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Lady. What's the business,

That fuch a hideous trumpet calls to parley
The fleepers of the house? ° Speak, speak.
Macd. O gentle lady,

'Tis not for you to hear what I can speak:

The repetition in a woman's ear

Would murther as it fell.

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Enter Macbeth, Lenox, and Roffe. Mach. Had I but dy'd an hour before this chance, I had liv'd a bleffed time; for from this inftant,

n The fo's omit Macbeth.

9 So all before P; he and all after,

• P. and all after, except C. read except C. Macduff for Dear Duff. Speak but once.

r The three last fo's, centrači for con

P P. and all after, except G. omit tradia.

0.

• C. omits and Roffe.

There

There's nothing serious in mortality;

All is but toys; renown, and grace, is dead;
The wine of life is drawn, and the mere lees
Is left this vault to brag of.

Enter Malcolm, and Donalbain.

Don. What is amifs?

Mach. You are, and do not know 't:

The fpring, the head, the fountain of your blood

Is ftopt; the very fource of it is ftopt.

Macd. Your royal father's murther❜d.

Mal. Oh, by whom?

Len. Thofe of his chamber, as it feem'd, had done 't; Their hands and faces were all badg'd with blood, So were their daggers, which unwip'd we found Upon their pillows; they ftar'd, and were diftracted; "As no man's life was to be trusted with them.

Macb. O, yet do I repent me of my fury, That I did kill them.

Macd. Wherefore did you fo?

Mach. Who can be wife, amaz'd, temp'rate, and furious, Loyal, and neutral, in a moment? No man.

The expedition of my violent love

Out-run the paufer, Reason.

His filver skin lac'd with his

W

Here lay Duncan,

golden blood,

And his gafh'd ftabs look'd like a breach in nature
For ruin 's wafteful entrance; there the murtherers
Steep'd in the colours of their trade, their daggers

* H. are for is.

"As is here added by H. and C. which is in no other edition; but this emen

dation feems neceffary.

w P. and H. read geary for golden.

Unman

* Unmannerly breech'd with gore. Who could refrain, That had a heart to love, and in that heart

Courage, to make 's love known?

Lady. Help me hence, ho!

Macd. Look to the lady 2.

Mal. Why do we hold our tongues,

[Seeming to faint.

That moft may claim this argument for ours?
Don. What fhould be fpoken here,

Where our fate, hid within an augre-hole,
May rush, and feize us? Let's away, our tears
Are not yet brew'd.

Mal. Nor our strong forrow

b Upon the foot of motion.

с

Ban. Look to the lady. [ Lady Macbeth is carried out. And when we have our naked frailties hid,

That fuffer in expofure; let us meet,

And question, this moft bloody piece of work,

To know it further. Fears and fcruples shake us.
In the great hand of God I ftand; and thence,
Against the undivulg'd pretence I fight

Of treasonous malice.

× W. reads, Unmanly reech'd, &c. propofes, Unmanly drench'd, &c. Heath, In a manner lay drench'd, &c. But I would defend the old reading, by this interpretation, their naked daggers were covered with gore: This might be Shakespeare's first thought; but, his po etic genius not fuffering him to deliver it in plain profe, Nakedness fuggested to bim the word unmannerly, and covered,

the word breeches, the covering of nakedness; and fo by a bold figure, he turns the daggers into men.

y This direction put in by R.
z Here C. directs, [gather about her.
a Firft f. in for within.
b P. and all after, except C. on for
upon.

c H. Look there to, &c.
d This direction put in by R.

Macb.

Macb. And fo do I.

All. So, all.

Macb. Let's briefly put on manly readiness,

And meet i' th' hall together.

All. Well contented.

[Exeunt all but Mal. and Don.

Mal. What will you do? Let's not confort with them.

To fhew an unfelt forrow, is an office

Which the falfe man does easy. I'll to England.

Don. To Ireland I: our separated fortune

Shall keep us both the fafer; where we are,

There 's daggers in men's fmiles; the near in blood,

The nearer bloody.

Mal. This murtherous fhaft that 's fhot,
Hath not yet lighted; and our fafeft way
Is to avoid the aim. Therefore to f horse;
And let us not be dainty of leave-taking,
But shift away; there 's warrant in that theft,
Which steals itself when there's no mercy left.

[Exeunt.

* P. and all after, except C. omit And.` £ The three last fo's, boufe for borse.

SCENE

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Old M. Threefcore and ten I can remember well;
Within the volume of which time, I have feen

Hours dreadful, and things ftrange: but this fore night
Hath trifled former knowings.

i

Roffe. Ha, good father,

Thou feeft, the heavens, as troubled with man's act,
* Threaten' his bloody ftage. By th' clock, 'tis day;
And yet dark night ftrangles the travelling lamp:
Is 't night's predominance, or the day's fhame,
That darkness does the face of earth intomb,
When living light should kiss it?

m

Old M. 'Tis unnatural,

Even like the deed that 's done. On Tuesday laft,

A faulcon, tow'ring in her pride of place,

Was by a moufing owl bawkt at and kill’d.

Roffe. And Duncan's horses (a thing moft ftrange and

certain !)

g This is called the fourth fcene in the fo's and C; and the 2d in R.

h ́T. first defcribes the scene.
So the fo's; the reft, Ab for Ha.

k The fo's, Threatens.

1 So all before T. who reads this for

bis; followed by W. and J.

m The 2d f. fhall for should.

Beauteous

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