King.
Now must your conscience my acquittance seal,
And you must put me in your heart for friend,
Sith you have heard, and with a knowing ear,
That he which ^note hath your noble father slain
Pursued my life.

Laer.
It well appears: but tell me
Why you proceeded ^note not against these feats,
So crimeful ^note and so ^note capital in nature,
As by your safety ^note, wisdom, all things else,
You mainly were stirr'd up.

King.
O, for two ^note special reasons,
Which may to you perhaps seem much unsinew'd ^note,
But ^note yet to me they're ^note strong. The queen his mother
Lives almost by his looks; and for myself—
My virtue or my plague, be it ^note either which—
She's so conjunctive ^note to my life and soul,
That, as the star moves not but in his sphere,
I could not but by her. The other motive,

Why to a public count I might not go,
Is the great love the general gender bear him;
Who, dipping all his faults in their affection,
Would ^note, like the spring that turneth wood to stone,
Convert his gyves ^note to graces; so that ^note my arrows,
Too slightly timber'd ^note for so loud a wind ^note,
Would have reverted to my bow ^note again
And ^note not ^note where I had ^note aim'd ^note them.

Laer.
And so have I ^note a noble father lost;
A sister driven into desperate terms,
Whose worth ^note, if praises may go back again,
Stood ^note challenger on mount ^note of all the age
For her perfections: but my ^note revenge will come.

King.
Break not your sleeps for that: you must not think ^note
That we are made of stuff so flat and dull
That we can let our beard ^note be shook with danger ^note
And think it pastime ^note. You shortly shall ^note hear more:
I loved your father, and we love ourself ^note;
And that, I hope, will teach you to imagine— ^note Enter ^note a Messenger, with letters.
How now! what news? ^note

Mess.
Letters, my lord, from Hamlet: ^note
This ^note to your majesty; this to the queen.

King.
From Hamlet! ^note who brought them?

Mess.
Sailors, my lord, they say; I saw them not:
They were given me by Claudio; he received them
Of him ^note that brought them. ^note

King.
Laertes, you shall hear ^note them.
Leave us. ^note [Exit ^note Messenger. [Reads] ^note

‘High and mighty, You shall know I am set naked on your kingdom. To-morrow shall I ^note beg leave to see your kingly eyes: when I shall, first asking your ^note pardon thereunto, ^note recount the occasion ^note of my sudden and more strange ^note return.

‘Hamlet. ^note’

Laer.
Know you the hand?

King.
'Tis Hamlet's character. ‘Naked!’
And in a postscript here, he says ‘alone. ^note’
Can you advise ^note me? ^note

Laer.
I'm ^note lost in it, my lord. But let him come;
It warms the very sickness in my heart,
That I shall ^note live and tell ^note him to his teeth,
‘Thus didest ^note thou.’

King.
If it be so, Laertes,—

As how should it ^note be so? how otherwise?—
Will you be ruled by me? ^note

Laer.
Ay, my lord ^note;
So you will ^note not o'errule me to a peace. ^note

King.
To thine own peace. If he be now return'd ^note,
As checking at ^note his voyage, and that he means
No more to undertake it, I will work him
To an exploit now ripe in my device ^note,
Under the which he shall not choose but fall:
And for his death no wind of blame shall breathe;
But even his mother shall uncharge the practice,
And call it accident ^note.

Laer.
My lord ^note, I will be ruled;
The rather, if you could devise it so
That I might be the organ ^note.

King.
It falls right.
You have been talk'd of since your travel much,
And that in Hamlet's hearing, for a quality
Wherein, they say, you shine: your sum of parts
Did not together pluck such envy from him,
As did that one, and that in my regard
Of the unworthiest siege.

Laer.
What part is that, my lord?

King.
A very riband ^note in the cap of youth,
Yet needful too; for youth no less becomes
The light and careless livery that it wears
Than settled age his sables and his weeds,
Importing health ^note and graveness. ^note Two months since ^note,

Here was a gentleman of Normandy:— ^note
I've ^note seen myself, and served against, the French,
And they can ^note well on horseback: but this gallant
Had witchcraft in't; he grew unto ^note his seat,
And to such wondrous doing brought his horse
As had he ^note been incorpsed and demi-natured
With the brave beast: so far he topp'd ^note my thought ^note
That I, in forgery of shapes and tricks,
Come ^note short of what he did.

Laer.
A Norman was't?

King.
A Norman.

Laer.
Upon my life, Lamond ^note.

King.
The very ^note same.

Laer.
I know him well: he is the brooch indeed
And gem of all the ^note nation.

King.
He made ^note confession of you,
And gave you such a masterly report,
For art and exercise in your defence,
And for your rapier most especial ^note,
That he cried out, 'twould be a sight ^note indeed
If one could match you: the scrimers ^note of their nation,
He swore, had neither motion, guard, nor eye,
If you opposed them. Sir, this ^note report of his
Did Hamlet so envenom with his ^note envy
That he could nothing do but wish and beg
Your sudden coming o'er ^note, to play with him ^note.

Now, out of this— ^note

Laer.
What ^note out of this, my lord?

King.
Laertes, was your father dear to you?
Or are you like the painting of a sorrow,
A face without a heart?

Laer.
Why ask you this?

King.
Not that I think you did not love your father,
But that I know love is begun ^note by time ^{note note},
And that I see, in passages of proof,
Time qualifies the spark and fire of it.
There lives within the very flame of love
A kind of wick ^note or snuff that will abate it;
And nothing is at a like goodness still,
For goodness, growing to a plurisy ^note,
Dies in his own too much: that ^note we would do
We should do when we would; for this ‘would’ changes
And hath abatements and delays as many
As there are tongues, are hands, are accidents ^note,
And then this ‘should’ ^note is like a spendthrift sigh ^note,
That hurts by easing. But, to the quick o' the ulcer: ^note
Hamlet comes ^note back: what would you undertake,
To show yourself your father's son in deed ^note
More than in words?

Laer.
To cut his throat i' the church.

King.
No place indeed should murder sanctuarize ^note;

Revenge should have no bounds. But, good Laertes,
Will you do this, keep close within your chamber. ^note
Hamlet return'd shall know you are come home:
We'll put on those shall praise your excellence
And set a double varnish on the fame ^note
The Frenchman ^note gave you; bring you in fine together
And wager on ^note your heads: he, being remiss,
Most generous and free from all contriving,
Will not peruse the foils, ^note so that with ease,
Or with a little shuffling, you may choose
A sword unbated ^note, and in a pass ^note of practice
Requite him for your father.

Laer.
I will do 't
And for that ^note purpose I'll anoint ^note my sword.
I bought an unction of a mountebank,
So mortal that but dip ^note a knife in it,
Where it draws blood no cataplasm so rare,
Collected from all simples that have virtue
Under the moon, can save the thing from death
That is but scratch'd withal: I'll touch my point
With this contagion, that, if I ^note gall him slightly,
It may be death. ^note

King.
Let's further think of this;
Weigh ^note what convenience ^note both of time and means
May fit us ^note to our shape: if this should fail, ^note

And that our drift look ^note through our bad performance,
'Twere better not assay'd: therefore this project
Should have a back or second, that might hold
If this did ^note blast in proof. Soft! let me see:
We'll make a solemn wager on your cunnings ^note:
I ha't ^note:
When in your motion you are hot and dry ^{note note}—
As ^note make your bouts more violent to that end ^note—
And that he calls for drink, I'll have prepared ^note him
A chalice for the nonce ^note; whereon but sipping ^note,
If he by chance escape your venom'd stuck ^note,
Our purpose may hold there. But stay, what noise? ^note Enter Queen. ^note
How now, sweet queen! ^{note note}

Queen.
One woe doth tread upon another's heel,
So fast they ^note follow: your sister's drown'd, Laertes.

Laer.
Drown'd! O, where?

Queen.
There is a willow grows aslant ^note a ^note brook,
That shows his hoar ^note leaves in the glassy stream;
There with fantastic garlands did she come ^note
Of crow-flowers, nettles, daisies, and long purples,
That liberal shepherds give ^note a grosser name ^note,

But our cold ^note maids do dead men's fingers call them:
There ^note, on the pendent boughs her coronet ^note weeds
Clambering to hang, an envious sliver ^note broke;
When down her ^note weedy trophies ^note and herself
Fell-in the weeping brook. Her clothes spread wide,
And mermaid-like awhile they bore ^note her up:
Which time she chanted snatches ^note of old tunes ^note,
As one incapable of her own distress,
Or like a creature native and indued ^note
Unto that element: but long it could not be
Till that her garments, heavy with their ^note drink,
Pull'd the poor wretch ^note from her melodious lay ^note
To muddy death.

Laer.
Alas, then she is drown'd! ^note

Queen.
Drown'd, drown'd.

Laer.
Too much of water hast thou, poor Ophelia,
And therefore I forbid my tears: but yet
It is our trick; nature her custom holds,
Let shame say what it will: when these are gone,
The woman will be out. Adieu, my lord:
I have a speech of fire ^note that fain would blaze,
But that this folly douts ^note it. [Exit.

King.
Let's ^note follow, Gertrude:
How much I had ^note to do to calm his rage!

Now fear I this will give it start again;
Therefore let's follow. [Exeunt.

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