_Ros._ (_correcting him_) The _whips_ and scorns. _Guild._ The whips and scorns, of course. (_Hamlet about to protest_) Don't tell us--let us guess--the whips of time? _Ham._ Oh, sirs, this interruption likes us not. I pray you give it up. _Ros._ My lord, we do. We cannot tell _who_ bears these whips and scorns! The third act opens with a passage in which the turns and rhythm of Shakespearean prose are happily imitated:-- _Enter_ King _and_ Queen, _meeting_ Rosencrantz. _Queen._ A fair good morrow to you, Rosencrantz. How march the Royal revels? _Ros._ Lamely, madam, lamely, like a one-legged duck. The Prince has discovered a strange play. He hath called it "A Right Reckoning Long Delayed." _Claud._ And of what fashion is the Prince's play? _Ros._ 'Tis an excellent poor tragedy, my Lord--a thing of shreds and patches welded into a form that hath mass without consistency, like an ill-built villa. _Queen._ But, sir, you should have used your best endeavours to wean his phantasy from such a play. _Ros._ Madam, I did, and with some success; for he now seeth the absurdity of its tragical catastrophes, and laughs at it as freely as we do. So, albeit the poor author had hoped to have drawn tears of sympathy, the Prince hath resolved to present it as a piece of pompous folly intended to excite no loftier emotion than laughter and surprise. After Poole published his "Hamlet,"[37] Shakespearean burlesque slumbered until 1834, when Maurice G. Dowling produced at Liverpool his "Othello Travestie." In this dull production, the Moor of Venice figures as "an independent nigger from the Republic of Hayti," and talks in "darkey" dialect (as does the same writer's Clifford in "Fair Rosamond"). Here, for example, is this Othello's address to the Senate (written and sung to the air of "Yankee Doodle"):-- [37] In "Hamlet Improved," by Colonel Colomb, a Mr. Mendall is supposed to have revised the last act of "Hamlet" in accordance with modern notions. Polonius is alive, having been only wounded by Hamlet; Hamlet's father also is alive, having only pretended to be dead. At the close, the King, Queen, Laertes, and Ophelia, all come to life again. Hamlet is represented by a stuffed figure, the actor chosen for the part having refused to enact it. Potent, grave, and rev'rend sir, Very noble massa-- When de maid a man prefer Den him no can pass her. Yes, it is most werry true, Him take dis old man's daughter; But no by spell, him promise you, But by fair means him caught her. 'Tis true she lub him berry much, 'Tis true dat off him carry her, And dat him lub for her is such, 'Tis werry true him marry her. All dis be true--and till him dead, Him lub her widout ending-- And dis, my massa, is the head And tail of him offending.