FRANCISCO at his post. Enter to him BERNARDO

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

FRANCISCO

I think I hear them. Stand, ho! Who’s there?[ Enter HORATIO and MARCELLUS]

HORATIO

Friends to this ground.

MARCELLUS

And liegemen to the Dane. FRANCISCO [ leaving ]

Give you good night.

MARCELLUS

O, farewell, honest soldier: Who hath relieved you?

FRANCISCO

Bernardo has my place. Give you good night.

Exit

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 appear’d again to-night?

BERNARDO

I have seen nothing.

MARCELLUS

Horatio says ’tis but our fantasy, And will not let belief take hold of him Touching this dreaded sight, twice seen of us: Therefore I have entreated him alon 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

Tush, tush, ’twill not appear.

BERNARDO

Sit down awhile; And let us once again assail your ears,That are so fortified against our sto,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 yond same star that’s westward from the pole Had made his course to illume that part of heaven Where now it burns, Marcellus and myself, The bell then beating one, Enter GHOST [ in armor ]

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 harrows me with fear and wonder.

BERNARDO

It would be spoke to.

MARCELLUS

Question 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? By heaven 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 on’t?

HORATIO

Before my God, I might 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 armour he had on When he the ambitious Norway combated; So frown’d he once, when, in an angry parle,He smote the sledded Polacks on the ice. ’Tis strange.

MARCELLUS

Thus twice before, and jump at this dead hour With martial stalk hath he gone by our watch.

HORATIO

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

MARCELLUS

Good now, sit down, and 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 cast 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-labourer 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 even but now appear’d to us, Was, as you know, by Fortinbras of Norway, Thereto prick’d on by a most emulate pride Dared to the combat; in which our valiant Hamlet—For so this side of our known world esteem’d him—Did slay this Fortinbras; who by a seal’d compact, Well ratified by law and heraldry Did forfeit, with his life, all those his lands Which he stood seized of, to the conqueror: Against the which, a moiety competent Was gaged by our King; which had return’d To the inheritance of Fortinbras, Had he been vanquisher; as, by the same covenant,And carriage of the article design’d, His fell to Hamlet. Now, sir, young Fortinbras, Of unimproved mettle hot and full, Hath in the skirts of Norway here and there Shark’d 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 compulsatory, those foresaid 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 hea Of this post-haste and rummage in the land.

BERNARDO

I think it be no other but e’en so: Well may it sort that this portentous figur Comes armed through our watch; so like the King That was and is the question of these wars

HORATIO

A mote it is to trouble the mind’s eye. In the most high and palmy state of Rome, A little ere the mightiest Julius fell, The graves stood tenantless and the sheeted dea Did squeak and gibber in the Roman streets: As stars with trains of fire and dews of blood Disasters in the sun; and the moist star Upon whose influence Neptune’s empire stand Was sick almost to doomsday with eclipse: And even 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! 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 Speak of it: stay, and speak! Stop it, Marcellus.

MARCELLUS

Shall I strike at it with my partisan?

HORATIO

Do, if it will not stand.[ They strike at it ]

BERNARDO

’Tis here! [ Exit GHOST]

HORATIO

’Tis here!

MARCELLUS

’Tis gone! We do it wrong, being so majestical, To offer it the show of violence For it is, 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 throa Awake the god of day; and, at his warning, Whether in sea or fire, in earth or air The extravagant and erring spirit hie To his confine: and of the truth herei This present object made probation

MARCELLUS

It faded on the crowing of the cock. Some say that ever ‘gainst that season comes Wherein our Saviour’s birth is celebrated, The 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, nor witch hath power to charm, So hallow’d 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 eastward hill: Break we our watch up; and by my advice, Let us impart what we have seen to-night Unto young Hamlet; for, upon my life, 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. ] dsmLP3xaiHrFK9tFAaoqt1K+OPAxzogP4Pe2zPkjyLjtNf+oArzM4YRTgrSqtuE9