Page:Hamlet (1917) Yale.djvu/74

62 And can say nothing; no, not for a king,

Upon whose property and most dear life

A damn'd defeat was made. Am I a coward?

Who calls me villain? breaks my pate across?

Plucks off my beard and blows it in my face?

Tweaks me by the nose? gives me the lie i' the throat,

As deep as to the lungs? Who does me this?

Ha!

Swounds, I should take it, for it cannot be

But I am pigeon-liver'd, and lack gall

To make oppression bitter, or ere this

I should have fatted all the region kites

With this slave's offal. Bloody, bawdy villain!

Remorseless, treacherous, lecherous, kindless villain!

O! vengeance!

Why, what an ass am I! This is most brave

That I, the son of a dear [father] murder'd,

Prompted to my revenge by heaven and hell,

Must, like a whore, unpack my heart with words,

And fall a-cursing, like a very drab,

A scullion!

Fie upon 't! foh! About, my brain! I have heard,

That guilty creatures sitting at a play

Have by the very cunning of the scene

Been struck so to the soul that presently

They have proclaim'd their malefactions;

For murder, though it have no tongue, will speak

With most miraculous organ. I'll have these players

 605 property; cf. n.

606 defeat: destruction

612 Swounds: God's wounds

613 But: but that

pigeon-liver'd: meek; cf. n.

614 make oppression bitter: make me feel the bitterness of oppression

615 region kites: kites of the air

617 kindless: unnatural

623 drab: street woman

624 scullion: kitchen servant

625 About, my brain: bestir yourself, my brain, or, my brain, on another tack

