Enter FORTINBRAS, a Captain, and Soldiers, marching
PRINCE FORTINBRAS
1 Go, captain, from me greet the Danish king; 2 Tell him that, by his licence, Fortinbras 3 Craves the conveyance of a promised march 4 Over his kingdom. You know the rendezvous. 5 If that his majesty would aught with us, 6 We shall express our duty in his eye; 7 And let him know so.
Captain
8 I will do't, my lord.
PRINCE FORTINBRAS
9 Go softly on.
Exeunt FORTINBRAS and Soldiers
Enter HAMLET, ROSENCRANTZ, GUILDENSTERN, and others
HAMLET
10 Good sir, whose powers are these?
Captain
11 They are of Norway, sir.
HAMLET
12 How purposed, sir, I pray you?
Captain
13 Against some part of Poland.
HAMLET
14 Who commands them, sir?
Captain
15 The nephews to old Norway, Fortinbras.
HAMLET
16 Goes it against the main of Poland, sir, 17 Or for some frontier?
Captain
18 Truly to speak, and with no addition, 19 We go to gain a little patch of ground 20 That hath in it no profit but the name. 21 To pay five ducats, five, I would not farm it; 22 Nor will it yield to Norway or the Pole 23 A ranker rate, should it be sold in fee.
HAMLET
24 Why, then the Polack never will defend it.
Captain
25 Yes, it is already garrison'd.
HAMLET
26 Two thousand souls and twenty thousand ducats 27 Will not debate the question of this straw: 28 This is the imposthume of much wealth and peace, 29 That inward breaks, and shows no cause without 30 Why the man dies. I humbly thank you, sir.
Captain
31 God be wi' you, sir.
Exit
ROSENCRANTZ
32 Wilt please you go, my lord?
HAMLET
33 I'll be with you straight go a little before. Exeunt all except HAMLET 34 How all occasions do inform against me, 35 And spur my dull revenge! What is a man, 36 If his chief good and market of his time 37 Be but to sleep and feed? a beast, no more. 38 Sure, he that made us with such large discourse, 39 Looking before and after, gave us not 40 That capability and god-like reason 41 To fust in us unused. Now, whether it be 42 Bestial oblivion, or some craven scruple 43 Of thinking too precisely on the event, 44 A thought which, quarter'd, hath but one part wisdom 45 And ever three parts coward, I do not know 46 Why yet I live to say 'This thing's to do;' 47 Sith I have cause and will and strength and means 48 To do't. Examples gross as earth exhort me: 49 Witness this army of such mass and charge 50 Led by a delicate and tender prince, 51 Whose spirit with divine ambition puff'd 52 Makes mouths at the invisible event, 53 Exposing what is mortal and unsure 54 To all that fortune, death and danger dare, 55 Even for an egg-shell. Rightly to be great 56 Is not to stir without great argument, 57 But greatly to find quarrel in a straw 58 When honour's at the stake. How stand I then, 59 That have a father kill'd, a mother stain'd, 60 Excitements of my reason and my blood, 61 And let all sleep? while, to my shame, I see 62 The imminent death of twenty thousand men, 63 That, for a fantasy and trick of fame, 64 Go to their graves like beds, fight for a plot 65 Whereon the numbers cannot try the cause, 66 Which is not tomb enough and continent 67 To hide the slain? O, from this time forth, 68 My thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth!