ACT IV LAER. I'm lost in it, my Lord. But let him come :

So you will not o'errule me to a peace.
KING. To thine own peace. If he be now return'd,

As checking at his voyage, and that he means

No more to undertake it, I will work him

To an exploit, now ripe in my device,

Under the which he shall not choose but fall:

And for his death no wind of blame shall breathe;

But even his mother shall uncharge the practice,
And call it accident.

You have been talk'd of since your travel much,
And that in Hamlet's hearing, for a quality
Wherein they say you shine: your sum of parts
Did not together pluck such envy from him,
As did that one; and that, in my regard,
Of the unworthiest siege.1

60

70

What part is that, my Lord?

LAER
KING. A very riband in the
riband in the cap of youth,

Yet needful too; for youth no less becomes
The light and careless livery that it wears
Than settled age his sables and his weeds,

Importing health and graveness. Two months since,
Here was a gentleman of Normandy:

I've seen, myself, and serv'd against, the French,
And they can well on horseback; but this gallant
Had witchcraft in 't; he grew unto his seat;
And to such wondrous doing brought his horse,
As had he been incorps'd and demi-natur'd
With the brave beast: so far he topp'd my thought,

1 of the lowest rank.

81

LAER. I know him well: he is the brooch, indeed,

And gem of all the nation.

KING. He made confession of you;

And gave you such a masterly report

For art and exercise in your defence,

And for your rapier most especially,

That he cried out, 'twould be a sight indeed,

If one could match you: the scrimers of their nation,

He swore, had neither motion, guard, nor eye,

If you oppos'd them. Sir, this report of his
Did Hamlet so envenom with his envy,
That he could nothing do but wish and beg
Your sudden coming o'er, to play with him.
Now, out of this—

LAER.

What out of this, my Lord? KING. Laertes, was your father dear to you?

Or are you like the painting of a sorrow,

A face without a heart?

LAER.

Why ask you this?

KING. Not that I think you did not love your father;

But that I know love is begun by time,
And that I see, in passages of proof,
Time qualifies the spark and fire of it.

There lives within the very flame of love

A kind of wick or snuff that will abate it;

And nothing is at a like goodness still;

For goodness, growing to a plurisy,

Dies in his own too much. That we would do

We should do when we would; for this would changes,

And hath abatements and delays as many

As there are tongues, are hands, are accidents;

And then this should is like a spendthrift sigh,

That hurts by easing. But, to the quick o' the ulcer:
Hamlet comes back: what would you undertake,

120

1 i.e. in imagining.

ACT IV
Sc. VII

To shew yourself your father's son in deed
More than in words?

LAER.
To cut his throat i' the church.
KING. No place, indeed, should murder sanctuarize;
Revenge should have no bounds. But, good Laertes,
Will you do this, keep close within your chamber.
Hamlet return'd shall know you are come home:
We'll put on those shall praise your excellence,
And set a double varnish on the fame
The Frenchman gave you; bring you, in fine,
together,

And wager on your heads. He, being remiss,

Most generous, and free from all contriving,
Will not peruse the foils; so that, with ease
Or with a little shuffling, you may choose
A sword unbated,1 and, in a pass of practice,2
Requite him for your father.
LAER.

I will do 't;
And for that purpose I'll anoint my sword.
I bought an unction of a mountebank,
So mortal that, but dip a knife in it,
Where it draws blood no cataplasm3 so rare,
Collected from all simples that have virtue
Under the Moon, can save the thing from death
That is but scratch'd withal: I'll touch my point
With this contagion, that, if I gall him slightly,
It may be death.

KING.
Let's further think of this;
Weigh what convenience both of time and means
May fit us to our shape. If this should fail,
And that our drift look through our bad performance,
"Twere better not assay'd: therefore this project
Should have a back or second, that might hold,

If this should blast in proof. Soft! let me see:
We'll make a solemn wager on your cunnings-
I ha't:

When in your motion you are hot and dry
(As make your bouts more violent to that end)
And that he calls for drink, I'll have prepar'd him
A chalice for the nonce; whereon but sipping,

1 i.e. a rapier without a button.

2 a treacherous thrust.

3 galve.

130

140

151

160 ACT IV Sc. VII

If he by chance escape your venom'd stuck,
Our purpose may hold there.

Enter the QUEEN.

How now, sweet Queen!

QUEEN. One woe doth tread upon another's heel,

So fast they follow. Your sister's drown'd, Laertes.

LAER. Drown'd! O, where?

QUEEN. There is a willow grows aslant a brook,

That shews his hoar leaves in the glassy stream:
There with fantastic garlands did she come

Of crow-flowers, nettles, daisies, and long purples,
That liberal shepherds give a grosser name,

But our cold maids do dead men's fingers call them: 170
There, on the pendent boughs her coronet weeds
Clambering to hang, an envious sliver broke;

When down her weedy trophies and herself

Fell in the weeping brook. Her clothes spread
wide,

And, mermaid-like, awhile they bore her up;
Which time she chanted snatches of old tunes,
As one incapable of her own distress,

Or like a creature native and indued

Unto that element: but long it could not be
Till that her garments, heavy with their drink,
Pull'd the poor wretch from her melodious lay
To muddy death.

LAER.

Alas, then she is drown'd!

QUEEN. Drown'd, drown'd!

LAER. Too much of water hast thou, poor Ophelia,

And therefore I forbid my tears: but yet

It is our trick; Nature her custom holds,

Let Shame say what it will: when these are gone,
The woman will be out. Adieu, my Lord:

I have a speech of fire, that fain would blaze,
But that this folly douts it.
KING.

180

[exit.

Let's follow, Gertrude:

How much I had to do to calm his rage!
Now fear I this will give it start again;
Therefore let's follow.

191

[exeunt.

ACT V
Sc. I

ACT V

SCENE I. Elsinore. A Churchyard.

Enter two Clowns, with spades, etc.

FIRST CLOWN. Is she to be buried in Christian burial

that wilfully seeks her own salvation?

SEC. CLOWN. I tell thee she is: and therefore make her grave straight: the crowner hath sat on her, and finds it Christian burial.

FIRST CLOWN. How can that be, unless she drown'd herself in her own defence?

8

SEC. CLOWN. Why, 'tis found so.
FIRST CLOWN. It must be se offendendo; it cannot be
else. For here lies the point: If I drown myself
wittingly, it argues an act; and an act hath three
branches; it is, to act, to do, and to perform: argal
she drown'd herself wittingly.

SEC. CLOWN. Nay, but hear you, Goodman Delver-
FIRST CLOWN. Give me leave. Here lies the water;
good: here stands the man; good: if the man go to
this water and drown himself, it is, will he, nill he, he
goes-mark you that; but if the water come to him
and drown him, he drowns not himself: argal he that
is not guilty of his own death shortens not his own life.
SEC. CLOWN. But is this law?

21

FIRST CLOWN. Ay, marry, is 't; Crowner's Quest law.
SEC. CLOWN. Will you ha' the truth on 't? If this had
not been a gentlewoman, she should have been buried
out of Christian burial.

FIRST CLOWN. Why, there thou say'st; and the more
pity that great folk should have countenance in this
world to drown or hang themselves, more than their
even-Christian. Come, my spade. There is no an-
cient gentlemen but gardeners, ditchers, and grave-
makers; they hold up Adam's profession.
SEC. CLOWN. Was he a gentleman?

31