Something of this kind happened once in the case of a certain Marcellus.

Hamlet demands of Horatio concerning the ghost of "buried Denmark:" "Stayed it long ?" Horatio answers: "While one with moderate haste might tell a hundred." Marcellus should add: "Longer, longer." But the Marcellus of this special occasion was mute.

"Longer, longer," whispered the prompter.

Then out spoke Marcellus, to the consternation of his associates: "Well, say two hundred!" So prosaic a Marcellus is only to be matched by that literal Guildenstern who, when besought by Hamlet to "Play upon this pipe," was so moved by the urgent manner of the tragedian, that he actually made the attempt, seizing the instrument, and evoking from it most eccentric sounds.
It is curious how many of the incidents and details of representation escape the notice of the audience.

And here we are referring less to merits than to mischances.