conscience of Polonius, not for hers. The worst that he could say to her is said before the discovery of her father, and before her falsehood, and hence the discovery and the falsehood do not serve to explain it. Nothing can explain it satisfactorily, but Hamlet's conviction that she has transferred her affections to the King. After Hamlet has for some time been in the King's chamber, whether it is with or without the King's request, he meets Ophelia there, and he finds her apparently waiting for some one, and whiling away the time by reading. So it has been pre-arranged, and so it seems to him. Plainly she has not been waiting for him, for, though he himself has been waiting, she has not addressed him, and in the end he first accosts her. Indeed, it has been planned that their meeting shall seem to him to be "by accident," and, so seeming, the idea of her waiting for him is precluded. Hence to him, already suspicious of her integrity, she must have come to meet the King. But he has before this been convinced of such an intrigue, as above shown, and because of it has renounced her; and accordingly he petitions her lightly, if not ironically: "Nymph, in thy orisons Be all my sins remember'd." Their meeting is on the same day as, or certainly not more than one day later than, the speechless interview; but Ophelia ignores that, and ignores his petition also, and inquires into the state of his health "for this many a day,"--that is, since Polonius has separated them,--to which he responds gravely, and without show of affection. Thereupon ensues the following conversation: "_Oph_. My lord, I have remembrances of yours That I have longed long to redeliver; I pray you now receive them. "_Ham_. No, not I; I never gave you aught. "_Oph_. My honor'd lord, you know right well you did, And with them words of so sweet breath compos'd As made the things more rich. Their perfume lost, Take them again; for to the noble mind Rich gifts wax poor when givers prove unkind."