Imatges de pàgina
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Some fay, that ever 'gainft that season comes
Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated,
This bird of dawning fingeth all night long :
And then, they fay, no spirit dares ftir abroad';
The nights are wholesome; then no planets ftrike,
No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm,
So hallow'd and fo gracious is the time.

Hor. So have I heard, and do in part believe it.
But, look, the morn, in ruffet mantle clad,
Walks o'er the dew of yon high eaftern hill 7:
Break we our watch up; and, by my advice,
Let us impart what we have feen to-night
Unto young Hamlet; for, upon my life,
This fpirit, dumb to us, will speak to him:
Do you confent 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 fhell find him most convenient,

SCENE II.

The fame. A Room of ftate in the fame.

[Exeunt.

Enter the King, Queen, HAMLET,POLONIUS,LAERTES, VOLTIMAND, CORNELIUS, Lords, and Attendants. • King. Though yet of Hamlet our dear brother's death

Faded has here its original fenfe; it vanished. Vado, Lat. So, in Spenter's Faery Queen, B. 1. C. V. St. 15:

"He ftands amazed how he thence fhould fade."

That our authour uses the word in this fenfe, appears from some fubfequent lines:

The morning cock crew loud;

And at the found it fhrunk in hafte away, "And vanish'd from our fight." MALONE.

Sdares fir abroad ;] Quarto. The folio reads—can walk-.STEEV. Spirit was formerly used as a monofyllable: fprite. The quarto, 1604, has-dareftir abroad. Perhaps Shakspeare wrote-no fpirits dare ftir abroad. The neceffary correction was made in a late quarto of no authority, printed in 1637. MALONE.

No fairy takes,] No fairy ftrikes with lameness or diseases. This fenfe of take is frequent in this authour. JOHNSON.

7-bigbeaftern bill:] The old quarto has it better eastward.WARB. The fuperiority of the latter of these readings is not, to me at least, very apparent. I find the former ufed in Lingua, &c. 1607:

and overclimbs

"Yonder gilt eaftern hills."

Baftern and eastward alike fignify toward the caft. STEEVENS.

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The memory be green; and that it us befitted
To bear our hearts in grief, and our whole kingdom
To be contracted in one brow of woe;

Yet fo far hath discretion fought with nature,
That we with wifeft forrow think on him,
Together with remembrance of ourselves.
Therefore our fometime fifter, now our queen,
The imperial jointress of this warlike state,
Have we, as 'twere, with a defeated joy,-
With one aufpicious, and one dropping eye;
With mirth in funeral, and with dirge in marriage,
In equal fcale weighing delight and dole,-
Taken to wife: nor have we herein barr'd
Your better wifdoms, which have freely gone
With this affair along:-For all, our thanks.
Now follows, that you know, young Fortinbras,-
Holding a weak fuppofal of our worth;
Or thinking, by our late dear brother's death,
Our state to be disjoint and out of frame,-
Colleagued with this dream of his advantage,
He hath not fail'd to pefter us with message,

Importing

8 With one aufpicious, and one dropping eye;] Thus the folio. The quarto, with fomewhat lefs of quaintnefs:

With an aufpicious, and a dropping eye.

The fame thought, however, occurs in the Winter's Tale : « She had one eye declined for the loss of her husband; another elevated that the oracle was fulfilled." STEEVENS.

Dropping in this line probably means depressed or caft downwards: an interpretation which is ftrongly fupported by the paffage already quoted from the Winter's Tale. It may, however, fignify weeping. "Dropping of the eyes" was a technical expreffion in our authour's ime. If the fpring be wet with much fouth wind,-the next fummer will happen agues and blearnefs, dropping of the eyes, and pains of the bowels." Hopton's Concordance of years, 8vo. 1616.

Again, in Montaigne's Effaies, 1603- they never faw any man there with eyes dropping, or crooked and stooping through age." MALONE.

9 Colleagued with this dream of bis advantage,] The meaning is, He goes to war fo indifcreetly, and unprepared, that he has no allies to fupport him but a dream, with which he is colleagued or confederated. WARBURTON.

Mr. Theobald, in his Shakspeare Reftored, propofed to read—collogued, but in his edition very properly adhered to the ancient copies. MALONE.

Importing the furrender of those lands
Loft by his father, with all bands of law,
To our most valiant brother.-So much for him.
Now for ourself, and for this time of meeting.
Thus much the bufinefs is: We have here writ
To Norway, uncle of young Fortinbras,-
Who, impotent and bed-rid, fcarcely hears
Of this his nephew's purpofe,-to fupprefs
His further gait herein; in that the levies,
The lifts, and full proportions, are all made
Out of his fubject:-and we here dispatch
You, good Cornelius, and you, Voltimand,
For bearers of this greeting to old Norway;
Giving to you no further perfonal power

To business with the king, more than the scope 2
Of thefe dilated articles allow 3.

Farewel; and let your hafte commend your duty.
Cor. Vol. In that, and all things, will we fhew our duty.
King. We doubt it nothing; heartily farewel.

[Exeunt VOLTIMAND, and CORNELIUS.
And now, Laertes, what's the news with you?
You told us of fome fuit; What is't, Laertes?
You cannot speak of reafon to the Dane,

And lofe your voice: What would't thou beg, Laertes,
That shall not be my offer, not thy asking?
The head is not more native to the heart,
The hand more inftrumental to the mouth,

Than is the throne of Denmark to thy father 4.

What

'His further gait berein ;] Gate or gait is here ufed in the northern fenfe, for proceeding, paffage; from the A. S. verb gae. A gare for a path, paffage, or street, is still current in the north. PERCY.

2

more than the fcope-] More than is comprised in the general defign of these articles, which you may explain in a more diffuse and dilated ftile. JoHNSON.

3-tbefe dilated articles, &c.] i. e. the articles when dilated. MusG. The poet fhould have written allows. Many writers fall into this error, when a plural noun immediately precedes the verb; as I have had occafion to obferve in a note on a controverted paffage in Love's Labours Loft. MALONE.

4 The bead is not more native to the heart,

The band more inftrumental to the mouth,

Than is the throne of Denmark to thy father.] The fenfe feems to be this: the head is not formed to be more ufeful to the heart, the

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What would't thou have, Laertes ?

Laer. My dread lord,

Your leave and favour to return to France;

From whence though willingly I came to Denmark,
To fhew my duty in your coronation ;

Yet now, I must confefs, that duty done,

My thoughts and wishes bend again toward France,
And bow them to your gracious leave and pardon.

King. Have you your father's leave? What fays Polo

nius ?

Pol. He hath, my lord, wrung from me my flow leave
By labourfome petition; and, at laft,
Upon his will I feal'd my hard confent:

I do beseech you, give him leave to go.

King. Take thy fair hour, Laertes; time be thine,
And thy best graces: fpend it at thy will.-
But now, my coufin Hamlet, and my fon,-
Ham. A little more than kin, and lefs than kind 7.

[Afide.

King

hand is not more at the fervice of the mouth, than my power is at your father's fervice. That is, he may command me to the utmost, he may do what he pleafes with my kingly authority. STEEVENS.

By native to the beart Dr. Johnfon understands, "natural and congenial to it, born with it, and co-operating with it.”

Formerly the heart was fuppofed the feat of wisdom; and hence the poet fpeaks of the clofe connexion between the heart and head. See Vol. VII. p. 150, n. 4. MALONE.

5 wrung from me my flow leave,] Thefe words and the two following lines are omitted in the folio. MALONE.

6 Take thy fair bour, Laertes; time be thine,

And thy beft graces: Spend it at thy will.] The fenfe, is: "You have my leave to go, Laertes; make the faireft ufe you pleafe of your time, and fpend it at your will with the fairest graces you are mafter of." THEOBALD.

I rather think this line is in want of emendation. I read,

Time is thine,

And my beft graces; Spend it at thy will. JOHNSON.

Ham. A little more than kin, and less than kind.] Kind is the Teutonick word for child. Hamlet therefore anfwers with propriety, to the titles of coufin and fon, which the king had given him, that he was fomewhat more than coufin, and lefs than fon. JOHNSON.

In this line, with which Shakspeare introduces Hamlet, Dr. Johnson has perhaps pointed out a nicer distinction than it can justly boast of. To establish the fenfe contended for, it should have been proved that

King, How is it that the clouds ftill hang on you?
Ham. Not fo, my lord, I am too much i' the fun3.
Queen. Good Hamlet, caft thy nighted colour off,
And let thine eye look like a friend on Denmark.
Do not, for ever, with thy vailed lids

kind was ever used by any English writer for child. A little more than kin, is a little more than a common relation. The king was certainly fomething less than kind, by having betrayed the mother of Hamlet into an indecent and incestuous marriage, and obtained the crown by means which he fufpects to be unjustifiable. In the 5th Act, the Prince accuses his uncle of having popt in between the election and bis bopes; which obviates Dr. Warburton's objection to the old reading, viz. that "the king had given no occafion for fuch a reflection.”

A jingle of the fame fort is found in Mother Bombie, 1594, and feems to have been proverbial, as I have met with it more than once: ❝ the nearer we are in blood, the further we must be from love; the greater the kindred is, the lefs the kindness muft be." Again, in Gorboduc, a tragedy, 1565:

"In kinde a father, but not in kindelynefs."

As kind, however, fignifies nature, Hamlet may mean that his relationship was become an unnatural one, as it was partly founded upon inceft. Our author's Julius Cæfar, Antony and Cleopatra, King Richard II, and Titus Andronicus, exhibit instances of kind being used for nature, and fo too in this play of Hamlet, A&t II. Sc. the last: Remorseless, treacherous, lecherous, kindless villain.

Dr. Farmer, however, obferves that kin is still used for cousin in the midland counties. STEEVENS.

Hamlet does not, I think, mean to fay, as Mr. Steevens supposes, that bis uncle is a little more than kin, &c. The king had called the prince" My coufin Hamlet, and my son."-His reply, therefore, is, "I am a little more than thy kinfman, [for I am thy ftep-fon;] and fomewhat less than kind to thee [for I hate thee, as being the person who has entered into an incestuous marriage with my mother]. Or, if we understand kind in its ancient fenfe, then the meaning will be, I am more than thy kinfman, for I am tby step-fon; being fuch, I am less near to thee than thy natural offspring, and therefore not entitled to the appellation of fon, which you have now given me. MALONE. 8 too much i' the fun.] He perhaps alludes to the proverb, Out of beaven's bleffing into the warm fun. JOHNSON.

-too much the fan.

Meaning probably his being fent for from his ftudies to be expofed at his uncle's marriage as his chiefeft courtier, &c. STEEVENS.

I question whether a quibble between fun and fon be not here intended. FARMER.

9- vailed lids-] With lowering eyes, caft down eyes. JOHNSON. See Vol. V. p. 286, n. 9. MALONE,

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