Enter HORATIO, MARCELLUS and Barnardo.

HORATIO        Hail to your lordship.

HAMLET                                 I am glad to see you well –

Horatio, or I do forget myself.

HORATIO        The same, my lord, and your poor servant ever.

HAMLET         Sir, my good friend, I’ll change that name with you.

And what make you from Wittenberg, Horatio?

Marcellus!

MARCELLUS   My good lord.

HAMLET         I am very glad to see you. [ to Barnardo] Good even, sir. –

But what in faith make you from Wittenberg?

HORATIO        A truant disposition, good my lord.             (1.2.160-168)

Back to the night watchers, then: enter Horatio, Marcellus, and Barnardo. Horatio’s formal, polite: hail to your lordship. Hamlet perhaps doesn’t recognise him at first—he’s been deeply immersed in his own thoughts, and besides, he’s at home in Denmark, he doesn’t expect to see his friend from Wittenberg—so his initial response is polite but distant, automatic: I am glad to see you well, a bland courtesy. Then: Horatio, or I do forget myself. It can be: have I got your name right? But more often in performance it’s delighted: HORATIO, friend, it’s you! You’re here! The same, my lord, and your poor servant ever. Yes, it’s me—and there can be a gesture of intimacy, yes, of course it’s me, you idiot, with an ironic tone, a little bow, on the formal your poor servant, now you’re the prince and I’m the visitor, we’re not just fellow students. Sir, my good friend, I’ll change that name with you: none of that, don’t be ridiculous; if you’re my servant then I’m your servant too. We’re friends, mates, comrades. Warmth, intimacy established. And what make you from Wittenberg, Horatio? What on earth are you doing here? But no time to get an answer, he’s noticed Marcellus—so he recognises at least some of the officers of the guard by name. My good lord, yes, all present and correct, SIR, replies Marcellus. I am very glad to see you: Hamlet’s also carefully polite with him, and brings Barnardo in too, although he doesn’t seem to know him: good even, sir. (So at least some of the day has passed since the encounter with the Ghost, not that it really matters.) But what in faith make you from Wittenberg? What are you doing here really, go on, tell me, Horatio? Horatio deflects a bit, tries to lighten the mood with a joke: a truant disposition, good my lord. Oh, you know, just bunking off for a bit. That’s all. (Not going to say that I’m worried sick about you, for instance.)