_First Play._ What speech, my good lord?[894][895] _Ham._ I heard thee speak me a speech once, but it was never acted; or, if it was, not above once; for the play, I remember, 415 pleased not the million; 'twas caviare to the general:[896] but it was--as I received it, and others, whose judgements[897] in such matters cried in the top of mine--an excellent play, well digested in the scenes, set down with as much modesty as cunning. I remember, one said there were no sallets in[898] 420 the lines to make the matter savoury, nor no matter in the phrase that might indict the author of affection; but called[899] it an honest method, as wholesome as sweet, and by very[900] much more handsome than fine. One speech in it I chiefly[900][901] loved: 'twas Æneas' tale to Dido; and thereabout of it especially,[902] 425 where he speaks of Priam's slaughter: if it live in[903] your memory, begin at this line; let me see, let me see; 'The rugged Pyrrhus, like th' Hyrcanian beast,'--[904] It is not so: it begins with 'Pyrrhus.'[905] 'The rugged Pyrrhus, he whose sable arms, 430 Black as his purpose, did the night resemble[906] When he lay couched in the ominous horse,[907] Hath now this dread and black complexion smear'd[908] With heraldry more dismal: head to foot[909] Now is he total gules; horridly trick'd[910] 435 With blood of fathers, mothers, daughters, sons, Baked and impasted with the parching streets,[911] That lend a tyrannous and a damned light[912][913] To their lord's murder: roasted in wrath and fire,[913][914] And thus o'er-sized with coagulate gore,[915] 440 With eyes like carbuncles, the hellish Pyrrhus[916] Old grandsire Priam seeks.' So, proceed you.[917] _Pol_ 'Fore God, my lord, well spoken, with good accent and good discretion. 445