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King. Stay, give me drink: Hamlet, this pearl | Exchange forgiveness with me, noble Hamlet: Mine and my father's death come not upon thee; Nor thine on me!

is thine ;

Here's to thy health.-Give him the cup.

[Trumpets sound; and Cannons shot off within.
Ham. I'll play this bout first, set it by awhile.
Come. Another hit; What say you? [They play.
Laer. 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.
Ham. Good madam,-

King.

Gertrude, do not drink. Queen. I will, my lord;-I pray you, pardon me. King. It is the poison'd cup; it is too late.

[Aside.
Ham. I dare not drink yet, madam; by and by.
Queen. Come, let me wipe thy face.
Laer. My lord, I'll hit him now.
King.
I do not think it.
Laer. And yet it is almost against my conscience.
[Aside.
Ham. Come, for the third, Laertes: You do but
dally;

pray you, pass with your best violence ;
I am afeard, you make a wanton2 of me.
Laer. Say you so? come on.
Osr. Nothing neither way.
Laer. Have at you now.

[They play.

[LAERTES wounds HAMLET; then, in scuf-
fling, they change Rapiers, and HAMLET
wounds LAERTES.

King.
Part them, they are incens'd.
Ham. Nay, come again. [The Queen falls.
Csr.
Look to the queen there, ho!
Ilor. They bleed on both sides;-How is it, my
lord?

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[Dies
Ham. 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.
Hor.
Never believe it ;
I am more an antique Roman than a Dane,
Here's yet some liquor left.
Ham.
As thou'rt a man,-
Give me the cup; let go; by heaven, I'll have it.-
O, God!-Horatio, what a wounded name,
Things standing thus unknown, shall live behind me?
If thou didst ever hold me in thy heart,
Absent thee from felicity awhile,
And in this harsh world draw thy breath in pain,
To tell my story.

[March afar off, and Shot within.
What warlike noise it this ?
Osr. Young Fortinbras, with conquest come from
Poland,

To the ambassadors of England gives
This warlike volley.

Ham.

O, I die, Horatio;
The potent poison quite o'ercrows my spirit,
I cannot live to hear the news from England
But I do prophesy the election lights
On Fortinbras; he has my dying voice;
So tell him, with the occurrents, more or less,
Which have solicited,'-The rest is silence. [Dies.
Hor. Now cracks a noble heart;-Good night,
sweet prince;

And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest!
Why does the drum come hither?

[March within. Enter FORTINBRAS, the English Ambassadors, and others.

Fort. Where is this sight?
Hor.

What is it, you would see? [Dies. If aught of woe, or wonder, cease your search. Fort. This quarry cries on havoc!”—O, proud

The dr villany!-Ho! let the door be lock'd:

Ham. Ó

Treachery! seek it out.

[LAERTES falls.

Laer. 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's life ;
The treacherous instrument is in thy hand,
Unbated,3 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.
Ham. The point

Envenom'd too!-Then, venom, to thy work.4
[Stabs the King.
Osr, and Lords. Treason! treason!
King. O, yet defend me, friends, I am but hurt.
Ham. Here, thou incestuous, murd'rous, damned
Dane,

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death!

What feast is toward in thine eternal cell,
That thou so many princes, at a shot,

So bloodily hast struck?

1 Amb.

The sight is dismal;

And our affairs from England come too late :
The ears are senseless, that should give us hearing,
To tell him, his commandment is fulfill'd,
That Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead:
Where should we have our thanks?

Hor.
Not from his mouth,
Had it the ability of life to thank you;
He never gave commandment for their death.
But since, so jump upon this bloody question,
You from the Polack wars, and you from England
Are here arriv'd; give order, that these bodies
High on a stage be placed to the view;
[King dies. And let me speak, to the yet unknowing world,
How these things câme about: So shall
you hear
Of carnal, bloody, and unnatural acts ;10

Drink off this potion :- Is the union here?
Follow my mother.

Laer.

He is justly serv'd ; It is a poison temper'd by himself.

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6 To overcrow, is to overcome, to subdue. These noblemen laboured with tooth and naile to overcrow, and consequently to overthrow one another.'-Holin shed's History of Ireland.

7 'The occurrents which have solicited—the occurrences or incidents which have incited. The sentence is left unfinished.

8 This quarry cries on havoc! To cry on, was to exclaim against. I suppose when unfair sportsmen destroyed more game than was reasonable, the censure was to call it havoc.--Johnson.

Quarry was the term used for a heap of slaughtered game. See Macbeth, Act iv. Sc. 3.

9 It has been already observed that jump and just, or exactly, are synonymous. Vide note on Act i. Sc. 1 10 'Of carnal, bloody, and unnatural acts' Of san

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Let us haste to hear it.

And call the noblest to the audience.

me,

For with sorrow,
sorrow, I embrace my fortune;
I have some rights of memory2 in this kingdom,
Which now to claim my vantage doth invite me.

Hor. Of that I shall have also cause to speak,
And from his mouth whose voice will draw on more ;
But let this same be presently perform'd,

Even while men's minds are wild; lest more mis-
chance,

On plots and errors, happen.
Fort.

Let four captains
Bear Hamlet, like a soldier, to the stage;
For he was likely, had he been put on,

To have prov'd most royally: and, for his passage,
The soldier's music, and the rites of war,
Speak loudly for him.-

Take up the bodies:-Such a sight as this
Becomes the field, but here shows much amiss.
Go, bid the soldiers shoot. [A dead March.
[Exeunt, bearing off the dead Bodies; after
which, a Peal of Ordnance is shot off.

The following scene in the first quarto, 1603, differs materially from the revised play, that it has been thought it would not be unacceptable to the reader :-Enter Horatio and the Queen.

Hor. Madam, your son is safe arrived in Denmarke,
This letter I even now receiv'd of him,
Whereas he writes how he escap'd the danger,
And subtle treason that the king had plotted,
Being crossed by the contention of the winds,
He found the packet sent to the king of England,
Wherein he saw himself betray'd to death,
As at his next conversion with your grace
He will relate the circumstance at full.

Be wary of his presence, lest that he
Fail in that he goes about.

Hor. Madam, never make doubt of thi
I think by this the news be come to court
He is arriv'd: observe the king, and you shall
Quickly find, Hamlet being here,

Things fell not to his mind.

Queen. But what became of Gilderstone and Res

sencraft?

Hor. He being set ashore, they went for England.
And in the packet there writ down that doom
To be perform'd on them 'pointed for him:
And by great chance he had his father's seal,
So all was done without discovery.

Queen. Thanks be to Heaven for blessing of the
prince.

Horatio, once again I take my leave,

With thousand mother's blessings to my son.
Hor. Madam, adieu!

IF the dramas of Shakspeare were to be characterised, each by the particular excellence which distinguishes it from the rest, we must allow to the tragedy of Hamlet the praise of variety. The incidents are so nume rous, that the argument of the play would make a long tale. The scenes are interchangeably diversified with merriment and solemnity: with merriment that includes judicious and instructive observations; and solemnity not strained by poetical violence above the natural sentiments of man. New characters appear from time to time in continual succession, exhibiting various forms of life and particular modes of conver sation. The pretended madness of Hamlet causes much mirth, the mournful distraction of Ophelia fills the heart with tenderness, and every personage pro duces the effect intended, from the apparition that in the first Act chills the blood with horror, to the fop in the last, that exposes affectation to just contempt.

The conduct is perhaps not wholly secure against objections. The action is indeed for the most part in continual progression; but there are some scenes which neither forward nor retard it. Of the feigned madness of Hamlet there appears no adequate cause; for he does nothing which he might not have done with the reputation of sanity. He plays the madman most when he treats Ophelia with so much rudeness

Queen. Then I perceive there's treason in his looks, which seems to be useless and wanton cruelty.

That seem'd to sugar o'er his villanies :.
But I will sooth and please him for a time,
For murderous minds are always jealous;
But know not you, Horatio, where he is?

Hor. Yes, madam, and he hath appointed me
To meet him on the east side of the city
To-morrow morning.

Queen. O fail not, good Horatio, and withal com-
mend me

A mother's care to him, bid him a while

guinary and unnatural acts, to which the perpetrator
was instigated by concupiscence or carnal stings.'
The allusion is to the murder of old Hamlet by his bro-
ther, previous to his incestuous union with Gertrude.
1. e. instigated, produced. Instead of 'forced
i.
cause,' the quartos read, 'for no cause.'

2 i. e. some rights which are remembered in this kingdom.

Hamlet is, through the whole piece, rather an instrument than an agent. After he has, by the strata gem of the play, convicted the King, he makes no attempt to punish him ; and his death is at last effected by an incident which Hamlet had no part in producing.

The catastrophe is not very happily produced; the exchange of weapons is rather an expedient of necessity, than a stroke of art. A scheme might easily be formed to kill Hamlet with the dagger, and Laertes with the bowl.

The poet is accused of having shown little regard to poetical justice, and may be charged with equal neglect of poetical probability. The apparition left the regions of the dead to little purpose; the revenge which he demands is not obtained, but by the death of hig that was required to take it; and the gratification whic would arise from the destruction of an usurper and murderer, is abated by the untimely death of Ophelia the young, the beautiful, the harmless, and the pious JOHNSON

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OTHELLO, THE MOOR OF VENICE.

PRELIMINARY REMAR K S.

mark; with the strange Adventures of Iago, Prince of Saxonie, 4to, 1605. It may indeed be urged, that these names were adopted from the tragedy before us: but every reader who is conversant with the peculiar style and method in which the work of honest John Rey nolds is composed, will acquit him of the slightest familiarity with the scenes of Shakspeare-Steevens.

THE HE story is taken from the collection of Novels, by | The History of the famous Euordanus, Prince of Den Gio Giraldi Cinthio, entitled Hecatommithi, being the seventh novel of the third decad. No English translation of so early a date as the age of Shakspeare has hitherto been discovered: but the work was translated into French by Gabriel Chappuys, Paris, 1584. The version is not a faithful one: and Dr. Farmer suspects that through this medium the novel came into English.

The name of Othello may have been suggested by some tale which has escaped our researches, as it occurs in Reynold's God's Revenge against Adultery, standing in one of his arguments as follows:- She ❘ marries Othello, an old German soldier.' This history (the eighth) is professed to be an Italian one; and here also the name of lago occurs. It is likewise found in

The time of this play may be ascertained from the following circumstances:-Selymus the Second formed his design against Cyprus in 1569, and took it in 1571 This was the only attempt the Turks ever made upor that island after it came into the hands of the Vene tians, (which was in 1473,) wherefore the time must fall in with some part of that inter val We learn from the play, that there was a junction of the Turkish fleet

at Rhodes n order for the invasion of Cyprus; that it first came sailing towards Cyprus; then went to Rhodes, there met another squadron, and then resumed its way to Cyprus. These are real historical facts, which happened when Mustapha, Selymus's general, attacked Cyprus, in May, 1570; which is therefore the true period of this performance.-See Knolle's History of the Turks, p. 938, 846, 867.-Reed. The first edition of this play, of which we have any certain knowledge, was printed by N. O. for Thomas Walkly, to whom it was entered on the Stationers' Books, October 6, 1621. The most material variations of this copy from the first folio are pointed out in the notes. The minute differences are so numerous, that to have specified them would only have fatigued the reader. Walkly's Preface will follow these Preliminary Remarks.

Malone first placed the date of the composition of this play in 1611, upon the ground of the allusion, supposed by Warburton, to the creation of the order of baronets. [See Act ili. Sc. 4, note.] On the same ground Mr. Chalmers attributed it to 1614; and Dr. Drake assigned the middle period of 1612. But this allusion being controverted, Malone subsequently affixed to it the date of 1604, because, as he asserts, we know it was acted in that year. He has not stated the evidence for this decisive fact; and Mr. Boswell was unable to discover it among his papers; but gives full credit to it, on the ground that 'Mr. Malone never expressed himself at random." The allusion to Pliny, translated by Philemon Holland, in 1601, in the simile of the Pontic Sea; and the supposed imitation of a passage in Cornwallis's Essays, of the same date, referred to in the note cited above, seem to have influenced Mr. Malone in settling the date of this play. What is more certain is, that it was played before King James at court, in 1613; which circumstance is gathered from the MSS. of Vertue the Engraver.

'If (says Schlegel) Romeo and Juliet shines with the colours of the dawn of morning, but a dawn whose purple clouds already announce the thunder of a sultry day, Othello is, on the other hand, a strongly shaded picture; we might call it a tragical Rembrandt.' Should these parallels between pictorial representaton and dramatic poetry be admitted,--for I have my doubts of their propriety,-this is a far more judicious *scription than that of Steevens, who, in a concluding

|

note to this play, would compare it to a picture from the school of Raphael. Poetry is certainly the pabulum of art; and this drama, as every other of our im mortal bard, offers a series of pictures to the imagina tion of such varied hues, that artists of every schoo. might from hence be furnished with subjects. What Schlegel means to say appears to be, that it abounds in strongly contrasted scenes, but that gloom predominates. Much has been written on the subject of this drama: and there has been some difference of opinion in regard to the rank in which it deserves to be placed. For my own part I should not hesitate to place it on the first. Perhaps this preference may arise from the circumstance of the domestic nature of its action, which lays a stronger hold upon our sympathy; for over powering as is the pathos of Lear, or the interest ex cited by Macbeth, it comes less near to the business o life.

In strong contrast of character, in delineation of the workings of passion in the human breast, in manifes tations of profound knowledge of the inmost recesses of the heart, this drama exceeds all that has ever issued from mortal pen. It is indeed true that no eloquence is capable of painting the overwhelming catastrophe in Othello,-the pressure of feelings which measure out in a moment the abysses of eternity.'

WALKLY'S PREFACE TO OTHELLO,

ED. 1622, 4to.

THE STATIONER TO THE READER. To set forth a booke without an Epistle, were like to the old English proverbe, 'A blew coat without a badge;' and the author being dead, I thought good to take that piece of worke upon me: To commend it, I will not; for that which is good, I hope every man will commend without intreaty: and I am the bolder, because the Author's name is sufficient to vent his worke. Thus leaving every one to the liberty of judgment, I have ventured to print this play, and leave it the generall censure. Yours,

THOMAS WALKLÝ.

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RODERIGO, a Venetian Gentleman.

Clown, Servant to Othello.
Herald.

DESDEMONA, Daughter to Brabantio, and Wife to

Othello.

EMILIA, Wife to Iago.

BIANCA, a Courtesan, Mistress to Cassio.

Officers, Gentlemen, Messengers, Musicians, Sailors, Attendants, &c.

MONTANO, Othello's Predecessor in the Government SCENE, for the first Act, in Venice; during the of Cyprus.

ACT I.

rest of the Play, at a Seaport in Cyprus.

Iago. Despise me, if I do not. Three great ones of the city,

SCENE I. Venice. A Street. Enter RODE- In personal suit to make me his lieutenant,

RIGO and IAGO. Roderigo.

ТSн, never tell me, I take it much unkindly,
That thou, Iago,-who hast had my purse,
A if the strings were thine,-should'st know of this.
iago. 'Sblood, but you will not hear me :—
If ever I did dream of such a matter,

Abhor me.

Oft capp'd1 to him ;—and, by the faith of man,
I know my price, I am worth no worse a place
But he, as loving his own pride and purposes,
Evades them, with a bombast circumstance,2
Horribly stuff'd with epithets of war;
And, in conclusion, nonsuits
My mediators; for, certes, says he,
I have already chose my officer.

Rod. Thou told'st me, thou didst hold him in thy And what was he?

hate.

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Forsooth, a great arithmetician,3
One Michael Cassio, a Florentine,
A follow almost damn'd in a fair wife ;4

4 The folio reads, dambd. This passage has given rise to much discussion. Mr. Tyrwhitt thought that we should read, almost damn'd in a fair „ife;' alluding to the judgment denounced in the Gospel against those o. whom all men speak well.' I should be contented to adopt his emendation, but with a different interpretation :-'A fellow almost damn'd (i. c. lost from luxurious habite) in the serene or equable tenor of

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