"For God's love, let me hear," added McCrab—"I hope that's apt too."
"If," said Mr. Stubbs, looking exceedingly grave, "if, I say, we take the first soliloquy of Hamlet—almost the first words he utters—we shall find a striking allusion to his habit of body; and not only shall we be struck by the allusion, but, I contend, the whole force and meaning of the passage are lost, unless the speaker can lay his hands upon a goodly paunch, as he exclaims,
'Oh! that this too too solid flesh would melt.
Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew.'
We are not to suppose Hamlet speaks metaphorically, but physically; and his corporeal appearance should be an illustration of his words. He is already weary of the world—he wishes to die—but 'the Everlasting has fixed his canon against self-slaughter,' and, therefore, he prays for natural dissolution, by any wasting disease, which may 'thaw' and dissolve his 'too too solid flesh.' This, perhaps, you will consider merely conjectural criticism: plausible, but not demonstrative. I own it has a higher character in my eyes; and, unless I am greatly mistaken, even the ghost of his own father glances at his adipose tendency, when he says,
'I find thee apt
But duller shouldst thou be than the fat weed
That roots itself in ease on Lethe's wharf,
Wouldst thou not stir in this.'
That is, according to my reading, 'fat as thou art, thou wouldst be duller than the fat weed of Lethe if you did not bestir yourself in this business.' Observe, too, with what propriety Shakspeare has here employed the word 'stir,' it being a well-known fact that corpulent persons have a strong disinclination to locomotion. And Hamlet himself, (in his interview with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern,) makes a pointed allusion to the indolence and lethargy which so commonly accompany obesity. 'I have of late,' he says, 'but wherefore I know not, lost all my mirth, foregone all custom of exercises, and, indeed, it goes so heavily with my disposition,' &c. &c. Now what is this, I would fain know, if it be not the natural complaint of a man suffering under the oppression of too much flesh? or, as he afterwards expresses it, with another allusion to his fatness, 'to grunt and sweat, under a weary life?' You have quoted the language of Ophelia in support of the common notions with regard to the personation of this character; but you forget the remarkable expression she uses when describing to her father the unexpected visit of 'Lord Hamlet,' while she was 'sewing in her closet: