Is now most still, most secret, and most grave,Who was in life a foolish peating knave.
Come, sir, to draw toward an end with you:—
Good night, mother.
[Exeunt severally; Hamlet, dragging out Polonius.]
ACT IV.
SCENE I. A room in the Castle.
[Enter King, Queen, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.]
King.
There’s matter in these sighs. These profound heaves
You must translate: ‘tis fit we understand them.
Where is your son?
Queen.
Bestow this place on us a little while.
[To Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, who go out.]
Ah, my good lord, what have I seen tonight!
King.
What, Gertrude? How does Hamlet?
Queen.
Mad as the sea and wind, when both contend
Which is the mightier: in his lawless fit
Behind the arras hearing something stir,
Whips out his rapier, cries ‘A rat, a rat!’
And in this brainish apprehension, kills
The unseen good old man.
King.
O heavy deed!
It had been so with us, had we been there:
His liberty is full of threats to all;
To you yourself, to us, to every one.
Alas, how shall this bloody deed be answer’d?
It will be laid to us, whose providence
Should have kept short, restrain’d, and out of haunt
This mad young man. But so much was our love
We would not understand what was most fit;
But, like the owner of a foul disease,
To keep it from divulging, let it feed
Even on the pith of life. Where is he gone?
Queen.
To draw apart the body he hath kill’d:
O’er whom his very madness, like some ore
Among a mineral of metals base,
Shows itself pure: he weeps for what is done.
King.
O Gertrude, come away!
The sun no sooner shall the mountains touch
But we will ship him hence: and this vile deed
We must with all our majesty and skill
Both countenance and excuse.—Ho, Guildenstern!
[Re-enter Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.]
Friends both, go join you with some further aid:
Hamlet in madness hath Polonius slain,
And from his mother’s closet hath he dragg’d him:
Go seek him out; speak fair, and bring the body
Into the chapel. I pray you, haste in this.
[Exeunt Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.]
Come, Gertrude, we’ll call up our wisest friends;
And let them know both what we mean to do
And what’s untimely done: so haply slander,—
Whose whisper o’er the world’s diameter,
As level as the cannon to his blank,
Transports his poison’d shot,—may miss our name,
And hit the woundless air.—O, come away!
My soul is full of discord and dismay.
[Exeunt.]
SCENE II. Another room in the Castle.
[Enter Hamlet.]
Ham.
Safely stowed.
Ros. and Guil.
[Within.] Hamlet! Lord Hamlet!
Ham.
What noise? who calls on Hamlet? O, here they come.
[Enter Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.]
Ros.
What have you done, my lord, with the dead body?
Ham.
Compounded it with dust, whereto ‘tis kin.
Ros.
Tell us where ‘tis, that we may take it thence,
And bear it to the chapel.
Ham.
Do not believe it.
Ros.
Believe what?
Ham. That I can keep your counsel, and not mine own. Besides, to be demanded of a sponge!—what replication should be made by the son of a king?
Ros.
Take you me for a sponge, my lord?
Ham. Ay, sir; that soaks up the King’s countenance, his rewards, his authorities. But such officers do the king best service in the end: he keeps them, like an ape, in the corner of his jaw; first mouthed, to be last swallowed: when he needs what you have gleaned, it is but squeezing you, and, sponge, you shall be dry again.
Ros.
I understand you not, my lord.
Ham.
I am glad of it: a knavish speech sleeps in a foolish ear.
Ros. My lord, you must tell us where the body is and go with us to the king.
