[Footnote 4: This supports the notion of Ophelia's ignorance of the espial. Polonius thinks she is about to disclose what has passed, and informs her of its needlessness. But it might well enough be taken as only an assurance of the success of their listening—that they had heard without difficulty.]
[Footnote 5: 'If she do not find him out': a comparable phrase, common at the time, was, Take me with you, meaning, Let me understand you.
Polonius, for his daughter's sake, and his own in her, begs for him another chance.]
[Footnote 6: 'in the insignificant, madness may roam the country, but in the great it must be watched.' The unmatcht of the Quarto might bear the meaning of countermatched.]
[Footnote 7: I should suggest this exhortation to the Players introduced with the express purpose of showing how absolutely sane Hamlet was, could I believe that Shakspere saw the least danger of Hamlet's pretence being mistaken for reality.]
[Footnote 8: He would have neither blundering nor emphasis such as might rouse too soon the king's suspicion, or turn it into certainty.]
[Footnote 9: 'liue'—lief]
[Footnote 10: 1st Q.:—
I'de rather heare a towne bull bellow,
Then such a fellow speake my lines.
Lines is a player-word still.]