Re-enter ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTErn. GUILDENSTERN. Good my lord, vouchsafe me a word with you. Your wisdom should show itself more richer to signify this to the doctor; for, for me to put him to his purgation would perhaps plunge him into far more choler. GUILDENSTERN. Good my lord, put your discourse into some frame, and start not so wildly from my affair. HAMLET. I am tame, sir: pronounce. GUILDENSTERN. The queen, your mother, in most great afflic tion of spirit, hath sent me to you. HAMLET. You are welcome. GUILDENSTERN. Nay, good my lord, this courtesy is not of the right breed. If it shall please you to make me a wholesome answer, I will do your mother's commandment: if not, your pardon and my return shall be the end of business. Sir, I cannot. my HAMLET. GUILDENSTERN. What, my lord? HAMLET. Make you a wholesome answer; my wit's diseased: but, sir, such answer as I can make, you shall command; or rather, as you say, my mother: therefore no more, but to the matter: my mother, you say, ROSENCRANTZ. Then thus she says; your behaviour hath struck her into amazement and admiration. HAMLET. O wonderful son, that can so astonish a mother! But is there no sequel at the heels of this mother's admiration? Impart. ROSENCRANTZ. She desires to speak with you in her closet, ere you go to bed. HAMLET. We shall obey, were she ten times our mother. Have you any further trade with us? ROSENCRANTZ. My lord, you once did love me. HAMLET. So I do still, by these pickers and stealers. ROSENCRANTZ. Good my lord, what is your cause of distemper? you do surely bar the door upon your own liberty, if you deny your griefs to your friend. HAMLET. Sir, I lack advancement. ROSENCRANTZ. How can that be, when you have the voice of the king himself for your succession in Denmark? HAMLET. Ay, sir, but "while the grass grows,”—the proverb is something musty. Re-enter PLAYERS with RECOrders. O, the recorders! let me see one. To withdraw with you: why do you go about to recover the wind of me, as if you would drive me into a toil? GUILDENSTERN. HAMLET. It is as easy as lying: govern these ventages with your fingers and thumb, give it breath with your mouth, and it will discourse most eloquent music. Look you, these are the stops. GUILDENSTERN. But these cannot I command to any utterance of harmony; I have not the skill. HAMLET. Why, look you now, how unworthy a thing you make of me! You would play upon me; you would seem to know my stops; you would pluck out the heart of my mystery; you would sound me from my lowest note to the top of my compass and there is much music, excellent voice, in this little organ; yet cannot you make it speak. 'Sblood, do you think I am easier to be played on than a pipe? Call me what instrument you will, though you can fret me, yet you cannot play upon me. Re-enter POLONIUS. God bless you, sir! POLONIUS. My lord, the queen would speak with you, and presently. HAMLET. Do you see yonder cloud that's almost in shape of a camel? POLONIUS. By the mass, and 'tis like a camel, indeed. HAMLET. Methinks it is like a weasel. POLONIUS. It is backed like a weasel. HAMLET. Or like a whale ? POLONIUS. Very like a whale. HAMLET. Then I will come to my mother by and by. They fool me to the top of my bent. I will come by and by. POLONIUS. I will say so. (Exit POLONIUS.) HAMLET. "By and by" is easily said. Leave me, friends. (Exeunt all but HAMLET.) 'Tis now the very witching time of night, When churchyards yawn, and hell itself breathes out Contagion to this world: now could I drink hot blood, And do such bitter business as the day Would quake to look on. Soft! now to my mother. O heart, lose not thy nature; let not ever Let me be cruel, not unnatural: I will speak daggers to her, but use none. (Exit.) |