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SCENE changes to a Room of State in the Castle.

A Banquet prepar'd. Enter Macbeth, Lady, Roffe, Lenox, Lords, and Attendants.

Mach. At first and last, the hearty welcome.

OU know your own degrees, fit down:

Lords. Thanks to your Majefty.

Macb. Ourself will mingle with fociety,

And play the humble host:

Our hoftefs keeps her ftate, but in beft time

We will require her welcome.

[They fit.

Lady. Pronounce it for me, Sir, to all our friends, For my heart fpeaks, they're welcome.

Enter firft Murderer.

Macb.See,they encounter thee with their hearts' thanks. Both fides are even: here I'll fit i' th' midft; Be large in mirth, anon we'll drink a measure The table round-There's blood upon thy face.

[To the Murderer, afide, at the door.

Mur. 'Tis Banquo's then.

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

Mur. My Lord, his throat is cut, that I did for him. Macb. Thou art the beft of cut-throats; yet he's good, That did the like for Fleance: if thou didst it, Thou art the non-pareil.

Mur. Moft royal Sir,

Fleance is 'fcap'd.

Macb. Then comes my fit again: I had elfe been perfect Whole as the marble, founded as the rock;

As broad, and gen'ral, as the cafing air:

But now I'm cabin'd, cribb'd, confin'd, bound in
To faucy doubts and fears. But Banquo's fafe?

Mur. Ay, my good Lord: fafe in a ditch he bides,
With twenty trenched gashes on his head;
The leaft a death to nature,

Macb. Thanks for that;

There

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

No teeth for th' prefent. Get thee gone, to-morrow We'll hear 't ourselves again.

Lady. My royal Lord,

[Exit Murderer.

You do not give the cheer; the feaft is fold,

That is not often vouched, while 'tis making;

'Tis given, with welcome. To feed, were beft at home From thence, the fauce to meat is ceremony;

Meeting were bare without it.

[The Ghoft of Banquo rifes, and fits in Macbeth's place.

Macb. Sweet remembrancer!

Now good digeftion wait on appetite,

And health on both!

Len. May't please your Highnefs fit?

Macb. Here had we now our country's honour roof'd, Were the grac'd perfon of our Banque prefent,(Whom may I rather challenge for unkindness, Than pity for mifchance!)

Roffe. His abfence, Sir,

Lays blame upon his promife. Pleas't your Highness

To grace us with your royal company?

Macb. The table's full.

Len. Here's a place referv'd, Sir.

Mach. Where?

Len. Here, my good Lord.

What is't that moves your Highness?

Mach. Which of you have done this?

Lords. What, my good Lord?

[Starting.

Mach. Thou can'ft not fay, I did it: never shake Thy goary locks at me.

Roffe. Gentlemen, rife; his Highness is not well. Lady. Sit, worthy friends, my Lord is often thus, And hath been from his youth. Pray you, keep feat. The fit is momentary, on a thought

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

[To Mach. afide.

Mach. Ay, and a bold one, that dare look on that,

Which might appall the devil.
Lady. O proper stuff!

This is the very painting of your fear;

This is the air-drawn-dagger, which, you faid,
Led you to Duncan. Oh, thefe flaws and ftarts
(Impoftors to true fear,) would well become
A woman's story at a winter's fire,

Authoriz'd by her grandam. Shame itself!—
Why do you make fuch faces? when all's done,
You look but on a stool.

Macb. Pr'ythee, see there!

[afide.

Behold! look! lo! how fay you? [Pointing to the Ghoft.
Why, what care I! if thou canst nod, fpeak too.-
If charnel-houses and our graves must send

Thofe, that we bury, back; our monuments
Shall be the maws of kites.

[The Ghoft vanishes.

Lady. What? quite unmann'd in folly?

Macb. If I ftand here, I saw him.

Lady. Fy, for fhame!

Macb. Blood hath been shed ere now, i' th' olden time,
Ere human ftatute purg'd the gen'ral weal; (25)
Ay, and fince too, murders have been perform'd
Too terrible for th' 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 ftools; this is more strange
Than fuch a murder is.

Lady. My worthy Lord,

Your noble friends do lack you.

Mach. I do forget.

Do not mufe at me. my moft worthy friends,

I have a ftrange infirmity, which is nothing

To thofe that know me. Come, love and health to all! (25) Ere buman ftatute purg'd the gentle weal.] Thus all the editions: but Mr. Warburton very justly advis'd, as I have reform'd the text, gen'ral weal: "And it is a very fine Periphrafis (fays he) to fignify, ere civil focieties were inftituted. For the early murders, "recorded in fcripture, are here alluded to: and Macbeth's apolo. "gizing for murder from the antiquity of the example is very natu rral.'

Then

Then I'll fit down: give me fome wine, fill full-
I drink to th' general joy of the whole table,
And to our dear friend Banquo, whom we mifs;
Would he were here! to all, and him, we thirst,
And all to all.

Lords. Our duties, and the pledge.

[The Ghoft rifes again. Mach. Avaunt, and quit my fight! let the earth hide

thee! (26)

Thy bones are marrow lefs, thy blood is cold;
Thou haft no fpeculation in those eyes,
Which thou doft glare with.

Lady. Think of this, good Peers,
But as a thing of custom; 'tis no other;
Only it fpoils the pleafure of the time.
Macb. What man dare, I dare:

Approach thou like the rugged Russian bear,
The arm'd rhinoceros, or Hyrcanian tyger,
Take any shape but that, and my firm nerves
Shall never tremble: Or, be alive again,
And dare me to the defert with thy sword;
If trembling I inhibit, then proteft me
The baby of a girl. Hence, horrible fhadow!
Unreal mock'ry, hence! why, fo,being gone,
[The Ghoft vanishes.
I am a man again: pray you, fit ftill. [The Lords rife.
Lady. You have difplac'd the mirth, broke the good
With most admir'd disorder.
[meeting

Mach. Can fuch things be,

And overcome us like a fummer's cloud,

Without our special wonder? You make me ftrange

Ev'n to the difpofition that I owe,

When now I think, you can behold fuch fights,
And keep the natural ruby of your cheeks,

(26) Avaunt, and quit my fight! let the earth hide thee!] i. e. As thou art a dead thing, the earth, thy grave, ought to overwhelm and cover thee from human fight. Thus Ia (in the Prometheus chain'd, by Afchylus) in her frenzy fancying that fhe faw the apparition of Argus, complains that the earth does not hide him tho' dead.

Ον ἐδὲ κατθανόντα γαῖα κεύθεια

When

When mine is blanch'd with fear.

Roffe. What fights, my Lord?

Lady. I pray you, fpeak not; he grows worse and worfe; 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

Attend his Majefty!

Lady. Good-night, to all.

[Exeunt Lords.

Macb. It will have blood, they fay; blood will have blood: Stones have been known to move, and trees to speak; Augurs, that understood relations, have (27)

By mag-pies, and by choughs, and rooks brought forth The fecret'ft man of blood.-What is the night?

Lady. Almoft at odds with morning, which is which. Macb. How fay'ft thou, that Macduff denies his perfon, At our great bidding?

Lady. Did you fend to him, Sir?

Mach. I hear it by the way; but I will fend:

(27) Augurs, that understood relations, bave

By mag-pies, and by cboughs, and rooks, brought forth

The fecretist man of blood. Confcience, as we may learn from Plutarch, has fometimes fupply'd the office of augury in this point. One Beffus, he tells us, who had a long time before murder'd his father, going to fup at a friend's house, suddenly with his fpear pull'd down a fwallow's neft, and kill'd all the young ones. The company enquiring into the reafon of his cruelty, Don't you bear, fays he, how they falfely accufe me of having kill'd my father? Vid. Plutarchum de Sera Numinis Vindicia. As remarkable a story is recorded by him, in another tract, upon which the Greeks founded their proverb, A 'Cune yegara. Ibycus the poet being furpriz'd by robbers in a defart, as they were about to kill him, call'd out to a flock of cranes, that flew over his head, to bear witnefs of his murder. Thefe murderers fometime afterwards fitting in the theatre, and seeing a flight of cranes, faid in triumph to one another; bebold, Ibycus's avengers! The words being overheard, the robbers were apprehended, rack'd upon fufpicion, and brought to a confeffion of the murder. And thus, as Aufonius fays,

Ibycus ut periit, vindex fuit altivolans grus.

Monfieur Le Fevre, in his lives of the Greek poets, has concluded with remarking on lbycus, that as he liv'd a Poet, so he dy'd a Prophet

There's

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