OBSERVATIONS.

IF the dramas of Shakspeare were to be characterised, each by the particular excellence which distinguishes it from the rest, we must allow to the tragedy of Hamlet the praise of variety. The incidents are so numerous, that the argument of the play would make a long tale. The scenes are interchangeably diversified with merriment and solemnity; with merriment that includes judicious and instructive observations, and solemnity, not strained by poetical violence above the natural sentiments of man. New characters appear from time to time in continual succession, exhibiting various forms of life and particular modes of conversation. The pretended madness of Hamlet causes much mirth, the mournful distraction of Ophelia fills the heart with tenderness, and every personage produces the effect intended, from the apparition that in the first act chills the blood with horror, to the fop in the last, that exposes affectation to just contempt.

The conduct is perhaps not wholly secure against objections. The action is indeed for the most part in continual progression, but there are some scenes which neither forward nor retard it. Of the feigned madness of Hamlet there appears no adequate cause, for he does nothing which he might not have done with the reputation of sanity. He plays the madman most, when he treats Ophelia with so much rudeness, which seems to be useless and wanton cruelty. "Hamlet is, through the whole piece, rather an instrument than an agent. After he has, by the stratagem of the play, convicted the king, he makes no attempt to punish him, and his death is at last effected by an incident which Hamlet had no part in producing.

The catastrophe is not very happily produced; the exchange of weapons is rather an expedient of necessity, than a stroke of art. A scheme might easily be formed to kill Hamlet with the dagger, and Laertes with the bowl.

The poet is accused of having shown little regard to poetical justice, and may be charged with equal neglect of poetical probability. The apparition left the regions of the dead to little purpose; the revenge which he demands is not obtained, but by the death of him that was required to take it; and the gratification which would arise from the destruction of an usurper and a murderer, is abated by the untimely death of Ophelia, the young, the beautiful, the harmless, and the pious.

JOHNSON

CLAUDIUS, king of Denmark.

HAMLET, Son to the former, and nephew to the pre

sent king.

MARCELLUS, officers
BERNARDO,

FRANCISCO, a soldier.

REYNALDO, servant to Polonius.

A Captain.

An Embassador.

Ghost of Hamlet's father.

FORTINBRAS, prince of Norway.

GERTRUDE, queen of Denmark, and mother of Hamlet.

OPHELIA, daughter of Polonius.

Lords, Ladies, Officers, Soldiers, Players, Grave-Diggers, Sailors, "Messengers, and other Attendants. SCENE, Elsinore.

The original story on which this play is built, may be found in Saxo Grammaticus, the Danish historian. From thence Belleforest adopted it in his collection of novels, which he began in 1564, and continued to publish through succeeding years. From this work, The Hystorie of Hamblett, quarto, bl. 1. was translated. I have yet met with no earlier edition of the play than one in the year 1604, though it must have been performed before that time, as I have seen a copy of Speght's edition of Chaucer, which formerly belonged to Dr. Harvey (the antagonist of Nash) who, in his own hand-writing, has set down Hamlet as a performance with which he was well acquainted, in the year 1598. His words are these: "The younger sort take much de"light in Shakspeare's Venus and Adonis; but his Lucrece, and his trag"edy of Hamlet, prince of Denmarke, have it in them to please the wiser "sort, 1598." STEEVENS.

Shakspeare's Hamlet was written, if my conjecture be well grounded, in 1596. MALONE.

ACT I.

SCENE I.-Elsinore. A Platform before the Castle. FRANCISCO on his post. Enter to him BERNARDO.

WHO's there?

Bernardo.

Fran. Nay, answer me : stand, and unfold

Yourself.

Ber.Long live the king!*

Fran. Bernardo ?

Ber. He.

Fran. You come most carefully upon your hour. Ber.'Tis now struck twelve; get thee to bed, Francisco Fran. For this relief, much thanks: 'tis bitter cold, And I am sick at heart.

Ber. Have you had quiet guard?
Fran. Not a mouse stirring.

Ber. Well, good night.

If you do meet Horatio and Marcellus,

2

The rivals of my watch, bid them make haste.

Enter HORATIO and MARCELLUS.

Fran. Ithink, I hear them.-Stand, ho! Who is there Hor. Friends to this ground.

Mar. And liegemen to the Dane.

Fran. Give you good-night.

Mar. O, farewell, honest soldier :

Who hath reliev'd you?

Fran. Bernardo hath my place..

Give you good night.

Mar. Holla! Bernardo !

Ber: Say,

What, is Horatio there?

Hor. A piece of him..

{Exit.

Ber. Welcome, Horatio; welcome, good Marcellus Hor. What, has this thing appear'd again to-night?

[1] This sentence appears to be the watch-word. STEEVENS.

[2] Rivals for partners. WARB.-Rival is constantly used by Shakspeare for a partner or associate. MALONE..

Ber. I have seen nothing.

Mar. Horatio says, 'tis but our fantasy;
And will not let belief take hold of him,

Touching this dreaded sight, twice seen of us :
Therefore I have entreated him along,

With us to watch the minutes of this night;
That, if again this apparition come,

He may approve our eyes, and speak to it:
Hor. Tush! tush! 'twill not appear.

Ber. Sit down awhile;

And let us once again assail your ears,
That are so fortified against our story,
What we two nights have seen.
Hor. Well, sit we down,

And let us hear Bernardo speak of this.

Ber. Last night of all,

When yon same star, that's westward from the pole,
Had made his course to illume that part of heaven
Where now it burns, Marcellus, and myself,

The bell then beating one,

Mar. Peace,break thee off; look, where it comes again!
Enter Ghost.

Ber. In the same figure, like the king that's dead.
Mar. Thou art a scholar, speak to it, Horatio.4
Ber. Looks it not like the king? mark it, Horatio.
Hor. Most like:-it harrows me with fear, and wonder.
Ber. It would be spoke to.

Mar. Speak to it, Horatio.

Hor. What art thou, that usurp'st this time of night, Together with that fair and warlike form

In which the majesty of buried Denmark

Did sometimes march? by heaven I charge thee, speak. Mar. It is offended.

Ber. See it stalks away.

Hor. Stay; speak : speak I charge thee, speak.

Mar. 'Tis gone, and will not answer.

[Exit Ghost.

Ber. How now, Horatio? you tremble, and look pale: Is not this something more than fantasy ?

What think you of it?

[3] Add a new testimony to that of our eyes.

JOHNSON.

[4] It has always been a vulgar notion that supernatural beings can only be spoken to with propriety or effect by persons of learning. Thus Toby, in the Night walker, by Beaumont and Fletcher, says:

Let's call the butler up, for he speaks latin, "And that will daunt the devil.” ́

REED.

Hor. Before my God, I might not this believe, Without the sensible and true avouch

Of mine own eyes.

Mar. Is it not like the king?
Hor. As thou art to thyself:

Such was the very armour he had on,
When he the ambitious Norway combated;
So frown'd he once, when, in an angry parle,
He smote the sledded Polack on the ice.5

'Tis strange.

Mar. Thus, twice before, and jump at this dead hour, With martial stalk, hath he gone by our watch.

Hor. In what particular thought to work, I know not;? But, in the gross and scope of mine opinion, & This bodes some strange eruption to our state.

Mar. Good now, sit down, and tell me, he that knows,
Why this same strict and most observant watch
So nightly toils the subject of the land?

And why such daily cast of brazen cannon,
And foreign mart for implements of war ;

Why such impress of shipwrights, whose sore task
Does not divide the Sunday from the week :
What might we toward, that this sweaty haste
Doth make the night joint-labourer with the day;
Who is't, that can inform me ?

Hor. That can I ;

At least, the whisper goes so. Our last king,
Whose image but even now appear'd to us,
Was, as you know, by Fortinbras of Norway,
Thereto prick'd on by a most emulate pride,
Dar'd to the combat ; in which our valiant Hamlet
(For so this side of our known world esteem'd him,)
Did slay this Fortinbras; who, by a seal'd compact,
Well ratified by law, and heraldry,

Did forfeit, with his life, all those his lands,
Which he stood seiz'd of, to the conqueror :
Against the which, a moiety competent
Was gaged by our king; which had return'd
To the inheritance of Fortinbras,

Had he been vanquisher; as, by the same co-mart,

POPE.

[5] He speaks of a prince of Poland whom he slew in battle. Polack was, in that age, the term for an inhabitant of Poland. JOHNSON. [6] Jump and just were synonymous in the time of Shakspeare. STEEV. [7] What particular train of thinking to follow. STEEVENS. [8] Gross and scope,-general thoughts, and tendency at large. JOHNSON.