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CHAPTER XI.
The forenoon and the afternoon fled rapidly away. The playhouse was already
full: our friend hastened to dress. It was not with the joy which it had given him
when he first essayed it, that he now put on the garb of Hamlet: he only dressed
that he might be in readiness. On his joining the women in the stage-room, they
unanimously cried that nothing sat upon him right; the fine feather stood awry;
the buckle of his belt did not fit: they began to slit, to sew, and piece together.
The music started: Philina still objected somewhat to his ruff; Aurelia had much
to say against his mantle. “Leave me alone, good people,” cried he: “this
negligence will make me liker Hamlet.” The women would not let him go, but
continued trimming him. The music ceased: the acting was begun. He looked at
himself in the glass, pressed his hat closer down upon his face, and retouched the
painting of his cheeks.
At this instant somebody came rushing in, and cried, “The Ghost! the Ghost!”
Wilhelm had not once had time all day to think of the Ghost, and whether it
would come or not. His anxiety on that head was at length removed, and now
some strange assistant was to be expected. The stage-manager came in, inquiring
after various matters: Wilhelm had not time to ask about the Ghost; he hastened
to present himself before the throne, where King and Queen, surrounded with
their court, were already glancing in all the splendors of royalty, and waiting till
the scene in front of them should be concluded. He caught the last words of
Horatio, who was speaking of the Ghost, in extreme confusion, and seemed to
have almost forgotten his part.
The intermediate curtain went aloft, and Hamlet saw the crowded house
before him. Horatio, having spoken his address, and been dismissed by the King,
pressed through to Hamlet; and, as if presenting himself to the Prince, he said,
“The Devil is in harness: he has put us all in fright.”
In the mean while, two men of large stature, in white cloaks and capouches,
were observed standing in the side-scenes. Our friend, in the distraction,
embarrassment, and hurry of the moment, had failed in the first soliloquy; at
least, such was his own opinion, though loud plaudits had attended his exit.
Accordingly, he made his next entrance in no pleasant mood, with the dreary
wintry feeling of dramatic condemnation. Yet he girded up his mind, and spoke
that appropriate passage on the “rouse and wassail,” the “heavy-headed revel” of
the Danes, with suitable indifference; he had, like the audience, in thinking of it,
quite forgotten the Ghost; and he started, in real terror, when Horatio cried out,
“Look, my lord! it comes!” He whirled violently round; and the tall, noble
figure, the low, inaudible tread, the light movement in the heavy-looking armor,
made such an impression on him, that he stood as if transformed to stone, and
could utter only in a half-voice his “Angels and ministers of grace defend us!”
He glared at the form, drew a deep breathing once or twice, and pronounced his
address to the Ghost in a manner so confused, so broken, so constrained, that the
highest art could not have hit the mark so well.
His translation of this passage now stood him in good stead. He had kept very
close to the original, in which the arrangement of the words appeared to him
expressive of a mind confounded, terrified, and seized with horror: —
“‘Be thou a spirit of health, or goblin damn’d, Bring with thee airs from
heaven, or blasts from hell, Be thy intents wicked, or charitable, Thou com’st in
such a questionable shape, That I will speak to thee: I’ll call thee Hamlet, King,
father, royal Dane: oh, answer me!’“
A deep effect was visible in the audience. The Ghost beckoned, the Prince
followed him amid the loudest plaudits.
The scene changed: and, when the two had re-appeared, the Ghost, on a
sudden, stopped, and turned round; by which means Hamlet came to be a little
too close upon it. With a longing curiosity, he looked in at the lowered visor; but
except two deep-lying eyes, and a well-formed nose, he could discern nothing.
Gazing timidly, he stood before the Ghost; but when the first tones issued from
the helmet, and a somewhat hoarse, yet deep and penetrating, voice, pronounced
the words, “I am thy father’s spirit,” Wilhelm, shuddering, started back some
paces; and the audience shuddered with him. Each imagined that he knew the
voice: Wilhelm thought he noticed in it some resemblance to his father’s. These
strange emotions and remembrances, the curiosity he felt about discovering his
secret friend, the anxiety about offending him, even the theatric impropriety of
coming too near him in the present situation, all this affected Wilhelm with
powerful and conflicting impulses. During the long speech of the Ghost, he
changed his place so frequently, he seemed so unsettled and perplexed, so
attentive and so absent-minded, that his acting caused a universal admiration, as
the Spirit caused a universal horror. The latter spoke with a feeling of
melancholy anger, rather than of sorrow; but of an anger spiritual, slow, and
inexhaustible. It was the mistemper of a noble soul, that is severed from all
earthly things, and yet devoted to unbounded woe. At last he vanished, but in a
curious manner; for a thin, gray, transparent gauze arose from the place of
descent, like a vapor, spread itself over him, and sank along with him.
Hamlet’s friends now entered, and swore upon the sword. Old Truepenny, in
the mean time, was so busy under ground, that, wherever they might take their
station, he was sure to call out right beneath them, “Swear!” and they started, as
if the soil had taken fire below them, and hastened to another spot. On each of
these occasions, too, a little flame pierced through at the place where they were
standing. The whole produced on the spectators a profound impression.
After this, the play proceeded calmly on its course: nothing failed; all
prospered; the audience manifested their contentment, and the actors seemed to
rise in heart and spirits every scene.
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