Ophelia me; we may call it herb of grace o' Sundays; O, you must wear your rue with a difference". Rue is well known for its symbolic meaning of regret, but the herb is also used to treat pain, bruises and has abortive qualities. In Act 4 Scene 7, Queen Gertrude reports that Ophelia had climbed into a willow tree ("There is a willow grows aslant the brook"), and that the branch had broken and dropped Ophelia into the brook, where she drowned. Gertrude says that Ophelia appeared "incapable of her own distress". Gertrude's announcement of Ophelia's death has been praised
Critical approaches to Hamlet not know the danger and thus was killed by the water, innocently. The burial of Ophelia reveals more of the religious doctrines in question through the Priest overseeing the funeral. Scholars have carefully outlined the "maimed rites" (as Hamlet calls them) carried out by the Priest. Many things are missing in her funeral that would normally make up a Christian burial. Laertes asks, "What ceremony else?" The priest answers that since her death was questionable, they will not give her the full funeral, although they will allow her "maiden strewments", or flowers which were thrown into her grave. In cases