If you do meet Horatio and Marcellus,
The rivals of my watch, bid them make haste.
Fran. I think I hear them. —Stand, ho! Who's
there *

Enter HoRATIo and MARCELLUs.

Horatio. Friends to this ground.

Marcellus. And liegemen to the Dane.

Fran. Give you good night. *.

Mar. O, farewell, honest soldier: Who hath reliev'd you ?

Fran. Bernardo has my place. Give you good night. - [Eacit FRANCIsco.

Mar. Holla Bernardo Ber. . . Say. What is Horatio there

Hor. A piece of him.

Ber. Welcome, Horatio : welcome, good Marcellus. Mar. What, has this thing appear'd again tonight o' .

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 a while ; 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 yond’ 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. Ber. Looks it not like the King mark it, Ho

ratio. Hor. Most like : — it harrows me with fear and wonder. . Ber. It would be spoke to. Mar. - Question 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 . [Exit Ghost. Mar. 'Tis gone, and will not answer. Ber. How now, Horatio ! you tremble, and look pale. Is not this something more than fantasy What think you on't 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 th’ ambitious Norway combated: So frown'd he once, when, in an angry parle, He smote the sledded Polacks on the ice. '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 2 What might be 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 even but 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 on, 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 cov'nant,
And carriage of the articles' design,
His fell to Hamlet. Now, sir, young Fortinbras,
Of unimproved mettle hot and full,
Hath in the skirts of Norway, here and there,
Shark'd up a list of lawless resolutes,
For food and diet, to some enterprise
That hath a stomach in t: which is no other
(As it doth well appear unto our State)
But to recover of us, by strong hand
And terms compulsative, those 'foresaid lands
So by his father lost. And this, I take it,
Is the main motive of our preparations,
The source of this our watch, and the chief head
Of this post-haste and romage in the land.
[Ber. I think it be no other, but e'en so :
Well may it sort, that this portentous figure
Comes armed through our watch ; so like the king
That was, and is, the question of these wars.
Hor. A mote it is to trouble the mind's eye.
In the most high and palmy state of Rome,
A little ere the mightiest Julius fell,
The graves stood tenantless, and the sheeted dead
Did squeak and gibber in the Roman streets:
[
As, stars with trains of fire, and dews of blood,
Disasters in the sun ; and the moist star,
Upon whose influence Neptune's empire stands,
Was sick almost to dooms-day with eclipse :
And even the like precurse of fierce events —
As harbingers preceding still the Fates,

And prologue to the omen coming on—
Have Heaven and Earth together demonstrated
Unto our climature and countrymen. —

Enter Ghost.

But, soft behold ! lo, where it comes again |
I'll cross it, though it blast me. — Stay, illusion
If thou hast any sound, or use of voice,
Speak to me:
If there be any good thing to be done,
That may to thee do ease, and grace to me,
Speak to me :
If thou art privy to thy country's fate,
Which happily foreknowing may avoid,
O, speak | -
Or, if thou hast uphoarded in thy life
Extorted treasure in the womb of Earth,
For which, they say, you spirits oft walk in death,
[Cock crows.
Speak of it : — stay, and speak — Stop it, Marcellus.
Mar. Shall I strike at it with my partisan :
Hor. Do, if it will not stand.

Ber. - 'Tis here !
Hor. 'Tis here !

Mar. 'Tis gone. - [Evit Ghost. We do it wrong, being so majestical, To offer it the shew of violence; For it is, as the air, invulnerable, And our vain blows malicious mockery.

Ber. It was about to speak, when the cock crew.

Hor. And then it started, like a guilty thing
Upon a fearful summons. I have heard,
The cock, that is the trumpet to the morn,
Doth with his lofty and shrill-sounding throat
Awake the god of day; and at his warning,