is from noticing this trait that I find
something characteristic too in this coincidence of phrase: 'Alas, poor
ghost!' (I. v. 4), 'Alas, poor Yorick!' (V. i. 202).]

[Footnote 70: This letter, of course, was written before the time when
the action of the drama begins, for we know that Ophelia, after her
father's commands in I. iii., received no more letters (II. i. 109).]

[Footnote 71: 'Frailty, thy name is woman!' he had exclaimed in the
first soliloquy. Cf. what he says of his mother's act (III. iv. 40):

Such an act
That blurs the grace and blush of modesty,
Calls virtue hypocrite, takes off the rose
From the fair forehead of an innocent love
And sets a blister there.]

[Footnote 72: There are signs that Hamlet was haunted by the horrible
idea that he had been deceived in Ophelia as he had been in his mother;
that she was shallow and artificial, and even that what had seemed
simple and affectionate love might really have been something very
different. The grossness of his language at the play-scene, and some
lines in the Nunnery-scene, suggest this; and, considering the state of
his mind, there is nothing unnatural in his suffering from such a
suspicion. I do not suggest that he _believed_ in it, and in the
Nunnery-scene it is clear that his healthy perception of her innocence
is in conflict with it.

He seems to have divined that Polonius suspected him of dishonourable
intentions towards Ophelia; and there are also traces of the idea that
Polonius had been quite ready to let his daughter run the risk as long
as Hamlet was prosperous. But it is dangerous, of course, to lay stress
on inferences drawn from his conversations with Polonius.]

[Footnote 73: Many readers and critics imagine that Hamlet went straight
to Ophelia's room after his interview with the Ghost. But we have just
seen that on the contrary he tried to visit her and was repelled, and it
is absolutely certain that a long interval separates the events of I. v.
and II. i. They think also, of course, that Hamlet's visit to Ophelia
was the first announcement of his madness. But the text flatly
contradicts that idea also. Hamlet has for some time appeared totally
changed (II. ii. 1-10); the King is very uneasy at his 'transformation,'
and has sent for his school-fellows in order to discover its cause.
Polonius now, after Ophelia has told him of the interview, comes to
announce his discovery, not of