Scene V.

6, 7. Speak.. shalt hear. These words are quoted in Fletcher's Woman

hater (Act ii. sc. 1), written about 1607.

II. to fast. mete and drink.' 16. harrow up.

And moreover the misese of helle shal be in defaute of (Chaucer, Parson's Tale, ed. Tyrwhitt.)

We have had harrow' before, i. I. 44.

19. an end. The quarto of 1603 reads 'on end,' and so Pope altered the text. In such adverbs as ajar,' ' asleep,' 'a-tiptoe, 'a' is an abbreviation of the preposition 'on,' and when it comes before a vowel, as here, it takes the n for euphony. See Abbott, §§ 24, 182. Compare 'on brood,' iii. 1. 165 of this play, and on sleep,' Acts xiii. 36. See also Eastwood and Wright, Bible Word-book, p. 2.

20. porpentine. This is the form constantly used by Shakespeare, as Comedy of Errors, iii. 1. 116. There and elsewhere it has been altered by editors to 'porcupine.'

21. eternal blazon, revelation of eternity. It may be however that Shakespeare uses 'eternal' for 'infernal' here, as in Julius Cæsar, i. 2. 160, 'The eternal devil,' and Othello, iv. 2. 130, 'Some eternal villain.' 'Blazon' is an heraldic term meaning description of armorial bearings, hence used for description generally, as in Much Ado about Nothing, ii. 1. 307. The verb 'blazon' occurs in Cymbeline, iv. 2. 170.

29. Haste is used transitively in 1 Henry IV, iii. 1. 143.

32. shouldst. We should now say 'wouldst.' There is a similar instance in Merchant of Venice, i. 2. 100.

33. roots.

The folios have 'rots,' perhaps rightly. See Antony and

Cleopatra, i. 4. 47.

Ib. Lethe wharf. See i. 3. 133. 'Lethe' occurs in 2 Henry IV, v. 2. 72 : May this be wash'd in Lethe and forgotten?'

37. process has here perhaps the sense of an official narrative, coming nearly to the meaning of the French procès verbal. By a proclamation dated 18 Aug. 1553, it was forbidden without licence 'to prynte any bookes, matter, ballet, ryme, interlude, processe or treatyse.' The English Drama and Stage (Roxburghe Library), p. 17.

38. Rankly, grossly. So 'rank,' ii. 1. 20.

42. adulterate, adulterous; like 'emulate,' i. I. 83, for 'emulous.' See Lover's Complaint, 175.

50. decline, turn aside. Compare Comedy of Errors, iii. 2. 44:

'Your weeping sister is no wife of mine,

Nor to her bed no homage do I owe:
Far more, far more to you do I decline.'

So also Tennyson, Locksley Hall, line 43:

'Having known me, to decline

On a range of lower feelings and a narrower heart than mine.'

Ib. those of mine. An inaccurate construction, like one found in Bacon's Advancement of Learning, i. 7, § 6, p. 55, ed. Wright: And for his government civil, though he did not attain to that of Trajan's,' &c.

53. virtue is not followed by a verb. Compare a similar construction in Lucrece, line 1208:

'My life's foul deed, my life's fair end shall free it.'

See Abbott, § 417.

56. sate. So the folios. The quartos have 'sort,' a misprint, for the quarto of 1603 has fate.'

60. of. So the quartos. The folios and the quarto of 1603 read 'in.' A somewhat similar use of the preposition occurs in Love's Labour's Lost, i. 1. 43: And not be seen to wink of all the day.' 'An after dinner's sleep' is mentioned in Measure for Measure, iii. 1. 33. Compare Tempest, iii. 2.95.

61. secure, unsuspicious, unguarded, like the Latin securus.

·

Compare Judges xviii. 7: They dwelt careless after the manner of the Zidonians, quiet and secure.' And I Henry VI, ii. 1. 11:

'This happy night the Frenchmen are secure.'

'Secure' is accented, as here, on the first syllable, in Othello, iv. 1. 72.

62. hebenon. So the folios. The quartos (including that of 1603) have 'hebona,' which Shakespeare may have first written and subsequently corrected. In Marlowe's Jew of Malta, written about 1590, 'the juice of hebon' is mentioned as a deadly poison, Act iii. p. 164, ed. Dyce, 1858. The word is generally explained as meaning 'ebony,' but we cannot find any evidence that the sap of this tree was considered poisonous. 'Ebony' is spelt 'ebene' in Holland's Pliny, and 'heben' in Spenser. Pliny (xxv. 4, Holland's translation, 1601), speaking of the juice of henbane says: "An oile is made of the seed thereof, which if it be but dropped into the eares, is ynough to trouble the braine.' Whence Grey supposed that 'hebenon' is for henebon,' by which Shakespeare meant 'henbane.' Steevens quotes Drayton's Barons' Wars, bk. iii. st. 7,

mandrake drad.'

"The poysning henbane and the 68. sudden vigour, rapid and violent action. For 'vigour' Staunton conjectures rigour.'

Ib. posset. The quartos here have 'possesse.' This is the only passage where Shakespeare uses 'posset' as a verb.

·

69. eager. Here used in the original sense of the French word. Cotgrave gives: Aigre: Eagre, sharpe, tart, biting, sower.' So, metaphorically, 3 Henry VI, ii. 6. 68: 'Vex him with eager words.'

71. instant, instantaneous, as in ii. 2. 499.

Ib. tetter. Cotgrave explains the French dartre, by 'tettar, or Ring-worme.' See Troilus and Cressida, v. I. 27.

72. lazar-like. 'Lazar' is equivalent to 'leper,' and is of course derived from Lazarus,' Luke xvi. Compare Henry V, i. 1. 15.

75. dispatch'd, deprived, as the quarto of 1603 reads. The author would scarcely have used it with 'crown' and 'queen' if he had not first used it with life.' The phrase 'dispatch of life' does not occur again; we have however dispatch his nighted life,' in King Lear, iv. 5. 12.

77. Unhousel'd, without the Eucharist. The word comes from the AngloSaxon husel, the Eucharist, whence the verb huslian, and participle gehuslud. Compare King Arthur, vol. iii. p. 350 (ed. T. Wright), of the death of Launcelot So when hee was howseled and eneled, and had all that a christian man ought to have, hee prayed the bishop that his fellowes might beare his body unto Joyous-gard.' Weston quotes as a parallel passage, Sophocles, Antigone, 1071: ἄμοιρον ἀκτέριστον, ἀνόσιον νέκυν.

77. disappointed, unprepared, unequipped for the last journey. 'Appointment' in the sense of preparation for death is found in Measure for Measure, iii. 1. 60:

'Therefore your best appointment make with speed.' And appointed' in the sense of equipped' occurs in Winter's Tale, iv. 4.603: 'It shall be so my care

To have you royally appointed as if

The scene you play were mine.'

Ib. unaneled, without having received extreme unction. See the quotation given above in the note on Unhousel'd.'

Nares quotes from Sir

Thomas More (Works, p. 345): The extreme vnccion or anelynge and confirmacion, he sayed be no sacramentes of the church.'

80. Given by Rann and some other editors to Hamlet.

83. luxury, lust, lewdness. Compare Measure for Measure, v. 1. 506: 'One all of luxury, an ass, a madman.'

Shakespeare never uses the word in its modern sense. Compare 'luxurious' in Macbeth, iv. 3. 58.

89. matin, morning. We can find no other instance of this word in the sense here used.

yo. pale, used transitively only in this passage of Shakespeare.

94. instant, instantly.

95. stiffly. So the folios. The quartos have 'swiftly,' doubtless a misprint. 96. memory. See our note on Macbeth, i. 7. 65-67.

97. Here Hamlet puts his hand upon his head.

98. table, tablet. Compare All's Well that Ends Well, i. 1. 106:

99. fond, foolish. See Merchant of Venice, iii. 3. 9: 'I do wonder,

Thou naughty gaoler, that thou art so fond

To come abroad with him at his request.'

Ib. records. Accented on the second syllable in Twelfth Night, v. 1. 253. 100. saws, sayings, proverbs, maxims. See As You Like It, ii. 7. 156: Full of wise saws and modern instances.'

'Tables,' or

Ib. pressures, impressions as of a seal. Compare iii. 2. 23. 107. my tables. These words are repeated in the folio. table-book,' means a memorandum book. Compare 2 Henry IV, iv. 1. 201: 'And therefore will he wipe his tables clean

And keep no tell-tale to his memory.'

Bacon uses the expression 'a pair of tables,' Adv. of Learning, i. 7, § 25. 110. word, watch-word, order of the day.

116. Hillo, &c. Expressions of encouragement which the falconer used to his hawks. See Latham's Falconry, p. 47 (ed. 1615), 'crying with a lowd voyce, Howe, howe, howe.'

119. Good my lord. So ii. 1. 70.

121. once, ever. See Antony and Cleopatra, v. 2. 50:

If idle talk will once be necessary."

125. needs ...come.

Abbott, § 349.

For the omission of 'to' before the infinitive see

127. circumstance, circumlocution. See iii. I. 1, and Merchant of Venice, i. J. 154:

132. go pray. Compare the phrases go sleep,' Tempest, ii. 1. 190; 'go kindle,' Two Gentlemen of Verona, ii. 7. 19; 'go watch,' Merry Wives of Windsor, i. 4. 7; 'go seek,' Hamlet, ii. 1. 101; and 'come view,' Merchant of Venice, ii. 7. 43.

133. whirling. Spelt wherling' in the quarto of 1603, 'whurling' in the other quartos, hurling' in the folios.

136. Some have supposed that there is a reference here to St. Patrick's Purgatory, but this does not seem probable.

147. Upon my sword. Because the hilt of the sword was in the form of a cross. So Winter's Tale, ii. 3. 168, Swear by this sword.' Compare 1 Henry IV, ii. 4. 371: 'Swore the devil his true liegeman upon the cross of a Welsh hook.'

150. truepenny. Said by Collier to be originally a mining term, applied to indications in the soil where ore was to be found. A familiar phrase for an honest fellow.' (Johnson.) Steevens quotes from Marston's Malecontent, produced 1604 [iii. 3]:

Illo, ho, ho, ho! arte there, olde true penny?'

Marston evidently had Hamlet in his mind. And so probably had Congreve,

when he makes a son irreverently address his father as 'old truepenny, Love for Love, iv. 10.

161. In the folios the Ghost is made to say 'Sweare by his sword.'

163. pioner. So the old copies. It is generally altered by editors to 'pioneer,' which means the same thing. So we have 'pioner,' Henry V, iii. 2. 92, and Othello, iii. 3. 346. Compare enginer,' Troilus and Cressida, ii. 3. 7, and Hamlet, iii. 4. 203; 'mutiner,' Coriolanus, i. 1. 256; and 'muleter,' Antony and Cleopatra, iii. 7. 36.

The levity displayed by Hamlet is at once the natural expression of a mind oppressed with horror (like the jests of dying men and hysterical laughter), and is also a cunning device to deceive his friends as to the purport of his communication with the Ghost.

165. And therefore receive it without doubt or question.' This seems to be the sense of the passage, not, as Warburton says, 'Keep it secret,' nor as Mason says, 'Seem not to know it.'

167. your. For this colloquial and familiar use see Hamlet, iii. 2. 3, iv. 3. 24, and Antony and Cleopatra, ii. 7. 29: Your serpent of Egypt is bred, now of your mud by the operation of your sun, so is your crocodile.'

172. put on, assume.

See King Lear, i. 3. 12:

Put on what weary negligence you please.'

Ib. antic, disguised, as in Romeo and Juliet, i. 5. 58:

'What dares the slave

Come hither, cover'd with an antic face,

To fleer and scorn at our solemnity?'

'Antic,' or 'antique,' as a substantive, means a grotesque figure, such as appeared in a masque or a pageant.

174. encumber'd, folded, intertwined.

6

176. an if, a reduplication, like or ere,' i. 2. 147.

178. giving out, profession. Compare Measure for Measure, i. 4. 54: His givings-out were of an infinite distance from his true-meant design.' Ib. to note. The 'to' is superfluous in the construction, which follows 'never shall,' line 173. Compare Coriolanus, v. 3. 123, and Beaumont and Fletcher, The Prophetess, iv. 4:

Thou would'st entreat thy prisoners like their births
And not their present fortune; and to bring 'em
Guarded into thy tent.'

And Merry Wives of Windsor, iv. 4, 57:

Then let them all encircle him about

And, fairy-like, to pinch the unclean knight.'

186. friending, friendliness.

speare.

The word is not found elsewhere in Shake

187. lack, be wanting. So Genesis xviii. 28: Peradventure there shall lack five of the fifty.'