Enter Fortinbras and Forces marching.

FORTINBRAS. Go, Captain, from me greet the Danish king. Tell him that by his license, Fortinbras Craves the conveyance of a promis’d march Over his kingdom. You know the rendezvous. If that his Majesty would aught with us, We shall express our duty in his eye; And let him know so.

CAPTAIN. I will do’t, my lord.

FORTINBRAS. Go softly on.

[Exeunt all but the Captain.]

Enter Hamlet, Rosencrantz, Guildenstern &c.

HAMLET. Good sir, whose powers are these?

CAPTAIN. They are of Norway, sir.

HAMLET. How purpos’d, sir, I pray you?

CAPTAIN. Against some part of Poland.

HAMLET. Who commands them, sir?

CAPTAIN. The nephew to old Norway, Fortinbras.

HAMLET. Goes it against the main of Poland, sir, Or for some frontier?

CAPTAIN. Truly to speak, and with no addition, We go to gain a little patch of ground That hath in it no profit but the name. To pay five ducats, five, I would not farm it; Nor will it yield to Norway or the Pole A ranker rate, should it be sold in fee.

HAMLET. Why, then the Polack never will defend it.

CAPTAIN. Yes, it is already garrison’d.

HAMLET. Two thousand souls and twenty thousand ducats Will not debate the question of this straw! This is th’imposthume of much wealth and peace, That inward breaks, and shows no cause without Why the man dies. I humbly thank you, sir.

CAPTAIN. God b’ wi’ you, sir.

[Exit.]

ROSENCRANTZ. Will’t please you go, my lord?

HAMLET. I’ll be with you straight. Go a little before.

[Exeunt all but Hamlet.]

How all occasions do inform against me, And spur my dull revenge. What is a man If his chief good and market of his time Be but to sleep and feed? A beast, no more. Sure he that made us with such large discourse, Looking before and after, gave us not That capability and godlike reason To fust in us unus’d. Now whether it be Bestial oblivion, or some craven scruple Of thinking too precisely on th’event,— A thought which, quarter’d, hath but one part wisdom And ever three parts coward,—I do not know Why yet I live to say this thing’s to do, Sith I have cause, and will, and strength, and means To do’t. Examples gross as earth exhort me, Witness this army of such mass and charge, Led by a delicate and tender prince, Whose spirit, with divine ambition puff’d, Makes mouths at the invisible event, Exposing what is mortal and unsure To all that fortune, death, and danger dare, Even for an eggshell. Rightly to be great Is not to stir without great argument, But greatly to find quarrel in a straw When honour’s at the stake. How stand I then, That have a father kill’d, a mother stain’d, Excitements of my reason and my blood, And let all sleep, while to my shame I see The imminent death of twenty thousand men That, for a fantasy and trick of fame, Go to their graves like beds, fight for a plot Whereon the numbers cannot try the cause, Which is not tomb enough and continent To hide the slain? O, from this time forth, My thoughts be bloody or be nothing worth.

[Exit.]