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How now, Horatio! You tremble and look pale: `
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Is not this something more than fantasy? `
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What think you on't? `
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Hor. `
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Before my God, I might not this believe `
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Without the sensible and true avouch `
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Of mine own eyes. `
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Mar. `
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Is it not like the King? `
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Hor. `
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As thou art to thyself: `
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Such was the very armour he had on `
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When he the ambitious Norway combated; `
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So frown'd he once when, in an angry parle, `
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He smote the sledded Polacks on the ice. `
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'Tis strange. `
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Mar. `
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Thus twice before, and jump at this dead hour, `
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With martial stalk hath he gone by our watch. `
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Hor. `
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In what particular thought to work I know not; `
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But, in the gross and scope of my opinion, `
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This bodes some strange eruption to our state. `
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Mar. `
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Good now, sit down, and tell me, he that knows, `
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Why this same strict and most observant watch `
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So nightly toils the subject of the land; `
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And why such daily cast of brazen cannon, `
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And foreign mart for implements of war; `
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Why such impress of shipwrights, whose sore task `
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Does not divide the Sunday from the week; `
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What might be toward, that this sweaty haste `
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Doth make the night joint-labourer with the day: `
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Who is't that can inform me? `
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Hor. `
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That can I; `
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At least, the whisper goes so. Our last king, `
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Whose image even but now appear'd to us, `
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Was, as you know, by Fortinbras of Norway, `
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Thereto prick'd on by a most emulate pride, `
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Dar'd to the combat; in which our valiant Hamlet,-- `
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For so this side of our known world esteem'd him,-- `
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Did slay this Fortinbras; who, by a seal'd compact, `
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Well ratified by law and heraldry, `
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Did forfeit, with his life, all those his lands, `
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Which he stood seiz'd of, to the conqueror: `
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Against the which, a moiety competent `
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Was gaged by our king; which had return'd `
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To the inheritance of Fortinbras, `
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Had he been vanquisher; as by the same cov'nant, `
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And carriage of the article design'd, `
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His fell to Hamlet. Now, sir, young Fortinbras, `
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Of unimproved mettle hot and full, `
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Hath in the skirts of Norway, here and there, `
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Shark'd up a list of lawless resolutes, `
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For food and diet, to some enterprise `
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That hath a stomach in't; which is no other,-- `
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As it doth well appear unto our state,-- `
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But to recover of us, by strong hand, `
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And terms compulsatory, those foresaid lands `
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So by his father lost: and this, I take it, `
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Is the main motive of our preparations, `
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The source of this our watch, and the chief head `
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Of this post-haste and romage in the land. `
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Ber. `
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I think it be no other but e'en so: `
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Well may it sort, that this portentous figure `
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Comes armed through our watch; so like the king `
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That was and is the question of these wars. `
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Hor. `
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A mote it is to trouble the mind's eye. `
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In the most high and palmy state of Rome, `
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A little ere the mightiest Julius fell, `
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The graves stood tenantless, and the sheeted dead `
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Did squeak and gibber in the Roman streets; `
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As, stars with trains of fire and dews of blood, `
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Disasters in the sun; and the moist star, `
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Upon whose influence Neptune's empire stands, `
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Was sick almost to doomsday with eclipse: `
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And even the like precurse of fierce events,-- `
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As harbingers preceding still the fates, `
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And prologue to the omen coming on,-- `
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Have heaven and earth together demonstrated `
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Unto our climature and countrymen.-- `
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But, soft, behold! lo, where it comes again! `
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[Re-enter Ghost.] `
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I'll cross it, though it blast me.--Stay, illusion! `
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If thou hast any sound, or use of voice, `
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Speak to me: `
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If there be any good thing to be done, `
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That may to thee do ease, and, race to me, `
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Speak to me: `
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If thou art privy to thy country's fate, `
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Which, happily, foreknowing may avoid, `
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O, speak! `
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Or if thou hast uphoarded in thy life `
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Extorted treasure in the womb of earth, `
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For which, they say, you spirits oft walk in death, `
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[The cock crows.] `
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Speak of it:--stay, and speak!--Stop it, Marcellus! `
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Mar. `
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Shall I strike at it with my partisan? `
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Hor. `
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Do, if it will not stand. `
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Ber. `
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'Tis here! `
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Hor. `
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'Tis here! `
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Mar. `
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'Tis gone! `
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[Exit Ghost.] `
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We do it wrong, being so majestical, `
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To offer it the show of violence; `
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For it is, as the air, invulnerable, `
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And our vain blows malicious mockery. `
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Ber. `
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It was about to speak, when the cock crew. `
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Hor. `
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And then it started, like a guilty thing `
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Upon a fearful summons. I have heard `
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The cock, that is the trumpet to the morn, `
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Doth with his lofty and shrill-sounding throat `
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Awake the god of day; and at his warning, `
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Whether in sea or fire, in earth or air, `
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The extravagant and erring spirit hies `
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To his confine: and of the truth herein `
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This present object made probation. `
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Mar. `
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It faded on the crowing of the cock. `
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Some say that ever 'gainst that season comes `
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Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated, `
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The bird of dawning singeth all night long; `
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And then, they say, no spirit dare stir abroad; `
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The nights are wholesome; then no planets strike, `
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No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm; `
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So hallow'd and so gracious is the time. `
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Hor. `
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So have I heard, and do in part believe it. `
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But, look, the morn, in russet mantle clad, `
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Walks o'er the dew of yon high eastward hill: `
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Break we our watch up: and by my advice, `
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Let us impart what we have seen to-night `
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Unto young Hamlet; for, upon my life, `
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This spirit, dumb to us, will speak to him: `
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Do you consent we shall acquaint him with it, `
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As needful in our loves, fitting our duty? `
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Mar. `
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Let's do't, I pray; and I this morning know `
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Where we shall find him most conveniently. `
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[Exeunt.] `
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Scene II. Elsinore. A room of state in the Castle. `
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[Enter the King, Queen, Hamlet, Polonius, Laertes, Voltimand, `
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Cornelius, Lords, and Attendant.] `
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King. `
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Though yet of Hamlet our dear brother's death `
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The memory be green, and that it us befitted `
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To bear our hearts in grief, and our whole kingdom `
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To be contracted in one brow of woe; `
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Yet so far hath discretion fought with nature `
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That we with wisest sorrow think on him, `
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Together with remembrance of ourselves. `
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Therefore our sometime sister, now our queen, `
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Th' imperial jointress to this warlike state, `
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Have we, as 'twere with a defeated joy,-- `
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With an auspicious and one dropping eye, `
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With mirth in funeral, and with dirge in marriage, `
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In equal scale weighing delight and dole,-- `
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Taken to wife; nor have we herein barr'd `
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Your better wisdoms, which have freely gone `
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With this affair along:--or all, our thanks. `
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Now follows, that you know, young Fortinbras, `
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Holding a weak supposal of our worth, `
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