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Cousin Hamlet,

You know the wager? Ham.

270

Very well, my lord;. Your grace hath laid the odds o' the weaker side.

King. I do not fear it; I have seen you both:

But since he is better'd, we have therefore odds.

Laer. This is too heavy, let me see another. Ham. This likes me well. These foils have

all a length? [They prepare to play. Osr. Ay, my good lord.

King. Set me the stoups of wine upon that table.

If Hamlet give the first or second hit,
Or quit in answer of the third exchange, 280
Let all the battlements their ordnance fire;
The king shall drink to Hamlet's better breath;
And in the cup an union shall he throw,
Richer than that which four successive kings
In Denmark's crown have worn. Give me the
cups;

And let the kettle to the trumpet speak,
The trumpet to the cannoneer without,
The cannons to the heavens, the heavens to
earth,

'Now the king drinks to Hamlet.' Come, be-
gin:
And you, the judges, bear a wary eye.

Ham. Come on, sir.

Come, my lord. [They play.

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Ham. Come, for the third, Laertes: you but dally;

310

I pray you, pass with your best violence;
I am afeard you make a wanton of me.
Laer. Say you so? come on. [They play
Osr. Nothing, neither way.

Laer. Have at you now!

[Laertes wounds Hamlet; then in scuffling, they change rapiers, and Hamlet wounds Laertes.

King. Part them; they are incensed.
Ham. Nay, come, again. [The Queen falls.
Osr.
Look to the queen there, ho
Hor. They bleed on both sides. How is it,
my lord ?

Osr. How is't, Laertes?

Laer. Why, as a woodcock to mine own

springe, Osric;

I am justly kill'd with mine own treachery.
Ham. How does the queen?
King.
She swounds to see them bleed.
Queen. No, no, the drink, the drink,-0
my dear Hamlet, -
320
The drink, the drink! I am poison'd. [Dies.
Ham. O villany! Ho! let the door be

lock'd: Treachery! Seek it out.

Laer. It is here, Hamlet: Hamlet, thou art slain;

290

One. No.

Judgment.

Well; again.

No medicine in the world can do thee good;
In thee there is not half an hour of life;
The treacherous instrument is in thy hand,
Unbated and envenom'd: the foul practice
Hath turn'd itself on me; lo, here I lie,
Never to rise again: thy mother's poison'd:
I can no more: the king, the king's to blame.
Ham. The point!-envenom'd too!

329

King. Stay; give me drink.

Hamlet, this

[Stabs the King.

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Laer.

Ham.

Laer.

Ham.

Osr. A hit, a very palpable hit. Laer.

[Trumpets sound, and cannon shot off

Give him the cup.

within.

Ham. I'll play this bout first; set it by awhile.

Come. [They play.] Another hit; what say you?

Laer. A touch, a touch, I do confess.
King. Our son shall win.
Queen.

He's fat, and scant of breath. Here, Hamlet, take my napkin, rub thy brows;

The queen carouses to thy fortune, Hamlet.

Then, venom, to thy work.

All. Treason! treason!

King. O, yet defend me, friends; I am but hurt.

Ham. Here, thou incestuous, murderous,

damned Dane,

Drink off this potion. Is thy union here?
Follow my mother.
Laer.

339

[King dies. He is justly served ; It is a poison temper'd by himself. Exchange forgiveness with me, noble Hamlet: Mine and my father's death come not upon

thee,

Nor thine on me.

[Dies.

Ham. Heaven make thee free of it I follow thee,

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So bloodily hast struck?
First Amb.
The sight is dismal;
And our affairs from England come too late :
The ears are senseless that should give us
hearing,

To tell him his commandment is fulfill'd, 381
That Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead :
Where should we have our thanks ?
Hor.

Not from his mouth,
Had it the ability of life to thank you:
He never gave commandment for their death.
But since, so jump upon this bloody question,
You from the Polack wars, and you from Eng-

land,

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So tell him, with the occurrents, more and And from his mouth whose voice will draw on

me.

On Fortinbras: he has my dying voice;

Hor. Of that I shall have also cause to speak,

less,

more;

Which have solicited. The rest is silence.

But let this same be presently perform'd, Even while men's minds are wild; lest more

Hor. Now cracks a noble heart. Good night, sweet prince: 370

mischance

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[March within.

[Dies.

And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest! Why does the drum come hither?

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Bear Hamlet, like a soldier, to the stage;
For he was likely, had he been put on,

To have proved most royally and, for his

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(WRITTEN ABOUT 1602.)

INTRODUCTION.

Among the plays or Shakespeare mentioned by Meres in his Palladis Tamia (lbs) occurs the name of Love's Labour's Won. This has been identified by some critics with The Taming of the Shrew and by others with Much Ado About Nothing; but the weight of authority inclines to the opinion that under this title Meres spoke of the play known to us as All's Well that Ends Well. It seems not improbable that All's Well, as we possess it in the First Folio-and no earlier edition exists is a rehandling, very thoroughly carried out, of an earlier version of this comedy. Coleridge believed that two styles were discernible in it; and there is certainly a larger proportion of rhyming lines in it than in any other play written after the year 1600. It is, however, far from certain that any portion of the play is of early origin, and assigning conjecturally the date about 1602 as that of the completion of the whole, we may view it as belonging to the later group of the second cycle of Shakespeare's comedies, not so early, therefore, as Twelfth Night or As You Like It, and certainly earlier than Measure for Measure. The story of Helena and Bertram was found by Shakespeare in Paynter's Palace of Pleasure (1566), Paynter having translated it from the Decameron of Boccacio (Novel 9, Third day). Shakespeare added the characters of the Countess, Lafeu, Parolles, and the Clown. What interested the poet's imagination in Boccacio's story was evidently the position and person of the heroine. In Boccacio, Giletta, the physician's daughter, is inferior in rank to the young Count, Beltramo, but she is rich. Shakespeare's Helena is of humbler birth than his Bertram, and she is also poor. Yet poor, and comparatively low-born, she aspires to be the young Count's wife, she pursues him to Paris and wins him against his will. To show Helena thus reversing in a measure the ordinary relations of man and woman, and yet to show her neither selfseeking nor unwomanly, was the task which the dramatist attempted. On the one hand he insists much on Bertram's youth, and gives him the faults and vices of yeath, making the reader or spectator of the play feel that his hero has great need of such a finely-tempered, right-willed and loyal nature to stand by his side as that of Helena. On the other hand he shows us Helena's enthusiastic attachment to Bertram, her fears and cares on his behalf, her adhesion to him rather than to herself, when her husband seems to set their interests in opposition to one another, until we come to feel that the imperious need which makes Helena overstep social conventions is the need of perfect service to the man she loves. Bertram's beauty and courage must bear part of the blame for Helena's loving him better than he deserves. With the youthful desire for independence which makes him break away from her, she can intelligently sympathize. In the last Act she appearswhen he has entangled himself in falsehood and shame-to save him, and rescue him from his baser self. We feel that when he has at last really found Helena, he is safe, and all ends well. Parolles, the incarnation of bragging meanness, is the counterfoil of Helena-she, the doer of virtuous deeds; he, the utterer of vain and swelling words; she, all brave womanliness; he, too cowardly for manhood. Parolles has been compared to Falstaff, but they ought rather to be contrasted; for Sir John is a man of genius, with real wit and power of fascination, and no ridicule can destroy him, but the exposure of Parolles makes him dwindle into his native pitifulness. The Countess is a charming creation of Shakespeare; in no play, unless it be some of his latest romantic dramas, is old age made more beautiful and dignified.

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ACT I.

SCENE I. Rousillon. The COUNT's palace. Enter BERTRAM, the COUNTESS of ROUSILLON, HELENA, and LAFEU, all in black.

Count. In delivering my son from me, I bury a second husband.

Ber. And I in going, madam, weep c'er my father's death anew: but I must attend his majesty's command, to whom I am now in ward, evermore in subjection.

Laf. You shall find of the king a husband, madam; you, sir, a father: he that so generally is at all times good must of necessity hold his virtue to you; whose worthiness would stir it up where it wanted rather than lack it where there is such abundance.

Count. What hope is there of his majesty's amendment?

Laf. He hath abandoned his physicians, madam; under whose practices he hath persecuted time with hope, and finds no other advantage in the process but only the losing of hope by time.

Count. This young gentlewoman had a father,-0, that 'had'! how sad a passage 'tis!-whose skill was almost as great as his honesty; had it stretched so far, would have made nature immortal, and death should have play for lack of work. Would, for the king's sake, he were living! I think it would be the death of the king's disease.

Laf. How called you the man you speak of, madam?

Count. He was famous, sir, in his profession, and it was his great right to be so: Gerard de Narbon.

31

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few,

Do wrong to none: be able for thine enemy
Rather in power than use, and keep thy
friend
[lence,
Under thy own life's key: be check'd for si-
But never tax'd for speech. What heaven
more will,
[down,
That thee may furnish and my prayers pluck
Fall on thy head! Farewell, my lord;
'Tis an unseason'd courtier; good my lord, 80
Advise him.

Laf. He cannot want the best

That shall attend his love.
Count. Heaven bless him! Farewell, Bert-
[Exit.

tram.

Ber. [To Helena] the best wishes that can be forged in your thoughts be servants to you! Be comfortable to my mother, your mistress, and make much of her.

Laf. Farewell, pretty lady: you must hold the credit of your father.

[Exeunt Bertram and Lafeu. Hel. O, were that all! I think not on my 90

Laf. He was excellent indeed, madam: the king very lately spoke of him admiringly and mourningly: he was skilful enough to have lived still, if knowledge could be set up against | And these great tears grace his remembrance

mortality.

Ber. What is it, my good lord, the king languishes of ?

Laf. A fistula, my lord.

Ber. I heard not of it before.

Laf. I would it were not notorious. Was this gentlewoman the daughter of Gerard de Narbon ?

Count. His sole child, my lord, and bequeathed to my overlooking. I have those hopes of her good that her education promises; her dispositions she inherits, which makes fair gifts fairer; for where an unclean mind carries virtuous qualities, there commendations go with pity; they are virtues and traitors too; in her they are the better for their simpleness; she derives her honesty and achieves her good

ness.

Laf. Your commendations, madam, get

from her tears.

Count. 'Tis the best brine a maiden can season her praise in. The remembrance of her father never approaches her heart but the tyr

father;

more

Than those I shed for him. What was he like?
I have forgot him: my imagination
Carries no favor in't but Bertram's.
I am undone: there is no living, none,
If Bertram be away. 'Twere all one
That I should love a bright particular star
And think to wed it, he is so above me :
In his bright radiance and collateral light
Must I be comforted, not in his sphere.
The ambition in my love thus plagues itself :
The hind that would be mated by the lion
Must die for love. 'Twas pretty, though a
plague,

100

To see him every hour; to sit and draw
His arched brows, his hawking eye, his curls,
In our heart's table; heart too capable
Of every line and trick of his sweet favor:
But now he's gone, and my idolatrous fancy
Must sanctify his reliques. Who comes here?
Enter PAROLLES.

father takes all livelihood from [Aside] One that goes with him:

for his sake;

I love him 110

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Hel. But he assails; and our virginity, though valiant, in the defence yet is weak : unfold to us some warlike resistance.

Par. There is none: man, sitting down before you, will undermine you and blow you up.

130

Hel. Bless our poor virginity from underminers and blowers up! Is there no military policy, how virgins might blow up men?

Par. Virginity being blown down, man will quicklier be blown up: marry, in blowing him down again, with the breach yourselves made, you lose your city. It is not politic in the commonwealth of nature to preserve virginity. Loss of virginity is rational increase and there was never virgin got till virginity was first lost. That you were made of is metal to make virgins. Virginity by being once lost may be ten times found; by being ever kept, it is ever lost: 'tis too cold a companion; away with 't! Hel. I will stand for 't a little, though therefore I die a virgin.

Par. There's little can be said in 't; 'tis against the rule of nature. To speak on the part of virginity, is to accuse your mothers; which is most infallible disobedience. He that hangs himself is a virgin : virginity murders itself and should be buried in highways out of all sanctified limit, as a desperate offendress against nature. Virginity breeds mites, much like a cheese; consumes itself to the very paring, and so dies with feeding his own stomach. Besides, virginity is peevish, proud, idle, made of self-love, which is the most inhibited sin in the canon. Keep it not; you cannot choose but loose by't: out with 't! within ten year it will make itself ten, which is a goodly increase; and the principal itself not much the worse: away with 't!

Hel. How might one do, sir, to lose it to her own liking?

Par. Let me see: marry, ill, to like him that ne'er it likes. 'Tis a commodity will lose the gloss with lying; the longer kept, the less worth: off with 't while 'tis vendible; answer the time of request. Virginity, like an old courtier, wears her cap out of fashion: zichly suited, but insuitable: just like the

now.

brooch and the tooth-pick, which wear not Your date is better in your pie and your porridge than in your cheek; and your virginity, your old virginity, is like one of our French withered pears, it looks ill, it eats drily; marry, 'tis a withered pear; it was formerly better; marry, yet 'tis a withered pear: will you anything with it?

181

Hel. Not my virginity yet.... There shall your master have a thousand loves. A mother and a mistress and a friend, A phœnix, captain and an enemy, A guide a goddess, and a sovereign, A counsellor, a traitress, and a dear; His humble ambition, prond humility. His jarring concord, and his discord dulcet, His faith, his sweet disaster; with a world Of pretty, fond, adoptious christendoms, That blinking Cupid gossips. Now shall heI know not what he shall, God send him well! The court's a learning place, and he is onePar. What one, i' faith? Hel. That I wish well. 'Tis pityPar. What's pity?

Hel. That wishing well had not a body in't, Which might be felt; that we, the poorer born, Whose baser stars do shut us up in wishes, Might with effects of them follow our friends, And show what we alone must think, which Return us thanks.

never

Enter Page.

200

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rather.

[fight.

Par. Why think you so ?
Hel. You go so much backward when you
Par. That's for advantage.

Hel. So is running away, when fear proposes the safety; but the composition that your valor and fear makes in you is a virtue of a good wing, and I like the wear well. 219 Par. I am so full of businesses, I cannot answer thee acutely. I will return perfect courtier; in the which, my instruction shall serve to naturalize thee, so thou wilt be capable of a courtier's counsel and understand what advice shall thrust upon thee; else thou diest in thine unthankfulness, and thine ignorance makes thee away: Larewell. When thou hast leisure, say thy prayers; when thou hast none, remember thy friends; get thee a good husband, and use him as he uses thee; so, farewell. Exit. 230

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