are wrinkled; their eyes purging thick amber, and plumtree gum; and that they have a plentiful lack of wit; together with most weak hams. All which, Sir, though I most powerfully and potently believe, yet I hold it not honesty to have it thus fet down; for yourfelf, Sir, fhall be as old as I am, if, like a crab, you' could go backward.

Pol. Though this be madness, yet there's method in't. Will you walk out of the air, my Lord?

Ham. Into my grave..

Pol. Indeed that is out o' th'air :-
"How pregnant (fometimes) his replies are?
"A happiness that often madness hits on,
"Which fanity and reafon could not be
"So profp'roufly deliver'd of. I'll leave him,
And fuddenly contrive the means of meeting
Between him and my daughter.

My Honourable Lord, I will most humbly
Take my leave of you.

Ham. You cannot, Sir, take from me any thing that
I will more willingly part withal, except my life.
Pol. Fare you well, my Lord.

Ham. Thefe tedious old fools!

Pol. You go to feek Lord Hamlet; there he is.

[Exit.

SCENE VI. Enter Rofincrantz and Guildenstern.

Rof. God fave you, Sir!

Guil. Mine honour'd Lord!

Rof. My most dear Lord!

Ham. My excellent good friends! How doft thou,
Guildenstern ?

Oh, Rofincrantz, good lads? how do ye both?
Rof. As the Indifferent children of the earth.
Guil. Happy, in that we are not over happy; on
Fortune's cap we are not the very button.

Ham. Nor the foals of her shoe?

Rof. Neither, my Lord.

Ham. Then you live about her waste, or in the middle of her favours?

Guil. 'Faith, in her privates we.

Ham. In the fecret parts of Fortune? oh, moft true; fhe is a trumpet. What news?

Rof. None, my Lord; but that the world's grown, honest.

Ham. Then is dooms-day near; but your news is not true. Let me question more in particular, What have you, my good friends, deferved at the hands of Fortune, that the fends you to prison hither?

Guil. Prifon, my Lord!

Ham. Denmark's a prison.

Rof Then is the world one.

Ham. A goodly one in which there are many confines, wards, and dungeons; Denmark being one o' th' worst.

Rof. We think not so, my Lord.

Ham. Why, then, 'tis none to you; for there is no thing either good or bad, but thinking makes it fo. To me it is a prifon.

Rof. Why, then your ambition makes it one: 'tis too narrow for your mind.

Ham, Oh God, I could be bounded in a nut-shell, and count myself a King of infinite space, were it not that I have bad dreams.

Guil. Which dreams, indeed, are ambition; for the very fubftance of the ambitious is merely the fhadow of a dream.

Ham. A dream itself is but a fhadow.

Rof. Truly, and I hold ambition of so airy and light a quality, that it is but a fhadow's fhadow.

Ham. Then are our beggars, bodies: and our monarchs and outftretch'd heroes, the beggars' fhadows. Shall we to th' court: for, by my fay, I cannot reafon. Both. We'll wait upon you.

Ham. No fuch matter. I will not fort you with the reft of my le vants; for, to speak to you like an honeft man, I am most dreadfully attended; but, in the beaten. way of friendship, what make you at Elfinoor?

Ref. To vifit you, my Lord; no other occafion. Ham. Beggar that I am, I am even poor in thanks; but I thank you: and fure, dear friends, my thanks are too dear of a halfpenny. Were you not fent for;

is it your own inclining? is it a free vifitation? Come, deal justly with me; come, come, nay speak. Guil. What thould we fay, my Lord?

Ham. Any thing, but to the purpofe. You were fent for; and there is a kind of confeffion in your looks, which your modefties have not craft enough to colour. I know the good King and Queen have fent for you. Rofo what end, my Lord?

Ham. That you must teach me; but let me conjure you by the rights of our fellowthip, by the confonancy of our youth, by the obligation of our ever-preserved love, and by what more dear a better proposer could charge you withal; be even and direct with me, whe ther you were fent for or no?

Rof. What fay you?

[To Guilden. ham. Nay, then I have an eye of you: if you love me, hold not off.

Guil. My Lord, we were fent for.

Ham, I will tell you why; fo thall my anticipation prevent your discovery, and your fecrecy to the King and Queen moult no feather. "I have of late, but "wherefore know not, loft all my mirth, forgone all "cuftom of exercife and indeed it goes to heavily with

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my difpofition, that this gooly frame, the earth, "feems to me a steril promontory; this most excellent canopy the air, look you, this brave o'er hanging "firmament, this majestical roof fretted with golden "fire, why, it appears no other thing to me, than a foul

and peftilent congregation of vapours What a piece of work is a man! how noble in reafon how infi"nite in faculties! in form and moving how express "and admirable in action how like an angel! in ap

66

prehenfion how like a god! the beauty of the world, "the paragon of animals; and yet to me, what is this quilteffence of dult? Man denghts not me, nor wo"man neither; though by your imiling you seem to Tay ro

Rof. My Lord, there was no fuch ituff in my thoughts. Ham. Why did you laugh, when I faid man delights not me?

Roj. To think, my Lord, if you delight not in man, what lenten entertainment the players fhall receive from

you. We accofted them on the way, and hither are they coming to offer you fervice.

Ham "He that plays the King, fhall be welcome; his Majefty hall have tribute of me; the adventurous knight fhall ufe his foil and target; the lover fhall "not figh gratis; the humorous man fhall end his part in peace; the clown fhall make thofe langh "whose lungs are tickled o' th' fere; and the lady shall fay her mind freely, or the blank verse shall halt for't. "What players are they?

Rof. Even thofe you were wont to take delight in, the tragedians of the city.

Ham. How chances it they travel? their residence both in reputation and profit was better, both ways. Rof. I think their inhibition comes by the means of

the late innovation.

Ham. Do they hold the fame estimation they did when I was in the city? are they fo follow'd? Rof. No, indeed, they are not.

Ham. How comes it? do they grow rusty?

Rof. Nay, their endeavours keep in the wonted pace: but there is, Sir, an aiery of children *, little eyafes: that cry out on the top of question, and are most tyrannically clapt for't. These are now the fashion, and fo berattle the common stages, (fo they call them), that many wearing rapiers are afraid of goofe-quills, and dare fcarce come thither.

Ham. What, are they children? who maintains 'em? how are they efcoted? will they purfue the quality no longer than they can fing? will they not fay afterwards, if they fhould grow themselves to common players, (aɛ it is most like, if their means are no better), their writers do them wrong to make them exclaim against their own fucceffion?

Rof Faith, there has been much to do on both fides; and the nation holds it no fin, to tarre them on to controversy. There was, for a while, no money bid for argument, unless the poet and the player went to cuffs in the question.

Ham. Is't poffible?

Relating to the playhouses then contending, the Bankside, the Fortune, &c. played by the children of his Majesty's chapel,

Guil. Oh, there has been much throwing about of brains.

Ham. Do the boys carry it away?

Rof. Ay, that they do, my Lord, Hercules and his load too.

Ham. It is not strange; för mine uncle is King of Denmark; and thofe that would make mowes at him while my father lived, gave twenty, forty, fifty, an hundred ducats apiece, for his picture in little. There is fomething in this more than natural, if philofophy could find it out. [Flourish for the players.

Guil. There are the players.

Ham. Gentlemen, you are welcome to Ellinoor ; your hands: come then, the appurtenance of welcome is fathion and ceremony. Let me comply with you in this garbe, left my extent to the players (which, I tell you, must shew fairly outward) should more appear like entertainment than yours. You are welcome; but my uncle-father and aunt-mother are deceiv'd.

Guil. In what, my dear Lord?

Ham. "I am but mad north, north-weft: when the "wind is foutherly, I know a hawk from a handsaw.

SCENE VII. Enter Polonius.

Pol. Well be with you, Gentlemen.

Ham. Hark you, Guildenstern, and you too, at each ear a hearer; that great baby you fee there, is not yet out of his swathling-clouts.

Rof. Haply he's the second time come to them; for they fay, an old man is twice a child.

Ham. I will prophety, he comes to tell me of the players. Mark it ; you fay right, Sir; for on Monday morning 'twas fo indeed.

Pol. My Lord, I have news to tell you.
Ham. My Lord, I have news to tell you.
When Rofcius was an actor in Rome--
Pol. The actors are come hither, my Lord.
Ham Buzze, buzze.

Pol. Upon mine honour

Ham. Then came each actor on his ass

Pol." The best actors in the world, either for tra"gedy, comedy, hiftory, paftoral, paitoral-comical, hiftorical-paftoral, fcene undividable, or poem un

VOL. VIII.

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