Our hostess keeps her state;1 but, in best time,
We will require her welcome.

Lady M. Pronounce it for me, sir, to all our friends; For my heart speaks, they are welcome.

Enter first Murderer, to the door.

Macb. See, they encounter thee with their hearts' thanks.

Both sides are even: Here I'll sit i' the midst :
Be large in mirth; anon, we'll drink a measure
The table round.-There's blood upon thy face.
Mur. 'Tis Banquo's, then.

Macb. 'Tis better thee without, than he within.
Is he despatched?

Mur. My lord, his throat is cut; that I did for him. Macb. Thou art the best o' the cutthroats.

he's good,

That did the like for Fleance: if thou didst it,

Thou art the nonpareil.

Mur.

Fleance is 'scaped.

Most royal sir,

Yet

Macb. Then comes my fit again. I had else been perfect;

Whole as the marble, founded as the rock;

As broad and general as the casing air:

But now, I am cabined, cribbed, confined, bound in
To saucy doubts and fears. But Banquo's safe?
Mur. Ay, my good lord; safe in a ditch he bides,
With twenty trenched3 gashes on his head;
The least a death to nature.

Macb.

Thanks for that.

There the grown serpent lies; the worm, that's fled, Hath nature that in time will venom breed,

1 "Keeps her state," continues in her chair of state. A state was a royal chair with a canopy over it.

2 ""Tis better thee without, than he within;" that is, I am better pleased that the blood of Banquo should be on thy face than he in this room.

3 "With twenty trenched gashes on his head;" from the French trancher, to cut.

No teeth for the present.-Get thee gone; to-morrow We'll hear ourselves again.

Lady

M.

Exit Murderer.

My royal lord, You do not give the cheer: the feast is sold,1 That is not often vouched while 'tis a making,

'Tis given with welcome. To feed were best at home; From thence, the sauce to meat is ceremony; Meeting were bare without it.

Sweet remembrancer!

Macb.
Now, good digestion wait on appetite,
And health on both!

Len.

May it please your highness, sit? [The ghost of BANQUO rises, and sits in MACBETH's place.

Macb. Here had we now our country's honor roofed, Were the graced person of our Banquo present; Who may I rather challenge for unkindness,

Than pity for mischance!

Rosse.

Lays blame upon his promise.

His absence, sir,

Please it your highness

To grace us with your royal company
Macb. The table's full.

Len.

Macb.

?

Here's a place reserved, sir.

Where?

Len. Here, my good lord. What is't that moves

your highness?

Macb. Which of you have done this?

What, my good lord?

Lords.
Macb. Thou canst not say, I did it: never shake

Thy gory locks at me.

Rosse. Gentlemen, rise; his highness is not well. Lady M. Sit, worthy friends.-My lord is often thus, And hath been from his youth: 'pray you, keep seat; The fit is momentary; upon a thought

2

He will again be well. If much you note him,
You shall offend him, and extend his passion;
Feed, and regard him not.-Are you a man?

1 That which is not given cheerfully cannot be called a gift; it is something that must be paid for.

2 i. e. prolong his suffering, make his fit longer

Macb. Ay, and a bold one, that dare look on that Which might appal the devil.

Lady M.
O proper stuff!
This is the very painting of your fear;

This is the air-drawn dagger, which, you said,
Led you to Duncan. O, these flaws and starts
(Impostors to true fear) would well become

1

A woman's story at a winter's fire,

Authorized by her grandam. Shame itself!
Why do you make such faces? When all's done,
You look but on a stool.

Macb. Pr'ythee, see there! behold! look! lo! how

Why, what care I? If thou canst nod, speak too.-
If charnel-houses, and our graves, must send
Those that we bury, back, our monuments
Shall be the maws of kites.

Lady M.

[Ghost disappears.

What! quite unmanned in folly?

Macb. If I stand here, I saw him.

Lady M.

Fie, for shame!

Macb. Blood hath been shed ere now, i' the olden

time,

Ere human statute purged the general weal;

Ay, and since, too, murders have been performed
Too terrible for the ear. The times have been,
That, when the brains were out, the man would die,
And there an end: but now, they rise again,
With twenty mortal murders on their crowns,
And push us from our stools. This is more strange
Than such a murder is.

Lady M.

My worthy lord,

Your noble friends do lack you.

Macb.

I do forget.

Do not muse at me, my most worthy friends;

I have a strange infirmity, which is nothing

To those that know me. Come, love and health

to all;

1 This was a form of elliptic expression, commonly used even at this day, in the phrase "this is nothing to them," i. e. in comparison to them. The folio reads gentle.

Then I'll sit down.

Give me some wine; fill full: I drink to the general joy of the whole table,

Ghost rises.

And to our dear friend Banquo, whom we miss;
'Would he were here! To all, and him, we thirst,
And all to all.1

Lords.

Our duties, and the pledge.

Macb. Avaunt! and quit my sight! Let the earth

hide thee!

Thy bones are marrowless, thy blood is cold;
Thou hast no speculation in those eyes
Which thou dost glare with!
Lady M.
But as a thing of custom. 'Tis no other;
Only it spoils the pleasure of the time.

Think of this, good peers,

Macb. What man dare, I dare:

Approach thou like the rugged Russian bear,
The armed rhinoceros, or the Hyrcan tiger,
Take any shape but that, and my firm nerves
Shall never tremble. Or, be alive again,
And dare me to the desert with thy sword:
If trembling I inhabit then, protest me
The baby of a girl. Hence, horrible shadow!

[Ghost disappears. Unreal mockery, hence!-Why, so;—being gone, I am a man again.-'Pray you, sit still.

Lady M. You have displaced the mirth, broke the good meeting,

With most admired disorder.

Macb.

Can such things be,

And overcome us like a summer's cloud,

Without our special wonder? You make me strange Even to the disposition that I owe,*

1 That is, "we desire to drink" all good wishes to all.

2 "Thou hast no speculation in those eyes." Bullokar, in his Expositor, 1616, explains "speculation, the inward knowledge or beholding of a thing."

3 "Dare me to the desert with thy sword; if then I do not meet thee there; if, trembling, I stay in my castle, or any habitation; if I then hide my head, or dwell in any place through fear,-protest me the baby of a girl." 4 i. e. possess.

When now I think you can behold such sights,
And keep the natural ruby of your cheeks,
When mine are blanched with fear.

Rosse.

What sights, my lord?

Lady M. I pray you, speak not; he grows worse and worse;

Question enrages him. At once, good night.—

Stand not upon the order of your going,

But go at once.

Len.

Good night, and better health

A kind good night to all!
[Exeunt Lords and Attendants.

Macb. It will have blood; they say, blood will have

blood;

Stones have been known to move, and trees to speak; Augures1 and understood relations have,

By magot-pies, and choughs, and rooks, brought forth The secret'st man of blood.-What is the night?

Lady M. Almost at odds with morning, which is which.

Macb. How say'st thou,' that Macduff denies his person,

At our great bidding?

Lady M.

Did you send to him, sir?

Macb. I hear it by the way; but I will send : There's not a one of them, but in his house

I keep a servant feed. I will, to-morrow, (And betimes I will,) to the weird sisters.

More shall they speak; for now I am bent to know, By the worst means, the worst. For mine own good, All causes shall give way: I am in blood

1 i. e. auguries, divinations; formerly spelled augures, as appears by Florio in voce augurio. By understood relations, probably, connected circumstances relating to the crime are meant. In all the modern editions we have it, erroneously, augurs. Magot-pie is the original name of the magpie: : stories, such as Shakspeare alludes to, are to be found in Lupton's Thousand Notable Things, and in Goulart's Admirable Histories.

2 i. e. what say'st thou to this circumstance? Thus, in Macbeth's address to his wife, on the first appearance of Banquo's ghost:—

"Behold! look! lo! how say you?