_Bernardo:_ Who's there?
_Francisco:_ Nay, answer me; stand, and unfold yourself.
_Bernardo:_ Long live the King!
_Francisco:_ Bernardo?
_Bernardo:_ He.
_Francisco:_ You come most carefully upon your hour.
_Bernardo:_ 'Tis now struck twelve; get thee to bed, Francisco.
_Francisco:_ For this relief much thanks; 'tis bitter cold....
And all that he tried to make others do with these lines, he himself did
with every line of his own part. Every word lived.
Some said: "Oh, Irving only makes Hamlet a love poem!" They said that, I
suppose, because in the Nunnery scene with Ophelia he was the lover
above the prince and the poet. With what passionate longing his hands
hovered over Ophelia at her words:
"Rich gifts wax poor when givers prove unkind."
His advice to the players was not advice. He did not speak it as an
actor. Nearly all Hamlets in that scene give away the fact that they are
actors, and not dilettanti of royal blood. Irving defined the way he
would have the players speak as an _order_, an instruction of the merit
of which he was regally sure. There was no patronizing flavor in his
acting here, not a touch of "I'll teach you how to do it.
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