LAERTES.

Most humbly do I take my leave, my lord.

POLONIUS.

The time invites you; go, your servants tend.

LAERTES.

Farewell, Ophelia, and remember well

What I have said to you.

OPHELIA.

'Tis in my memory lock'd,

And you yourself shall keep the key of it.

Farewell.

LAERTES.

POLONIUS.

(Exit.)

What is't, Ophelia, he hath said to you ?

OPHELIA.

So please you, something touching the Lord Hamlet.

POLONIUS.

Marry, well bethought:

'Tis told me, he hath very oft of late

Given private time to you, and you yourself Have of your audience been most free and boun

teous:

If it be so- -as so 'tis put on me,

And that in way of caution-I must tell you,
You do not understand yourself so clearly
As it behoves my daughter and your honour.
What is between you? give me up the truth.

OPHELIA.

He hath, my lord, of late made many tenders
Of his affection to me.

POLONIUS.

Affection! pooh! you speak like a green girl,
Unsifted in such perilous circumstance.
Do you believe his tenders, as you call them?
OPHELIA.

I do not know, my lord, what I should think.

POLONIUS.

Marry, I'll teach you: think yourself a baby, That you have ta'en these tenders for true pay, Which are not sterling. Tender yourself more dearly;

Or you'll tender me a fool.

OPHELIA.

My lord, he hath importuned me with love
In honourable fashion.

POLONIUS.

Ay, fashion you may call it; go to, go to.

OPHELIA.

And hath given countenance to his speech, my lord,

With almost all the holy vows of heaven.

POLONIUS.

Ay, springes to catch woodcocks. I do know, When the blood burns, how prodigal the soul Lends the tongue vows.

This is for all:

I would not, in plain terms, from this time forth,
Have you so slander any moment leisure,
As to give words or talk with the Lord Hamlet.
Look to 't, I charge you: come your ways.

OPHELIA.

I shall obey, my

lord.

(Exeunt.)

[The action of this scene passes on the same platform that was shown in the first scene of this act. HAMLET and HORATIO appear from the first entrance on the right and approach MARCELLUS, who is on guard. HORATIO stops at the left of the platform, and looks out over the battlements.]

Indeed? I heard it not: it then draws near the

season

Wherein the spirit held his wont to walk.

(A flourish of trumpets, and ordnance shot off within.)

What doth this mean, my lord?

HAMLET.

The king doth wake to-night and takes his rouse, Keeps wassail, and the swaggering up-spring reels;

And as he drains his draughts of Rhenish down, The kettle-drum and trumpet thus bray out The triumph of his pledge.

HORATIO.

Is it a custom ?

Ay, marry, is't:

HAMLET.

But to my mind, though I am native here

And to the manner born, it is a custom

More honoured in the breach than the observance.

Enter GHOST.

HORATIO.

Look, my lord, it comes!

HAMLET.

Angels and ministers of grace defend us!
Be thou a spirit of health or goblin damn'd,
Bring with thee airs from heaven or blasts from
hell,

Be thy intents wicked or charitable,

Thou comest in such a questionable shape
That I will speak to thee: I'll call thee Hamlet,
King, father, royal Dane: O, answer me!
Let me not burst in ignorance; but tell
Why thy canonized bones, hearsed in death,
Have burst their cerements; why the sepulchre,
Wherein we saw thee quietly inurn'd,
Hath oped his ponderous and marble jaws,
To cast thee up again. What may this mean,
That thou, dead corse, again, in complete steel,
Revisit'st thus the glimpses of the moon,
Making night hideous; and we fools of nature
So horridly to shake our disposition

With thoughts beyond the reaches of our souls? Say, why is this? wherefore? what should we do? (GHOST beckons HAMLET.)

HORATIO.

It beckons you to go away with it,
As if it some impartment did desire
To you alone.

MARCELLUS.

Look, with what courteous action

It waves you to a more removed ground:
But do not go with it.

HORATIO.

No, by no means.

HAMLET.

It will not speak; then I will follow it.

Do not, my lord.

HORATIO.

HAMLET.

Why, what should be the fear?

I do not set my life at a pin's fee;
And for my soul, what can it do to that,
Being a thing immortal as itself?

It waves me forth again: I'll follow it.

HORATIO.

What if it tempt you toward the flood, my lord, Or to the dreadful summit of the cliff,

And there assume some other horrible form,

And draw you into madness?