Page:Wit, humor, and Shakspeare. Twelve essays (IA cu31924013161223).pdf/353

 *turned; and the old plotter has arranged this for the King to witness. Filial deference cannot stoop lower than this sad enforcement; but her whole life has been the non-assertion of a will. She,

"Of ladies most deject and wretched, That suck'd the honey of his music vows,"

and who longed to

"Bring him to his wonted way again,"

is still so docile, so subject to the pervading influence of her father's house, that she declares to Hamlet she has wished for a long time to redeliver his gifts and letters, "of so sweet breath composed." And when we hear her say,

"To the noble mind, Rich gifts wax poor, when givers prove unkind,"

we have a glimpse of the interview that was brought on by him when, as she was sewing in her chamber, he forced himself into her presence, in disordered dress, and with a manner as if he would dismiss her from his heart. It wounded and distressed her:—

"Oh, woe is me! To have seen what I have seen, see what I see!"

It need not seem unnatural that the fair girl is so obsequious to the father's will. We find no mother in the house: she is gone, and the only daughter and only son transfer their love of a mother to the bereaved father, and cling to him with a devotion that includes a special submissiveness. They live very much withdrawn into themselves, and mutually dependent. The gentle