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Since my dear soul was mistress of her choice,
And could of men distinguish her election,
She hath seal'd thee for herself: for thou hast been
As one, in suffering all, that suffers nothing;
A man, that fortune's buffets and rewards
Hast ta'en with equal thanks: and bless'd are those,
Whose blood and judgment are so well co-mingled,
That they are not a pipe for fortune's finger
To sound what stop she please: Give me that man
That is not passion's slave, and I will wear him
In my heart's core, ay, in my heart of heart,
As I do thee.-Something too much of this.-
There is a play to-night before the king;
One scene of it comes near the circumstance,
Which I have told thee of my father's death.
I pr'ythee, when thou seest that act afoot,
Even with the very comment of thy soul
Observe my uncle: if his occulted guilt
Do not itself unkennel in one speech,
It is a damned ghost that we have seen;
And my imaginations are as foul

As Vulcan's stithy.2 Give him heedful note:
For I mine eyes will rivet to his face;
And, after, we will both our judgments join
In censure of his seeming.

Hor.

Well, my lord:

If he steal aught, the whilst this play is playing, And scape detecting, I will pay the theft.

Ham. They are coming to the play; I must be idle:

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King. How fares our cousin Hamlet?

Ham. Excellent, i'faith; of the chameleon's dish: I eat the air, promise-crammed: You cannot feed capons so.

Iman do, but be merry? for, look you, how cheerfully my mother looks, and my father died within these two hours.

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Oph. Nay, 'tis twice two months, my lord. Ham. So long? Nay, then let the devil wear black, for I'll have a suit of sables.5 O heavens! die two months ago, and not forgotten yet? Then there's hope, a great man's memory may outlive his life half a year: But, by'r-lady, he must build churches then or else shall he suffer not thinking on, with the hobby-horse; whose epitaph is, For, O, for, O, the hobby-horse is forgot.

Trumpets sound. The dumb show follows. Enter a King and a Queen, very lovingly; the Queen embracing him, and he her. She kneels, and makes show of protestation unto him. He takes her up, and declines his head upon her neck: lays him down upon a bank of flowers; she, seeing him asleep, leaves him. Anon comes in a fellow, takes off his crown, kisses it, and pours poison in the King's ears, and exit. The Queen returns; finds the King dead, and makes passionate action. The poisoner, with some two or three Mutes, comes in again, seeming to lament with her The dead body is carried away. The poisoner woos the Queen with gifts; she seems loath and unwilling awhile, but, in the end, accepts his love. [Exeunt.

Oph. What means this, my lord? Ham. Marry, this is miching mallecho;6 it means mischief.

Oph. Belike, this show imports the argument of the play. Enter Prologue.

Ham. We shall know by this fellow: the players cannot keep counsel; they'll tell all.

Oph. Will he tell us what this show meant? Ham. Ay, or any show that you'll show him :

King. I have nothing with this answer, Hamlet;||Be not you ashamed to show, he'll not shame to

these words are not mine.

Ham. No, nor mine now. My lord,-you played once in the university, you say [To Polonius. Pol. That did I, my lord; and was accounted a good actor.

Ham. And what did you enact?

Pol. I did enact Julius Cæsar: I was killed i'the Capitol; Brutus killed me.

Ham. It was a brute part of him, to kill so capital a calf there.-Be the players ready?

Ros. Ay, my lord; they stay4 upon your patience. Queen. Come hither, my dear Hamlet, sit by me. Ham. No, good mother, here's metal more at

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the play.

Pro. For us, and for our tragedy,
Here stooping to your clemency,
We beg your hearing patiently.
Ham. Is this a prologue, or the posy of a ring?
Oph. 'Tis brief, my lord.
Ham. As woman's love.

Enter a King and a Queen.

P. King. Full thirty times hath Phoebus' cart gone round

Neptune's salt wash, and Tellus" orbed ground; And thirty dozen moons, with borrow'd sheen,10 About the world have times twelve thirties been;

Since love our hearts, and Hymen did our hands,

Unite commutual in most sacred bands.

moon

P. Queen. So many journeys inay the sun and Make us again count o'er, ere love be done! But, wo is me, you are so sick of late, So far from cheer, and from your former state, That I distrust you. Yet, though I distrust, Discomfort you, my lord, it nothing must: For women fear too much, even as they love; And women's fear and love hold quantity ; In neither aught, or in extremity. Now, what my love is, proof hath made you know: And as my love is siz'd,11 my fear is so.

(7) Short. (8) Car, chariot. (9) The earth's, (10) Shining, lustre.

(11) Magnitude, proportion.

3 Y

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P. King. 'Faith, I must leave thee, love, and shortly too;

My operant powers their functions leave to do:
And thou shalt live in this fair world behind,
Honour'd, belov'd; and, haply, one as kind
For husband shalt thou-

P. Queen.
O, confound the rest!
Such love must needs be treason in breast:
my

In second husband let me be accurst!
None wed the second, but who kill'd the first.
Ham. That's wormwood.

P. Queen. The instances,? that second marriage

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speak:

But, what we do determine, oft we break.
Purpose is but the slave to memory;

Of violent birth, but poor validity:

Which now, like fruit unripe, sticks on the tree;
But fall, unshaken, when they mellow be.
Most necessary 'tis, that we forget
To pay ourselves what to ourselves is debt:
What to ourselves in passion we propose,
The passion ending, doth the purpose lose.
The violence of either grief or joy

Their own enactures with themselves destroy :
Where joy most revels, grief doth most lament;
Grief joys, joy grieves, on slender accident.
This world is not for aye 4 nor 'tis not strange,
That even our loves should with our fortunes change;
For 'tis a question left us yet to prove,
Whether love lead fortune, or else fortune love.
The great man down, you mark his favourite flies;
The poor advanc'd makes friends of enemies.
And hitherto doth love on fortune tend:
For who not needs, shall never lack a friend;
And who in want a hollow friend doth try,
Directly seasons him his enemy.

But, orderly to end where I begun,--
Our wills, and fates, do so contráry run,
That our devices still are overthrown;

Our thoughts are ours, their ends none of our own:
So think thou wilt no second husband wed;
But die thy thoughts, when thy first lord is dead.

P. Queen. Nor earth to give me food, nor heaven light!

Sport and repose lock from me, day and night!
To desperation turn my trust and hope!
An anchor's cheer in prison be my scope!
Each opposite, that blanks the face of joy,
Meet what I would have well, and it destroy!
Both here, and hence, pursue me lasting strife,
If, once a widow, ever I be wife!
Ham. If she should break it now,

[To Oph.

P. King. 'Tis deeply sworn. Sweet, leave me here a while;

My spirits grow dull, and fain I would beguile
The tedious day with sleep.
[Sleeps.
P. Queen.
Sleep rock thy brain;
And never come mischance between us twain!

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Ham. O, but she'll keep her word. King. Have you heard the argument? Is there no offence in't?

Ham. No, no, they do but jest, poison in jest; no offence i'the world. King. What do you call the play?

Ham. The Mouse-trap.6 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 of that? your majesty, and we that have free souls, it touches us not: Let the galled jade wince, our withers are unwrung.

Enter Lucianus.

This is one Lucianus, nephew to the king.
Oph. You are as good as a 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 mistake your husbands.—Begin, murderer ;-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 ban8 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 his 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!
Pol. 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;
Thus runs the world away.-
Would not this, sir, and a forest of feathers? (if the
rest of my fortunes turn Turk10 with me,) with two
Provencial roses on my razed shoes, get me a fel-
lowship in a cry12 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-peacock.

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 poisoning,

Hor. I did very well note him.

Ham. Ah, ha!-Come, some music; come, the recorders, 13

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For if the king like not the comedy,

tages,4 with your fingers and thumb, give it breath Why then, belike, he likes it not, perdy.with your mouth, and it will discourse most elo

Enter Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.

Come, some music.

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?

quent music. Look you, these are the stops.
Guil. But these cannot I command to any utter-
ance of harmony; I have not the skill.

Ham. Why, look you now, how unworthy a thing you make of me. You would play upon me; you would seem to know my stops: you would pluck out the heart of my mystery; you would sound me from my lowest note to the top of my compass and

Guil. Is, in his retirement, marvellous distem- there is much music, excellent voice, in this little

pered.

Ham. With drink, sir?

Guil. No, my lord, with choler.

Ham. Your wisdom should show itself more richer, to signify this to the doctor; for, for me to put him to his purgation, would, perhaps, plunge him into 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 astonish a mother!-But is there no sequel at the heels of this mother's admiration? impart.

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 trade2 with us? Ros. My lord, you once did love me.

Ham. And do still, by these pickers and stealers.3 Ros. Good my lord, what is your cause of distemper? you do, surely, but 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.

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 is too unmannerly.

love

Ham. I do not well understand that. Will you play upon this pipe?

Guil. My lord, I cannot.
Ham. I pray you.
Guil. Believe me, I cannot.
Ham. I do beseech you.

Guil. I know no touch of it, my lord.
Ham. 'Tis as easy as lying: govern these ven-

(1) Par Dieu. (2) Business. (3) Hands.
(4) Holes. (5) Utmost stretch. (6) Reproved.

organ; yet cannot you make it speak. 'Sblood, do
you think, I am easier to be played on than a pipe?
Call me what instrument you will, though you can
fret me, you cannot play upon me.
Enter Polonius.

God bless you, sir!

Pol. My lord, the queen would speak with you, and presently.

Ham. Do you see yonder cloud, that's almost in shape of a camel?

Pol. By the mass, and 'tis like a camel, indeed.
Ham. Methinks, it is like a weasel.
Pol. It is backed like a weasel.

Ham. Or, like a whale?

Pol. Very like a whale.

Ham. Then will I come to my mother by and by. -They fool me to the top of my bent.5-I will come by and by.

Pol. I will say so. [Exit Polonius. Ham. By and by is easily said.-Leave me, friends. [Exeunt Ros. Guil. Hor. &c. 'Tis now the very witching time of night; When churchyards yawn, and hell itself breathes

out

Contagion to this world: Now could I drink hot blood,

And do such business as the bitter day
Would quake to look on. Soft; now to my mother.
O, heart, lose not thy nature; let not ever
The soul of Nero enter this firm bosom :
Let me be cruel, not unnatural :

I will speak daggers to her, but use none;
My tongue and soul in this be hypocrites:
How in my words soever she be shent,6
To give them seals? never, my soul, consent! [Ex.
SCENE_III-A room in the same. Enter King,
Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern.

King. I like him not; nor stands it safe with us,
To let his madness range. Therefore, prepare you;
I your commission will forthwith despatch,
And he to England shall along with you:
The terms of our estate may not endure
Hazard so near us, as doth hourly grow
Out of his lunes.8
Guil.
We will ourselves provide :
Most holy and religious fear it is,
To keep those many many bodies safe,
That live, and feed, upon your majesty.

Ros. The single and peculiar life is bound, With all the strength and armour of the mind, To keep itself from 'noyance: but much more That spirit, upon whose weal depend and rest The lives of many. The cease of majesty Dies not alone; but, like a gulf, doth draw What's near it, with it: it is a massy wheel, Fix'd on the summit of the highest mount, To whose huge spokes ten thousand lesser things Are mortis'd and adjoin'd; which when it falls,

(7) Authority to put them in execution. (8) Lunacies.

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With all his crimes broad-blown, as flush as May;
And, how his audit stands, who knows, save heaven?
But, in our circumstance and course of thought,
voy-Tis heavy with him: And am I then reveng'd,
To take him in the purging of his soul,
When he is fit and season'd for his passage?

For we will fetters put upon this fear,
Which now goes too free-footed.
Ros. Guil
We will haste us.
[Exeunt Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.
Enter Polonius.

Pol. My lord, he's going to his mother's closet:
Behind the arras! I'll convey myself,
To hear the process; I'll warrant, she'll tax him
home :

And, as you said, and wisely was it said,
'Tis meet, that some more audience, than a mother,
Since nature makes them partial, should o'erhear
The speech, of vantage. Fare you well, my liege;
I'll call upon you ere you go to bed,
And tell you what I know.
King.

Thanks, dear my lord.
[Exit Polonius.
O, my offence is rank, it smells to heaven;
It hath the primal eldest curse upon't,
A brother's murder!-Pray can I not,
Though inclination be as sharp as will;
My stronger guilt defeats my strong intent;
And, like a man to double business bound,
I stand in pause where I shall first begin,
And both neglect. What if this cursed hand
Were thicker than itself with brother's blood?
Is there not rain enough in the sweet heavens,
To wash it white as snow? Whereto serves mercy,
But to confront the visage of offence?
And what's in prayer, but this two-fold force,-
To be forestalled, ere we come to fall,
Or pardon'd, being down? Then I'll look up;
My fault is past. But, O, what form of prayer
Can serve my turn? Forgive me my foul murder!—
That cannot be; since I am still possess'd
Of those effects for which I did the murder,
My crown, mine own ambition, and my queen.
May one be pardon'd, and retain the offence?
In the corrupted currents of this world,
Offence's gilded hand may shove by justice;
And oft 'tis seen, the wicked prize itself
Buys out the law: But 'tis not so above:
There is no shuffling, there the action lies
In his true nature; and we ourselves compell'd,
Even to the teeth and forehead of our faults,
To give in evidence. What then? what rests?
Try what repentance can: What can it not?
Yet what can it, when one can not repent?
O wretched state! O bosom, black as death!

O limed2 soul; that struggling to be free,
Art more engag'd! Help, angels, make assay !

No.

Up, sword; and know thou a more horrid hent :
When he is drunk, asleep, or in his rage;
Or in the incestuous pleasures of his bed;
At gaming, swearing; or about some act
That has no relish of salvation in't:
Then trip him, that his heels may kick at heaven;
And that his soul may be as damn'd, and black,
As hell, whereto it goes. My mother stays:
This physic but prolongs thy sickly days. [Exit.
The King rises and advances.

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Ham. Now, mother; what's the matter? Queen. Hamlet, thou hast thy father much offended.

Ham. Mother, you have my father much offended.

Queen. Come, come, you answer with an idle tongue.

Ham. Go, go, you question with a wicked tongue.
Queen. Why, how now, Hamlet?
Ham.

What's the matter now?
Queen. Have you forgot me?
Ham.
No, by the rood,7 not so:
You are the queen, your husband's brother's wife;
And,-'would it were not so!-you are my mother.
Queen Nay, then I'll set those to you that can
speak.

Ham. Come, come, and sit you down; you shall not budge;

You go not, till I set you up a glass

Bow, stubborn knees! and, heart with strings of Where you may see the inmost part of you.

steel,

Be soft as sinews of the new-born babe;

Queen. What wilt thou do? thou wilt not murder me?

[Retires and kneels Help, help, ho!

All

may be well.

Enter Hamlet.

Pol. [Behind.] What, ho! help! Ham.

How now! a rat? [Draws.

Ham. Now might I do it, pat, now he is praying; || Dead, for a ducat, dead.

And now I'll do't: and so he goes to heaven:
And so am I reveng'd? That would be scann'd :3
A villain kills my father; and, for that,

I, his sole4 son, do this same villain send

To heaven.

Why, this is hire and salary,5 not revenge.
He took my father grossly, full of bread;

(1) Tapestry. (2) Caught as with bird-lime. (3) Should be considered. (4) Only.

[Hamlet makes a pass through the arras. O, I am slain. [Falls, and dies.

Pol. [Behind.]

Queen. O me, what hast thou done?

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Queen. O, what a rash and bloody deed is this! || And melt in her own fire: proclaim no shame,
Ham. A bloody deed;-almost as bad, good When the compulsive ardour gives the charge;
mother,
Since frost itself as actively doth burn,
And reason panders will.
Queen.

As kill a king, and marry with his brother.
Queen. As kill a king!
Ham.

O, Hamlet, speak no more:
Ay, lady, 'twas my word.-Thou turn'st mine eyes into my very soul;
And there I see such black and grained spots,
As will not leave their tinct. 12
Ham.

Thou wretched, rash, intruding fool, farewell!
[To Polonius.

I took thee for thy better; take thy fortune:
Thou find'st, to be too busy, is some danger.-
Leave wringing of your hands: Peace; sit you
down,

And let me wring your heart: for so I shall,
If it be made of penetrable stuff;

If damned custom have not braz'd it so,
That it be proof and bulwark against sense.
Queen. What have I done, that thou dar'st wag
thy tongue

In noise so rude against me?

Such an act,

Ham.
That blurs the grace and blush of modesty ;
Calls virtue, hypocrite; takes off the rose
From the fair forehead of an innocent love,
And sets a blister there; makes marriage-vows
As false as dicers' oaths: O, such a deed
As from the body of contraction1 plucks
The very soul; and sweet religion makes
A rhapsody of words: Heaven's face doth glow:
Yea, this solidity and compound mass,
With tristful2-visage, as against the doom,
Is thought-sick at the act.

Queen.

Ah me, what act,

That roars so loud, and thunders in the index ?3
Ham. Look here, upon this picture, and on this;
The counterfeit presentment of two brothers.
See, what a grace was seated on this brow:
Hyperion's curls; the front of Jove himself;
An

eye like Mars, to threaten and command;
A stations like the herald Mercury,
New-lighted on a heaven-kissing hill;
A combination, and a form, indeed,

Where every god did seem to set his seal,
To give the world assurance of a man:

Nay, but to live
In the rank sweat of an enseamed13 bed;
Stew'd in corruption; honeying and making love
Over the nasty sty;-

Queen.
These words, like daggers, enter in mine ears:
No more, sweet Hamlet.

O, speak to me no more;

Of

Ham

A murderer, and a villain :
A slave, that is not twentieth part the tythe
your precedent lord :-a vice14 of kings:
A cutpurse of the empire and the rule;
That from a shelf the precious diadem stole,
And put it in his pocket!
Queen.
No more.

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Ham. Do you not come your tardy son to chide,
That, laps'd in time and passion, lets go by
The important acting of your dread command?
O, say!

Ghost. Do not forget: This visitation
Is but to whet thy almost blunted purpose.
But, look! amazement on thy mother sits:
0. step between her and her fighting soul;
Conceit15 in weakest bodies strongest works;
Speak to her, Hamlet.

Ham.

How is it with you, lady?
Queen. Alas, how is't with you,
That you do bend your eye on vacancy,

This was your husband.-Look you now, what fol- || And with the incorporal air do hold discourse?

lows:

Here is your husband; like a mildew'd ear,
Blasting his wholesome brother. Have you eyes?
Could you on this fair mountain leave to feed,
And batten on this moor? Ha! have you eyes?
You cannot call it, love: for, at your age,
The hey-day in the blood is tame, it's humble,
And waits upon the judgment; and what judg-

ment

Would step from this to this? Sense,7 sure, you have,
Else, could you not have motion: But, sure, that

sense

Is apoplex'd: for madness would not err;
Nor sense to ecstasy8 was ne'er so thrall'd,
But it reserv'd some quantity of choice,
To serve in such a difference. What devil was't,
That thus hath cozen'd you at hoodman-blind ?9
Eyes without feeling, feeling without sight,
Ears without hands or eyes, smelling sans10 all,
Or but a sickly part of one true sense
Could not so mope. 11

O shame! where is thy blush? Rebellious hell,
If thou canst mutine in a matron's bones,

To flaming youth let virtue be as wax,

(1) Marriage-contract.

(2) Sorrowful.

Forth at your eyes your spirits wildly peep;
And, as the sleeping soldiers in the alarm,
Your bedded hair, like life in excrements, 16
Starts up, and stands on end. O gentle son,
Upon the heat and flame of thy distemper'
Sprinkle cool patience. Whereon do you look?
Ham. On him! on him!-Look you, how pale

he glares!

His form and cause conjoin'd, preaching to stones,
Would make them capable. 17--Do not look upon me;
Lest, with this piteous action, you convert
My stern effects:18 then what I have to do
Will want true colour; tears, perchance, 19 for blood.
Queen. To whom do you speak this?
Ham.
Do you see nothing there?
Queen. Nothing at all; yet all that is, I see.
Ham. Nor did you nothing hear?
Queen.
No, nothing, but ourselves.
Ham. Why, look you there! look, how it steals

away!

My father, in his habit as he liv'd?

Look, where he goes, even now, out at the portal! [Exit Ghost. Queen. This is the very coinage of your brain:

(3) Index of contents prefixed to a book.
(4) Anollo's. (5) The act of standing.
(6) 10 grow fat. (7) Sensation. (8) Frenzy.is,
(9) Blindman's buff. (10) Without.

(11) Be so stupid. (12) Colour. (13) Greasy.
(14) Mimic.
(15) Imagination.
(16) The hair of animals is excrementitious, that
without life or sensation.

(17) Intelligent. (18) Actions. (19) Perhaps.

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