'Tis told me, he hath very oft of late
Given private time to you, and you yourself

Have of your audience been most free and bounteous:
If it be so-as so 'tis put on me,

And that in way of caution-I must tell you,
You do not understand yourself so clearly

As it behoves my daughter and your honour.
What is between you? give me up the truth.

Ophelia. He hath, my lord, of late made many tenders Of his affection to me.

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Polonius. Affection! pooh! you speak like a green girl, Unsifted in such perilous circumstance.

Do you believe his tenders, as you call them?

Ophelia. I do not know, my lord, what I should think. Polonius. Marry, I'll teach you: think yourself a baby, That you have ta'en these tenders for true pay, Which are not sterling. Tender yourself more dearly; Or-not to crack the wind of the poor phrase, Running it thus-you'll tender me a fool.

Ophelia. My lord, he hath importuned me with love In honourable fashion.

III

Polonius. Ay, fashion you may call it; go to, go to. Oph. And hath given countenance to his speech, my lord, With almost all the holy vows of heaven.

Polonius. Ay, springes to catch woodcocks.
When the blood burns, how prodigal the soul
Lends the tongue vows: these blazes, daughter,
Giving more light than heat, extinct in both,
Even in their promise, as it is a-making,
You must not take for fire. From this time
Be something scanter of your maiden presence;
Set your entreatments at a higher rate
Than a command to parley. For Lord Hamlet,
Believe so much in him, that he is young,
And with a larger tether may he walk

Than may be given you: in few, Ophelia,

Do not believe his vows; for they are brokers,

I do know,

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Not of that dye which their investments show,
But mere implorators of unholy suits,
Breathing like sanctified and pious bawds,
The better to beguile. This is for all:

I would not, in plain terms, from this time forth,
Have you so slander any moment leisure,

As to give words or talk with the Lord Hamlet.

Look to't, I charge you: come your ways.

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Ophelia. I shall obey, my lord.

SCENE IV. The platform.

Enter HAMLET, HORATIO, and MArcellus. Hamlet. The air bites shrewdly; it is very cold. Horatio. It is a nipping and an eager air.

Hamlet. What hour now?

Horatio.

Hamlet. No, it is struck.

[Exeunt.

I think it lacks of twelve.

Horatio. Indeed? I heard it not: it then draws near

the season

Wherein the spirit held his wont to walk.

[A flourish of trumpets, and ordnance shot off within. What does this mean, my lord?

Ham. The king doth wake to-night and takes his rouse, Keeps wassail, and the swaggering up-spring reels;

And, as he drains his draughts of Rhenish down,

The kettle-drum and trumpet thus bray out

The triumph of his pledge.

Horatio.

Hamlet. Ay, marry, is’t:

Is it a custom?

But to my mind, though I am native here

And to the manner born, it is a custom

More honour'd in the breach than the observance.

This heavy-headed revel east and west

Makes us traduced and tax'd of other nations:

They clepe us drunkards, and with swinish phrase

IO

Soil our addition; and indeed it takes

From our achievements, though perform'd at height,
The pith and marrow of our "attribute.

So, oft it chances in particular men,

That for some vicious mole of nature in them,
As, in their birth-wherein they are not guilty,
Since nature cannot choose his origin-
By the o'ergrowth of some complexion,
Oft breaking down the pales and forts of reason,
Or by some habit that too much o'er-leavens
The form of plausive manners, that these men,
Carrying, I say, the stamp of one defect,
Being nature's livery, or fortune's star,—
Their virtues else, be they as pure as grace,
As infinite as man may undergo-

Shall in the general censure take corruption
From that particular fault: the dram of eale
Doth all the noble substance of a doubt
To his own scandal.

Horatio.

Enter Ghost.

Look, my lord, it comes!

Hamlet. Angels and ministers of grace defend us! Be thou a spirit of health or goblin damn'd,

Bring with thee airs from heaven or blasts from hell,

Be thy intents wicked or charitable,

Thou comest in such a questionable shape

That I will speak to thee: I'll call thee Hamlet,

King, father, royal Dane: O, answer me!

Let me not burst in ignorance; but tell

Why thy canonized bones, hearsed in death,
Have burst their cerements; why the sepulchre,
Wherein we saw thee quietly inurn'd,

Hath oped his ponderous and marble jaws,
To cast thee up again. What may this mean,
That thou, dead corse, again in complete steel
Revisit'st thus the glimpses of the moon,
Making night hideous; and we fools of nature

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30

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So horridly to shake our disposition

With thoughts beyond the reaches of our souls?
Say, why is this? wherefore? what should we do?

[Ghost beckons Hamlet.

Horatio. It beckons you to go away with it, As if it some impartment did desire

To you alone.

Marcellus.

Look, with what courteous action It waves you to a more removed ground:

But do not go with it.

Horatio.

No, by no means.

Hamlet. It will not speak; then I will follow it.
Horatio. Do not, my lord.

Hamlet.

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Why, what should be the fear?

I do not set my life at a pin's fee;
And for my soul, what can it do to that,
Being a thing immortal as itself?

It waves me forth again: I'll follow it.

Horatio. What if it tempt you toward the flood, my lord, Or to the dreadful summit of the cliff

That beetles o'er his base into the sea,

And there assume some other horrible form,
Which might deprive your sovereignty of reason
And draw you into madness? think of it:
The very place puts toys of desperation,
Without more motive, into every brain
That looks so many fathoms to the sea
And hears it roar beneath.

Hamlet.

Go on; I'll follow thee.

Marcellus.

Hamlet.

It waves me still.

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You shall not go, my lord.

Hold off your hands.

Horatio. Be ruled; you shall not go.
Hamlet.

My fate cries out,

And makes each petty artery in this body
As hardy as the Nemean lion's nerve.

Still am I call'd. Unhand me, gentlemen.

By heaven, I'll make a ghost of him that lets me:
I say, away! Go on; I'll follow thee.

[Exeunt Ghost and Hamlet. Horatio. He waxes desperate with imagination.

Marcellus. Let's follow; 'tis not fit thus to obey him.
Horatio. Have after. To what issue will this come?
Marcellus. Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.
Horatio. Heaven will direct it.
Marcellus.

Nay, let's follow him. 91 [Exeunt.

SCENE V. Another part of the platform.

Enter GHOST and HAMLet.

Ham. Whither wilt thou lead me? speak; I'll go no further. Ghost. Mark me.

Hamlet.

Ghost.

I will.

My hour is almost come,

When I to sulphurous and tormenting flames

Must render up myself.

Ghost. Pity me not, but lend thy serious hearing To what I shall unfold.

Hamlet.

Speak; I am bound to hear.

Ghost. So art thou to revenge, when thou shalt hear. Hamlet. What?

Ghost. I am thy father's spirit;

Doom'd for a certain term to walk the night,
And for the day confined to fast in fires,
Till the foul crimes done in my days of nature
Are burnt and purged away. But that I am forbid
To tell the secrets of my prison-house,

I could a tale unfold whose lightest word

Would harrow up thy soul, freeze thy young blood, Make thy two eyes, like stars, start from their spheres,

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