Hamlet (21 page)

FIRST CLOWN
    Cudgel thy brains no more about it, for your dull ass

will not
mend
⁵⁴
his pace with beating; and when you are asked

this question next, say ‘A grave-maker: the houses that he

makes lasts till doomsday.’ Go, get thee to
Yaughan
⁵⁶
: fetch me

a
stoup
⁵⁷
of liquor.

In youth, when I did love, did love
⁵⁸
,

Methought it was very sweet,

To
contract-O-the time, for-a-my behove
⁶⁰
,

O, methought there was nothing
meet
⁶¹
.

HAMLET
    Has this fellow no feeling of his business that he

sings at grave-making?

HORATIO
    Custom hath made it in him a
property of easiness
⁶⁴
.

HAMLET
    ’Tis e’en so: the hand of little employment
hath the
⁶⁵

daintier sense.

FIRST CLOWN
    But age with his stealing steps

Hath caught me in his clutch,

And hath
shipped me
intil
⁶⁹
the land,

As if I had never
been such
⁷⁰
.

HAMLET
    That skull had a tongue in it and could sing once:

how the knave
jowls
it to th’ground, as if it were
Cain
⁷²
’s jaw-

bone, that did the first murder. It might be the pate of a

politician
, which this ass
o’er-offices
⁷⁴
, one that could

circumvent
⁷⁵
God, might it not?

HORATIO
    It might, my lord.

HAMLET
    Or of a courtier, which could say ‘Good morrow,

sweet lord! How dost thou, good lord?’ This might be my lord

Such-a-one, that praised my lord Such-a-one’s horse when

he meant to beg it, might it not?

HORATIO
    Ay, my lord.

HAMLET
    Why, e’en so, and now my lady Worm’s,
chapless
⁸²
,

and knocked about the
mazzard
⁸³
with a sexton’s spade: here’s

fine
revolution
, if we had the
trick
to see’t.
Did these bones
⁸⁴

cost no more the breeding, but to play at
loggats
⁸⁵
with ’em?

Mine ache to think on’t.

FIRST CLOWN
    A pickaxe and a spade, a spade,

For and
a
shrouding sheet
⁸⁸
:

O, a pit of clay for to be made

For such a guest is meet.

HAMLET
    There’s another: why may not that be the skull of a

lawyer? Where be his
quiddities now, his quillets
⁹²
, his cases,

his
tenures
, and his tricks? Why does he suffer this
rude
⁹³

knave now to knock him about the
sconce
⁹⁴
with a dirty shovel,

and will not tell him of his
action of battery
⁹⁵
? Hum. This fellow

might be in’s time a great buyer of land, with his
statutes
⁹⁶
, his

recognizances
, his
fines, his
double vouchers
⁹⁷
, his recoveries:

is this the
fine of his fines
⁹⁸
and the recovery of his recoveries,

to have his fine pate full of fine dirt? Will his
vouch
⁹⁹
ers vouch

him no more of his purchases, and double ones too, than
the
¹⁰⁰

length and breadth of a
pair of indentures
¹⁰¹
? The very

conveyances
of his lands will hardly lie in this
box
¹⁰²
; and must

the
inheritor
¹⁰³
himself have no more, ha?

HORATIO
    Not a jot more, my lord.

HAMLET
    Is not parchment made of sheepskins?

HORATIO
    Ay, my lord, and of calf-skins too.

HAMLET
    They are sheep and calves that seek out
assurance in
¹⁰⁷

that. I will speak to this fellow.— Whose grave’s this,
sirrah
¹⁰⁸
?

FIRST CLOWN
    Mine, sir.

O, a pit of clay for to be made

For such a guest is meet.

HAMLET
    I think it be thine, indeed, for thou liest in’t.

FIRST CLOWN
    You lie out on’t, sir, and therefore it is not yours. For

my part, I do
not lie
¹¹⁴
in’t, and yet it is mine.

HAMLET
    Thou dost lie in’t, to be in’t and say ’tis thine: ’tis for

the dead, not for the
quick
¹¹⁶
: therefore thou liest.

FIRST CLOWN
    ’Tis a quick lie, sir: ’twill away again, from me to

you.

HAMLET
    What man dost thou dig it for?

FIRST CLOWN
    For no man, sir.

HAMLET
    What woman, then?

FIRST CLOWN
    For none, neither.

HAMLET
    Who is to be buried in’t?

FIRST CLOWN
    One that was a woman, sir; but, rest her soul, she’s

dead.

HAMLET
    How
absolute
the knave is! We must speak
by the
¹²⁶

card, or
equivocation
¹²⁷
will undo us. By the Lord, Horatio,

these three years I have taken note of it: the age is grown so

picked
¹²⁹
that the toe of the peasant comes so near the heels of

our courtier, he
galls his kibe
¹³⁰
.— How long hast thou been a

grave-maker?

FIRST CLOWN
    Of all the days i’th’year, I came to’t that day that

our last king Hamlet o’ercame Fortinbras.

HAMLET
    How long is that since?

FIRST CLOWN
    Cannot you tell that? Every fool can tell that: it was

the very day that young Hamlet was born — he that was

mad and sent into England.

HAMLET
    Ay, marry, why was he sent into England?

FIRST CLOWN
    Why, because he was mad: he shall recover his wits

there, or if he do not, it’s no great matter there.

HAMLET
    Why?

FIRST CLOWN
    ’Twill not be seen in him: there the men are as mad

as he.

HAMLET
    How came he mad?

FIRST CLOWN
    Very strangely, they say.

HAMLET
    How strangely?

FIRST CLOWN
    Faith, e’en with losing his wits.

HAMLET
    Upon what
ground
¹⁴⁸
?

FIRST CLOWN
    Why, here in Denmark: I have been sexton here,

man and boy, thirty years.

HAMLET
    How long will a man lie i’th’earth ere he rot?

FIRST CLOWN
    I’faith, if he be not rotten before he die — as we have

many
pocky
corpses now-a-days, that will scarce
hold the
¹⁵³

laying in — he will last you some eight year or nine year: a

tanner
¹⁵⁵
will last you nine year.

HAMLET
    Why he more than another?

FIRST CLOWN
    Why, sir, his hide is so tanned with his trade that he

will keep out water a great while, and your water is a sore

decayer of your
whoreson
dead body.
Here’s a skull
¹⁵⁹
now: this

skull has lain in the earth three-and-twenty years.

HAMLET
    Whose was it?

FIRST CLOWN
    A whoreson mad fellow’s it was: whose do you

think it was?

HAMLET
    Nay, I know not.

FIRST CLOWN
    
A
¹⁶⁵
pestilence on him for a mad rogue! A poured a

flagon of
Rhenish
¹⁶⁶
on my head once. This same skull, sir, this

same skull, sir, was Yorick’s skull, the king’s jester.

HAMLET
    This?

FIRST CLOWN
    E’en that.

HAMLET
    Let me see.—Alas, poor Yorick!

I knew him, Horatio: a fellow of infinite jest, of most

excellent
fancy
¹⁷²
. He hath borne me on his back a thousand

times — and how
abhorred
my imagination is!
My
gorge
¹⁷³

rises at it. Here hung those lips that I have kissed I know not

how oft.— Where be your gibes now, your gambols, your

songs, your flashes of merriment that were wont to set the

table on a roar?
No one now to mock your own jeering?
¹⁷⁷
Quite

chop-fallen
¹⁷⁸
? Now get you to my lady’s chamber and tell her,

let her paint an inch thick, to this
favour
¹⁷⁹
she must come.

Make her laugh at that.— Prithee, Horatio, tell me one

thing.

HORATIO
    What’s that, my lord?

HAMLET
    Dost thou think
Alexander
¹⁸³
looked o’this fashion

i’th’earth?

HORATIO
    E’en so.

HAMLET
    And smelt so? Puh!

HORATIO
    E’en so, my lord.

HAMLET
    To what base uses we may return, Horatio! Why

may not imagination trace the noble dust of Alexander till

he find it stopping a
bung-hole
¹⁹⁰
?

HORATIO
    ’Twere to consider
too curiously
¹⁹¹
to consider so.

HAMLET
    No, faith, not a jot, but to follow him thither with

modesty
¹⁹³
enough, and likelihood to lead it, as thus:

Alexander died, Alexander was buried, Alexander returneth

into dust; the dust is earth; of earth we make
loam
¹⁹⁵
, and why

of that loam whereto he was converted might they not stop a

beer-barrel?

Imperial Caesar, dead and turned to clay,

Might stop a hole to keep the wind away.

O, that that earth, which kept the world in awe,

Should patch a wall t’expel the winter’s
flaw
²⁰¹
!

But soft, but soft, aside: here comes the king.

The queen, the courtiers — who is that they follow?

And with such
maimèd
²⁰⁴
rites? This doth betoken

The corpse they follow did with
desperate
²⁰⁵
hand

Fordo
it own life: ’twas of some
estate
²⁰⁶
.

Couch
²⁰⁷
we awhile and mark.

LAERTES
    What ceremony else?

HAMLET
    That is Laertes, a very noble youth. Mark.

LAERTES
    What ceremony else?

PRIEST
    Her
obsequies
²¹¹
have been as far enlarged

As we have
warrantise
: her death was
doubtful
²¹²
,

And but that great command
o’ersways
²¹³
the order

She should in ground
unsanctified
²¹⁴
have lodged

Till the
last trumpet.
For
²¹⁵
charitable prayer,

Shards
²¹⁶
, flints and pebbles should be thrown on her.

Yet here she is allowed her virgin rites,

Her maiden
strewments
and the
bringing home
²¹⁸

Of bell and burial.

LAERTES
    Must there no more be done?

PRIEST
    No more be done:

We should profane the service of the dead

To sing
sage requiem
and
such rest
²²³
to her

As to
peace-parted
²²⁴
souls.

LAERTES
    Lay her i’th’earth:

And from her fair and unpolluted flesh

May
violets
²²⁷
spring! I tell thee, churlish priest,

A minist’ring angel shall my sister be

When thou liest
howling
²²⁹
.