1st Scene
BARNARDO ; Who's there?
FRANCISCO ; Nay, answer me. Stand
and unfold yourself.
BARNARDO ; Long live the King!
FRANCISCO ; Barnardo?
BARNARDO ; He.
FRANCISCO ; You come most carefully
upon your hour.
BARNARDO ; 'Tis now struck twelve.
Get thee to bed,
Franciscoo.
FRANCISCO ; For this relief much
thanks. 'Tis bitter cold,
And I am sick at heart.
BARNARDO ; Have you had quiet
guard?
FRANCISCO ; Not a mouse stirring.
BARNARDO ; Well, good night.
FRANCISCO ; If you do meet Horatio
and Marcellus,
The rivals of my watch,
bid them make haste.
FRANCISCO ; I think I hear them.—
Stand ho! Who is there?
HERATIO ; Friends to this ground.
MARCELLUS ; And liegemen to the
Danee.
FRANCISCO ; Give you good night.
MARCELLUS ; O farewell, honest
(soldier). Who hath
relieved you?
FRANCISCO ; Barnardo hath my place.
Give you good night.
MARCELLUS ; Holla, Barnardo.
BARNARDO ; Say, what, is Horatio
there?
HORATIO ; A piece of him.
BARNARDO ; Welcome, Horatio.—
Welcome, good Marcellus.
HORATIO ; What, has this thing
appeared again tonight?
BARNARDO ; I have seen nothing.
MARCELLUS ; 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,
Thatt, if again this
apparition come, He may
approve our eyes and
speak to it.
HORATIO ; Tush, tush, 'twill not appear.
BARNARDO ; Sit down awhile, And let
us once again assail your
ears, That are so fortified
against our story, What
we have two nights seen.
HORATIO ; Well, sit we down, And let us
hear Barnardo speak of this.
BARNARDO ; Last night of all, When
yond same star that's
westward from the pole
Had made his course t'
illume that part of heaven
Where now it burns,
Marcellus and myself,
The bell then beating one.
MARCELLUS ; Peace, break thee off!
Look where it comes
again.
BARNARDO ; In the same figure like the
King that's dead.
( To Horatio)
MARCELLUS ; Thou art a scholar.
Speak to it, Horatio.
BARNARDO ; Looks he not like the
King? Mark it, Horatio.
HORATIO ; Most like. It harrows me
with fear and wonder.
BARNARDO ; It would be spoke to.
MARCELLUS ; Speak to it, Horatio.
HORATIO ; What art thou that usurp'st
this time of night, Together
with that fair and warlike
form In which the majesty of
buried Denmark Did
sometimes march? By
heaven, I charge thee, speak.
MARCELLUS ; It is offended.
BARNARDO ; See, it stalks away.
HORATIO ; Stay! speak! speak! I charge
theee, speak!
MARCELLUS ; 'Tis gone and will not
answer.
BARNARDO ; How now, Horatio, you
tremble and look pale.
Is not this something
more than fantasy?
What think you on 't?
HORATIO ; Before my God, I might not
this believe Without the
sensible and true avouch Of
minee own eyes.
MARCELLUS ; Is it not like the King?
HORATIO ; As thou art to thyself. Such
was the very armor he had
on When he the ambitious
Norway combated. So
frowned he once when, in an
angryy parle, He smote the
sleddedd Polacks on the ice.
'Tis strange.
MARCELLUS ; Thus twice before, and
jump at this dead hour,
With martial stalk hath he
gonee by our watch.
HORATIO ; 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.
MARCELLUS ; 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
laborer with the day?
Who is 't that can inform
me?
HORATIO ; That can I. At least the
whisper goes so: our last
king, Whose image even
but now appeared to us,
Was, as you know, by
Fortinbras of Norway,
Thereto pricked on by a
most emulate pride, Dared
to the combat; in which our
valiant Hamlet (For so this
side of our known world
esteemed him) Did slay this
Fortinbras, who by a sealed
compact, Well ratified by
law and heraldry, Did forfeit,
with his life, all those his
lands Which he stood
seized of, to the conqueror.
Against the which a moiety
competent Was gagèd by
our king, which had returned
To the inheritance of
Fortinbras Had he been
vanquisher, as, by the same
comart
And carriage of the article
designed,
His fell to Hamlet. Now, sir,
young Fortinbras, Of
unimprovèd mettle hot and
full, Hath in the skirts of
Norway here and there
Sharked up a list of lawless
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 posthaste
and rummage in the land.
BARNARDO ; I think it be no other but
e'en so. Well may it sort
that this portentous figure
Comes armèd through
our watch so like the king
That was and is the
question of these wars.
HORATIO ; A mote it is to trouble the
mind's eye. In the most high
and palmy state of Rome, A
little ere the mightiest Julius
fell, The graves stood
tenantless, and the sheeted
dead Did squeak and gibber
in the Roman streets; As
stars with trains of fire and
dews of blood, Disasters in
the sun; and the moist star,
Upon whose influence
Neptune's empire stands,
Wass sick almost to
doomsday with eclipse. And
even the like precurse of
feared events,
As harbingers preceding still
the fates
And prologue to the omen
coming on, Have heaven and
Earth together demonstrated
Unto our climatures and
countrymen.
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, Speak of
it. Stay and speak!—Stop it,
Marcellus.
MARCELLUS ; Shall I strike it with my
partisan?
HORATIO ; Do, if it will not stand.
BARNARDO ; 'Tis here.
HORATIO ; 'Tis here.
MARCELLUS ; 'Tis gone.
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.
BARNARDO ; It was about to speak
when the cock crew.
HORATIO ; And then it started like a
guilty thing Upon a fearful
summons. I have heard The
cock, that is the trumpet to
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, Th' extravagant and
erring spirit hies To his
confine, and of the truth
herein This present object
made probation.
MARCELLUS ; It faded on the crowing
of the cock. Some say
that ever 'gainst that
season comes Wherein
our Savior's birth is
celebrated, This bird of
dawning singeth all night
long; And then, they say,
no spirit dare stir abroad,
The nights are
wholesome; then no
planets strike, No fairy
takes, nor witch hath
power to charm, So
hallowed and so gracious
is that time.
HORATIO ; So have I heard and do in
part believe it. But look, the
morn in russet mantle clad
Walks o'er the dew of yon high eastward hill. Break we our watch up, and by my advice Let us impart what we have seen tonight
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?
MARCELLUS ; Let's do 't, I pray, and I this morning know Where we shall find him most convenient.