Obseruers, quite, quite downe.

Haue I of Ladies most deiect and wretched, [Sidenote: And I of]

That suck'd the Honie of his Musicke Vowes: [Sidenote: musickt]

Now see that n.o.ble, and most Soueraigne Reason, [Sidenote: see what]

Like sweet Bels iangled out of tune, and harsh,[7]

[Sidenote: out of time]

That vnmatch'd Forme and Feature of blowne youth,[8]

[Sidenote: and stature of]

Blasted with extasie.[9] Oh woe is me, T'haue scene what I haue scene: see what I see.[10]

[Sidenote: _Exit_.]

_Enter King, and Polonius_.

_King_. Loue? His affections do not that way tend, Nor what he spake, though it lack'd Forme a little, [Sidenote: Not]

Was not like Madnesse.[11] There's something in his soule?

O're which his Melancholly sits on brood, And I do doubt the hatch, and the disclose[12]

Will be some danger,[11] which to preuent [Sidenote: which for to]

I haue in quicke determination [Sidenote: 138, 180] Thus set it downe. He shall with speed to England For the demand of our neglected Tribute: Haply the Seas and Countries different

[Footnote 1: 'The thing must be put a stop to! the world must cease! it is not fit to go on.']

[Footnote 2: 'already--(_aside_) all but one--shall live.']

[Footnote 3: _1st Q_.

_Ofe._ Great G.o.d of heauen, what a quicke change is this?

The Courtier, Scholler, Souldier, all in him, All dasht and splinterd thence, O woe is me, To a seene what I haue seene, see what I see. _Exit_.

To his cruel words Ophelia is impenetrable--from the conviction that not he but his madness speaks.

The moment he leaves her, she breaks out in such phrase as a young girl would hardly have used had she known that the king and her father were listening. I grant, however, the speech may be taken as a soliloquy audible to the spectators only, who to the persons of a play are _but_ the spiritual presences.]

[Footnote 4: 'The hope and flower'--The _rose_ is not unfrequently used in English literature as the type of perfection.]

[Footnote 5: 'he by whom Fashion dressed herself'--_he who set the fashion_. His great and small virtues taken together, Hamlet makes us think of Sir Philip Sidney--ten years older than Shakspere, and dead sixteen years before _Hamlet_ was written.]

[Footnote 6: 'he after whose ways, or modes of behaviour, men shaped theirs'--therefore the mould in which their forms were cast;--_the object of universal imitation_.]

[Footnote 7: I do not know whether this means--the peal rung without regard to tune or time--or--the single bell so handled that the tongue checks and jars the vibration. In some country places, I understand, they go about ringing a set of hand-bells.]

[Footnote 8: youth in full blossom.]

[Footnote 9: madness 177.]

[Footnote 10: 'to see now such a change from what I saw then.']

[Footnote 11: The king's conscience makes him keen. He is, all through, doubtful of the madness.]

[Footnote 12: --of the fact- or fancy-egg on which his melancholy sits brooding]

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With variable Obiects, shall expell This something setled matter[1] in his heart Whereon his Braines still beating, puts him thus From[2] fashion of himselfe. What thinke you on't?

_Pol_. It shall do well. But yet do I beleeue The Origin and Commencement of this greefe [Sidenote: his greefe,]

Sprung from neglected loue.[3] How now _Ophelia_?

You neede not tell vs, what Lord _Hamlet_ saide, We heard it all.[4] My Lord, do as you please, But if you hold it fit after the Play, Let his Queene Mother all alone intreat him To shew his Greefes: let her be round with him, [Sidenote: griefe,]

And Ile be plac'd so, please you in the eare Of all their Conference. If she finde him not,[5]

To England send him: Or confine him where Your wisedome best shall thinke.

_King_. It shall be so: Madnesse in great Ones, must not vnwatch'd go.[6]