The Best of Shakespeare:. William Shakespeare
in jest; no offence i’ the world.
King.
What do you call the play?
Ham. The Mouse-trap. Marry, how? Tropically. This play is the image of a murder done in Vienna: Gonzago is the duke’s name; his wife, Baptista: you shall see anon; ‘tis a knavish piece of work: but what o’ that? your majesty, and we that have free souls, it touches us not: let the gall’d jade wince; our withers are unwrung.
[Enter Lucianus.]
This is one Lucianus, nephew to the King.
Oph.
You are a good chorus, my lord.
Ham. I could interpret between you and your love, if I could see the puppets dallying.
Oph.
You are keen, my lord, you are keen.
Ham.
It would cost you a groaning to take off my edge.
Oph.
Still better, and worse.
Ham. So you must take your husbands.—Begin, murderer; pox, leave thy damnable faces, and begin. Come:—‘The croaking raven doth bellow for revenge.’
Luc.
Thoughts black, hands apt, drugs fit, and time agreeing;
Confederate season, else no creature seeing;
Thou mixture rank, of midnight weeds collected,
With Hecate’s ban thrice blasted, thrice infected,
Thy natural magic and dire property
On wholesome life usurp immediately.
[Pours the poison into the sleeper’s ears.]
Ham.
He poisons him i’ the garden for’s estate. His name’s Gonzago:
The story is extant, and written in very choice Italian; you
shall see anon how the murderer gets the love of Gonzago’s wife.
Oph.
The King rises.
Ham.
What, frighted with false fire!
Queen.
How fares my lord?
Pol.
Give o’er the play.
King.
Give me some light:—away!
All.
Lights, lights, lights!
[Exeunt all but Hamlet and Horatio.]
Ham.
Why, let the strucken deer go weep,
The hart ungalled play;
For some must watch, while some must sleep:
So runs the world away.—
Would not this, sir, and a forest of feathers—if the rest of my
fortunes turn Turk with me,—with two Provincial roses on my
razed shoes, get me a fellowship in a cry of players, sir?
Hor.
Half a share.
Ham.
A whole one, I.
For thou dost know, O Damon dear,
This realm dismantled was
Of Jove himself; and now reigns here
A very, very—pajock.
Hor.
You might have rhymed.
Ham. O good Horatio, I’ll take the ghost’s word for a thousand pound! Didst perceive?
Hor.
Very well, my lord.
Ham.
Upon the talk of the poisoning?—
Hor.
I did very well note him.
Ham.
Ah, ha!—Come, some music! Come, the recorders!—
For if the king like not the comedy,
Why then, belike he likes it not, perdy.
Come, some music!
[Enter Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.]
Guil.
Good my lord, vouchsafe me a word with you.
Ham.
Sir, a whole history.
Guil.
The king, sir—
Ham.
Ay, sir, what of him?
Guil.
Is, in his retirement, marvellous distempered.
Ham.
With drink, sir?
Guil.
No, my lord; rather with choler.
Ham. Your wisdom should show itself more richer to signify this to the doctor; for me to put him to his purgation would perhaps plunge him into far more choler.
Guil. Good my lord, put your discourse into some frame, and start not so wildly from my affair.
Ham.
I am tame, sir:—pronounce.
Guil. The queen, your mother, in most great affliction of spirit, hath sent me to you.
Ham.
You are welcome.
Guil. Nay, good my lord, this courtesy is not of the right breed. If it shall please you to make me a wholesome answer, I will do your mother’s commandment: if not, your pardon and my return shall be the end of my business.
Ham.
Sir, I cannot.
Guil.
What, my lord?
Ham. Make you a wholesome answer; my wit’s diseased: but, sir, such answer as I can make, you shall command; or rather, as you say, my mother: therefore no more, but to the matter: my mother, you say,—
Ros. Then thus she says: your behaviour hath struck her into amazement and admiration.
Ham. O wonderful son, that can so stonish a mother!—But is there no sequel at the heels of this mother’s admiration?
Ros.
She desires to speak with you in her closet ere you go to bed.
Ham. We shall obey, were she ten times our mother. Have you any further trade with us?
Ros.
My lord, you once did love me.
Ham.
And so I do still, by these pickers and stealers.
Ros. Good my lord, what is your cause of distemper? you do, surely, bar the door upon your own liberty if you deny your griefs to your friend.
Ham.
Sir, I lack advancement.
Ros. How can that be, when you have the voice of the king himself for your succession in Denmark?
Ham. Ay, sir, but ‘While the grass grows’—the proverb is something musty.
[Re-enter the Players, with recorders.]
O, the recorders:—let me see one.—To withdraw with you:—why do you go about to recover the wind of me, as if you would drive me into a toil?
Guil.
O my lord, if my duty be too bold, my love is too unmannerly.
Ham.
I do not well understand that. Will you play upon