第 25 节

ime.

HAMLET. I am constant to my purposes, they follow the King’s pleasure. If his fitness speaks, mine is ready. Now or whensoever, provided I be so able as now.

LORD. The King and Queen and all are coming down.

HAMLET. In happy time.

LORD. The Queen desires you to use some gentle entertainment to Laertes before you fall to play.

HAMLET. She well instructs me.

[_Exit Lord._]

HORATIO. You will lose this wager, my lord.

HAMLET. I do not think so. Since he went into France, I have been in continual practice. I shall win at the odds. But thou wouldst not think how ill all’s here about my heart: but it is no matter.

HORATIO. Nay, good my lord.

HAMLET. It is but foolery; but it is such a kind of gain-giving as would perhaps trouble a woman.

HORATIO. If your mind dislike anything, obey it. I will forestall their repair hither, and say you are not fit.

HAMLET. Not a whit, we defy augury. There’s a special providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now, ’tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be now; if it be not now, yet it will come. The readiness is all. Since no man has aught of what he leaves, what is’t to leave betimes?

Enter King, Queen, Laertes, Lords, Osric and Attendants with foils &c.

KING. Come, Hamlet, come, and take this hand from me.

[_The King puts Laertes’s hand into Hamlet’s._]

HAMLET. Give me your pardon, sir. I have done you wrong; But pardon’t as you are a gentleman. This presence knows, and you must needs have heard, How I am punish’d with sore distraction. What I have done That might your nature, honour, and exception Roughly awake, I here proclaim was madness. Was’t Hamlet wrong’d Laertes? Never Hamlet. If Hamlet from himself be ta’en away, And when he’s not himself does wrong Laertes, Then Hamlet does it not, Hamlet denies it. Who does it, then? His madness. If’t be so, Hamlet is of the faction that is wrong’d; His madness is poor Hamlet’s enemy. Sir, in this audience, Let my disclaiming from a purpos’d evil Free me so far in your most generous thoughts That I have shot my arrow o’er the house And hurt my brother.

LAERTES. I am satisfied in nature, Whose motive in this case should stir me most To my revenge. But in my terms of honour I stand aloof, and will no reconcilement Till by some elder masters of known honour I have a voice and precedent of peace To keep my name ungor’d. But till that time I do receive your offer’d love like love, And will not wrong it.

HAMLET. I embrace it freely, And will this brother’s wager frankly play.— Give us the foils; come on.

LAERTES. Come, one for me.

HAMLET. I’ll be your foil, Laertes; in mine ignorance Your skill shall like a star i’ th’ darkest night, Stick fiery off indeed.

LAERTES. You mock me, sir.

HAMLET. No, by this hand.

KING. Give them the foils, young Osric. Cousin Hamlet, You know the wager?

HAMLET. Very well, my lord. Your Grace has laid the odds o’ the weaker side.

KING. I do not fear it. I have seen you both; But since he is better’d, we have therefore odds.

LAERTES. This is too heavy. Let me see another.

HAMLET. This likes me well. These foils have all a length?

[_They prepare to play._]

OSRIC. Ay, my good lord.

KING. Set me the stoups of wine upon that table. If Hamlet give the first or second hit, Or quit in answer of the third exchange, Let all the battlements their ordnance fire; The King shall drink to Hamlet’s better breath, And in the cup an union shall he throw Richer than that which four successive kings In Denmark’s crown have worn. Give me the cups; And let the kettle to the trumpet speak, The trumpet to the cannoneer without, The cannons to the heavens, the heavens to earth, ‘Now the King drinks to Hamlet.’ Come, begin. And you, the judges, bear a wary eye.

HAMLET. Come on, sir.

LAERTES. Come, my lord.

[_They play._]

HAMLET. One.

LAERTES. No.

HAMLET. Judgement.

OSRIC. A hit, a very palpable hit.

LAERTES. Well; again.

KING. Stay, give me drink. Hamlet, this pearl is thine; Here’s to thy health.

[_Trumpets sound, and cannon shot off within._]

Give him the cup.

HAMLET. I’ll play this bout first; set it by awhile.

[_They play._]

Come. Another hit; what say you?

LAERTES. A touch, a touch, I do confess.

KING. Our son shall win.

QUEEN. He’s fat, and scant of breath. Here, Hamlet, take my napkin, rub thy brows. The Queen carouses to thy fortune, Hamlet.

HAMLET. Good madam.

KING. Gertrude, do not drink.

QUEEN. I will, my lord; I pray you pardon me.

KING. [_Aside._] It is the poison’d cup; it is too late.

HAMLET. I dare not drink yet, madam. By and by.

QUEEN. Come, let me wipe thy face.

LAERTES. My lord, I’ll hit him now.

KING. I do not think’t.

LAERTES. [_Aside._] And yet ’tis almost ’gainst my conscience.

HAMLET. Come for the third, Laertes. You do but dally. I pray you pass with your best violence. I am afeard you make a wanton of me.

LAERTES. Say you so? Come on.

[_They play._]

OSRIC. Nothing neither way.

LAERTES. Have at you now.

[_Laertes wounds Hamlet; then, in scuffling, they change rapiers, and Hamlet wounds Laertes._]

KING. Part them; they are incens’d.

HAMLET. Nay, come again!

[_The Queen falls._]

OSRIC. Look to the Queen there, ho!

HORATIO. They bleed on both sides. How is it, my lord?

OSRIC. How is’t, Laertes?

LAERTES. Why, as a woodcock to my own springe, Osric. I am justly kill’d with mine own treachery.

HAMLET. How does the Queen?

KING. She swoons to see them bleed.

QUEEN. No, no, the drink, the drink! O my dear Hamlet! The drink, the drink! I am poison’d.

[_Dies._]

HAMLET. O villany! Ho! Let the door be lock’d: Treachery! Seek it out.

[_Laertes falls._]

LAERTES. It is here, Hamlet. Hamlet, thou art slain. No medicine in the world can do thee good. In thee there is not half an hour of life; The treacherous instrument is in thy hand, Unbated and envenom’d. The foul practice Hath turn’d itself on me. Lo, here I lie, Never to rise again. Thy mother’s poison’d. I can no more. The King, the King’s to blame.

HAMLET. The point envenom’d too! Then, venom, to thy work.

[_Stabs the King._]

OSRIC and LORDS. Treason! treason!

KING. O yet defend me, friends. I am but hurt.

HAMLET. Here, thou incestuous, murderous, damned Dane, Drink off this potion. Is thy union here? Follow my mother.

[_King dies._]

LAERTES. He is justly serv’d. It is a poison temper’d by himself. Exchange forgiveness with me, noble Hamlet. Mine and my father’s death come not upon thee, Nor thine on me.

[_Dies._]

HAMLET. Heaven make thee free of it! I follow thee. I am dead, Horatio. Wretched Queen, adieu. You that look pale and tremble at this chance, That are but mutes or audience to this act, Had I but time,—as this fell sergeant, death, Is strict in his arrest,—O, I could tell you,— But let it be. Horatio, I am dead, Thou liv’st; report me and my cause aright To the unsatisfied.

HORATIO. Never believe it. I am more an antique Roman than a Dane. Here’s yet some liquor left.

HAMLET. As th’art a man, Give me the cup. Let go; by He