To grunt and sweat under a weary life; But that the dread of something after death, desperate fray between two, made at all weapons, from the brown bill to the bodkin." Again, in Chaucer, as he is quoted at the end of a pamphlet called The Serpent of Division, &c. whereunto is annexed the Tragedy of Gorboduc, &c. 1591: "With bodkins was Cæsar Julius "Murdered at Rome of Brutus Crassus." STEEVENS. By a bare bodkin, does not perhaps mean, "by so little an instrument as a dagger," but "by an unsheathed dagger." In the account which Mr. Steevens has given of the original meaning of the term quietus, after the words, "who personally attended the king on any foreign expedition," should have been added, and were therefore exempted from the claims of scutage, or a tax on every knight's fee. MALONE. To grunt and sweat-] Thus the old copies. It is undoubtedly the true reading, but can scarcely be borne by modern ears. JOHNSON. This word occurs in The Death of Zoroas, by Nicholas Grimoald, a translation of a passage in the Alexandreis of Philippe Gualtier, into blank verse, printed at the end of Lord Surrey's Poems. 66 none the charge could give: "Here grunts, here grones, echwhere strong youth is spent." And Stanyhurst in his translation of Virgil, 1582, for supremum congemuit gives us : " for sighing it grunts." Again, in Turbervile's translation of Ovid's Epistle from Canace to Macareus: “What might I miser do? greefe forst me grunt.” Again, in the same translator's Hypermnestra to Lynceus: round about I heard 66 "Of dying men the grunts." The change made by the editors [to groan] is however supported by the following line in Julius Caesar, Act IV. sc. i: "To groan and sweat under the business.” STEEVENS. I apprehend that it is the duty of an editor to exhibit what his author wrote, and not to substitute what may appear to the present age preferable: and Dr. Johnson was of the same opinion. See his note on the word hugger-mugger, Act IV. sc. v. I have therefore, though with some reluctance, adhered to the old copies, however unpleasing this word may be to the ear. On the The undiscover'd country, from whose bourn stage, without doubt, an actor is at liberty to substitute a less offensive word. To the ears of our ancestors it probably conveyed no unpleasing sound; for we find it used by Chaucer and others: "But never gront he at no stroke but on, The Monkes Tale, v. 14,627, Tyrwhitt's edit. Again, in Wily Beguil'd, written before 1596: "She's never well, but grunting in a corner." 'The undiscover'd country, from whose bourn MALONE. No traveller returns,] This has been cavilled at by Lord Orrery and others, but without reason. The idea of a traveller in Shakspeare's time, was of a person who gave an account of his adventures. Every voyage was a Discovery. John Taylor has "A Discovery by sea from London to Salisbury." Again, Marston's Insatiate Countess, 1603: 66 -wrestled with death, FARMER, "From whose stern cave none tracks a backward path." "Qui nunc it per iter tenebricosum "Illuc unde negant redire quenquam." Catullus. Again, in Sandford's translation of Cornelius Agrippa &c. 4to. bl. 1. 1569 (once a book of uncommon popularity) "The countrie of the dead is irremeable, that they cannot retourne.' Sig. Pp. Again, in Cymbeline, says the Gaoler to Posthumus: "How you shall speed in your journey's end [after execution] I think you'll never return to tell one." STEEVENS. This passage has been objected to by others on a ground which, at the first view of it, seems more plausible. Hamlet himself, it is objected, has had ocular demonstration that travellers do sometimes return from this strange country. I formerly thought this an inconsistency. But this objection is also founded on a mistake. Our poet without doubt in the passage before us intended to say, that from the unknown regions of the dead no traveller returns with all his corporeal powers; such as he who goes on a voyage of discovery brings back, when he returns to the port from which he sailed. The traveller whom Hamlet had seen, though he appeared in the same habit which he had worn in his life-time, was nothing but a shadow; "invulnerable as the air," and consequently incorporeal. And makes us rather bear those ills we have, Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought; If, says the objector, the traveller has once reached this coast, it is not an undiscovered country. But by undiscovered Shakspeare meant not undiscovered by departed spirits, but, undiscovered, or unknown to "such fellows as us, who crawl between earth and heaven;" superis incognita tellus. In this sense every country, of which the traveller does not return alive to give an account, may be said to be undiscovered. The Ghost has given us no account of the region from whence he came, being, as he himself informed us, "forbid to tell the secrets of his prisonhouse." Marlowe, before our poet, had compared death to a journey to an undiscovered country: 66 weep not for Mortimer, "That scorns the world, and, as a traveller, King Edward II. 1598 (written before 1593). Perhaps this is another instance of Shakspeare's acquaintance with the Bible: "Afore I goe thither, from whence I shall not turne againe, even to the lande of darknesse and shadowe of death; yea into that darke cloudie lande and deadlye shadowe whereas is no order, but terrible feare as in the darknesse." Job, ch. x. "The way that I must goe is at hande, but whence I shall not turne againe." Ibid. ch. xvi. I quote Cranmer's Bible. Douce. 2 great pith-] Thus the folio. The quartos read,-of great pitch. STEEVENS. Pitch seems to be the better reading. The allusion is to the pitching or throwing the bar;-a manly exercise, usual in country villages. RITSON. 3 turn awry,] Thus the quartos. The folio-turn away. The same printer's error occurs in the old copy of And lose the name of action.-Soft you, now! ОРН. Good my lord, How does your honour for this many a day? HAM. I humbly thank you; well. OPH. My lord, I have remembrances of yours, That I have longed long to re-deliver; I pray you, now receive them. HAM. I never gave you aught. No, not I; OPH. My honour'd lord, you know right well, you did; And, with them, words of so sweet breath com pos'd As made the things more rich: their perfume lost, Take these again; for to the noble mind, Rich gifts wax poor, when givers prove unkind. There, my lord. HAM. Ha, ha! are you honest? OPH. My lord? HAM. Are you fair? OPH. What means your lordship? HAM. That if you be honest, and fair, you should admit no discourse to your beauty.5 Antony and Cleopatra, where we find-" Your crown's away," instead of "Your crown's awry." STEEVENS. 4 Nymph, in thy orisons &c.] This is a touch of nature. Hamlet, at the sight of Ophelia, does not immediately recollect, that he is to personate madness, but makes her an address grave and solemn, such as the foregoing meditation excited in his thoughts. JOHNSON. That if you be honest, and fair, you should admit no discourse to your beauty.] This is the reading of all the modern OPH. Could beauty, my lord, have better commerce than with honesty? HAM. Ay, truly; for the power of beauty will sooner transform honesty from what it is to a bawd, than the force of honesty can translate beauty into his likeness; this was some time a paradox, but now the time gives it proof. I did love you once. OPH. Indeed, my lord, you made me believe so. HAM. You should not have believed me: for virtue cannot so inoculate our old stock, but we shall relish of it: I loved you not. OPH. I was the more deceived. should editions, and is copied from the quarto. The folio reads-your honesty should admit no discourse to your beauty. The true reading seems to be this,-if you be honest and fair, you admit your honesty to no discourse with your beauty. This is the sense evidently required by the process of the conversation. JOHNSON. That if you be honest and fair, you should admit no discourse to your beauty.] The reply of Ophelia proves beyond doubt, that this reading is wrong. The reading of the folio appears to be the right one, and requires no amendment." Your honesty should admit no discourse to your beauty," means,-" Your honesty should not admit your beauty to any discourse with her;" which is the very sense that Johnson contends for, and expressed with sufficient clearness. M. MASON. 66 rara est concordia formæ 66 Atque pudicitiæ." Ovid. STEEvens. into his likeness:] The modern editors read-its likeness; but the text is right. Shakspeare and his contemporaries frequently use the personal for the neutral pronoun. So Spenser, Fairy Queen, Book III. c. ix: See "Then forth it break; and with his furious blast, :-inoculate-] This is the reading of the first folio. The first quarto reads euocutat; the second euacuat; and the third, evacuate. STEEVENS. |