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II. 11. 344. Humorous. Eccentric.

II. i. 345-46. Whose lungs are tickle o' the sere. Who are easily moved to laughter. The sere is a part of a gunlock, and to be tickle o' the sere meant "to go off on the slightest touch." For the lungs as the seat of laughter, Cf. As You Like It, II. vii. 30, "My lungs began to crow like chanticleer."

II. ii. 347-48. if she have to self.

II. ii. 351.

Or the blank verse shall halt for 't. Even break the rules of metre to express her

Residence. I. e., in the city.

II. ii. 354. Inhibition. Stoppage of performances in the city; not necessarily a legal prohibition.

II. ii. 355. Innovation. Probably the growing fashion of performances by companies of children in the licensed theatres.

II. ii. 361. Aery. Eagle's nest, hence "brood."

II. ii. 362. Eyases. Young hawks. On the top of question. (1) "In a high key, dominating conversation" (Clar.), question being taken in the common sense of "discussion.' (2) "More and louder than the occasion requires" (Schmidt). (3) "The height of controversy" (Dowden). It may mean no more than "At the pitch of their voices."

II. ii. 363. Tyrannically. Boisterously.

II. ii. 365. Berattle. Attack noisily, berate. Common stages. The theatres where the regular actors played.

II. ii. 367. Goose-quills. I. e., the pens of the writers who supplied the children's companies. Thither. To the "common stages." The point of the passage seems to be that the children's companies, which were popular in London when this play was written, were accustomed to use personal satire, and that men were afraid to patronize the regular actors lest they should offend the children's playwrights, and be made victims of satirical attacks. II. ii. 369. Escoted. Paid.

II. II. 870.

ing.

Quality. Profession, especially that of act

II. 1. 373-74. If their means are no better. If they find no better means of subsistence.

II. ii. 375. Succession. Future careers.

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II. ii. 385-86.

Hercules and all.

Hercules and his load. The whole world,
There is supposed to be a reference here

to the sign of the Globe Theatre, Hercules carrying the

world on his back.

II. ii. 387. Hamlet quotes his uncle as another instance of sudden growth of popularity.

II. ii. 389.

II. ii. 391.

Mows. Grimaces.

In little. In miniature. 'Sblood. By

God's blood, an oath by the sacrament of the Lord's Sup

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II. ii. 399. Extent. The reception I extend.
II. ii. 401. Entertainment. Warm welcome.

II. ii. 405-407. I am but mad.. handsaw. I am mad only in certain circumstances. When it suits me, I can tell what I am about. Heath (quoted by Clar.) takes handsaw as a corruption of "heronshaw" or "hernsew," a provincial word for a heron, and explains that in hawking In a southerly wind the sportsman would have the sun be hind him, and so be able to distinguish between the two birds. But no proof that handsaw ever appears for "hernsew" has been produced, and it is quite likely that the phrase belongs to the common type of alliterative phrases, in which two quite dissimilar things are coupled. Cf. To tell "chalk from cheese," "a bull from a barn-door," etc. II. ii. 420. When Roscius, etc. In the time of Cicero. The suggestion is of very stale news.

II. ii. 422. Buz, buz. "It was an interjection used at Oxford, when any one began a story that was generally known before." (Blackstone, quoted in Var.)

II. ii. 424. "Then came," etc. Probably the fragment of a ballad.

II. ii. 428-29. unity of place. unities.

II. ii. 431.

Scene individable.

A play observing the Poem unlimited. A play not limited by the

Law of writ. Obligation to stick to the text. Liberty. I. e., to improvise, as comic actors often did on the Elizabethan stage.

II. ii. 437. The old song quoted by Hamlet may be found in the second and later editions of Percy's Reliques.

II. ii. 438. Passing. Surpassingly.

II. ii. 443-45. Follows. Hamlet puns here on the two senses of follows: (1) Comes next; (2) Follows logically. II. ii. 449. First row of the pious chanson. Explained by the reading of Q1. "The first verse of the godly ballad." II. ii. 450. Abridgement (plural in Ff.). A means of shortening (1) my speech; (2) the time. Cf. Midsummer Night's Dream, V. i. 39,

Say what abridgement have you for this evening,
What masque, what music?

II. ii. 455. Valanced. Fringed (with a beard).

II. ii. 456-57. My young lady. The women's parts were taken by boys with unbroken voices.

II. ii. 459. Chopine. A kind of shoe raised from the ground by a thick sole of cork or wood.

So far broken as

II. ii. 461. Cracked within the ring. to have lost its value. A coin was no longer of its full value if it had a crack running from the edge to within the ring surrounding the sovereign's head.

II. ii. 465. Quality. Professional skill. Cf. II. ii. 370. II. ii. 471. Caviare. Used as typical of things requirGeneral. Supply "public."

ing a cultivated taste.

II. ii. 473-74. Cried in the top of. Spoke with more authority than.

II. ii. 475. Modesty. Moderation. Cf. III. ii. 23, V. i. 231.

II. ii. 477.

Sallets. Salads, piquant herbs to give zest;

1. e., ribald or extravagant passages.

II. ii. 480.

II. ii. 482.

II. ii. 487.

Honest. Honorable.

Fine. I. e., made fine by artifice.

Pyrrhus, or Neoptolemus, one of the Greek

heroes who sacked Troy. He Andromache. Hyrcanian beast. the Caspian Sea.

killed Priam, and married A tiger from the shores of

II. ii. 491. Ominous horse. The wooden horse in which the band of Greeks entered Troy to destroy it.

II. ii. 494. Gules. The heraldic term for red. Tricked. Adorned.

II. ii. 496. Impasted. The blood made into paste with the dust of the streets.

II. ii. 497. Tyrannous. Cruel.

II. ii. 499. O'er-sized.

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Smeared as with glue. Coagu

II. ii. 511. Ilium. The citadel of Troy.

II. ii. 518. ness.

II. ii. 520.

Neutral to. Not acting for. Matter. Busi

Against. Before.

Rack. Thin cloud.
Region. Air.

II. ii. 521.

II. ii. 524.

II. ii. 527.

Proof eterne.

Cf., line 624, below.

II. ii. 537.

Everlasting resistance.

Jig. Humorous song. This meaning existed

alongside of the meaning of "dance." Cf. III. i. 151, and III. ii. 125.

II. ii. 540. Mobled. Muffled.

II. II. 544.

Bisson rheum. Blinding tears.

Bisson

properly means "near-sighted."

II. ii. 546. O'er-teemed. "Exhausted by child-bearing" (Clar.).

II. ii. 555. Milch.

ning with tears."

Literally, "milk-giving"; here, “run

II. ii. 556. Passion. Feeling, suffering.

II. ii. 489-556. The turgid style of this speech and the favorable criticism of it put into the mouth of Hamlet have caused endless discussion. For the criticism, it is to be remembered that it is not spoken by Shakspere in his own person. For the style of the speech, see Introduction, p. 42.

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II. 11. 563. Abstract. Epitome. The reference in this passage is to the practice of dealing with contemporary events on the stage.

II. ii. 568. God's bodykins. An oath by the host in the Sacrament. Cf. II. ii. 621, note.

II. ii. 569.

II. ii. 596.

II. il. 598.

II. ii. 599.

II. 11. 606.

II. ii. 607.
II. ii. 608.

After. According to.

Conceit. Imagination.

Aspect. For accent, cf. Introduction, p. 44, 6.
Function. Bodily action.

General. Cf. line 471, above.

Free. Innocent. Cf. III. ii, 239.

Amaze.

Paralyze. A stronger word than it

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II. 11. 622. Pigeon-livered and lack gall. The spirit of resentment and rancor was supposed to have its seat in the gall, and pigeons were believed to have none.

Region. Air. Cf. line 524, above, and I. iii.

II. ii. 624.

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II. ii. 643.

Tent. Probe. Blench. Flinch.

II. ii. 649. Abuses. Deceives. Damn. By leading me to kill an innocent man.

II. ii. 650. Relative. Conclusive.

ACT III.

III. 1. The present scene further exhibits Hamlet's speculative tendency in the soliloquy on suicide, and advances the plot by convincing the King that love is not at the bottom of Hamlet's conduct and arousing in him suspicion definite enough to lead him to resolve to get his nephew out of the country.

III. i. 1. Drift of circumstance.

Cf. "drift of question," II. i. 10.

Round-about method.

III. i. 2. Puts on. The king does not mean to imply that Hamlet's confusion of mind is pure pretense.

III. 1. 12. Disposition. Mood.

III. 1. 13. Niggard of question.

Whether question is

used for "discussion," or in the modern sense, Rosencrantz's speech hardly agrees with the facts.

He appears

to be trying to put the best face possible upon the baffling of their attempts to draw Hamlet.

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III. i. 52. To the thing, etc. E. K. Chambers says, "to

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