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[Elsinore castle, a lookout platform. Francisco is at his guard post. Bernardo enters.]
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! Who's there?
Horatio
Friends to this ground.
Marcellus
And liegemen to the Dane.
Francisco
Give you good night.
Marcellus
Oh, farewell, honest soldier.
Who has 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 appeared again tonight?
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 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
Tush, tush, 'twill not appear.
Bernardo
Sit down awhile,
And let us once again assail your ears,
That are so fortified against our story,
What we two nights have 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]
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 armor he had on
When he the ambitious Norway combated.
So frowned he once when, in an angry parle,
He smote the sledded Polacks on the ice.
'Tis strange.
Marcellus
Thus twice before — and just 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-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 even but now appeared to us,
Was, as you know, by Fortinbras of Norway
Thereto pricked on by a most emulate 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 those his lands
Which he stood seized of 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 covenant
And carriage of the article designed,
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 landless resolutes,
For food and diet, to some enterprise
That hath a stomach in't, which is no other —
And 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
Of this post-haste and rummage in the land.
[Enter Ghost.]
But soft, behold! Lo where it comes again!
I'll cross it though it blast me.
[The ghost spreads its arms.]
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,
Oh, 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.
[The cock crows.]
Marcellus
Shall I strike at it with my partisan?
Horatio
Do, if it will not stand.
[They strike at the Ghost.]
Bernardo
'Tis here!
Horatio
'Tis here!
[Exit Ghost.]
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 throat,
Awake the god of day, and at his warning,
Whether in sea or fire, in earth or air,
The extravagant and erring spirit hies
To his confine. And of the truth herein,
This present object made probation.
Marcellus
It faded on the crowing of the cock.
Some say that ever 'gainst that season comes around
Wherein our Savior's birth is celebrated,
The bird of dawning singeth all night long,
And then, they say, no spirit dares walk abroad.
The nights are wholesome, then no planets strike,
No fairy takes, nor 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. 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.
[Exit.]
