one, would have been a most natural feeling .in an honorable man at any period of the world's history, and indicated in him a sound ness of moral as well as of mental insight. Polonius rasped the prince's sensitive temperament, and aroused his special dislike both by acting as a spy upon him and by in terfering between him and Ophelia. The irritating presence of the meddling, foolish old man, whose nature was in itself so an tagonistic to his own, made Hamlet feel as if he must be on the defensive, and at the same time he yielded to the temptation to take an unfair advantage. He turned the battery of his wit upon the unfortunate, un suspecting courtier who was further misled by the puzzling, yet pertinent speeches which even his dull wits comprehended were the result of madness with a method in it. Rosencrantz and Guilclenstcrn furnished food for Hamlet's newly acquired bitterness towards men, when he discovered they came under the guise of friendship to act as spies upon him, and thus serve as tools in the hands of Claudius. He protected himself with half-truths from them also and confused them with equivocal expressions. His actions in regard to Ophelia, wherein he seems the maddest, are not wholly inex plicable on the ground of sanity. Two pecu liar traits of his disposition, of which he elsewhere and everywhere gave proof, are brought out here perhaps more strongly than at any other time; that is, his generous overestimate of those he loved, and what, for want of a better name, may be called an alertness of the emotions. His love for Ophelia had not become a ruling passion, yet we may believe it was a sincere admiration which included perfect trust. He could not expect anything else from her than loving sympathy, if not a complete comprehension of his terrible trouble. This expectation was disappointed; he met, at first, repulsion of his honorable intentions, later, perplexity and pity only. Thus was his cup of bitterness filled to overflowing. Possibly it was in the
first shock of his disappointment that he rushed impulsively into Ophelia's presence, regardless of disarranged garments, and as she expressed it "Falls to such perusal of my face As he would draw it."
He seemed to desire to penetrate her inmost thought, to measure her heart and soul. Her frightened but otherwise irresponsive face did not arouse his compassion for her; his sigh " so piteous and profound " was for him self. This feeling, that she too had proved unworthy and faithless, rushed over him when he next encountered her, and he was goaded to a certain fierceness of temper and harsh ness of speech not altogether incompatible with the depth of his wound. He readily saw in her action, or attitude, a confirmation of his idea of the fickleness of woman which has followed his loss of faith in his mother. His strongly expressed contempt for love and niarriage, as well as his accusations against himself, might have arisen partly from a sense of unfaithfulness in himself to love as an absorbing passion. But his speeches in this interview with Ophelia, strange as they appear, had too much pertinence, and exhibit too plainly their underlying meaning, to be called insane. His conduct at her grave is less easily accounted for. His al ready shaken nerves are naturally disturbed to the point of entire momentary loss of selfcontrol by the news of her death brought to him so suddenly and under such strange cir cumstances. His imagination quickly pic tured the dead girl in all her living loveliness and womanly sweetness, while his memory sped back to his harsh dealing with her and to the murder of her father, occurrences which he might naturally infer had much to do with her death. When his emotional nature thus instantly gained the ascendancy, remorse and despair demanded of him some outward expression; and while Laertes' pas sionate manifestation of grief irritated him, it furnished him an example; and in his fiercely
