| LORD POLONIUS | Give him this money and these notes, Reynaldo. |
| REYNALDO | I will, my lord. |
| LORD POLONIUS | You shall do marvellous wisely, good Reynaldo, Before you visit him, to make inquire Of his behavior. |
| REYNALDO | My lord, I did intend it. |
| LORD POLONIUS | Marry, well said; very well said. Look you, sir, Inquire me first what Danskers are in Paris; And how, and who, what means, and where they keep, What company, at what expense; and finding By this encompassment and drift of question That they do know my son, come you more nearer Than your particular demands will touch it: Take you, as ’twere, some distant knowledge of him; As thus, ‘I know his father and his friends, And in part him: ‘ do you mark this, Reynaldo? |
| REYNALDO | Ay, very well, my lord. |
| LORD POLONIUS | ‘And in part him; but’ you may say ‘not well: But, if’t be he I mean, he’s very wild; Addicted so and so:’ and there put on him What forgeries you please; marry, none so rank As may dishonour him; take heed of that; But, sir, such wanton, wild and usual slips As are companions noted and most known To youth and liberty. |
| REYNALDO | As gaming, my lord. |
| LORD POLONIUS | Ay, or drinking, fencing, swearing, quarrelling, Drabbing: you may go so far. |
| REYNALDO | My lord, that would dishonour him. |
| LORD POLONIUS | ‘Faith, no; as you may season it in the charge You must not put another scandal on him, That he is open to incontinency; That’s not my meaning: but breathe his faults so quaintly That they may seem the taints of liberty, The flash and outbreak of a fiery mind, A savageness in unreclaimed blood, Of general assault. |
| REYNALDO | But, my good lord,– |
| LORD POLONIUS | Wherefore should you do this? |
| REYNALDO | Ay, my lord, I would know that. |
| LORD POLONIUS | Marry, sir, here’s my drift; And I believe, it is a fetch of wit: You laying these slight sullies on my son, As ’twere a thing a little soil’d i’ the working, Mark you, Your party in converse, him you would sound, Having ever seen in the prenominate crimes The youth you breathe of guilty, be assured He closes with you in this consequence; ‘Good sir,’ or so, or ‘friend,’ or ‘gentleman,’ According to the phrase or the addition Of man and country. |
