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1 Watch. Hold him in safety, till the prince come hither.

Bal.

Full half an hour.

Fri. Go with me to the vault. Bal.

I dare not, sir:

My master knows not, but I am gone hence; And fearfully did menace me with death,

If I did stay to look on his intents.

Enter another Watchman, with Friar Laurence. 3 Watch. Here is a friar, that trembles, sighs, and weeps:

Fri. Stay then, I'll go alone:-Fear comes upon We took this mattock and this spade from him,

me:

O, much I fear some ill unlucky thing.

Bal. As I did sleep under this yew-tree here,
I dreamt my master and another fought,
And that my master slew him.

Fri.
Romeo! [Advances.
Alack, alack, what blood is this, which stains
The stony entrance of this sepulchre ?-
What mean these masterless and gory swords
To lie discolour'd by this place of peace?

[Enters the monument. Romeo! O, pale!-Who else? what, Paris too? And steep'd in blood?-Ah, what an unkind hour Is guilty of this lamentable chance!The lady stirs. [Juliet wakes and stirs. Jul. Ó, comfortable friar! where is my lord? I do remember well where I should be, And there I am:-Where is my Romeo?

[Noise within.

Fri. I hear some noise.-Lady, come from that

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Jul. Go, get thee hence, for I will not away. What's here? a cup, clos'd in my true-love's hand? Poison, I see, hath been his timeless end ;O churl! drink all? and leave no friendly drop To help me after?-I will kiss thy lips; Haply, some poison yet doth hang on them, To make me die with a restorative. Thy lips are warm!

[Kisses him.

I Watch. [Within.] Lead, boy:-Which way? Jul. Yea, noise ?-then I'll be brief.-O happy dagger! [Snatching Romeo's dagger. This is thy sheath; [Stabs herself.] there rust, and let me die.

[Falls on Romeo's body, and dies. Enter Watch, with the Page of Paris. Page. This is the place; there, where the torch doth burn.

1 Watch. The ground is bloody; Search about the church-yard:

Go, some of you, whoe'er you find, attach.

[Exeunt some. Pitiful sight! here lies the county slain;-And Juliet bleeding; warm, and newly dead, Who here hath lain these two days buried.Go, tell the prince,-run to the Capulets,Raise up the Montagues,-some others search;[Exeunt the other Watchmen. We see the ground whereon these woes do lie; But the true ground of all these piteous woes, We cannot without circumstance descry.

Enter some of the Watch, with Balthasar.

As he was coming from this church-yard side. 1 Watch. A great suspicion; Stay the friar too.

Enter the Prince and Attendants. Prince. What misadventure is so early up, That calls our person from our morning's rest? Enter Capulet, Lady Capulet, and others. Cap. What should it be, that they so shriek abroad?

La. Cap. The people in the street cry-Romeo, Some-Juliet, and some-Paris; and all run, With open outcry toward our monument.

Prince. What fear is this, which startles in our ears?

1 Watch. Sovereign, here lies the county Paris slain; And Romeo dead; and Juliet, dead before, Warm and new kill'd.

Prince. Search, seek, and know how this foul murder comes.

1 Watch. Here is a friar, and slaughter'd Romeo's man;

With instruments upon them, fit to open
These dead men's tombs.

Cap. O, heavens!-O, wife! look how our daugh ter bleeds!

This dagger hath mista'en,-for lo! his house1
Is empty on the back of Montague,

And is mis-sheathed in my daughter's bosom.
La. Cap. O me! this sight of death is as a bell,
That warns my old age to a sepulchre.

Enter Montague and others.

Prince. Come, Montague; for thou art early up, To see thy son and heir more early down.

Mon. Álas, my liege, my wife is dead to-night; Grief of my son's exile hath stopp'd her breath: What further wo conspires against mine age? Prince. Look, and thou shalt see.

Mon. O thou untaught! what manners is in this, To press before thy father to a grave?

Prince. Seal up the mouth of outrage for a while,
Till we can clear these ambiguities,
And know their spring, their head, their true de
scent;

And then will I be general of your woes,
And lead you even to death: Mean time forbear,
And let mischance be slave to patience.-
Bring forth the parties of suspicion.

Fri. I am the greatest, able to do least,
Yet most suspected, as the time and place
Doth make against me, of this direful murder;
And here I stand, both to impeach and purge
Myself condemn'd and myself accus'd.

Prince. Then say at once what thou dost know

in this.

Fri. I will be brief, for my short date of breath
Is not so long as is a tedious tale.

Romeo, there dead, was husband to that Juliet;
And she, there dead, that Romeo's faithful wife:
I married them; and their stolen marriage-day

2 Watch. Here's Romeo's man, we found him in Was Tybalt's doomsday, whose untimely death

the church-yard.

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Banish'd the new-made bridegroom from this city;
For whom, and not for Tybalt, Juliet pin'd.
You-to remove that sicge of grief from her,-

Scene III.

ROMEO AND JULIET.

Betroth'd, and would have married her perforce,
To county Paris :-Then comes she to me;
And, with wild looks, bid me devise some means
To rid her from this second marriage,
Or, in my cell there would she kill herself.
Then gave I her, so tutor'd by my art,
A sleeping-potion: which so took effect
As I intended, for it wrought on her

The form of death: meantime I writ to Romeo,
That he should hither come at this dire night,
To help to take her from her borrow'd grave,
Being the time the potion's force should cease.
But he which bore iny letter, friar John,
Was staid by accident; and yesternight
Return'd my letter back: Then all alone,
At the prefixed hour of her waking,
Came I to take her from her kindred's vault;
Meaning to keep her closely at my cell,
Till I conveniently could send to Romeo:
But, when I came (some minute ere the time
Of her awakening,) here untimely lay
The noble Paris, and true Romeo, dead.
She wakes; and I entreated her come forth,
And bear this work of heaven with patience:
But then a noise did scare me from the tomb;
And she, too desperate, would not go with me,
But (as it seems,) did violence on herself.
All this I know; and to the marriage
Her nurse is privy: And, if aught in this
Miscarried by my fault, let my old life
Be sacrific'd, some hour before his time,
Unto the rigour of severest law.

Prince. We still have known thee for a holy man.
Where's Romeo's man? what can he say in this?
Bal. I brought my master news of Juliet's death;
And then in post he came from Mantua,
To this same place, to this same monument.
This letter he early bid me give his father;
And threaten'd me with death, going in the vault,
If I departed not, and left him there.

This is my daughter's jointure, for no more
Can I demand.

Mon.
But I can give thee more:
For I will raise her statue in pure gold;
That, while Verona by that name is known,
There shall no figure at such rate be set,
As that of true and faithful Juliet.

Cop. As rich shall Romeo by his lady lie!
Poor sacrifices of our enmity!

Prince. A glooming peace this morning with it
brings;

The sun for sorrow will not show his head:
Go hence, to have more talk of these sad things;
Some shall be pardon'd, and some punished:
For never was a story of more wo,
Than this of Juliet and her Romeo.

[Exeunt.

This play is one of the most pleasing of our author's performances. The scenes are busy and various, incidents numerous and important, the catastrophe irresistibly affecting, and the process of the action carried on with such probability, at least with such congruity to popular opinions, as tragedy requires.

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Here is one of the few attempts of Shakspeare to exhibit the conversation of gentlemen, to repre. sent the airy sprightliness of juvenile elegance. Mr. Dryden mentions a tradition, which might easily reach his time, of a declaration made by Shakspeare, that he was obliged to kill Mercutio in the third Act, lest he should have been killed by him. Yet he thinks him no such formidable person, but that he might have lived through the play, and died in his bed, without danger to the poet. Dryden well knew, had he been in quest of truth, in a pointed sentence, that more regard is commonly had to the words than the thought, and that it is very seldom to be rigorously understood. Mercu

Prince. Give me the letter, I will look on it.Where is the county's page, that rais'd the watch?-tio's wit, gaiety, and courage, will always procure

Sirrah, what made your master in this place?
Page. He came with flowers to strew his lady's

grave;

And bid me stand aloof, and so I did:
Anon, comes one with light to ope the tomb;
And, by and by, my master drew on him;
And then I ran away to call the watch.

Prince. This letter doth make good the friar's
words,

him friends that wish him a longer life; but his death is not precipitated, he has lived out the time allotted him in the construction of the play; nor do I doubt the ability of Shakspeare to have continued his existence, though some of his sallies are perhaps out of the reach of Dryden; whose genius was not very fertile of merriment, nor ductile to humour, but acute, argumentative, comprehensive, and sublime.

The Nurse is one of the characters in which the author delighted: he has, with great subtilty of distinction, drawn her at once loquacious and secret, obsequious and insolent, trusty and disho

Their course of love, the tidings of her death:
And here he writes-that he did buy a poison
Of a poor 'pothecary, and therewithal
Came to this vault to die, and lie with Juliet.-
Where be these enemies? Capulet! Montague!-nest.
See, what a scourge is laid upon your hate,
That Heaven finds means to kill your joys with love!
And I, for winking at your discords too,
Have lost a brace of kinsmen :'-all are punish'd.
Cap. O, brother Montague, give me thy hand:
(1) Mercutio and Paris.

His comic scenes are happily wrought, but his pathetic strains are always polluted with some unexpected depravations. His persons, however distressed, have a conceit left them in their misery, a miserable conceit. JOHNSON.

HAMLET, PRINCE OF DENMARK.

PERSONS REPRESENTED.

Claudius, king of Denmark.

Francisco, a soldier.

Hamlet, son to the former king, and nephew to the Reynaldo, servant to Polonius.

Laertes, son to Polonius.

present king.

Polonius, lord chamberlain.

Horatio, friend to Hamlet.

Voltimand,

Cornelius,

Rosencrantz,

Guildenstern,

Another Courtier.

courtiers.

Osric, a courtier.

A Priest.

Marcellus, officers.
Bernardo,

A Captain. An Ambassador.
Ghost of Hamlet's father.

Fortinbras, prince of Norway.

Gertrude, queen of Denmark, and mother of
Hamlet.

Ophelia, daughter of Polonius.

Lords, Ladies, Officers, Soldiers, Players, Grace diggers, Sailors, Messengers, and other Atendants.

Scene, Elsinore.

ACT I.

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Hor. What, has this thing appear'd again tonight?

Ber. I have seen nothing.

Mar. Horatio says, 'tis but our fantasy;
And will not let belief take hold of him,
Touching this dreaded sight, twice seen of us;
Therefore I have entreated him, along
With us to watch the minutes of this night;

Fran. Nay, answer me: stand, and unfold That, if again this apparition come,

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And let us hear Bernardo speak of this.
Well, sit we down,
Ber. Last night of all,

When yon same star, that's westward from the
pole,

Not a mouse stirring. Had made his course to illume that part of heaven
Where now it burns, Marcellus, and myself,
The bell then beating one,-

If you do meet Horatio and Marcellus,
The rivals' of my watch, bid them make haste.
Enter Horatio and Marcellus.

Fran. I think, I hear them.-Stand, ho! Who
is there?

And liegemen to the Dane.

Hor. Friends to this ground.
Mar.
Fran. Give you good night.
Mar.

O, farewell, honest soldier:

Who hath reliev'd you?
Fran. Bernardo hath my place.
Give you good night.
Mar.

Hor.

[Exit Francisco. Holla! Bernardo!

Ber.

Say,

What, is Horatio there?

A piece of him.

(1) Partners.

Ber. Welcome, Horatio; welcome, good Marcellus.

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Ber.
See! it stalks away.
Hor. Stay, speak: speak I charge thee, speak.
[Exit Ghost.
Mar. 'Tis gone, and will not answer.
Ber. How now, Horatio? you tremble, and look
pale:

Is not this something more than fantasy?
What think you of it?

Hor. Before my God, I might not this believe, Without the sensible and true avouch

Of mine own eyes.

Mar.

Is it not like the king?
Hor. As thou art to thyself:
Such was the very armour he had on,
When he the ambitious Norway combated;
So frown'd he once, when, in angry parle,
He smote the sledded2 Polack3 on the ice.
'Tis strange.

Mer. Thus, twice before, and jump at this dead hour,

With martial stalk hath he gone by our watch.
Hor. In what particular thought to work, I know
not;

But, in the gross and scope of mine opinion
This bodes some strange eruption to our state.
Mar. Good now, sit down, and tell me, he that
knows,

Why this same strict and most observant watch
So nightly toils the subject of the land ;
And why such daily cast of brazen cannon,
And foreign mart for implements of war;
Why such impress of shipwrights, whose sore task
Does not divide the Sunday from the week:
What might be toward, that this sweaty haste
Doth make the night joint-labourer with the day;
Who is't, that can inform me ?

Hor.

That can I;
At least, the whisper goes so. Our last king,
Whose image even but now appear'd to us,
Was, as you know, by Fortinbras of Norway,
Thereto prick'd on by a most emulate pride,
Dar'd to the combat; in which our valiant Hamlet
(For so this side of our known world esteem'd him,)
Did slay this Fortinbras; who, by a seal'd compact,
Well ratified by law and heraldry,

Did forfeit, with his life, all those his lands
Which he stood seiz'd of, to the conquèror:
Against the which, a moiety competent
Was gaged by our king; which had return'd
To the inheritance of Fortinbras,

Had he been vanquisher; as, by the same co-mart,
And carriage of the article design'd,"

His fell to Hamlet: Now, sir, young Fontinbras,
Of unimproved mettle hot and full,"
Hath in the skirts of Norway, here and there,
Shark'd up a list of landless resolutes,
For food and diet, to some enterprise
That hath a stomach in't: which is no other
(As it doth well appear unto our state,)
But to recover of us, by strong hand,
And terms compulsatory, those 'foresaid lands
So by his father lost: And this, I take it,
Is the main motive of our preparations;
The source of this our watch; and the chief head
Of this post-haste and romage1o in the land.

[Ber. I think, it be no other, but even so:
Well may it sort," that this portentious figure
Comes armed through our watch; so like the king
That was, and is, the question of these wars.

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But, soft; behold! lo, where it comes again!
I'll cross it, though it blast me.-Stay, illusion!
If thou hast any sound, or use of voice,
Speak to me:

If there be any good thing to be done,
That may to thee do ease, and grace to me,
Speak to me:

If thou art privy to thy country's fate,
Which, happily, foreknowing may avoid,
O, speak!

Or, if thou hast uphoarded in thy life
Extorted treasure in the womb of earth,
For which, they say, you spirits oft walk in death,
[Cock crows
Speak of it:-stay, and speak.-Stop it, Marcellus.
Mar. Shall I strike at it with my partizan?
Hor. Do, if it will not stand.

Ber. Hor.

Mar. 'Tis gone!

'Tis here!

'Tis here [Exit Ghost.

We do it wrong, being so majestical,
To offer it the show of violence;
For it is, as the air, invulnerable,
And our vain blows malicious mockery.
Ber. It was about to speak, when the cock crew.
Hor. And then it started, like a guilty thing
Upon a fearful summons. have heard,
The cock, that is the trumpet of the morn,
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 erring15 spirit hies
To his confine: and of the truth herein
This present object made probation. 1

16

Mar. It faded on the crowing of the cock. 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, 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, 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

(7) Full of spirit without experience.
(8) Picked.
(11) Suit.

(14) Event.

(9) Resolution. (10) Search. (12) Victorious. (13) The moon. (15) Wandering. (16) Proof.

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King. Though yet of Hamlet our dear brother's
death

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 wo;
Yet so far hath discretion fought with nature,
That we with wisest sorrow think on him,
Together with remembrance of ourselves.
Therefore our sometime sister, now our queen,
The imperial jointress of this warlike state,
Have we, as 'twere, with a defeated joy,-
With one auspicious, and one dropping eye;
With mirth in funeral, and with dirge in marriage,
In equal scale weighing delight and dole,'
Taken to wife: nor have we herein barr'd
Your better wisdoms, which have freely gone
With this affair along :-For all, our thanks.

Upon his will I seal'd my hard consent:]
I do beseech you, give him leave to go.
And thy best graces: spend it at thy will.-
King. Take thy fair hour, Laertes; time be thine,
But now, my cousin Hamlet, and my son,-
Ham. A little more than kin, and less than kind.“
[Aside.

King. How is it that the clouds still hang on you?
Ham. Not so, my lord, I am too much i'the sun
Queen. Good Hamlet, cast thy nighted colour of
And let thine eye look like a friend on Denmark.
Do not, for ever, with thy veiled lids'
Seek for thy noble father in the dust:
Thou know'st, 'tis common; all, that live, must die,
Passing through nature to eternity.

Ham. Ay, madam, it is common.
Queen.

If it be,

Why seems it so particular with thee?
Ham. Seems, madam! nay, it is; I know not

seems.

'Tis not alone my inky cloak, good mother,
Nor customary suits of solemn black,
Nor windy suspiration of forc'd breath,

Now follows, that you know, young Fortinbras,-No, nor the fruitful river in the eye,
Holding a weak supposal 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 pester us with message,
Importing the surrender of those lands,
Lost 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 business is: We have here writ
To Norway, uncle of young Fortinbras,-
Who, impotent and bed-rid, scarcely hears
Of this his nephew's purpose,-to suppress
His further gait herein; in that the levies,
The lists, and full proportions, are all made
Out of his subject:-and we here despatch
You, good Cornelius, and you, Voltimand,
For bearers of this greeting to old Norway;
Giving to you no further personal power

Nor the dejected haviour of the visage,
Together with all forms, modes, shows of grief,
That can denote me truly: These, indeed, seem,
For they are actions that a man might play:
But I have that within, which passeth show;
These, but the trappings and the suits of wo.
King. 'Tis sweet and commendable in your na-
ture, Hamlet,

To business with the king, more than the scope
Of these dilated articles allow.

Farewell: and let your haste commend your duty.
Cor. Vol. In that, and all things, will we show
our duty.

King. We doubt it nothing; heartily farewell.
[Exeunt Voltimand and Cornelius.
And now, Laertes, what's the news with you?
You told us of some suit; What is't, Laertes ?
You cannot speak of reason to the Dane,

And lose your voice: What would'st thou beg,
Laertes,

That shall not be my offer, not thy asking?
The head is not more native to the heart,
The hand more instrumental to the mouth,
Than is the throne of Denmark to thy father.
What would'st thou have, Laertes?

Laer.
My dread lord,
Your leave and favour to return to France;
From whence though willingly I came to Denmark,
To show my duty in your coronation;
Yet now, I must confess, 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 says
Polonius?

Pol. He hath, my lord, [wrung from me my slow
leave,

By laboursome petition; and, at last,

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To give these mourning duties to your father:
But, you must know, your father lost a father;
That father lost his; and the survivor bound
In filial obligation, for some term

To do obsequious sorrow: But to perséver
In obstinate condolement, is a course
Of impious stubbornness; 'tis unmanly grief:
It shows a will most incorrect to heaven;
A heart unfortified, or mind impatient;
An understanding simple and unschool'd:
For what, we know, must be, and is as common
As any the most vulgar thing to sense,
Why should we, in our peevish opposition,
Take it to heart? Fie! 'tis a fault to heaven,
A fault against the dead, a fault to nature,
To reason most absurd; whose common theme
Is death of fathers, and who still hath cried,
From the first corse, till he that died to-day,
This must be so. We pray you, throw to earth
This unprevailing wo; and think of us
As of a father: for let the world take note,
You are the most immediate to our throne;
And, with no less nobility of love,
Than that which dearest father bears his son,
Do I impart toward you. For your intent
In going back to school in Wittenberg,
It is most retrograde to our desire:
And, we beseech you, bend you to remain
Here, in the cheer and comfort of our eye,
Our chicfest courtier, cousin, and our son.
Queen. Let not thy mother lose her prayers,
Hamlet;

I pray thee, stay with us, go not to Wittenberg.
Ham. I shall in all my best obey you madam.
King. Why, 'tis a loving and a fair reply;
Be as ourself in Denmark.-Madam, cone;
This gentle and unfore'd accord of Hamlet
Sits smiling to my heart: in grace whereof,

(4) Nature; a little more than a kinsman, and
less than a natural one.
(5) Lowering eyes.

(6) Contrary.

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