Happy Ending in the Grave Scene
I'm feeling more cheerful today and I've thought of a more upbeat interpretation than my "Elegy to a Kissing Carrion."
Perhaps while in the grave Hamlet returned his father's ghost to the dust where it belonged, to the "treasure in the womb of earth" for which he had walked the night. And perhaps, while in her grave, Laertes returned the key of her memory to Ophelia's ghost so that she could ascend to heaven with her chaste treasure (which was really her soul rather than her "secret parts") in tact.
Then, with his mother close by, Hamlet was re-born from the "womb of earth" with his true self restored.
As Gertrude said (while Hamlet was ranting in the grave):
This is mere madness:
And thus awhile the fit will work on him;
Anon, as patient as the female dove,
When that her golden couplets are disclosed,
His silence will sit drooping.
Hamlet's last words: "The rest is silence." He was finally free from the voice of Denmark.
(There's still more than a little sexual confusion in this interpretation - Hamlet laying eggs while being reborn from a womb of earth, which was also the bride-bed and final resting place of his bride-not-to-be's chaste treasure, while his mother stood by. And that's a very crowded grave, with Ophelia and Hamlet and Laertes and Hamlet's father's ghost and Polonius' ghost, not to mention Yorick and the lawyer and the "great buyer of land." Its a plot of land not tomb and continent to hide the slain.)
King Hamlet / Ophelia link is only metaphorical
I think "extorted treasure in the womb of earth" is a metaphor for all the earthly possessions and powers that King Hamlet had acquired (and especially the land he won from Fortinbras Sr, which made him the "question of these wars)." Ophelia's grave, dug by the gravedigger hired on the day King Hamlet won the land from Fortinbras, is a metaphor for that land. "Womb of earth" is also evoked by the fact that Hamlet was born on that same day. And "not tomb and continent to hide the slain" comes naturally to mind when the gravedigger is unearthing multiple prior tenants of that grave.
I don't think King Hamlet had any literal designs on Ophelia. But Ophelia might be in part an allegory for "filial duty," which is a major theme of the play. So her grave is an allegory for both the death caused by filial duty and for the death of filial duty, as Hamlet finally shakes off his father's spirit when he exits Ophelia's grave.
I think one meaning of "dram of eale" is a pun on "drama filial" or "Drama Ophelia." The whole play is a filial drama about Hamlet and Ophelia being untrue to themselves because filial duty leads them to follow their fathers' values instead of their own. The Mousetrap is Hamlet's filial drama, endangering his own life in order to fulfill his father's commandment.
Thus "extorted treasure in the womb of earth" and "chaste treasure" might be an intentional link between King Hamlet and Ophelia, but only in a metaphorical and allegorical sense.
(That grave is not only crowded with old bones and new mourners - it's also crowded with symbols and metaphors.)
- Ray