FIRST CLOWN. [_Sings._] But age with his stealing steps Hath claw’d me in his clutch, And hath shipp’d me into the land, As if I had never been such.

[_Throws up a skull._]

HAMLET. That skull had a tongue in it, and could sing once. How the knave jowls it to th’ ground, as if ’twere Cain’s jawbone, that did the first murder! This might be the pate of a politician which this ass now o’er-offices, one that would circumvent God, might it not?

HORATIO. It might, my lord.

HAMLET. Or of a courtier, which could say ‘Good morrow, sweet lord! How dost thou, good lord?’ This might be my lord such-a-one, that praised my lord such-a-one’s horse when he meant to beg it, might it not?

HORATIO. Ay, my lord.