The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark - George MacDonald (best ereader for pc .txt) 📗

rash,
[Sidenote: For though | spleenatiue rash,] Yet haue I something in me dangerous, [Sidenote: in me something] Which let thy wisenesse feare. Away thy hand.
[Sidenote: wisedome feare; hold off they]

King . Pluck them asunder.

Qu. Hamlet, Hamlet . [Sidenote: All . Gentlemen.]

Gen . Good my Lord be quiet. [Sidenote: Hora . Good]

Ham . Why I will fight with him vppon this Theme, Vntill my eielids will no longer wag.[4]

Qu . Oh my Sonne, what Theame?

Ham . I lou'd Ophelia [5]; fortie thousand Brothers Could not (with all there quantitie of Loue) Make vp my summe. What wilt thou do for her?[6]

King . Oh he is mad Laertes .[7]

Qu . For loue of God forbeare him.

Ham . Come show me what thou'lt doe.
[Sidenote: Ham S'wounds shew | th'owt fight,
woo't fast, woo't teare] Woo't weepe? Woo't fight? Woo't teare thy selfe? Woo't drinke vp Esile , eate a Crocodile?[6] Ile doo't. Dost thou come heere to whine; [Sidenote: doost come] To outface me with leaping in her Graue? Be[8] buried quicke with her, and so will I. And if thou prate of Mountaines; let them throw Millions of Akers on vs; till our ground Sindging his pate against the burning Zone, [Sidenote: 262] Make Ossa like a wart. Nay, and thoul't mouth, Ile rant as well as thou.[9]

[Footnote 1: This fine speech is yet spoken in the character of madman, which Hamlet puts on once more the moment he has to appear before the king. Its poetry and dignity belong to Hamlet's feeling; its extravagance to his assumed insanity. It must be remembered that death is a small affair to Hamlet beside his mother's life, and that the death of Ophelia may even be some consolation to him.

In the Folio , a few lines back, Laertes leaps into the grave. There is no such direction in the Q . In neither is Hamlet said to leap into the grave; only the 1st Q. so directs. It is a stage-business that must please the common actor of Hamlet; but there is nothing in the text any more than in the margin of Folio or Quarto to justify it, and it would but for the horror of it be ludicrous. The coffin is supposed to be in the grave: must Laertes jump down upon it, followed by Hamlet, and the two fight and trample over the body?

Yet I take the ' Leaps in the grave ' to be an action intended for Laertes by the Poet. His 'Hold off the earth a while,' does not necessarily imply that the body is already in the grave. He has before said, 'Lay her i'th' earth': then it was not in the grave. It is just about to be lowered, when, with that cry of 'Hold off the earth a while,' he jumps into the grave, and taking the corpse, on a bier at the side of it, in his arms, calls to the spectators to pile a mountain on them-in the wild speech that brings out Hamlet. The quiet dignity of Hamlet's speech does not comport with his jumping into the grave: Laertes comes out of the grave, and flies at Hamlet's throat. So, at least, I would have the thing acted.

There is, however, nothing in the text to show that Laertes comes out of the grave, and if the manager insist on the traditional mode, I would suggest that the grave be represented much larger. In Mr. Jewitt's book on Grave-Mounds, I read of a 'female skeleton in a grave six feet deep, ten feet long, and eight feet wide.' Such a grave would give room for both beside the body, and dismiss the hideousness of the common representation.]

[Footnote 2: - springing out of the grave and flying at Hamlet .]

[Footnote 3: Note the temper, self-knowledge, self-government, and self-distrust of Hamlet.]

[Footnote 4: The eyelids last of all become incapable of motion.]

[Footnote 5: That he loved her is the only thing to explain the harshness of his behaviour to her. Had he not loved her and not been miserable about her, he would have been as polite to her as well bred people would have him.]

[Footnote 6: The gallants of Shakspere's day would challenge each other to do more disagreeable things than any of these in honour of their mistresses.

' Ésil. s.m. Ancien nom du Vinaigre.' Supplement to Academy Dict. , 1847.-'Eisile, vinegar ': Bosworth's Anglo-Saxon Dict ., from Somner's Saxon Dict. , 1659.-'Eisel ( Saxon), vinegar; verjuice; any acid ': Johnson's Dict .

1st Q . 'Wilt drinke vp vessels.' The word up very likely implies the steady emptying of a vessel specified-at a draught, and not by degrees.]

[Footnote 7: -pretending care over Hamlet.]

[Footnote 8: Emphasis on Be , which I take for the imperative mood .]

[Footnote 9: The moment it is uttered, he recognizes and confesses to the rant, ashamed of it even under the cover of his madness. It did not belong altogether to the madness. Later he expresses to Horatio his regret in regard to this passage between him and Laertes, and afterwards apologizes to Laertes. 252, 262.

Perhaps this is the speech in all the play of which it is most difficult to get into a sympathetic comprehension. The student must call to mind the elements at war in Hamlet's soul, and generating discords in his behaviour: to those comes now the shock of Ophelia's death; the last tie that bound him to life is gone-the one glimmer of hope left him for this world! The grave upon whose brink he has been bandying words with the sexton, is for her ! Into such a consciousness comes the rant of Laertes. Only the forms of madness are free to him, while no form is too strong in which to repudiate indifference to Ophelia: for her sake, as well as to relieve his own heart, he casts the clear confession of his love into her grave. He is even jealous, over her dead body, of her brother's profession of love to her-as if any brother could love as he loved! This is foolish, no doubt, but human, and natural to a certain childishness in grief. 252.

Add to this, that Hamlet-see later in his speeches to Osricke-had a lively inclination to answer a fool according to his folly (256), to outherod Herod if Herod would rave, out-euphuize Euphues himself if he would be ridiculous:-the digestion of all these things in the retort of meditation will result, I would fain think, in an understanding and artistic justification of even this speech of Hamlet: the more I consider it the truer it seems. If proof be necessary that real feeling is mingled in the madness of the utterance, it may be found in the fact that he is immediately ashamed of its extravagance.]

[Page 244]

Kin .[1] This is meere Madnesse: [Sidenote: Quee .[1]] And thus awhile the fit will worke on him: [Sidenote: And this] Anon as patient as the female Doue, When that her golden[2] Cuplet[3] are disclos'd[4];
[Sidenote: cuplets[3]] His silence will sit drooping.[5]

Ham . Heare you Sir:[6] What is the reason that you vse me thus? I loud' you euer;[7] but it is no matter:[8] Let Hercules himselfe doe what he may, The Cat will Mew, and Dogge will haue his day.[9]
Exit. [Sidenote: Exit Hamlet and Horatio. ]

Kin . I pray you good Horatio wait vpon him,
[Sidenote: pray thee good] Strengthen you patience in our last nights speech, [Sidenote: your] [Sidenote: 254] Wee'l put the matter to the present push:[10] Good Gertrude set some watch ouer your Sonne, This Graue shall haue a liuing[11] Monument:[12] An houre of quiet shortly shall we see;[13]
[Sidenote: quiet thirtie shall] Till then, in patience our proceeding be. Exeunt.

[Footnote 1: I hardly know which to choose as the speaker of this speech. It would be a fine specimen of the king's hypocrisy; and perhaps indeed its poetry, lovely in itself, but at such a time sentimental, is fitter for him than the less guilty queen.]

[Footnote 2: 'covered with a yellow down' Heath .]

[Footnote 3: The singular is better: 'the pigeon lays no more than two eggs.' Steevens . Only, couplets might be used like twins .]

[Footnote 4: - hatched , the sporting term of the time.]

[Footnote 5: 'The pigeon never quits her nest for three days after her two young ones are hatched, except for a few moments to get food.'
Steevens .]

[Footnote 6: Laertes stands eyeing him with evil looks.]

[Footnote 7: I suppose here a pause: he waits in vain some response from Laertes.]

[Footnote 8: Here he retreats into his madness.]

[Footnote 9: '-but I cannot compel you to hear reason. Do what he will, Hercules himself cannot keep the cat from mewing, or the dog from following his inclination!'-said in a half humorous, half contemptuous despair.]

[Footnote 10: 'into immediate train'- to Laertes .]

[Footnote 11: life-like , or