Изображения страниц
PDF
EPUB

I'll lug the guts into the neighbour room.-
Mother, good night.-Indeed, this counsellor
Is now most still, most secret, and most grave,
Who was in life a foolish 10 prating knave.
Come, sir, to draw toward an end with you.
Good night, mother.

[Exeunt severally; HAMLET dragging in POLONIUS'.

ACT IV. SCENE I.

The Same.

Enter King, Queen, ROSENCRANTZ, and GUILDENSTERN2.

King. There's matter in these sighs: these profound heaves

You must translate; 'tis fit we understand them.
Where is your son?

Queen. Bestow this place on us a little while'.

[Exeunt ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN. Ah, my good lord, what have I seen to-night! King. What, Gertrude? How does Hamlet? Queen. Mad as the sea, and wind, when both contend

Which is the mightier. In his lawless fit,

Behind the arras hearing something stir,

10 Who was in life a foolish—] The quarto, 1604, has, “Who was in life a most foolish," &c. Boswell tells us that "the quarto" (he does not say which) reads, "in 's life :" he seems to have consulted only the undated quarto.

1

Hamlet DRAGGING in Polonius.] The folio has “tugging in," and the quarto, 1603, "Exit Hamlet with the dead body." The other quartos have merely Exit.

2 Enter King, Queen, Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern.] In the folio it is only "Enter King," the Queen even not being mentioned. Our stage-direction is from the quarto, 1604: that of 1603 has "Enter the King and Lordes."

3 Bestow this place on us a little while.] This line is omitted in the folio, because it does not appear that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern came on the stage. In the next line the quartos read, "Ah! my own lord.”

He whips his rapier out, and cries*, "A rat! a rat!" And in his brainish apprehension kills

The unseen good old man.

King.

O heavy deed!

It had been so with us, had we been there.

His liberty is full of threats to all;

To you yourself, to us, to every one.

Alas! how shall this bloody deed be answer'd?

It will be laid to us, whose providence

Should have kept short, restrain'd, and out of haunt,
This mad young man; but so much was our love,
We would not understand what was most fit,
But, like the owner of a foul disease,

To keep it from divulging, let it feed
Even on the pith of life. Where is he gone?
Queen. To draw apart the body he hath kill'd;
O'er whom his very madness, like some ore
Among a mineral of metals base,

Shows itself pure: he weeps for what is done.
King. O, Gertrude! come away.

The sun no sooner shall the mountains touch,
But we will ship him hence; and this vile deed
We must, with all our majesty and skill,
Both countenance and excuse.-Ho! Guildenstern!

Enter ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN.

Friends both, go join you with some farther aid.
Hamlet in madness hath Polonius slain,
And from his mother's closet hath he dragg'd him:
Go, seek him out; speak fair, and bring the body
Into the chapel. I pray you, haste in this.

[Exeunt Ros. and GUIL. Come, Gertrude, we'll call up our wisest friends; And let them know, both what we mean to do,

HE whips his rapier out, AND cries,] The quartos read merely," Whips out his rapier, cries," &c. In the next line, they have this for "his," of the folio.

And what's untimely done: so, haply, slander',-
Whose whisper o'er the world's diameter,

As level as the cannon to his blank,

Transports his poison'd shot,-may miss our name,
And hit the woundless air.-O, come away!
My soul is full of discord, and dismay.

[Exeunt.

Ham.

SCENE II.

Another Room in the Same.

Enter HAMLET.

Safely stowed.-[Ros. &c. within. Ham

let! lord Hamlet!] But soft!-what noise? who calls on Hamlet? O! here they come.

Enter ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN.

Ros. What have you done, my lord, with the dead body?

Ham. Compounded it with dust, whereto 'tis kin.

Ros. Tell us where 'tis; that we may take it thence, And bear it to the chapel.

Ham. Do not believe it.

Ros. Believe what?

Ham. That I can keep your counsel, and not mine own. Besides, to be demanded of a sponge, what replication should be made by the son of a king?

5

so, haply, slander,] These words are of Theobald's introducing, in order to make the sense complete: no part of the passage down to "And hit the woundless air," is to be found in the folio, and it was perhaps omitted, because without some addition, like that of Theobald, it was unintelligible.

But soft!] These words are from the quartos. It is to be remarked, that in the quarto, 1603, this scene is wanting, excepting that what Hamlet says about a sponge is introduced in an earlier scene between Hamlet, Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern.

Ros. Take you me for a sponge, my lord?

Ham. Ay, sir; that soaks up the king's countenance, his rewards, his authorities. But such officers do the king best service in the end: he keeps them, like an ape', in the corner of his jaw, first mouthed, to be last swallowed when he needs what you have gleaned, it is but squeezing you, and, sponge, you shall be dry again.

Ros. I understand you not, my lord.

Ham. I am glad of it: a knavish speech sleeps in a foolish ear.

Ros. My lord, you must tell us where the body is, and go with us to the king.

Ham. The body is with the king, but the king is not with the body. The king is a thing—

Guil. A thing, my lord!

Ham. Of nothing: bring me to him. Hide fox, and all afters.

[Exeunt.

SCENE III.

Another Room in the Same.

Enter King, attended.

King. I have sent to seek him, and to find the body. How dangerous is it, that this man goes loose!

Yet must not we put the strong law on him:
He's lov'd of the distracted multitude,

Who like not in their judgment, but their eyes;

7 — like an APE ;] So the folio; and that it is the true reading (and not apple, as in the quartos, 1604, &c.) we have the evidence of the quarto, 1603, which has "he doth keep you as an ape doth nuts." Farmer and Ritson conjectured that we ought to read, " like an ape an apple." 8Hide fox, and all after.] All hid, and Sir T. Hanmer "Hide fox, and all after."

This is supposed to refer to the boyish game of expressly tells us that it was sometimes called

And where 'tis so, th' offender's scourge is weigh'd,
But never the offence. To bear all smooth and even,
This sudden sending him away must seem

Deliberate pause diseases, desperate grown,
By desperate appliance are reliev'd,

Enter ROSENCRANTZ.

Or not at all.-How now! what hath befallen?
Ros. Where the dead body is bestow'd, my lord,
We cannot get from him.

King.

Ros. Without, my lord; pleasure.

But where is he?

guarded, to know your

King. Bring him before us.

Ros. Ho, Guildenstern! bring in my lord.

Enter HAMLET and GUILDENSTERN.

King. Now, Hamlet, where's Polonius?
Ham. At supper.

King. At supper! Where?

Ham. Not where he eats, but where he is eaten a certain convocation of politic worms are e'en at him. Your worm is your only emperor for diet: we fat all creatures else to fat us, and we fat ourselves for maggots your fat king, and your lean beggar, is but variable service; two dishes, but to one table: that's the end.

King. Alas, alas!

Ham. A man may fish with the worm that hath eat of a king; and eat of the fish that hath fed of that worm'.

King. What dost thou mean by this?

Ham. Nothing, but to show you how a king may go a progress through the guts of a beggar.

1

- and eat of the fish that hath fed of that worm.] This speech and the preceding interjections, obviously necessary to the sense, are not contained in the folio. In Hamlet's previous speech it omits “politic."

« ПредыдущаяПродолжить »