With funeral praises do adorn thy tomb! [The boy whistles. The boy gives warning, something doth approach. What cursed foot wanders this way to-night, To cross my obsequies, and true-love's rites? What, with a torch!-muffle me, night, a while. [Retires. Rom. In faith, I will:-Let me peruse this Mercutio's kinsman, noble county Paris:- Enter Romeo and Balthasar, with a torch, mat-Or am I mad, hearing him talk of Juliet, tock, &c. Rom. Give me that mattock, and the wrenching Hold, take this letter; early in the morning In dear employment: therefore hence, be gone:- Bal. I will be gone, sir, and not trouble you. thou that: Live, and be prosperous; and farewell, good fellow. [Breaking open the door of the monument. And, in despite, I'll cram thee with more food. Par. This is that banish'd haughty Montague, That murder'd my love's cousin ;-with which grief, It is supposed the fair creature died ;And here is come to do some villanous shame To the dead bodies: I will apprehend him.— [Advances. Stop thy unhallow'd toil, vile Montague; Rom. I must, indeed; and therefore came I hither. Good gentle youth, tempt not a desperate man, Rom. Wilt thou provoke me? then have at thee. Open the tomb, lay me with Juliet. (1) i. e. Action of importance. [Dies. To think it was so? O, give me thy hand, [Laying Paris in the monument. And shake the yoke of inauspicious stars Arms, take your last embrace! and lips, O you [Dies. Enter at the other end of the church-yard, Friar Laurence, with a lantern, crow, and spade. Fri. Saint Francis be my speed! how oft to-night Have my old feet stumbled at graves?-Who's there? Who is it that consorts, so late, the dead? Bal. Here's one, a friend, and one that knows you well. Fri. Bliss be upon you! Tell me, good my friend, What torch is yond', that vainly lends his light To grubs and eyeless sculls? as I discern, It burneth in the Capels' monument. Bal. It doth so, holy sir; and there's my master, One that you love. Who is it? Fri. Bal. (3) The allusion is to a louvre or turret full of windows, by means of which ancient balls, &c. are (5) Conductor. (2) I do refuse to do as thou conjurest me to do, illuminated. i. e. depart. (4) Presence-chamber. 1 Watch. Hold him in safety, till the prince come hither. Bal. Full half an hour. Fri. Go with me to the vault. Bal. I dare not, sir: My master knows not, but I am gone hence; And fearfully did menace me with death, If I did stay to look on his intents. Enter another Watchman, with Friar Laurence. 3 Watch. Here is a friar, that trembles, sighs, and weeps: Fri. Stay then, I'll go alone :-Fear comes upon We took this mattock and this spade from him, me: O, much I fear some ill unlucky thing. Bal As I did sleep under this yew-tree here, I dreamt my master and another fought, And that my master slew him. Fri. Romeo! [Advances. Alack, alack, what blood is this, which stains The stony entrance of this sepulchre ?— What mean these masterless and gory swords To lie discolour'd by this place of peace? [Enters the monument. Romeo! O, pale!-Who else? what, Paris too? And steep'd in blood?-Ah, what an unkind hour Is guilty of this lamentable chance!— The lady stirs. [Juliet wakes and stirs Jul. Ŏ, comfortable friar! where is lord? my I do remember well where I should be, And there I am:-Where is my Romeo? [Noise within. Fri. I hear some noise.--Lady, come from that nest Of death, contagion, and unnatural sleep; Hath thwarted our intents; come, come away: Jul. Go, get thee hence, for I will not away. 1 Watch. [Within.] Lead, boy-Which way? Jul. Yea, noise?-then I'll be brief.-O happy dagger! [Snatching Romeo's dagger This is thy sheath; [Stabs herself.] there rust, and let me die. [Falls on Romeo's body, and dies. Enter Watch, with the Page of Paris. Page. This is the place; there, where the torch doth burn. 1 Watch. The ground is bloody; Search about the church-yard: Go, some of you, whoe'er you find, attach. [Exeunt some Pitiful sight! here lies the county slain :- Enter some of the Watch, with Balthasar. 2 Watch. Here's Romeo's man, we found him in the church-yard. (1) i. e. The scabbard. (2) Seat. As he was coming from this church-yard side. Enter Capulet, Lady Capulet, and others. Cap. What should it be, that they so shriek abroad? La. Cap. The people in the street cry-Romeo, Some-Juliet, and some-Paris; and all run, With open outcry toward our monument. Prince. What fear is this, which startles in our ears? 1 Watch. Sovereign, here lies the county Paris slain; And Romeo dead; and Juliet, dead before, Prince Search, seek, and know how this foul murder comes. 1 Watch. Here is a friar, and slaughter'd Romeo's man; With instruments upon them, fit to open Cap. O, heavens!-O, wife! look how our daughter bleeds! This dagger hath mista'en.-for lo! his house! empty on the back of Montague, Is And is mis-sheathed in my daughter's bosom. Enter Montague and others. Prince. Come, Montague; for thou art early up, To see thy son and heir more early down. Mon. Alas, my liege, my wife is dead to-night; Grief of my son's exile hath stopp'd her breath: What further wo conspires against mine age? Prince. Look, and thou shalt see. Mon. O thou untaught! what manners is in this, To press before thy father to a grave? Prince. Seal up the mouth of outrage for a while, Till we can clear these ambiguities, And know their spring, their head, their true de scent; And then will I be general of your woes, Fri. I am the greatest, able to do least, Prince. Then say at once what thou dost know in this. Fri. I will be brief, for my short date of breath Romeo, there dead, was husband to that Juliet; Betroth'd, and would have married her perforce, The form of death: meantime I writ to Romeo, This play is one of the most pleasing of our author's performances. The scenes are busy and various, incidents numerous and important, the catastrophe irresistibly affecting, and the process of the action carried on with such probability, at least with such congruity to popular opinions, as tragedy requires. Here is one of the few attempts of Shakspeare to exhibit the conversation of gentlemen, to represent the airy sprightliness of juvenile elegance. Mr. Dryden mentions a tradition, which might easily reach his time, of a declaration made by Shakspeare, that he was obliged to kill Mercutio in the third Act, lest he should have been killed by Prince. We still have known thee for a holy man. Where's Romeo's man? what can he say in this? Bal. I brought my master news of Juliet's death;him. Yet he thinks him no such formidable perAnd then in post he came from Mantua, To this same place, to this same monument. This letter he early bid me give his father; And threaten'd me with death, going in the vault, If I departed not, and left him there. son, but that he might have lived through the play, and died in his bed, without danger to the poet. Dryden well knew, had he been in quest of truth, in a pointed sentence, that more regard is commonly had to the words than the thought, and that it is very seldom to be rigorously understood. Mer Prince. Give me the letter, I will look on it. Where is the county's page, that rais'd the watch?cutio's wit, gaiety, and courage, will always pro Sirrah, what made your master in this place? grave; And bid me stand aloof, and so I did: Their course of love, the tidings of her death: cure him friends that wish him a longer life; but his death is not precipitated, he has lived out the time allotted him in the construction of the play; nor do I doubt the ability of Shakspeare to have continued his existence, though some of his sallies are perhaps out of the reach of Dryden; whose genius was not very fertile of merriment, nor ductile to humour, but acute, argumentative, comprehensive, and sublime. The Nurse is one of the characters in which the author delighted: he has, with great subtilty of distinction, drawn her at once loquacious and secret, obsequious and insolent, trusty and dishonest. Came to this vault to die, and lie with Juliet.- (1) Mercutio and Paris. a miserable conceit. JOHNSON. HAMLET, PRINCE OF DENMARK. Claudius, king of Denmark. PERSONS REPRESENTED. Francisco, a soldier. Hamlet, son to the former king, and nephew to Reynaldo, servant to Polonius. the present king. Polonius, lord chamberlain. A Captain. An Ambassador. Gertrude, queen of Denmark, and mother of Ophelia, daughter of Polonius. Lords, Ladies, Officers, Soldiers, Players, Grave diggers, Sailors, Messengers, and other At tendants. Scene, Elsinore. ACT I. SCENE 1-Elsinore. A platform before the castle. Francisco on his post. Enter to him Bernardo. WHO'S there? Bernardo. Hor. What, has this thing appear'd ag in tonight? Ber. I have seen nothing. Mar. Horatio says, 'tis but our fantasy; Fran. Nay, answer me: stand, and unfold That, if again this apparition come, Yourself. Ber. Long live the king! He. Bernardo? Francisco. Fran. For this relief, much thanks: 'tis bitter cold, And I am sick at heart. Ber. Have you had quiet guard? Ber. Well, good night. Well, sit we down, When yon same star, that's westward from the Not a mouse stirring. Had made his course to illume that part of heaven If do meet Horatio and Marcellus, you The rivals! of my watch, bid them make haste. Enter Horatio and Marcellus. Fran. I think, I hear them.-Stand, ho! Who is there? Hor. Friends to this ground. Mar. And liegemen to the Dane. O, farewell, honest soldier: Fran. Give you good night. Give you good night. Bernardo hath my place. Holla! Bernardo! Mar. Mar. Peace, break thee off; look, where it comes again! Enter Ghost. Ber. In the same figure like the king that's dead. Together with that fair and warlike form |