BERNARDO.
Who's there?

FRANCISCO.
Nay, answer me. Stand and unfold yourself.

BERNARDO.
Long live the King!

FRANCISCO.
Bernardo?

BERNARDO.
He.

FRANCISCO.
You come most carefully upon your hour.

BERNARDO.
'Tis now struck twelve. Get thee to bed, Francisco.

FRANCISCO.
For this relief much thanks. 'Tis bitter cold,
And I am sick at heart.

BERNARDO.
Have you had quiet guard?

FRANCISCO.
Not a mouse stirring

BERNARDO.
Well, good night.
If you do meet Horatio and Marcellus,
The rivals of my watch, bid them make haste. Enter Horatio and Marcellus.

FRANCISCO.
I think I hear them. Stand ho, who's there?

HORATIO.
Friends to this ground.

MARCELLUS.
And liegemen to the Dane.

FRANCISCO.
Good night.

MARCELLUS.
Farewell, honest soldier: who hath relieved you?

FRANCISCO.
Bernardo has my place. Good night. Exit Francisco.

MARCELLUS.
Holla, Bernardo!

BERNARDO.
Say, what, is Horatio there?

HORATIO.
A piece of him.

BERNARDO.
Welcome, Horatio. Welcome, good Marcellus.

MARCELLUS.
What, has this thing appeared again tonight?

BERNARDO.
I have seen nothing.

MARCELLUS.
Horatio says 'tis but a fantasy,
And will not let belief take hold of him
Touching the dreadful sight, twice seen of us.
Therefore I have entreated him along
With us to watch the minutes of this night,
That, if again this apparition come,
He may approve our eyes and speak to it.

HORATIO.
'Twill not appear.

BERNARDO.
’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 Bernardo speak of this.

BERNARDO.
Last night of all,
When yon same star that's westward from the pole
Had made his course t'enlighten that part of heaven
Where it now burns, Marcellus and myself,
The bell then beating one— Enter Ghost.

MARCELLUS.
Peace! break thee off! Look where it comes again!

BERNARDO.
In the same figure, like the King that's dead.

MARCELLUS.
’Thou art a scholar;’ speak to it Horatio.

BERNARDO.
’Looks it not like the King? Mark it, Horatio.

HORATIO.
Most like. ’It startles me with fear and wonder.

BERNARDO.
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? I charge thee speak!

MARCELLUS.
It is offended.

BERNARDO.
See, it stalks away.

HORATIO.
Stay! Speak, speak! I charge thee speak. Exit Ghost.

MARCELLUS.
'Tis gone and will not answer.

BERNARDO.
How now, Horatio? You tremble and look pale:
Is not this something more than fantasy?
What think you of it?

HORATIO.
I could not this believe
Without the sensible and true avouch
Of mine own eyes.

MARCELLUS.
Is it not like the King?

HORATIO.
As thou art to thyself.
Such was the very armor he had on
When th' ambitious Norway he combated;
’So frowned he once when, in an angry parle,
’He smote the sledded Pole-ax on the ice.
’'Tis strange—’

MARCELLUS.
Thus twice before, and just at the same hour,
With martial stalk hath he gone by our watch.

HORATIO.
In what particular thought to work I know not;
But, in the scope of mine opinion,
This bodes some strange eruption to our state.

MARCELLUS.
Pray 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 cost 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 ev'n but now appeared to us,
Was, as you know, by Fortinbras of Norway,
’Thereto pricked on by a most emulent 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 these his lands
’Which he stood seized on, to the conqueror;
’Against the which a moiety competent
’Was gaged by our king; which had returned

’To the inheritance of Fortinbras,
’Had he been vanquisher, as, by the same compact
’And carriage of the article's design
’His fell to Hamlet.’ Now, sir, young Fortinbras,
’Of unimproved 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 compulsive,’ those aforesaid 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 post-haste and romage in the land.’

BERNARDO.
I think it is no other but even so.
Well may it sort that this portentous figure
Comes armed through our watch so like the King
That was and is the question of the wars.

HORATIO.
’A mote it is to trouble the mind's eye.
’In the most high and flourishing state of Rome,
’A little ere the mightiest Julius fell,
’The grave stood tenantless, and the sheeted dead
’Did squeak and gibber in the Roman streets;
’Stars shone with trains of fire, dews of blood fell,
’Disasters veiled the sun; and the moist star
’Upon whose influence Neptune's empire stands
’Was sick almost to doomsday with eclipse.
’And ev'n the like precurse of fierce 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.’ Enter Ghost.
But soft! behold! Lo, where it comes again!
I'll cross it, though it blast me.—Stay, illusion! (Spreading his arms.)
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), Cock crows.
Speak of it! Stay, and speak!—Stop it, Marcellus!

MARCELLUS.
Shall I strike it with my partisan?

HORATIO.
Do, if it will not stand.

BERNARDO.
'Tis here!

HORATIO.
'Tis here!

MARCELLUS.
'Tis gone.—
We do it wrong, being so majestical,
To offer it the show of violence;
It is ever, as the air, invulnerable,
And our vain blows malicious mockery.

BERNARDO.
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 at 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 dares stir abroad,
’The nights are wholesome, then no planets strike,
’No fairy takes, no witch hath power to charm,
’So hallowed and so gracious is the 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 eastern hill.
Break we our watch up; and by my advice
Let us impart what we have seen tonight
Unto young Hamlet. Perhaps
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 conveniently. Exeunt.

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