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Hamlet
The last scene
HORATIO:
Y
ou will lose this wager, my
lord.
HAMLET:
I do not think
so: since he went into France, I have been in
continual practice: I shall
win at the
odds. But you wouldst not think how ill all's here
about my heart: but it is no
matter.
HORATIO:
Nay, good my
lord,--
HAMLET:
It is but
foolery; but it is such a kind of gain-giving, as
would perhaps trouble a woman.
HORATIO:
If your mind dislikes any thing, obey
it: I will forestall their repair hither, and say
you
are not fit.
HAMLET:
Not a
whit, we defy augury: there's a special providence
in the fall of a sparrow. If it be
now,
it is not to come; if it be not to come, it will
be now; if it be not now, yet it will
come: the readiness is all: since no
man has aught of what he leaves, what is it to
leave
betimes?
(Enter KING CLAUDIUS, QUEEN GERTRUDE,
LAERTES, Lords, OSRIC, and Attendants with
foils.)
KING CLAUDIUS:
Come, Hamlet, come, and take this hand
from me.
(
KING CLAUDIUS puts
LAERTES' hand into HAMLET's)
HAMLET
:
Give me
your pardon, sir: I've done you wrong. But pardon,
as you are a gentleman.
This presence
knows and you must have heard how I am punished
with sore distraction.
What I have done
might roughly awake your nature, honor. What I
here proclaimed was
madness. Hamlet
denies it. Who does it, then? His madness: if it
is so, Hamlet is of the
faction that is
wrong, his madness is poor Hamlet's enemy. Sir, in
this audience, Let my
disclaiming from
a purposed evil. Free me so far in your most
generous thoughts that I
have shot mine
arrow over the house and hurt my
brothe
r.
LAERTES:
I am satisfied in nature whose motive
in this case should stir me most. To my revenge:
but in my terms of honor, I stand
aloof. Until by some elder honored masters, I have
a
voice and precedent of peace. By
then, I do receive your offered love, like love,
and I
will not wrong it.
HAMLET:
I embrace it freely
and wish this brother's wager frankly play. Give
us the foils.
Come on!
LAERTES
:
Come,
one for me.
HAMLET
:
I'll be
your foil. Laertes: in my ignorance, your skill
shall be like a star in the darkest
night, stick fiery off
indeed.
LAERTES
:
Y
ou mock me, sir.
HAMLET
:
No, by
this hand.
KING CLAUDIUS
:
Give them the foils, young Osric.
Cousin Hamlet, you know the wager?
HAMLET
:
V
ery well, my lord.
Y
our grace has laid the odds
off the weaker side.
KING
CLAUDIUS
:
I do not fear it;
I have seen you both:
But since he is
better .we have therefore odds.
LAERTES
:
This is too heavy, let me see another.
HAMLET
:
This
likes me well. These foils have all a length?
(They prepare to play)
OSRIC
:
Y
es,my good lord.
KING CLAUDIUS
:
(Set the cups of wine upon that table.)
If Hamlet gives the first or second
hit, or quit in answer of the third exchange,
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 dunks to Hamlet.' Come,
begin: And you, the judges, bear a wary
eye.
HAMLET
:
Come on, sir.
LAERTES:
Come, my lord.
(They play)
HAMLET:
One.
LAERTES:
No.
HAMLET
:
Judgment.
OSRIC
:
A hit, a
very obvious hit.
LAERTES
:
Well; again.
KING
CLAUDIUS
:
Stay, give me
drink. Hamlet, this pearl is
yours,
Here’s
to your health.
(Trumpets sound Give him the cup )