eat happiness was given, and not only
in being restored to her dear parents; for she married Lysimachus, and
became a princess in the land where she had been sold as a slave.

HAMLET

Hamlet was the only son of the King of Denmark. He loved his father and
mother dearly--and was happy in the love of a sweet lady named Ophelia.
Her father, Polonius, was the King's Chamberlain.

While Hamlet was away studying at Wittenberg, his father died. Young
Hamlet hastened home in great grief to hear that a serpent had stung
the King, and that he was dead. The young Prince had loved his father so
tenderly that you may judge what he felt when he found that the Queen,
before yet the King had been laid in the ground a month, had determined
to marry again--and to marry the dead King's brother.

Hamlet refused to put off mourning for the wedding.

"It is not only the black I wear on my body," he said, "that proves my
loss. I wear mourning in my heart for my dead father. His son at least
remembers him, and grieves still."

Then said Claudius the King's brother, "This grief is unreasonable. Of
course you must sorrow at the loss of your father, but--"

"Ah," said Hamlet, bitterly, "I cannot in one little month forget those
I love."

With that the Queen and Claudius left him, to make merry over their
wedding, forgetting the poor good King who had been so kind to them
both.

And Hamlet, left alone, began to wonder and to question as to what he
ought to do. For he could not believe the story about the snake-bite.
It seemed to him all too plain that the wicked Claudius had killed the
King, so as to get the crown and marry the Queen. Yet he had no proof,
and could not accuse Claudius.

And while he was thus thinking came Horatio, a fellow student of his,
from Wittenberg.

"What brought you here?" asked Hamlet, when he had greeted his friend
kindly.

"I came, my lord, to see your father's funeral."

"I think it was to see my mother's wedding," said Hamlet, bitterly. "My
father! We shall not look upon his like again."

"My lord," answered Horatio, "I think I saw him yesternight."

Then, while Hamlet listened in surprise, Horatio told how he, with two
gentlemen of the guard, had seen the King's ghost on the battlements.
Hamlet went that night, and true enough, at midnight, the ghost of the
King, in the armor he had been wont to wear, appeared on the battlements
in the chill moonlight. Hamlet was a brave youth. Instead of