CLAUDIUS Let’s further think of this,
Weigh what convenience both of time and means
May fit us to our shape. If this should fail
And that our drift look through our bad performance
’Twere better not essayed. Therefore this project
Should have a back or second that might hold
If this did blast in proof. Soft, let me see:
We’ll make a solemn wager on your cunnings –
I ha’t!
When in your motion you are hot and dry
(As make your bouts more violent to that end)
And that he calls for drink, I’ll have preferred him
A chalice for the nonce, whereon but sipping,
If he by chance escape your venomed stuck,
Our purpose may hold there. (4.7.146-160)
Claudius is really into this now, thinking through all possible contingencies; partly this is his practical cunning, but it’s also further creating a sense of team with Laertes, that he and Laertes would be in this together, rather than Laertes just being the agent of an arm’s-length assassination. Let’s further think of this—keep thinking it through, work-shopping it—weigh what convenience both of time and means may fit us to our shape. We need to get all the details right, when this takes place, how it’s undertaken. Because if this should fail and that our drift look through our bad performance ’twere better not essayed. We’ll only get one shot; if it doesn’t go according to plan and exposes us, it’d be better not to have tried at all. We need a back-up plan, a second line of attack in case the first one (the sharpened rapier, the poisoned tip) fails, blows up in our faces: therefore this project should have a back or second that might hold if this did blast in proof. Soft, let me see—and there could be a gesture of shushing to Laertes, protesting that of course he’ll get it right first time—but it’s more that Claudius, like his nephew, likes to think things through. Hmmmm, hmmmm. We’ll make a solemn wager on your cunnings, have bets on your skill, yes, I’ve got that bit (he’s going over the plan, thinking out loud).
I ha’t! Got it! Yes! When in your motion you are hot and dry (as make your bouts more violent to that end)—when you’re hot, thirsty, out of breath in the contest, and you’ll need to make your attacks as physical as possible, to accomplish that, and that he calls for drink—when Hamlet (not named, of course) asks for a break, a drink—I’ll have preferred him a chalice for the nonce, a drink standing by for exactly that purpose, that occasion (chalice can just mean cup, but here, like unction, it strikes a particularly sacrilegious note), whereon but sipping—the least drop—if he by chance escape your venomed stuck, our purpose may hold there. Yes; if you don’t manage to scratch him with your poisoned blade, then that’ll do it. Crude but effective.
