Hath in the skirts of Norway, here and there, 4 5 Hor. A mote it is, to trouble the mind's eye. The graves stood tenantless, and the sheeted dead * * * * * 8 As, stars with trains of fire and dews of blood, But, soft; behold! lo, where it comes again! If there be any good thing to be done, If thou art privy to thy country's fate, Or, if thou hast uphoarded in thy life 1 i. e. snapped up or taken up hastily. Scroccare is properly to do any thing at another man's cost, to shark or shift for any thing. Scroccolone, a cunning shifter or sharker for any thing in time of need, namely for victuals; a tall trencher-man, shifting up and down for belly cheer. The same word also signifies to snap. This word has not yet lost its force in vulgar conversation. 2 Stomach is used for determined purpose. 3 Romage, now spelt rummage, and in common use as a verb, though not as a substantive, for making a thorough ransack or search, a busy and tumultuous movement. We do it wrong, being so majestical, 12 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 of the morn,13 Doth with his lofty and shrill-sounding throat Awake the god of day; and at his warning, Whether in sea or fire, in earth or air, The extravagant and erring14 spirit hies To his confine and of the truth herein This present object made probation. Mar. It faded on the crowing of the cock.15 Some say, that ever 'gainst that season comes Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated, This bird of dawning singeth all night long: And then they say no spirit dares stir abroad; The nights are wholesome: then no planets strike, No fairy takes, 16 nor witch hath power to charm, So hallow'd and so gracious" is the time. Hor. So I have heard, and do in part believe it. But look, the morn,18 in russet mantle clad, Walks o'er the dew of yon high eastern hill: Break we our watch up; and, by my advice, Let us impart what we have seen to-night Unto young Hamlet: for, upon my life, This spirit, dumb to us, will speak to him: Do you consent we shall acquaint him with it, As needful in our loves, fitting our duty? Mar. Let's do't, I pray; and I this morning know Where we shall find him most convenient. [Exeunt. SCENE II. The same. A Room of State in the Enter the King, Queen, HAMLET, POLONIUS, LAERTES, VOLTIMAND, CORNELIUS, Lords, and Attendants. same. King. Though yet of Hamlet our dear brother's death The memory be green; and that it us befitted have been occasioned by witchcraft, is the following: On Friday there appeared a tali man, who twice crossed him swiftly; and when the earl came to the place where he saw this man he fell sick.-Lodge's Illustrations of English History, vol. iii. p. 48. Johnson remarks that the speech of Horatio to the spectre is very elegant and noble, and congruous to the common traditions of the causes of apparitions. 12 Thus in Macbeth : And 13 'As easy may'st thou the intrenchant air With thy keen sword impress.' in King John: 'Against the invulnerable clouds of heaven.' And now the cocke, the morning's trumpeter, Play'd hunts-up for the day-star to appear." Drayton. 14 'The extravagant and erring spirit. Extra-va4 All the lines within crotchets in this play are omit-gans, wandering about, going beyond bounds.' Thus in ted in the folio of 1623. The title-pages of the quartos Othello:- To an extravagant and wheeling stranger * of 1604 and 1605 declare this play to be enlarged to Erring is erraticus, straying or roving up and down. almost as much againe as it was, according to the true 15 This is a very ancient superstition. Philostratus, and perfect copie.' giving an account of the apparition of Achilles' shade to Apollonius of Tyanna, says, 'that it vanished with a little gleam as soon as the cock crowed.' There is a Hymn of Prudentius, and another of St. Ambrose, in which it is mentioned; and there are some lines in the latter very much resembling Horatio's speech. Mr. Douce has given them in his Illustrations of Shak. 5. e. fall in with the idea of, suit, accord. 6 i. e. theme, or subject. 7 i. e. victorious; the palm being the emblem of victory. Chapman, in his Middle Temple Masque, has high-palm'd hearts.' 8 A line or more is here supposed to be lost. 9 i. e. the moon. 'Not that night-wand'ring pale and watry star. Marlowe's Hero and Leander. 10 Omen is here put by a figure of speech for predicted event. 16 i. e. no fairy blasts, or strikes. Merry Wives of Windsor, Act iv. Sc. 4:And there he blasts the tree and takes the cattle' See note on that passage. 11 The person who crossed the spot on which a spectre 17 It has already been observed that gracious is some was seen, became subject to its malignant influence. times used by Shakspeare for graced, favoured. Vide Among the reasons for supposing the death of Ferdi- note on As You Like It, Act. i. Sc 2. nand, Earl of Derby, (who died young, in 1594,) to 18 First quarto, 'sun' The imperial jointress of this warlike state, King. We doubt it nothing; heartily farewell. That shall not be my offer, not thy asking? Laer. 1 Thus the folio. The quarto reads: 2 i. e. grief. 3 i. e. united to this strange fancy of, &c. 4 The folio reads, bonds; but bands and bonds sig nified the same thing in the poet's time. 5 Gait here signifies course, progress. Gait for road, way, path, is still in use in the north. We have this word again in A Midsummer Night's Dream, Act v. Sc. 2: Every fairy takes his gait.' From whence though willingly I came to Denmark, Pol. He hath, my lord, [wrung from me my slow By laboursome petition; and, at last, Ham. Ay, madam, it is common. If it be, Why seems it so particular with thee? seems. "Tis not alone my inky cloak, good mother, To give these mourning duties to your father: 13 This 8 In the first quarto this passage stands thus:'King. With all our heart, Laertes, fare thee well. Laert. I in all love and dutie take my leave. [Exit. The king's speech may be thus explained :-'Take an thy best virtues guide thee in spending of it at thy will.' auspicious hour, Laertes; be your time your own, and Johnson thought that we should read, And my best graces. The editors had rendered this passage doubly obscure by erroneously placing a colon at graces. 9 A little more than kin, and less than kind. passage has baffled the commentators, who are at issue about its meaning; but have none of them rightly explained it. A contemporary of the poet will lead us to its true meaning. A little more than kin has been rightly said to allude to the double relationship of the by blood and kindred by marriage. By less than kind king to Hamlet, as uncle and step-father, his kindrea Hamlet means degenerate and base. Going out of kinde, (says Baret,) which goeth out of kinde, which dothe or worketh dishonour to his kindred. Degener; 'Forligner, (says Cotgrave,) to degenerate, to grow out of kind, to differ in conditions with his ancestors.' That less than kind and out of kind have the same meaning, who can doubt? 10 It is probable that a quibble is intended between sun and son. The old spelling is sonne. 11 i. e. with eyes cast down. 6 The folio reads, More than the scope of these dilated articles allow. I have not scrupled to read reiated, upon the authority of the first quarto, as more intelligible. Malone says, 'the poet should have written allows; but the grammar and practice of Shakspeare's age was not strict in the concordance of plural and sin-forlignant.-Alvearie, K. 59. gular in noun and verb: and numerous examples might be adduced from his contemporaries to prove this. The question is, Are the writers of that time to be tried by modern rules of grammar, with which they were not acquainted? Steevens, with a sweeping assertion, which no one conversant with MSS. of the time will aflow, would attribute all such inaccuracies to illiterate transcribers or printers. We have Malone's assertion, that such errors are to be met with in almost every page of the first folio. The first quarto reads:no further personal power To business with the king Than those related articles do shew." 7 The various parts of the body enumerated are not more allied, more necessary to each other, than the throne of Denmark (i. e. the king) is bound to your father to do him service. Vail your regard Upon a wrong'd, I'd fain have said a maid.' 12 'My grief lies all within, And these external manners of lament King Richard II. 13 i. e. your father lost a father, (your grandfather, which lost grandfather also lost his father. The first quarto reads, 'That father dead, lost his' To do obsequious sorrow. But to persevere This must be so. We pray you, throw to carth Than that which dearest father bears his son, I pray thee, stay with us, go not to Wittenberg. [Exeunt King, Queen, Lords, &c. POLO- Ham. O, that this too too solid flesh would melt, Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew! 1 Obsequious sorrow is dutiful, observant sorrow. Shakspeare seems to have used this word generally with an allusion to obsequies, or funeral rites 2 Condolement for grief. 3 'It shows a will most undisciplined towards hea. veri.' 4 Unprevailing was used in the sense of unavailing as late as Dryden's time, He may often prevail himself of the same advantages in English.'-Essay on Dramatic Poetry, 1st ed. And dyvers noble victoryes, as the history doth ex press, That he atchyved to the honour of the town, Could not him prevayle whan Fortune lyst to frown.' Metrical Visions by G. Cavendish, p. 81. 5 This was a common form of figurative expression. The Ghost, describing his affection for the Queen, says: To me, whose love was of that dignity,” 6 1. e. dispense, bestow. Thus Dryden :'High state and honours to others impart, But give me your heart.' 7 To bend is to incline. The moste parte bende to, &c. In hoc consilium maxime inclinant,' &c.-Baret. 8 The quarto of 1603 reads: 'The rouse the king shall drink unto the prince.' A rouse appears to have been a deep draught to the health of any one, in which it was customary to empty the glass or vessel. Its etymology is uncertain; but I suspect it to be only an abridgment of carouse, which is used in the same sense. See Peacham's Complete Gentleman, 1627, p. 194. Carouse, seems to have come to us from the French, who again appear to have derived it from the German gar-auss, to drink all out: at least so we may judge from the following passage in Rabelais, B. iii. Prologue: -'Enfans, beuvez a plein godets. Si bon ne vous semble, laissez le. Je ne suis de ces importuns lifrelofres, qui par force, par outrage, et violence contraignent les gentils compagnons trinquer, boire caraus, et allauz.' The reader may consult Mr. Gifford's Massinger, vol i. p. 240. 9 To resolve had anciently the same meaning as to dissolve To thaw or resolve that which is frozen; Or that the Everlasting had not fix'd How weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable That grows to seed; things rank, and gross in na ture, Possess it merely.11 That it should come to this! But two months dead!-nay, not so much, not two. So excellent a king; that was, to this, Hyperion' to a satyr: so loving to my mother, That he might not beteem13 the winds of heaven Visit her face too roughly. Heaven and earth! Must I remember? why, she would hang on him, As if increase of appetite had grown By what it fed on: And yet, within a month, A little month; or ere those shoes were old, My father's brother; but no more like my father, ever. Ham. Sir, my good friend; I'll change that name with you. regelo.-The snow is resolved and melted. To till the another word in a Latin sense; but it is not peculiar to ground, and resolve it into dust.'-Cooper. This is Shakspeare. 10 The old copy reads, cannon; but this was the old spelling of canon, a law or decree. 11 i. e. absolutely, solely, wholly. Mere, Lat. 12 Hyperion, or Apollo, always represented as a model of beauty. 13 i. e. deign to allow. This word being of uncommon occurrence, it was changed to permitted by Rowe; and to let e'en by Theobald. Steevens had the merit of pointing out the passage in Golding's Ovid, which settles its meaning: Yet could he not beteeme The shape of any other bird than egle for to seeme nulla tamen alite verti Dignatur, nisi quæ possit sua fulmine ferre." Rowe has an elegant imitation of this passage :— 'I thought the gentlest breeze that wakes the spring Too rough to breathe upon her.' The word occurs again in A Midsummer Night's Dream, Act i. Sc. 2. 14 Oh heaven! a beast that wants discourse of reason.' Mr. Gifford, in a note on Massinger, vol. L p. 149, is of opinion that we should read, 'discourse and reason.' It has, however, been shown by several quo tations that discourse of reason' was the phraseology of Shakspeare's time; and, indeed, the poet again uses the same language in Troilus and Cressida, Act ii. Sc. 2: is your blood So madly hot, that no discourse of reason— can qualify the same.' In the language of the schools, Discourse is that rational act of the mind by which we deduce or infer one thing from another. Discourse of reason therefore may mean ratiocination. Brutes have not this reason. ing faculty, though they have what has been called instinct and memory. Hamlet opposes the discursive power of the intellect of men to the instinct of brutes in Act iv. Sc. 4, which may tend to elucidate his present meaning, if the reader has any doubts. The first quarto reads, a beast devoid of reason.' We have discourse of thought, for the discursive range of thought, in Othello, Act iv. Sc. 2. And what make you1 from Wittenberg, Horatio ?— Marcellus? Mar. My good lord, Ham. I am very glad to see you; good even, sir. But what, in faith, make you from Wittenberg? Hor. A truant disposition, good my lord. Ham. I would not hear your enemy say so: Nor shall you do mine ear that violence, To make it truster of your own report Against yourself: I know you are no truant. But what is your affair in Elsinore? We'll teach you to drink deep ere you depart. Hor. My lord, I came to see your father's fune ral. Hor. Season your admiration for a while With an attent ear; till I may deliver, Upon the witness of these gentlemen, This marvel to you. Ham. For God's love, let me hear. Hor. Two nights together had these gentlemen, Appears before them, and, with solemn march, Stand dumb, and speak not to him. This to me But where was this? 1 i. e. what do you. Vide note ou Love's Labour's Lost, Act iv. Sc. 3. 2 It was anciently the custom to give an entertainment at a funeral. The usage was derived from the Roman cana funeralis; and is not yet disused in the North, where it is called an arvel supper. 3 See note on Twelfth Night, Act v. Sc. 1. 4 This is the reading of the quarto of 1604. The first quarto and the folio read, Ere I had ever.' himself behind 5 Was left unseen, save to the eye of mind.' Rape of Lucrece. Chaucer has the expression in his Man of Lawe's Tale : In sorrow than in anger. Ham. Hor. Nay, very pale. Ham. A countenance more Pale, or red? And fix'd his eyes upon you? Hor. Most constantly. Ham. I would, I had been there. Hor. It would have much amaz'd you. Very like: Stay'd it long? Very like, Hor. While one with moderate haste might tell a hundred. Mar. Ber. Longer, longer. Hor. Not when I saw it. Ham. His beard was grizzled? no? it will. Hor. It was as I have seen it in his life, A sable silver'd.10 Ham. I will watch to-night; Perchance, 'twill walk again. Hor. I warrant you, Ham. If it assume my noble father's person, I'll speak to it, though hell itself should gape, And bid me hold my peace. I pray you all, If you have hitherto conceal'd this sight, Let it be tenable11 in your silence still; And whatsoever else shall hap to-night, Give it an understanding, but no tongue; I will requite your loves: So, fare you well: Upon the platform, 'twixt eleven and twelve, I'll visit you. 8 'It is a most inimitable circumstance in Shakspeare so to have managed this popular idea, as to make the Ghost, which has been so long obstinately silent, and of course must be dismissed by the morning, begin or rather prepare to speak, and to be interrupted at the very critical time by the crowing of a cock. Another poet, according to custom, would have suffered his ghost tamely to vanish, without contriving this start, which is like a start of guilt: to say nothing of the aggravation of the future suspense occasioned by this preparation to speak, and to impart some mysterious secret. Less speak-would have been expected if nothing had been pro But it were with thilke eyen of his mind, Which men mowen see whan they ben blinde.' And Ben Jonson, in his Masque of Love's Triumphs:As only by the mind's eye may be seen.' And Richard Rolle, in his Speculum Vitæ, MS. ing of Jacob's Dream : That Jacob sawe with gostly eye.' i. e. the eye of the mind or spirit. 6 The first quarto, 1603, has:- 'In the dead vast and middle of the night.' suffer the following note to stand as I had written it previous to the discovery of that copy. We have that vast of night' in The Tempest, Act i. 11 The quarto of 1603 reads tenible. The other quar My father's spirit in arms! all is not well; Laer. My necessaries are embark'd; farewell: Oph. Do you doubt that? Laer. For Hamlet, and the trifling of his favour, A violet in the youth of primy nature, Oph. No more but so? Think it no more: you, It fits your wisdom so far to believe it, If she unmask her beauty to the moon: Virtue itself scapes not calumnious strokes : 1 This is the reading of the quarto copy. The folio has sweet, not lasting, The suppliance of a minute." It is plain that perfume is necessary to exemplify the idea of sweet not lasting. The suppliance of a minute' should seem to mean supplying or enduring only that short space of time, as transitory and evanescent. The simile is eminently beautiful: it is to be regretted that it should be obscured by an unusual word. 2 i. e. sinews and muscular strength. Vide note on the Second Part of King Henry IV. Act iii. Sc. 2. I stay too long;-But here my father comes. A double blessing is a double grace; Pol. Yet here, Laertes! aboard, aboard, for The wind sits in the shoulder of your sail, [Laying his Hand on LAERTES' Head. thy tables are within my brain Full character'd with lasting memory.' 12 The old copies read, with hoops of steel.' 13 But do not dull thy palm.' This figurative ex depression means, do not blunt thy feeling by taking every new acquaintance by the hand, or by admitting him to the intimacy of a friend.' 3 Cautel is cautious circumspection, subtlety, or ceit. Minsheu explains it, a crafty way to deceive.' Thus, in a Lover's Complaint: In him a plenitude of subtle matter, be caught by cautelous baits and practice.' The virtue of his will,' means his virtuous intentions. 4 Besmirch is besmear, or sully. Thus 5 The safety and health of the whole state." the quarto of 1604. In the folio it is altered to sanctity,' &c., supposing the metre defective. safety is used as a trisyllable by Spenser and others. Thus Hall, in his first Satire, b. iii.: But 'Nor fish can dive so deep in yielding sea, Though Thetis self should swear her safety.' 6 If with too credulous ear you listen to his songs.' 7 Licentious. 14 i. e. judgment, opinion; censura, Lat. Thus in King Henry VI. Part II. : The king is old enough to give his censure.' 15 The quarto of 1603, reads: 'Are of a most select and generall chief in this. The folio: Are of a most select and generous cheff, in that. The other quartos give the line : 'As of a most select and generous, cheese in that' 'Or of a most select and generous, cheese in that. Malone has tried to torture the passage into a meaning, by supposing an allusion to the chief or upper part of a shield in heraldry. But the redundancy of the line, and discrepancy of the copies, evidently show it to be corrupt. The simple emendation by omitting of a, an 8 i. e. the most cautious, the most discreet. In the proper punctuation of the line, make all clear. Green's Never too Late, 1616: Love requires not The nobility of France are most select and highchastity, but that her soldiers be chary. And again :-minded (generosus) chiefly in that;' chief being an ad. She lives chastly enough that lives charily. We have jective used adverbially. We have generous for high chariness in The Merry Wives of Windsor; and un-minded, noble, in Othello, and in Measure for Measure. chary in Twelfth Night, Act ili. Sc. 4 16 i. e. thrift, economical prudence |