Macbeth Page #3

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Macduff!

Good morrow, noble sir.

Good morrow, both.

Is the king stirring, worthy thane?

Not yet.

He did command me to call timely on him:

I have almost slipp'd the hour.

There is the door.

I'll make so bold to call.

Goes the king hence to-day?

He does:
he did appoint so.

The night has been unruly: where we lay,

our chimneys were blown down;

As they say, lamentings heard i' the air

Strange screams of death,

and prophesying with accents terrible

of dire combustion and confused events

new hatch'd to the woeful time,

the obscure bird clamour'd the livelong night,

Some say, the earth was feverous and did shake.

'Twas a rough night.

Murder and treason!

What is 't you say?

Mean you his majesty?

Ring the alarum-bell.

Awake! Malcolm! Malcolm!

Malcolm! Awake!

My lord!

/ Murder and treason!

Malcolm, Malcolm!

Malcolm! Awake!

Husband!

Horror, horror, horror!

Tongue nor heart cannot conceive nor name thee!

Confusion now hath made his masterpiece!

What's the matter.

[New Text]

What is amiss?

You are, and do not know't:

The spring, the head, the fountain of your

blood is stopp'd.

The very source of it is stopp'd.

Your royal father 's murder'd.

By whom?

Those of his chamber, as it seem'd, had done 't:

Their hands and faces were an badged with blood;

So were their daggers.

They stared, and were distracted.

No man's life was to be trusted with them.

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

Wherefore did you so?

Here lay Duncan, his silver skin laced with

his golden blood;

And his gash'd stabs look'd like

a breach in nature for ruin's wasteful entrance.

There, the murderers, steep'd in the colours of their trade,

their daggers unmannerly breech'd with gore:

Who could refrain, that had a heart to love?

Help me, hence, ho!

/ Look to the lady.

And when we have our naked frailties hid,

that suffer in exposure,

let's meet to question this most bloody

piece of work,

To know it further.

Fears and scruples shake us.

/In the great hand of God I stand.

And I.

So all.

How goes the world, sir, now?

Why, see you not?

Is't known who did this more than bloody deed?

Those that Macbeth hath slain.

I have seen hours dreadful and things strange,

but this sore night hath trifled former knowings.

By the clock, 'tis day,

and yet dark night strangles the travelling lamp.

Is't night's predominance, or the day's shame,

that darkness does the face of earth entomb,

when living light should kiss it?

'Tis unnatural,

Even like the deed that's done.

What will you do?

Do?

Where we are, there's daggers in men's smiles:

the near in blood, the nearer bloody.

Therefore, to horse!

My husband!

And let us not be dainty of leave-taking,

but shift away!

Farewell, father.

God's benison go with you,

and with those that would make good of bad,

and friends of foes!

Thou hast it now:

king, Cawdor, Glamis, all,

As the weird women promised,

and, I fear, thou play'dst most foully for't.

Yet it was said, it should not stand in thy posterity,

But that myself should be the root

and father of many kings.

If there come truth from them, as upon thee,

Macbeth, their speeches shine.

Why, by the verities on thee made good,

may they not be my oracles as well,

and set me up in hope?

Malcolm and Macduff, my lord, are fled to England.

Fled to England!

We can entreat an hour to serve; we'll spend it

in some words upon that business,

If you would grant the time.

At your kind'st leisure.

You shall cleave to my consent, when 'tis,

it shall make honour for you.

So I lose none in seeking to augment.

You lack the season of all natures.

Sleep.

To bed.

To bed.

We have scotch'd the snake, not kill'd it:

She'll close and be herself, whilst our poor malice

remains in danger of her former tooth.

Banquo?

He chid the sisters when first they put

the name of king upon me,

and bade them speak to him:

then prophet-like they hail'd him

father to a line of kings:

Upon my head they placed a fruitless crown.

and put a barren sceptre in my gripe.

Thence to be wrench'd with an unlineal hand,

No son of mine succeeding.

If 't be so, for Banquo's issue have I filed my mind.

For them the gracious Duncan have I murder'd;

Put rancours in the vessel of my peace only for them.

and mine eternal jewel given

to the common enemy of man,

to make them kings,

the seed of Banquo kings!

Things without all remedy should be without regard:

What's done is done.

To bed.

To bed. Come.

Liar and slave!

My strange and self-abuse is the initiate fear that wants hard use:

We are yet but young in deed.

Methought I heard a voice cry 'Sleep no more!

Macbeth does murder sleep',

the innocent sleep,

sleep that knits up the ravell'd sleeve of care,

the death of each day's life,

sore labour's bath, balm of hurt minds,

great nature's second course, chief nourisher in life's feast!

What do you mean?

Still it cried 'Sleep no more!' to all the house.

'Glamis hath murder'd sleep, and therefore Cawdor

shall sleep no more;

Macbeth shall sleep no more.'

I will drain him dry as hay:

Sleep shall neither night nor day.

Hang upon his pent-house lid;

He shall live a man forbid.

To be thus is nothing

but to be safely thus.

What had he done, to make him fly the land?

You must have patience, madam.

He had none:
his flight was madness:

when our actions do not,

our fears do make us traitors.

You know not whether it was his wisdom or his fear.

Wisdom!

to leave his wife, to leave his babes,

all in a place from whence himself does fly?

We hear, Macdoff and Malcolm are gone hence,

not confessing their cruel murders,

but filling their hearers with strange invention.

But of that to-morrow, here's our chief guest.

If he had been forgotten,

it had been as a gap in our great feast,

And all-thing unbecoming.

To-night we hold a solemn supper sir,

and I'll request your presence.

Let your highness command upon me.

Ride you this afternoon?

Ay, my good lord.

We should have else desired your good advice,

in this day's council,

but we'll take to-morrow.

Is't far you ride?

As far, my lord, as will fill up the time

'twixt this and supper.

Fail not our feast.

My lord, I will not.

Farewell.

Let every man be master of his time till seven at night:

To make society the sweeter welcome,

we will keep ourself till supper-time alone.

While then, God be with you!

Our fears in Banquo stick deeper.

and in his royalty of nature reigns that which would be fear'd

'tis much he dares;

And, to that dauntless temper of his mind,

he hath a wisdom that doth guide his valour to act in safety.

There is none but he whose being I do fear;

and, under him, my Genius is rebuked;

as, it is said, Mark Antony's was by Caesar.

Let the frame of things disjoint,

both the worlds suffer,

ere we will eat our meal in fear

and sleep in the affliction of these terrible

dreams that shake us nightly.

Better be with the dead,

Whom we, to gain our peace, have sent to peace,

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