Hamlet by William Shakespeare (top 100 books to read .TXT) 📕

/> Hor.
Custom hath made it in him a property of easiness.

Ham.
'Tis e'en so: the hand of little employment hath the daintier
sense.

1 Clown.
[Sings.]
But age, with his stealing steps,
Hath claw'd me in his clutch,
And hath shipp'd me intil the land,
As if I had never been such.

[Throws up a skull.]

Ham.
That skull had a tongue in it, and could sing once: how the
knave jowls it to the ground,as if 'twere Cain's jawbone, that
did the first murder! This might be the pate of a politician,
which this ass now o'erreaches; one that would circumvent God,
might it not?

Hor.
It might, my lord.

Ham.
Or of a courtier, which could say 'Good morrow, sweet lord!
How dost thou, good lord?' This might be my lord such-a-one, that
praised my lord such-a-one's horse when he meant to beg
it,--might it not?

Hor.
Ay, my lord.

Ham.
Why, e'en so: and now my Lady Worm's; chapless, and knocked
about the mazard with a sexton's spade: here's fine revolution,
an we had the trick to see't. Did these bones cost no more the
breeding but to play at loggets with 'em? mine ache to think
on't.

1 Clown.
[Sings.]
A pickaxe and a spade, a spade,
For and a shrouding sheet;
O, a pit of clay for to be made
For such a guest is meet.

[Throws up another skull].

Ham.
There's another: why may not that be the skull of a lawyer?
Where be his quiddits now, his quillets, his cases, his tenures,
and his tricks? why does he suffer this rude knave now to knock
him about the sconce with a dirty shovel, and will not tell him
of his action of battery? Hum! This fellow might be in's time a
great buyer of land, with his statutes, his recognizances, his
fines, his double vouchers, his recoveries: is this the fine of
his fines, and the recovery of his recoveries, to have his fine
pate full of fine dirt? will his vouchers vouch him no more of
his purchases, and double ones too, than the length and breadth
of a pair of indentures? The very conveyances of his lands will
scarcely lie in this box; and must the inheritor himself have no
more, ha?

Hor.
Not a jot more, my lord.

Ham.
Is not parchment made of sheep-skins?

Hor.
Ay, my lord, And of calf-skins too.

Ham.
They are sheep and calves which seek out assurance in that. I
will speak to this fellow.--Whose grave's this, sir?

1 Clown.
Mine, sir.
[Sings.]
O, a pit of clay for to be made
For such a guest is meet.

Ham.
I think it be thine indeed, for thou liest in't.

1 Clown.
You lie out on't, sir, and therefore 'tis not yours: for my part,
I do not lie in't, yet it is mine.

Ham.
Thou dost lie in't, to be in't and say it is thine: 'tis for
the dead, not for the quick; therefore thou liest.

1 Clown.
'Tis a quick lie, sir; 't will away again from me to you.

Ham.
What man dost thou dig it for?

1 Clown.
For no man, sir.

Ham.
What woman then?

1 Clown.
For none neither.

Ham.
Who is to be buried in't?

1 Clown.
One that was a woman, sir; but, rest her soul, she's dead.

Ham.
How absolute the knave is! We must speak by the card, or
equivocation will undo us. By the Lord, Horatio, these three
years I have taken note of it, the age is grown so picked that
the toe of the peasant comes so near the heel of the courtier he
galls his kibe.--How long hast thou been a grave-maker?

1 Clown.
Of all the days i' the year, I came to't that day that our
last King Hamlet overcame Fortinbras.

Ham.
How long is that since?

1 Clown.
Cannot you tell that? every fool can tell that: it was the
very day that young Hamlet was born,--he that is mad, and sent
into England.

Ham.
Ay, marry, why was be sent into England?

1 Clown.
Why, because he was mad: he shall recover his wits there;
or, if he do not, it's no great matter there.

Ham.
Why?

1 Clown.
'Twill not he seen in him there; there the men are as mad as he.

Ham.
How came he mad?

1 Clown.
Very strangely, they say.

Ham.
How strangely?

1 Clown.
Faith, e'en with losing his wits.

Ham.
Upon what ground?

1 Clown.
Why, here in Denmark: I have been sexton here, man and boy,
thirty years.

Ham.
How long will a man lie i' the earth ere he rot?

1 Clown.
Faith, if he be not rotten before he die,--as we have many
pocky corses now-a-days that will scarce hold the laying in,--he
will last you some eight year or nine year: a tanner will last
you nine year.

Ham.
Why he more than another?

1 Clown.
Why, sir, his hide is so tann'd with his trade that he will
keep out water a great while; and your water is a sore decayer of
your whoreson dead body. Here's a skull now; this skull hath lain
in the earth three-and-twenty years.

Ham.
Whose was it?

1 Clown.
A whoreson, mad fellow's it was: whose do you think it was?

Ham.
Nay, I know not.

1 Clown.
A pestilence on him for a mad rogue! 'a pour'd a flagon of
Rhenish on my head once. This same skull, sir, was Yorick's
skull, the king's jester.

Ham.
This?

1 Clown.
E'en that.

Ham.
Let me see. [Takes the skull.] Alas, poor Yorick!--I knew him,
Horatio; a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy: he
hath borne me on his back a thousand times; and now, how abhorred
in my imagination it is! my gorge rises at it. Here hung those
lips that I have kiss'd I know not how oft. Where be your gibes
now? your gambols? your songs? your flashes of merriment, that
were wont to set the table on a roar? Not one now, to mock your
own grinning? quite chap-fallen? Now, get you to my lady's
chamber, and tell her, let her paint an inch thick, to this
favour she must come; make her laugh at that.--Pr'ythee, Horatio,
tell me one thing.

Hor.
What's that, my lord?

Ham.
Dost thou think Alexander looked o' this fashion i' the earth?

Hor.
E'en so.

Ham.
And smelt so? Pah!

[Throws down the skull.]

Hor.
E'en so, my lord.

Ham.
To what base uses we may return, Horatio! Why may not
imagination trace the noble dust of Alexander till he find it
stopping a bung-hole?

Hor.
'Twere to consider too curiously to consider so.

Ham.
No, faith, not a jot; but to follow him thither with modesty
enough, and likelihood to lead it: as thus: Alexander died,
Alexander was buried, Alexander returneth into dust; the dust is
earth; of earth we make loam; and why of that loam whereto he
was converted might they not stop a beer-barrel?
Imperious Caesar, dead and turn'd to clay,
Might stop a hole to keep the wind away.
O, that that earth which kept the world in awe
Should patch a wall to expel the winter's flaw!
But soft! but soft! aside!--Here comes the king.

[Enter priests, &c, in procession; the corpse of Ophelia,
Laertes, and Mourners following; King, Queen, their Trains, &c.]

The queen, the courtiers: who is that they follow?
And with such maimed rites? This doth betoken
The corse they follow did with desperate hand
Fordo it own life: 'twas of some estate.
Couch we awhile and mark.

[Retiring with Horatio.]

Laer.
What ceremony else?

Ham.
That is Laertes,
A very noble youth: mark.

Laer.
What ceremony else?

1 Priest.
Her obsequies have been as far enlarg'd
As we have warranties: her death was doubtful;
And, but that great command o'ersways the order,
She should in ground unsanctified have lodg'd
Till the last trumpet; for charitable prayers,
Shards, flints, and pebbles should be thrown on her,
Yet here she is allowed her virgin rites,
Her maiden strewments, and the bringing home
Of bell and burial.

Laer.
Must there no more be done?

1 Priest.
No more be done;
We should profane the service of the dead
To sing a requiem and such rest to her
As to peace-parted souls.

Laer.
Lay her i' the earth;--
And from her fair and unpolluted flesh
May violets spring!--I tell thee, churlish priest,
A ministering angel shall my sister be
When thou liest howling.

Ham.
What, the fair Ophelia?

Queen.
Sweets to the sweet: farewell.
[Scattering flowers.]
I hop'd thou shouldst have been my Hamlet's wife;
I thought thy bride-bed to have deck'd, sweet maid,
And not have strew'd thy grave.

Laer.
O, treble woe
Fall ten times treble on that cursed head
Whose wicked deed thy most ingenious sense
Depriv'd thee of!--Hold off the earth awhile,
Till I have caught her once more in mine arms:
[Leaps into the grave.]
Now pile your dust upon the quick and dead,
Till of this flat a mountain you have made,
To o'ertop old Pelion or the skyish head
Of blue Olympus.

Ham.
[Advancing.]
What is he whose grief
Bears such an emphasis? whose phrase of sorrow
Conjures the wandering stars, and makes them stand
Like wonder-wounded hearers? this is I,
Hamlet the Dane.
[Leaps into the grave.]

Laer.
The devil take thy soul!
[Grappling with him.]

Ham.
Thou pray'st not well.
I pr'ythee, take thy fingers from my throat;
For, though I am not splenetive and rash,
Yet have I in me something dangerous,
Which let thy wiseness fear: away thy hand!

King.
Pluck them asunder.

Queen.
Hamlet! Hamlet!

All.
Gentlemen!--

Hor.
Good my lord, be quiet.

[The Attendants part them, and they come out of the grave.]

Ham.
Why, I will fight with him upon this theme
Until my eyelids will no longer wag.

Queen.
O my son, what theme?

Ham.
I lov'd Ophelia; forty thousand brothers
Could not, with all their quantity of love,
Make up my sum.--What wilt thou do for her?

King.
O, he is mad, Laertes.

Queen.
For love of God, forbear him!

Ham.
'Swounds, show me what thou'lt do:
Woul't weep? woul't fight? woul't fast? woul't tear thyself?
Woul't drink up eisel? eat a crocodile?
I'll do't.--Dost thou come here to whine?
To outface me with leaping in her grave?
Be buried quick with her, and so will I:
And, if thou prate of mountains, let them throw
Millions of acres on us, till our ground,
Singeing his pate against the burning zone,
Make Ossa like a wart! Nay, an thou'lt mouth,
I'll rant as well as thou.

Queen.
This is mere madness:
And thus a while the fit will work on him;
Anon, as patient as the female dove,
When that her golden couplets are disclos'd,
His silence will sit drooping.

Ham.
Hear you, sir;
What is the reason that you use me thus?
I lov'd you ever: but it is no matter;
Let Hercules himself do what he may,
The cat will