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

a command to parley. For Lord Hamlet , [Sidenote: parle;] Beleeue so much in him, that he is young, And with a larger tether may he walke, [Sidenote: tider] Then may be giuen you. In few,[6] Ophelia , Doe not beleeue his vowes; for they are Broakers, Not of the eye,[7] which their Inuestments show:
[Sidenote: of that die] But meere implorators of vnholy Sutes, [Sidenote: imploratators] Breathing like sanctified and pious bonds, The better to beguile. This is for all:[8] [Sidenote: beguide] I would not, in plaine tearmes, from this time forth, Haue you so slander any moment leisure,[9] [Sidenote: 70, 82] As to giue words or talke with the Lord Hamlet :[10] Looke too't, I charge you; come your wayes.

Ophe . I shall obey my Lord.[11] Exeunt .

Enter Hamlet, Horatio, Marcellus. [Sidenote: and Marcellus ]

[Sidenote: 2] Ham . [12]The Ayre bites shrewdly: is it very cold?[13]

Hor . It is a nipping and an eager ayre.

Ham . What hower now?

Hor . I thinke it lacks of twelue.

Mar . No, it is strooke.

Hor . Indeed I heard it not: then it drawes neere the season,
[Sidenote: it then] Wherein the Spirit held his wont to walke. What does this meane my Lord? [14]
[Sidenote: A flourish of trumpets and 2 peeces goes of. [14]]

[Footnote 1: Woodcocks were understood to have no brains.]

[Footnote 2: 1st Q . 'How prodigall the tongue lends the heart vowes.' I was inclined to take Prodigall for a noun, a proper name or epithet given to the soul, as in a moral play: Prodigall, the soul ; but I conclude it only an adjective used as an adverb, and the capital P a blunder.]

[Footnote 3: -in both light and heat.]

[Footnote 4: The Quarto has not 'Daughter.']

[Footnote 5: To be entreated is to yield : 'he would nowise be entreated:' entreatments, yieldings : 'you are not to see him just because he chooses to command a parley.']

[Footnote 6: 'In few words'; in brief.]

[Footnote 7: I suspect a misprint in the Folio here-that an e has got in for a d , and that the change from the Quarto should be Not of the dye . Then the line would mean, using the antecedent word brokers in the bad sense, 'Not themselves of the same colour as their garments ( investments ); his vows are clothed in innocence, but are not innocent; they are mere panders.' The passage is rendered yet more obscure to the modern sense by the accidental propinquity of bonds, brokers , and investments -which have nothing to do with stocks .]

[Footnote 8: 'This means in sum:'.]

[Footnote 9: 'so slander any moment with the name of leisure as to': to call it leisure, if leisure stood for talk with Hamlet, would be to slander the time. We might say, 'so slander any man friend as to expect him to do this or that unworthy thing for you.']

[Footnote 10: 1st Q .

Ofelia , receiue none of his letters,
For louers lines are snares to intrap the heart;
[Sidenote: 82] Refuse his tokens, both of them are keyes
To vnlocke Chastitie vnto Desire;
Come in Ofelia ; such men often proue,
Great in their wordes, but little in their loue.

' men often prove such -great &c.'-Compare Twelfth Night , act ii. sc. 4, lines 120, 121, Globe ed.]

[Footnote 11: Fresh trouble for Hamlet .]

[Footnote 12: 1st Q.

The ayre bites shrewd; it is an eager and
An nipping winde, what houre i'st?]

[Footnote 13: Again the cold.]

[Footnote 14: The stage-direction of the Q . is necessary here.]

[Page 44]

[Sidenote: 22, 25] Ham . The King doth wake to night, and takes his rouse, Keepes wassels and the swaggering vpspring reeles,[1]
[Sidenote: wassell | up-spring] And as he dreines his draughts of Renish downe, The kettle Drum and Trumpet thus bray out The triumph of his Pledge.

Horat . Is it a custome?

Ham . I marry ist; And to my mind, though I am natiue heere, [Sidenote: But to] And to the manner borne: It is a Custome More honour'd in the breach, then the obseruance. [A]

Enter Ghost.

Hor . Looke my Lord, it comes.

[Sidenote: 172] Ham . Angels and Ministers of Grace defend vs: [Sidenote: 32] Be thou a Spirit of health, or Goblin damn'd, Bring with thee ayres from Heauen, or blasts from Hell,[2]

[Footnote A: Here in the Quarto:-

This heauy headed reueale east and west[3] Makes vs tradust, and taxed of other nations, They clip[4] vs drunkards, and with Swinish phrase Soyle our addition,[5] and indeede it takes From our atchieuements, though perform'd at height[6] The pith and marrow of our attribute, So oft it chaunces in particuler men,[7] That for some vicious mole[8] of nature in them As in their birth wherein they are not guilty,[8] (Since nature cannot choose his origin) By their ore-grow'th of some complextion[10] Oft breaking downe the pales and forts of reason Or by[11] some habit, that too much ore-leauens The forme of plausiue[12] manners, that[13] these men Carrying I say the stamp of one defect Being Natures liuery, or Fortunes starre,[14] His[15] vertues els[16] be they as pure as grace, As infinite as man may vndergoe,[17] Shall in the generall censure[18] take corruption From that particuler fault:[19] the dram of eale[20] Doth all the noble substance of a doubt[21] To his[22] owne scandle.]

[Footnote 1: Does Hamlet here call his uncle an upspring , an
upstart ? or is the upspring a dance, the English equivalent of 'the high lavolt ' of Troil. and Cress . iv. 4, and governed by
reels -'keeps wassels, and reels the swaggering upspring'-a dance that needed all the steadiness as well as agility available, if, as I suspect, it was that in which each gentleman lifted the lady high, and kissed her before setting her down? I cannot answer, I can only put the question. The word swaggering makes me lean to the former interpretation.]

[Footnote 2: Observe again Hamlet's uncertainty. He does not take it for granted that it is his father's spirit, though it is plainly his form.]

[Footnote 3: The Quarto surely came too early for this passage to have been suggested by the shameful habits which invaded the court through the example of Anne of Denmark! Perhaps Shakspere cancelled it both because he would not have it supposed he had meant to reflect on the queen, and because he came to think it too diffuse.]

[Footnote 4: clepe, call .]

[Footnote 5: Same as attribute , two lines lower-the thing imputed to, or added to us-our reputation, our title or epithet.]

[Footnote 6: performed to perfection.]

[Footnote 7: individuals.]

[Footnote 8: A mole on the body, according to the place where it appeared, was regarded as significant of character: in that relation, a
vicious mole would be one that indicated some special vice; but here the allusion is to a live mole of constitutional fault, burrowing within, whose presence the mole- heap on the skin indicates.]

[Footnote 9: The order here would be: 'for some vicious mole of nature in them, as by their o'er-growth, in their birth-wherein they are not guilty, since nature cannot choose his origin (or parentage)-their o'ergrowth of (their being overgrown or possessed by) some complexion, &c.']

[Footnote 10: Complexion , as the exponent of the temperament , or masterful tendency of the nature, stands here for temperament -'oft breaking down &c.' Both words have in them the element of mingling -a mingling to certain results.]

[Footnote 11: The connection is:

That for some vicious mole-
As by their o'ergrowth-
Or by some habit, &c.]

[Footnote 12: pleasing.]

[Footnote 13: Repeat from above '-so oft it chaunces,' before 'that these men.']

[Footnote 14: 'whether the thing come by Nature or by Destiny,'
Fortune's star : the mark set on a man by fortune to prove her share in him. 83.]

[Footnote 15: A change to the singular.]

[Footnote l6: 'be his virtues besides as pure &c.']

[Footnote 17: walk under; carry .]

[Footnote 18: the judgment of the many.]

[Footnote 19: 'Dead flies cause the ointment of the apothecary to send forth a stinking savour: so doth a little folly him that is in reputation for wisdom and honour.' Eccles. x. 1.]

[Footnote 20: Compare Quarto reading, page 112:

The spirit that I haue scene
May be a deale, and the deale hath power &c.

If deale here stand for devil , then eale may in the same edition be taken to stand for evil . It is hardly necessary to suspect a Scotch printer; evil is often used as a monosyllable, and eale may have been a pronunciation of it half-way towards ill , which is its contraction.]

[Footnote 21: I do not believe there is any corruption in the rest of the passage. 'Doth it of a doubt:' affects it with a doubt , brings it into doubt. The following from Measure for Measure , is like, though not the same.

I have on Angelo imposed the office,
Who may, in the ambush of my name, strike home
And yet my nature never in the fight
To do in slander.

'To do my nature in slander'; to affect it with slander; to bring it into slander, 'Angelo may punish in