my mother looks, and my father dy'd within these two hours. Ok. Nay, 'tis twice two months, my Lord. Ham. So long? nay, then let the Devil wear black, for I'll have a fuit of fables. Oh heav'ns! die two months ago, and not forgotten yet! then there's hope, a great man's memory may out-live his life half a year: but, by'r lady, he muft build churches then; or elfe fhall he fuffer not thinking on, with the hobby-horfe; whose epitaph is, For ob, for ob, the hobby-horse is forgot. Hautboys plays. The dumb fhew enters. (38) Enter a Duke and Dutchess, with regal Coronet!, very lovingly; the Dutchess embracing him, and he her. She kneels; he takes her up, and declines his head upon her neck; he lays him down upon a bank of flowers; the feeing him afleet, leaves him. Anon comes in a fellow, takes off his Crown, kiffes it, and pours poifon in the Duke's ears, and Exit. The Dutchefs returns, finds the Duke dead, and makes paffionate a lion. The poifner, aith fome two or three mutes, comes in again, Jeeming to lament with her. The dead body is carried away. The poifoner wooes the Dutchess with gifts; she fecms loth and unwilling a while, but in the end accepts his love. [Exeunt. Oph. What means this, my Lord ? -Ham. Marry, this is miching Malicho; it means mischief. (38) Enter a King and Queen very lovingly :] Thus have the blundering and inadvertent editors all along given us this stage direction, tho' we are exprefsly told by Hamlet anon, that the ftcry of this introduced interlude is the murther of Gonzago duke of Vienna. The fource of this miftake is eafily to be accounted for, from the ftage's. dreffing the characters. Regal coronets being at first order'd by the Poet for the duke and dutchess, the fucceeding players, who did not ftrictly obferve the quality of the perfons or circumstances of the ftory,. miftook 'em for a king and queen; and fo the error was deduced down from thence to the prefent times. Methinks, Mr. Pope might have indulg'd his private sense in so obvious a mistake, without any fear of Lathness being imputed to him for the arbitrary correction. H 3 Opbo Op. Belike, this fhow imports the arguments of the play? Enter Prologue. Ham. We fhall know by this fellow: the players cannot keep counfel; they'll tell all. Be not Oph. Will he tell us, what this show meant? Ham Ay, or any fhow that you'll fhew him. afhamed to fhew, he'll not fhame to tell you what it means. you p. You are naught, you are naught, I'll mark the play. Prol. For us, and for our traged, Ham. Is this a prologue, or the poefy of a ring? Ham. As woman's love. Enter Duke, and Dutchef, Players. Dake. Full thirty times hath Phabus' carr gone round Durch. So many journeys may the fun and moon you know; Where (39) And as my love is fix'd, my fear is fo] Mr. Pope fays, I real fix'd, and, indeed, I do fo: because, I obferve, the quarto of 160; rtad: Where love is great, the smallest doubts are fear; Dutch. Oh, confound the rest! Such love muft needs be treafon in my breast: None wed the fecond, but who kill the first. Ham. Wormwood, wormwood! Dutch. The inftances, that fecond marriage move, Duke. I do believe, you think what now you speak; But what we do determine, oft we break ; Purpofe is but the flave to memory, Of violent birth, but poor validity: Which now, like fruits unripe, fiicks on the tree, Moft neceffary "tis, that we forget To pay ourfelves what to ourselves is debt: Their own enactors with themselves destroy. reads ciz'd; that of 1611 ciz; the folio in 1632, fix; and that in 1623, fiz'd: and because, befides the whole tenour of the context demands this reading. For the lady evidently is talking here of the quantity and proportion of her love and fear, not of their continuance, duration, or stability. Cleopatra expreffes herself much in the fame manner, with regard to her grief for the loss of Antony. our fize of forrow, Proportion'd to our caufe, must be as great H For For 'tis a question left us yet to prove, Whether love leads fortune, or elfe fortune love. But orderly to end where I begun, Our wills and fates do fo contrary run, Our thoughts are ours, their ends none of our own. Ham. If the fhould break it now Duke. 'Tis deeply fworn; fweet, leave me here a while; My fpirits grow dull, and fain I would beguile The tedious day with fleep. Dutch. Sleep rock thy brain, [Sleeps. And never come mifchance between us twain! [Exit. Ham. Madam, how like you this play? Queen. The lady protefts too much, methinks. Ham. Oh, but she'll keep her word. King. Have you heard the argument, is there no offence in't? Ham. No, no, they do but jeft, poison in jeft, no offence i'th' world. King. What do you call the play? Ham. The Moufe-Trap Marry, how? tropically. This play is the image of a murder done in Fienna; Gonzago is the Duke's name, his wife's Baptita; you fall fee anon, 'tis a knavish piece of work; but but what o'that? your Majefty, and we that have free fouls, it touches us not; let the gall'd jade winch, our withers are unrung. Enter Lucianas. This is one Lucianus, nephew to the Duke. Oph. You are keen, my Lord, you are keen. Ham. It would coft you a groaning to take off my edge. Oph.. Still better and worse. (40) Ham. So you mistake your hulbands. Begin, murderer.-Leave thy damnable faces, and begin.. Confederate feason, and no creature feeing: (40) Still worse and worse. 'Tis Ham. So you must take your busbands.] Surely, this is the mot uncomfortable leffon, that ever was preach'd to the poor ladies: and I can't help wishing, for our own fakes too, it mayn't be true. too foul a blat upon our reputations, that woman takes must be worse than her former. certain, intended no fuch scandal upon the fex. collator of copies is Mr. Pope! All the old quarto's and folio's read, Ophel. Still better and worse. Ham. So you mistake husbands. every hulband that a The Poet, I am pretty But what a precious Hamlet is talking to her in fuck, grofs double entendres, that he is forc'd to parry them by indirect anfwers: and, remarks, that tho' his wit be smarter, yet his meaning is more blunt. This, I think, is the fenfe of her-Still better and worse. This puts Hamlet in. mind of the words in the church fervice of matrimony, and he replies, fo you mistake busbands, i..e. So you take husbands, and find yourselves miftaken in them. (41) With Hecate's bane thrice blafted,] Here, again, Mr. Pope approves himself a worthy collator: for the old quarro's and folie's concur in reading, as I have reform'd the text, With Hecate's bann thrice blasted 11.5 |