Pol. If you call me Jephthah, my lord, I have a daughter, that I love passing well.

Ham. Nay, that follows not.

Pol. What follows then, my lord?

Ham. Why, As by lot, God wot2, and then, you know, It came to pass, As most like it was, The first row of the pious chanson3 will show you more: for look, my abridgment comes.

Enter Four or Five Players.

You are welcome, masters; welcome, all:—I am glad to see thee well:-welcome, good friends.-O, old friend! why, thy face is valanced since I saw thee last; Com'st thou to beard me in Denmark?-What! my young lady and mistress! By-'r-lady, your ladyship is nearer to heaven, than when I saw you last, by the altitude of a chopine. Pray God, your voice, like a piece of uncurrent gold, be not cracked within the ring. - Mas

2 Why, As by lot, God wot,—&c. The old song from which these quotations are taken, has a place in Dr. Percy's Reliques of ancient English Poetry.

the pious chanson -] The pious chansons were a kind of Christmas carols, containing some scriptural history thrown into loose rhymes, and sung about the streets by the common people when they went at that season to solicit alms. Hamlet is here repeating some scraps from a song of this kind, and when Polonius enquires what follows them, he refers him to the first row (i. e. division) of one of these, to obtain the information he wanted.

— my abridgment - He calls the players afterwards the brief chronicles of the times; but I think he now means only those who will shorten my talk. JOHNSON.

5

thy face is valanced —] i. e. fringed with a beard. The valance is the fringes or drapery hanging round the tester of a bed. to beard me-] To beard, anciently signified to set at de

6

france.

7

by the altitude of a chopine.] A chioppine is a high shoe, or rather, a clog, worn by the Italians.

8

for use.

women.

be not cracked within the ring.] That is, cracked too much This is said to a young player who acted the parts of

ters, you are all welcome. We'll e'en to't like French falconers, fly at any thing we see: We'll have a speech straight: Come, give us a taste of your quality; come, a passionate speech.

1 Play. What speech, my lord?

Ham. I heard thee speak me a speech once, - but it was never acted; or, if it was, not above once: for the play, I remember, pleased not the million; 'twas caviare to the general: but it was (as I received it, and others, whose judgments, in such matters, cried in the top of mine',) an excellent play; well digested in the scenes, set down with as much modesty as cunning. I remember, one said, there were no sallets in the lines, to make the matter savoury; nor no matter in the phrase, that might indite the author of affection2; but called it, an honest method3, as wholesome as sweet, and by very much more handsome than fine. One speech in it I chiefly loved: 'twas Æneas' tale to Dido; and thereabout of it especially, where he speaks of Priam's slaughter: If it live in your memory, begin at this line; let me see, let me see;

The rugged Pyrrhus, like the Hyrcanian beast, — 'tis not so; it begins with Pyrrhus.

The rugged Pyrrhus, he, whose sable arms,

9

Black as his purpose, did the night resemble

When he lay couched in the ominous horse,

Hath now this dread and black complexion smear'd
With heraldry more dismal; head to foot

Now is he total gules*; horridly trick'd3

caviare to the general :] Caviare is a Russian delicacy made of the roe of the sturgeon. The general, the common people. cried in the top of mine,] Were higher than mine.

1

2

indite the author of affection:] i. e. convict the author of being a fantastical affected writer.

3 an honest method,] Honest, for chaste.

4 Now is he total gules ;] Gules is a term in the barbarous jargon peculiar to heraldry, and signifies red.

5

trick'd-] i. e. smeared, painted. An heraldick term.

With blood of fathers, mothers, daughters, sons;
Bak'd and impasted with the parching streets,
That lend a tyrannous and a damned light

To their lord's murder: Roasted in wrath, and fire,
And thus o'er-sized with coagulate gore,

With eyes like carbuncles, the hellish Pyrrhus
Old grandsire Priam seeks; - So proceed you.
Pol. 'Fore God, my lord, well spoken; with good
accent, and good discretion.

1

1 Play. Anon he finds him

Striking too short at Greeks; his antique sword,
Rebellious to his arm, lies where it falls,
Repugnant to command: Unequal match'd,
Pyrrhus at Priam drives; in rage, strikes wide;
But with the whiff and wind of his fell sword
The unnerved father falls. Then senseless Ilium,
Seeming to feel this blow, with flaming top
Stoops to his base; and with a hideous crash
Takes prisoner Pyrrhus' ear: for, lo! his sword
Which was declining on the milky head
Of reverend Priam, seem'd i'the air to stick:
So, as a painted tyrant, Pyrrhus stood;
And, like a neutral to his will and matter,
Did nothing.

But, as we often see, against some storm,
A silence in the heavens, the rack stand still,
The bold winds speechless, and the orb below
As hush as death: anon the dreadful thunder
Doth rend the region: So, after Pyrrhus pause,
A roused vengeance sets him new a work;

And never did the Cyclops' hammers fall
On Mars's armour, forg'd for proof eterne,
With less remorse than Pyrrhus' bleeding sword
Now falls on Priam.

Out, out, thou strumpet, Fortune! All you gods,
In general synod, take away her power;
Break all the spokes and fellies from her wheel,

And bowl the round nave down the hill of heaven,

As low as to the fiends!

Pol. This is too long.

Ham. It shall to the barber's, with your beard. — Pr'ythee, say on:- He's for a jig, or a tale of bawdry, or he sleeps: say on: come to Hecuba.

1 Play. But who, ah woe! had seen the mobled queen 6

Ham. The mobled queen?

Pol. That's good; mobled queen is good.

1 Play. Run barefoot up and down, threat'ning the
flames

With bisson rheum"; a clout upon that head,
Where late the diadem stood; and, for a robe,
About her lank and all o'er-teemed loins,

A blanket, in the alarm of fear caught up;
Who this had seen, with tongue in venom steep'd,
'Gainst fortune's state would treason have pronounc'd :
But if the gods themselves did see her then,
When she saw Pyrrhus make malicious sport
In mincing with his sword her husband's limbs;
The instant burst of clamour that she made,
(Unless things mortal move them not at all,)
Would have made milch the burning eye of heaven,
And passion in the gods.

Pol. Look, whether he has not turn'd his colour, and has tears in's eyes. Pr'ythee, no more.

Ham. 'Tis well; I'll have thee speak out the rest of this soon.-Good my lord, will you see the players well bestowed? Do you hear, let them be well used; for they are the abstract, and brief chronicles, of the time: After your death you were better have a bad epitaph, than their ill report while you live.

6 the mobled queen -] Mobled or mabled signifies veiled; or according to Johnson, huddled, grossly covered.

7 With bisson rheum ;] Bisson or becsen, i. e. blind. A word still in use in some parts of the north of England.

Pol. My lord, I will use them according to their desert.

Ham. Odd's bodikin, man, much better: Use every man after his desert, and who shall 'scape whipping! Use them after your own honour and dignity: The less they deserve, the more merit is in your bounty. Take them in.

Pol. Come, sirs.

[Exit POLONIUS, with some of the Players.

Ham. Follow him, friends: we'll hear a play to-morrow. Dost thou hear me, old friend; can you play the murder of Gonzago?

1 Play. Ay, my lord.

Ham. We'll have it to-morrow night. You could, for a need, study a speech of some dozen or sixteen lines, which I would set down, and insert in't? could you not?

1 Play. Ay, my lord.

Ham. Very well. Follow that lord; and look you mock him not. [Exit Player.] My good friends, [to Ros. and GUIL.] I'll leave you till night: you are welcome to Elsinore.

Ros. Good my lord!

[Exeunt ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN. Now I am alone.

Ham. Ay, so, God be wi'
you:
O, what a rogue and peasant slave am I !
Is it not monstrous, that this player here,
But in a fiction, in a dream of passion,
Could force his soul so to his own conceit,
That from her working, all his visage wann'd;
Tears in his eyes, distraction in's aspéct,
A broken voice, and his whole function suiting
With forms to his conceit? And all for nothing!
For Hecuba!

What's Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba,

That he should weep for her? What would he do,