All ready at a point, was setting forth:

Now we'll together; and the chance, of goodness,
Be like our warranted quarrel! Why are you silent?
Macd. Such welcome and unwelcome things at

once,

'Tis hard to reconcile.-See, who comes here?
Mal. My countryman; but yet I know him not.
Enter ROSSE.

Macd. My ever gentle cousin, welcome hither.
Mal. I know him now: Good Heaven, betimes re-

move

The means that make us strangers!

Rosse. Sir, Amen.

Macd. Stands Scotland where it did?

Rosse. Alas, poor country!

Almost afraid to know itself! It cannot

Be call'd our mother, but our grave; where nothing,
But who knows nothing, is once seen to smile;
Where sighs, and groans, and shrieks that rend the air,
Are made, not mark'd; where violent sorrow seems
A modern ecstacy: the dead man's knell

Is there scarce ask'd, for whom; and good men's lives

Expire before the flowers in their caps,

Dying, or ere they sicken.

Macd. O, relation,

Too nice, and yet too true!

Mal. What is the newest grief?

Rosse. That of an hour's age doth hiss the speaker;

Each minute teems a new one.

Macd. How does my wife?

Rosse. Why, well.

Macd. And all my children?
Rosse. Well too.

Macd. The tyrant has not batter'd at their peace? Rosse. No; they were all at peace, when I did leave them.

Macd. Be not a niggard of your speech; how goes it? Rosse. When I came hither to transport the tidings Which I have heavily borne, there ran a rumour Of many worthy fellows that were out; Which was to my belief witness'd the rather, For that I saw the tyrant's power a-foot: Now is your time of help; your eye in Scotland Would create soldiers, make our women fight, To doff their dire distresses.

Mal. Be it their comfort,

We are coming thither: gracious England hath
Lent us good Siward, and ten thousand men ;
An older, and a better soldier, none

That Christendom gives out.

Rosse. 'Would I could answer

This comfort with the like! But I have words,
That would be howl'd out in the desert air,
Where hearing should not latch them.
Macd. What concern they?

The general cause? or is it a fee-grief,
Due to some single breast?

Rosse. No mind, that's honest,

But in it shares some woe; though the main part
Pertains to you alone.

Macd. If it be mine,

Keep it not from me, quickly let me have it.

Rosse. Let not your ears despise my tongue for ever, Which shall possess them with the heaviest sound That ever yet they heard.

Macd. Hum! I guess at it.

Rosse. Your castle is surpris'd; your wife, and babes, Savagely slaughter'd: to relate the manner, Were, on the quarry of these murder'd deer, To add the death of you.

Mal. Merciful Heaven!

What, man! ne'er pull your hat upon your brows; Give sorrow words: the grief, that does not speak, Whispers the o'erfraught heart, and bids it break.

Macd. My children too?

Rosse. Wife, children, servants, all

That could be found.

Macd. And I must be from thence!

My wife kill'd too?

Rosse. I have said.

Mal. Be comforted:

Let's make us med'cines of our great revenge,
To cure this deadly grief.

Macd. He has no children,-All my pretty ones? Did you say, all?—Oh, hell-kite!—All? What, all my pretty chickens, and their dam, At one fell swoop?

Mal. Dispute it like a man.

Macd. I shall do so;

But I must also feel it as a man:

I cannot but remember such things were,
That were most precious to me.-Did Heaven look on,
And would not take their part? Sinful Macduff,
They were all struck for thee! naught that I am,
Not for their own demerits, but for mine,
Fell slaughter on their souls!

Mal. Be this the whetstone of your sword: let grief Convert to anger; blunt not the heart, enrage it.

Macd. O, I could play the woman with mine eyes, And braggart with my tongue!-But, gentle Heaven, Cut short all intermission; front to front Bring thou this fiend of Scotland, and myself; Within my sword's length set him; if he 'scape, Heaven forgive him too!

[Exeunt.

ACT THE FIFTH.

SCENE I.

LADY MACBETH's Rooms, in the Castle at Dunsinane.

Phy. I have two nights watch'd with you, but can perceive no truth in your report. When was it she last walk'd?

Gent. Since his majesty went into the field, I have seen her rise from her bed, throw her night-gown upon her, unlock her closet, take forth paper, fold it, write upon it, read it, afterwards seal it, and again return to bed; yet all this while in a most fast sleep.

Phy. What at any time have you heard her say? Gent. That, sir, which I will not report after her. Phy. You may, to me; and 'tis most meet you should.

Gent. Neither to you, nor any one; having no witness to confirm my speech.-Lo you, here she comes! This is her very guise; and, upon my life, fast asleep. Observe her; stand close.

Enter LADY MACBETH, with a Taper.

Phy. How came she by that light?

Gent. Why, it stood by her: she has light by her continually; 'tis her command.

Phy. You see her eyes are open.

Gent. Ay, but their sense is shut.

Phy. What is it she does now? Look, how she rubs her hands.

Gent. It is an accustom'd action with her, to seem

G

thus washing her hands; I have known her continue in this a quarter of an hour. Lady. Yet here's a spot. Phy. Hark, she speaks.

Lady. Out, damned spot! out, I say!-One; Two; Why, then 'tis time to do't:-Hell is murky!-Fie, my lord, fie! a soldier, and afeard? what need we fear who knows it, when none can call our power to account?—Yet who would have thought the old man to have had so much blood in him?

Phy. Do you mark that?

Lady. The Thane of Fife had a wife; where is she now? What, will these hands ne'er be clean! No more o'that, my lord, no more o'that: you mar all with this starting.

Phy. Go to, go to; you have known what you should not.

Gent. She has spoke what she should not, I am sure of that: Heaven knows what she has known.

Lady. Here's the smell of the blood still: all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. Oh! oh! oh!

Phy. What a sigh is there! The heart is sorely charg'd.

Gent. I would not have such a heart in my bosom, for the dignity of the whole body.

Lady. Wash your hands, put on your night-gown; look not so pale:I tell you yet again, Banquo's buried: he cannot come out of his grave.

Phy. Even so?

Lady. To bed, to bed; there's knocking at the gate. Come, come, come, come, give me your hand; what's done, cannot be undone: To bed, to bed, to bed. [Exit LADY MACBETH.

Phy. Will she now go to bed?
Gent. Directly.

Phy. More needs she the divine, than the physi

cian.