Fordo its own life. 'Twas of fome eftate; 8 Prieft. Her obfequies have been as far enlarg'd As we have warranty: Her death was doubtful; And, but that great command o'erfways the order, She fhould in ground unfanctify'd have lodg'd 'Till the laft trumpet; for charitable prayers, Shards, flints, and peebles, fhould be thrown on her : Yet here fhe is allow'd her virgin crants, Her 6 Fordo its own life,] To fordo, is to undo, to destroy. So, in Othello: this is the night "That either makes me or fordoes me quite." Again, in Acolafus, a comedy, 1529: -wolde to God it might be leful for me to fordoo myself, or to make an ende of me!" STEEVENS. 7-fome eftate:] Some perfon of high rank. JOHNSON. Strieft.] This Prieft in the old quarto is called Doctor. STEEVENS. 9 Her obfequies have been as far enlarg'd As we have warranty. Is there any allufion here to the coroner's warrant, directed to the minifter and church-wardens of a parish, and permitting the body of a perfon, who comes to an untimely end, to receive Chriftian burial ? WHALLEY. 1-allow'd her virgin rites,] The old quarto reads virgin crants, evidently corrupted from chants, which is the true word. A fpecific rather than a generic term being here required to answer to maiden frewments. WARBURTON. I have been informed by an anonymous correfpondent, that crants is the German word for garlands, and I fuppofe it was retained by us from the Saxons. To carry garlands before the bier of a maiden, and to hang them over her grave, is ftill the practice in rural parishes. Crants therefore was the original word, which the author, difcovering it to be provincial, and perhaps not understood, changed to a term more intelligible, but lets proper. Maiden rites give no certain or definite image. He might have put maiden wreaths, or maiden garlands, but he perhaps bestowed no thought upon it, and Her maiden ftrewments, and the bringing home ४ Of bell and burial, Laer. Muit there no more be done? Prieft. No more be done; We fhould profane the fervice of the dead, Laer. Lay her i' the earth ; And from her fair and unpolluted flesh When thou lieft howling. Ham. What, the fair Ophelia ! Queen. Sweets to the fweet: Farewel! [Scattering flowers. I hop'd, thou fhouldft have been my Hamlet's wife; I thought, thy bride-bed to have deck'd, sweet maid, And not have ftrew'd thy grave, Laer. O, treble woe Fall ten times treble on that curfed head, Whofe wicked deed thy moft ingenious fenfe Depriv'd thee of!-Hold off the earth a while, 'Till I have caught her once more in mine arms: [Laertes leaps into the grave Now pile your duft upon the quick and dead; 'Till of this flat a mountain you have made, To o'er-top old Pelion, or the skyish head Of blue Olympus. and neither genius nor practice will always fupply a hafty writer with the moit proper diction JoHNSON. In Minshew's Dictionary, fee Beades, where roofen krants means fertum rofarium; and fuch is the name of a character in this play. TOLLET. 2 Of bell and burial.] Burial, here, fignifies interment in confecrated ground. WARBURTON. 3 To fing a Requiem,] A Requiem is a mafs performed in Popish churches for the rest of the foul of a perfon deceased. The folio reads-ling fage requiem. STEEVENS. Ham Ham. advancing]. What is he, whofe grief Bears fuch an emphafis? whofe phrafe of forrow Conjures the vandring ftars, and makes them ftand Like wonder-wounded hearers? this is I, I pr'ythes, take thy fingers from my throat; Queen. Hamlet, Hamlet! Hor. Good my lord, be quiet. [The attendants part them. Ham. Why, I will fight with him upon this theme, Until my eye-lids will no longer wag. Queen. O my fon! what theme? Ham. I lov'd Ophelia; forty thousand brothers Could not with all their quantity of love Make up my fum.-What wilt thou do for her? Queen. For love of God, forbear him... Ham. Shew me what thou'lt do: Woo't weep? woo't fight? woo't faft? woo't tear thyfelf? 2 Woo't drink up Efil ? eat a crocodile? I'll 4 All, &c.] This is restored from the quartos. STEEVENS. 2 Woo't drink up Efilt? eat a crocodile?] This word has through all the editions been diftinguifhed by Italick characters, as if it were the proper name of fome river; and fo, I dare fay, all the editors have from time to time understood it to be. But then this must be fome river in Denmark; and there is none there fo called; nor is there any near itin name, that I know of but Yl, from which the province of Overy flel derives its title I'll do't.--Doft thou come here to whine? Be in the German Flanders. Befides, Hamlet is not propofing any impoffibilities to Laertes, as the drinking up a river would be but he rather feems to mean, Wilt thou refolve to do things the most fhocking and diftafeful to human nature; and, behold, I am as refolute. I am periuaded the port wrote: Wilt drink up Eifel ? eat a crocodile? i. c. Wilt thou fwallow down large draughts of vinegar? The propofition, indeed, is not very grand: but the doing it might be as diftafieful and unfavoury as eating the flesh of a crocodile. And now there is neither an in poflibility, nor an anticlimax : and the low nels of the idea is in fome meafure removed by the unTHEOBALD. common term. Hanmer has, Wilt drink up Nile? or eat a crocodile? Hamlet certainly meant (for he fays he will rant) to dare Laertes to attempt any thing, however difficult or unnatural; and might fafely promife to follow the example his antagonist was to fet, in draining the channel of a river, or trying his teeth on an animal, whofe fcales are fuppofed to be impenetrable. Had Shakipeare meant to make Hamlet fay-Wilt thou drink vinegar ? he probably would not have ufed the term drink up; which means, totally to exhaust; neither is that challenge very magnificent, which only provokes an adverfary to hazard a fit of the heart burn or the colic The commentator's el would ferve Hamlet's turn or mine. This river is twice mentioned by Stowe, p. 735. "It standeth a good diftance from the river Ifell, but hath a sconce on Iffel of incredible ftrength." Again, by Drayton, in the 24th Song of his Polyolbion: The one O'er fell's banks the ancient Saxons taught; "At Over Ifell reft, the other did apply:" And, in K. Richard II. a thought in part the fame, occurs, act ii. fc. 2 64 the tafk he undertakes "Is numb'ting fands, and drinking oceans dry." But in an old Latin account of Denmark and the neighbouring provinces, I find the names of feveral rivers Fittle differing from Efil, or Eifil, in fpelling or pronunciation. Such are the Effa, the Orfil, and fome others. The word, like many more, may indeed be irrecoverably corrupted; but, I must add, that no authors later than Chaucer or Skelton make ufe of evfel for vinegar: nor has Shakipcare employed it in any other of his plays. The poet might have written the Weifel, a contiderable river which falls into the Baltic ocean, and could not be unknown to any prince Be buried quick with her, and fo will I: Singeing his pate against the burning zone, 3 Queen. This is mere madness : And thus a while the fit will work on him; + When that her golden couplets are difelos'd, Ham. Hear you, fir; What is the reafon that you ufe me thus? prince of Denmark. STEEVENS. Mr. Steevens appears to have forgot our author's 111th fonnet "I will drinke "Potions of Eyfell." I believe it has not been obferved that many of these fonnets are addreffed to his beloved nephew William Harte. FARMER. I have fince observed, that Mande ville has the fame word. STEEVENS. 3 Queen.) This fpeech in the 1ft, and zd, folio is given to the king. MALONE. 4 When that her golden couplets-] We fhould read, E'er that for it is the patience of birds, during the time of incubation, that is here spoken of. The pigeon generally fits upon two eggs; and her young, when first disclosed, are covered with a yellow down. WARBURTON. Perhaps it should be, Ere yet Yet and that are cafily confounded. JOHNSON. To difclofe was anciently used for to batch. So, in the Booke of Huntyng, Harkyng, Fyfyng, &c. bl. 1. no date: First they ben eges; and after they ben diclofed, haukes; and commonly gofhaukes ben diclofed as fone as the choughes." To exclude is the technical term at prefent. I believe neither commentator has rightly explained this image. During three days after the pigeon has hatched her couplets (for the lays no more than two eggs,) the never quits her neft, except for a few moments in queft of a little food for herfelf; as all her young require in that early fiae, is to be kept warm, an office which the never entrufts to the male. STEVENS. Let |