The Tragedy of LEGO Hamlet, Prince of Denmark – Act 3, Scene 2, Part 2
HAMLET
Madam, how like you this play?
QUEEN GERTRUDE
The lady protests too much, methinks.
HAMLET
O, but she’ll keep her word.
KING CLAUDIUS
Have you heard the argument? Is there no offence in ‘t?
HAMLET
No, no, they do but jest, poison in jest; no offence
i’ the world.
KING CLAUDIUS
What do you call the play?
HAMLET
The Mouse-trap. Marry, how? Tropically. This play
is the image of a murder done in Vienna: Gonzago is
the duke’s name; his wife, Baptista: you shall see
anon; ’tis a knavish piece of work: but what o’
that? your majesty and we that have free souls, it
touches us not: let the galled jade wince, our
withers are unwrung.
Enter LUCIANUS
HAMLET
I could interpret between you and your love, if I
could see the puppets dallying.
OPHELIA
You are keen, my lord, you are keen.
HAMLET
It would cost you a groaning to take off my edge.
OPHELIA
Still better, and worse.
HAMLET
So you must take your husbands. Begin, murderer;
pox, leave thy damnable faces, and begin. Come:
‘the croaking raven doth bellow for revenge.’
OPHELIA
The king rises.
HAMLET
What, frighted with false fire!
QUEEN GERTRUDE
How fares my lord?
LORD POLONIUS
Give o’er the play.
All
Lights, lights, lights!
Exeunt all but HAMLET and HORATIA
HAMLET
Why, let the stricken deer go weep,
The hart ungalled play;
For some must watch, while some must sleep:
So runs the world away.
Would not this, sir, and a forest of feathers– if
the rest of my fortunes turn Turk with me–with two
Provincial roses on my razed shoes, get me a
fellowship in a cry of players, sir?
HORATIA
Half a share.
HAMLET
A whole one, I.
For thou dost know, O Damon dear,
This realm dismantled was
Of Jove himself; and now reigns here
A very, very–pajock.
HORATIA
You might have rhymed.
Re-enter ROSACRANTZ and GUILDASTERN
HAMLET
Sir, a whole history.
GUILDASTERN
The king, sir,–
HAMLET
Ay, sir, what of him?
GUILDASTERN
Is in his retirement marvellous distempered.
HAMLET
With drink, sir?
GUILDASTERN
No, my lord, rather with choler.
HAMLET
Your wisdom should show itself more richer to
signify this to his doctor; for, for me to put him
to his purgation would perhaps plunge him into far
more choler.
GUILDASTERN
Good my lord, put your discourse into some frame and
start not so wildly from my affair.
HAMLET
I am tame, sir: pronounce.
GUILDASTERN
Nay, good my lord, this courtesy is not of the right
breed. If it shall please you to make me a
wholesome answer, I will do your mother’s
commandment: if not, your pardon and my return
shall be the end of my business.
HAMLET
Sir, I cannot.
GUILDASTERN
What, my lord?
HAMLET
Make you a wholesome answer; my wit’s diseased: but,
sir, such answer as I can make, you shall command;
or, rather, as you say, my mother: therefore no
more, but to the matter: my mother, you say,–
ROSACRANTZ
Then thus she says; your behavior hath struck her
into amazement and admiration.
HAMLET
O wonderful son, that can so astonish a mother! But
is there no sequel at the heels of this mother’s
admiration? Impart.
ROSACRANTZ
She desires to speak with you in her closet, ere you
go to bed.
HAMLET
We shall obey, were she ten times our mother. Have
you any further trade with us?
ROSACRANTZ
My lord, you once did love me.
HAMLET
So I do still, by these pickers and stealers.
ROSACRANTZ
Good my lord, what is your cause of distemper? you
do, surely, bar the door upon your own liberty, if
you deny your griefs to your friend.
HAMLET
Sir, I lack advancement.
ROSACRANTZ
How can that be, when you have the voice of the king
himself for your succession in Denmark?
HAMLET
Ay, but sir, ‘While the grass grows,’–the proverb
is something musty.
Re-enter Horatia with recorders
GUILDASTERN
But these cannot I command to any utterance of
harmony; I have not the skill.
HAMLET
‘Sblood, do you think I am
easier to be played on than a pipe? Call me what
instrument you will, though you can fret me, yet you
cannot play upon me.
Enter POLONIUS
God bless you, sir!
HAMLET
Do you see yonder cloud that’s almost in shape of a camel?
LORD POLONIUS
By the mass, and ’tis like a camel, indeed.
HAMLET
Methinks it is like a weasel.
LORD POLONIUS
It is backed like a weasel.
HAMLET
Or like a whale?
LORD POLONIUS
Very like a whale.
HAMLET
Then I will come to my mother by and by. They fool
me to the top of my bent. I will come by and by.
LORD POLONIUS
I will say so.
HAMLET
By and by is easily said.
Exit POLONIUS
Exeunt all but HAMLET
HAMLET
Soft! now to my mother.
O heart, lose not thy nature; let not ever
The soul of Nero enter this firm bosom:
Let me be cruel, not unnatural:
I will speak daggers to her, but use none;
My tongue and soul in this be hypocrites;
How in my words soever she be shent,
To give them seals never, my soul, consent!
Exit