Hamlet (3,2) Such Bitter Business

[monk222]

Hamlet’s elation over baring naked the conscience of the king is indeed short-lived, as Rosencrantz and Guildenstern return, and I do not think that Hamlet has any more doubts about where they stand. They are the king’s men and not his childhood buddies, and they are come like hunting dogs after the king’s prey.

GUILDENSTERN

Good my lord, vouchsafe me a word with you.

HAMLET

Sir, a whole history.



GUILDENSTERN

The king, sir,--

HAMLET

Ay, sir, what of him?

GUILDENSTERN

Is in his retirement marvellous distempered.

HAMLET

With drink, sir?

GUILDENSTERN

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.

GUILDENSTERN

Good my lord, put your discourse into some frame and
start not so wildly from my affair.

HAMLET

I am tame, sir: pronounce.

GUILDENSTERN

The queen, your mother, in most great affliction of
spirit, hath sent me to you.

HAMLET

You are welcome.

GUILDENSTERN

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.

GUILDENSTERN

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,--

ROSENCRANTZ

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.

ROSENCRANTZ

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?

And, here, we get a resonant echo from the earlier exchange between Hamlet and Ophelia, when it was she who was wondering whether he ever loved her. We see how Hamlet is cast adrift from his relations of old, having only Horatio’s friendship now.

ROSENCRANTZ

My lord, you once did love me.

HAMLET

So I do still, by these pickers and stealers.

ROSENCRANTZ

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.

ROSENCRANTZ

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 Players with recorders]

While Hamlet and Rosencrantz were chatting, it seems that Guildenstern was positioning himself behind Hamlet, as if to help Rosencrantz trap and carry off their quarry, as if they literally are on a hunt, and it is suggested that Horatio gestures a warning to Hamlet, and now matters become somewhat more aggressive. The recorders inspire Hamlet’s wit.

HAMLET

O, the recorders! let me see one. To withdraw with
you:--why do you go about to recover the wind of me,
as if you would drive me into a toil?

GUILDENSTERN

O, my lord, if my duty be too bold, my love is too
unmannerly.

HAMLET
I do not well understand that. Will you play upon
this pipe?

GUILDENSTERN

My lord, I cannot.

HAMLET

I pray you.

GUILDENSTERN

Believe me, I cannot.

HAMLET

I do beseech you.

GUILDENSTERN

I know no touch of it, my lord.

HAMLET

'Tis as easy as lying: govern these ventages with
your fingers and thumb, give it breath with your
mouth, and it will discourse most eloquent music.
Look you, these are the stops.

GUILDENSTERN

But these cannot I command to any utterance of
harmony; I have not the skill.

HAMLET

Why, look you now, how unworthy a thing you make of
me! You would play upon me; you would seem to know
my stops; you would pluck out the heart of my
mystery; you would sound me from my lowest note to
the top of my compass: and there is much music,
excellent voice, in this little organ; yet cannot
you make it speak. '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.

This tense situation is saved by Polonius’s arrival to add more haste to Hamlet to see his mother. Hamlet plays around with Polonius as well, this being the scene where the prince gets Polonius to follow his mad lead about a cloud looking like a weasel and then a whale and so on, as Hamlet is tired of suffering these fools:

There is such utter weariness, there is such scorn of this miserable, dishonest, luxurious court, there is such despair of a noble nature set upon by ignoble natures, there is such impatience of this last crafty, unscrupulous, lying courtier.... [Quoted by Marvin Rosenberg]

Hamlet assures them that he will presently see his mother and bids everyone to leave, closing the scene by composing himself in a soliloquy to the audience, bespeaking his readiness to do justice, but calming himself in order to deal with his mother first.

Tis now the very witching time of night,
When churchyards yawn and hell itself breathes out
Contagion to this world: now could I drink hot blood,
And do such bitter business as the day
Would quake to look on. 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!