Everywhere in the first version we admire that sureness of touch which, without lengthy reflection, seems rather as if it had been poured out spontaneously, a vivifying and illuminating discovery. And whatever excellences the poet may have given to his later work, whatever deviations he employed, at least we find nowhere any important omission or alteration. Only here and there some rather coarse and naïve expressions are expunged. In closing we shall mention, however, a noticeable difference which concerns the costume of the Ghost. His first appearance, as we know, is in armor; he is armed from head to foot; his face is pale and sad, his glance wan and yet austere. In this guise he appears on the terrace, where the castle guard is marching up and down, and where he himself may often have drawn up his warriors. In the closet of the Queen, on the other hand, we find mother and son in the familiar dialogue, and finally these words:-- “Queen. Hamlet, you break my heart. Hamlet. O throw the worser part away and keep the better.” But then follows: “Enter the Ghost in his night-gowne.” Who, on first hearing this, does not find it for a moment incongruous? And yet if we grasp it, if we think it over, we shall find it right and proper. He should--indeed he must--appear first in armor, when he is entering the place where he has rallied his warriors, where he has encouraged them to noble deeds. And now we begin to be less confident of our conviction that it was suitable to see him enter the private closet of the queen in armor, too. How much more private, homelike, terrible, is his entrance here in the form in which he used to appear--in his house apparel, his night robe, harmless and unarmed--a guise which in itself stigmatizes in the most piteous way the treachery which befell him. Let the intelligent reader, as he may, picture this to himself. Let the stage-manager, convinced of this effect, produce it in this way, if Shakespeare is to be staged in his integrity. It is worth noting that the commentator Steevens has already criticized this scene. When Hamlet says:-- “My father in his habit as he lived!” this discerning critic adds this note:--“If the poet means by this expression that the father is appearing in his own house costume, he has either forgotten that at the beginning he introduced him in armor, or else it must be his intention in this latter appearance to alter his attire. Hamlet’s father, just as a warrior prince might do, does not always remain in armor, or sleep, as they tell of King Haakon, of Norway, with his battle-ax in his hand.”