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PERSONS REPRESENTED.

CLAUDIUS, King of Denmark.

HAMLET, Son to the former, and Nephew to the present, King.

POLONIUS, Lord Chamberlain.

HORATIO, Friend to Hamlet.

LAERTES, Son to Polonius.

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GERTRUDE, Queen of Denmark, and Mother to Hamlet.
OPHELIA, Daughter to Polonius.

Lords, Ladies, Officers, Soldiers, Players, Grave-diggers, Sailors, Messengers, and other Attendants.

SCENE. Elsinore.

HAMLET, PRINCE OF DENMARK.

ACT I.

SCENE I. Elsinore. A Platform before the Castle.

FRANCISCO on his post. Enter to him, BERNARDO.

Bernardo. WHO's there?

Fran.

Yourself.

Nay, answer me;1 stand, and unfold

Ber. Long live the king!

Fran.

Ber.

Bernardo?

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. Haye you had quiet guard?
Fran.

Ber. Well, good night.

Not a mouse stirring.

If you do meet Horatio and Marcellus,

2

The rivals of my watch, bid them make haste.

1 ie. e. me, who have a right to demand the watchword; which appears to have been, "Long live the king."

2 Shakspeare uses rivals for associates, partners; and competitor has the same sense throughout these plays. It is the original sense of rivalis.

Enter HORATIO and MARCellus.

Fran. I think I hear them.-Stand, ho! Who is

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Hor.

A piece of him.

Ber. Welcome, Horatio; welcome, good Marcellus. Hor. What, has this thing appeared again to-night? 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 approve1 our eyes, and speak to it.
Hor. Tush! tush! 'twill not appear.
Ber.

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

Hor.

Sit down awhile;

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!

1 To approve is to confirm.

Enter Ghost.

Ber. In the same figure like the king that's dead.
Mar. Thou art a scholar; speak to it, Horatio.1
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.

Hor. What art thou, that

night,

2

Speak to it, Horatio.

usurp'st this time of

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?

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 armor he had on,

When he the ambitious Norway combated;
So frowned he once, when, in an angry parle,
He smote the sledded Polack3 on the ice.
'Tis strange.

1 It was a vulgar notion, that a supernatural being could only be spoken to, with effect, by persons of learning; exorcisms being usually practised by the clergy in Latin.

2 The first quarto reads, "it horrors me."

3 i. e. the sledged Polander (Polaque, Fr.). The old copy reads Pollax.

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; 2

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 be toward, that this sweaty haste
Doth make the night joint-laborer 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 even but now appeared to us,
Was, as you know, by Fortinbras of Norway,
Thereto pricked on by a most emulate pride,
Dared to the combat; in which our valiant Hamlet
(For so this side of our known world esteemed him)
Did slay this Fortinbras; who, by a sealed compact,
Well ratified by law and heraldry,

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

1 Jump. So the quarto of 1603, and that of 1604. The folio reads just. Jump and just were synonymous. So in Chapman's May Day,

1611:

"Your appointment was jumpe at three with me."

2 That is, "what particular train of thought to follow," &c. The first quarto reads:

"In what particular to work I know not."

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