SCENE II

A hall in the castle.

Enter HAMLET and HORATIO.

Ham. So much for this, sir: now shall you see the other; You do remember all the circumstance?

Hor. Remember it, my lord!

Ham. Sir, in my heart there was a kind of fighting,
That would not let me sleep: methought I lay
Worse than the mutines in the bilboes. Rashly,-
And praised be rashness for it, let us know,
Our indiscretion sometime serves us well

Hor.

When our deep plots do pall; and that should teach

us

There's a divinity that shapes our ends,
Rough-hew them how we will,-

Ham. Up from my cabin,

That is most certain.

My sea-gown scarf'd about me, in the dark
Groped I to find out them; had my desire,
Finger'd their packet, and in fine withdrew
To mine own room again; making so bold,
My fears forgetting manners, to unseal

ΙΟ

Their grand commission; where I found, Horatio,-
O royal knavery!-an exact command,

Larded with many several sorts of reasons

Importing Denmark's health and England's too,
With, ho! such bugs and goblins in my life,

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Hor.

That, on the supervise, no leisure bated,
No, not to stay the grinding of the axe,

My head should be struck off.

Is't possible?

Ham. Here's the commission: read it at more leisure. But wilt thou hear me how I did proceed?

Hor. I beseech you.

Ham. Being thus be-netted round with villanies,

Hor.

Ere I could make a prologue to my brains,
They had begun the play,-I sat me down,
Devised a new commission; wrote it fair:
I once did hold it, as our statists do,

A baseness to write fair, and labor'd much
How to forget that learning; but, sir, now
It did me yeoman's service: wilt thou know
The effect of what I wrote?

Ay, good my lord.
Ham. An earnest conjuration from the king,

Hor.

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As England was his faithful tributary,
As love between them like the palm might flourish,
As peace should still her wheaten garland wear
And stand a comma 'tween their amities,
And many such-like 'As'es of great charge,
That, on the view and knowing of these contents,
Without debatement further, more or less,
He should the bearers put to sudden death,
Not shriving-time allow'd.

How was this seal'd?

Ham. Why, even in that was heaven ordinant.
I had my father's signet in my purse,

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Which was the model of that Danish seal:
Folded the writ up in form of the other;
Subscribed it, gave't the impression, placed it
safely,

The changeling never known. Now, the next day
Was our sea-fight; and what to this was sequent
Thou know'st already.

Hor. So Guildenstern and Rosencrantz go to't.

Ham. Why, man, they did make love to this employ

Hor.

ment;

They are not near my conscience; their defeat
Does by their own insinuation grow:

'Tis dangerous when the baser nature comes
Between the pass and fell incensed points
Of mighty opposites.

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Why, what a king is this!
Ham. Does it not, thinks't thee, stand me now upon-
He that hath kill'd my king and whored my mother,
Popp'd in between the election and my hopes,
Thrown out his angle for my proper life,

And with such cozenage-is't not perfect conscience,
To quit him with this arm? and is't not to be

damn'd,

To let this canker of our nature come

In further evil?

Hor. It must be shortly known to him from England

What is the issue of the business there.

Ham. It will be short: the interim is mine;

And a man's life's no more than to say 'One.'
But I am very sorry, good Horatio,

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Hor.

That to Laertes I forgot myself;

For, by the image of my cause, I see

The portraiture of his: I'll court his favors:
But, sure, the bravery of his grief did put me
Into a towering passion.

Peace! who comes here? 80

Enter OSRIC.

Osr. Your lordship is right welcome back to Denmark.

Ham. I humbly thank you, sir. Dost know this water-fly?

Hor. No, my good lord.

Ham. Thy state is the more gracious, for 'tis a vice
to know him. He hath much land, and fertile:
let a beast be lord of beasts, and his crib shall
stand at the king's mess: 'tis a chough, but, as
I say, spacious in the possession of dirt.
Osr. Sweet lord, if your lordship were at leisure,

I should impart a thing to you from his
majesty.

Ham. I will receive it, sir, with all diligence of
spirit. Put your bonnet to his right use; 'tis

for the head.

Osr. I thank your lordship, it is very hot.

Ham. No, believe me, 'tis very cold; the wind is northerly.

Osr. It is indifferent cold, my lord, indeed.

Ham. But yet methinks it is very sultry and hot for

my complexion.

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100

Osr. Exceedingly, my lord; it is very sultry,-as 'twere, I cannot tell how. But, my lord, his majesty bade me signify to you that he has laid a great wager on your head: sir, this is the

matter

Ham. I beseech you, remember

[Hamlet moves him to put on his hat. Osr. Nay, good my lord; for mine ease, in good faith. Sir, here is newly come to court Laertes; 110 believe me, an absolute gentleman, full of most excellent differences, of very soft society and great showing: indeed, to speak feelingly of him, he is the card or calendar of gentry, for you shall find in him the continent of what part a gentleman would see.

Ham. Sir, his definement suffers no perdition in

you; though, I know, to divide him inventorially would dizzy the arithmetic of memory, and yet but yaw neither, in respect of his quick sail. 120 But, in the verity of extolment, I take him to be a soul of great article; and his infusion of such dearth and rareness, as, to make true diction of him, his semblable is his mirror; and who else would trace him, his umbrage, nothing more. Osr. Your lordship speaks most infallibly of him.

Ham. The concernancy, sir? why do we wrap
the gentleman in our more rawer breath?
Osr. Sir?

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