Ban.

Look, how our partner's rapt. Macb. If chance will have me king, why, chance may

crown me,

Without my stir.

Ban.

New honors come upon him

Like our strange garments; cleave not to their mould, But with the aid of use.

Macb.
Come what come may;
Time and the hour runs through the roughest day.
Ban. Worthy Macbeth, we stay upon your leisure.
Macb. Give me your favor;-my dull brain was wrought
With things forgotten. Kind gentlemen, your pains
Are registered where every day I turn

The leaf to read them.-Let us toward the king.—
Think upon what hath chanced; and, at more times,
The interim having weighed it, let us speak

Our free hearts each to other.

Ban.

Very gladly.

[Exeunt.

Macb. Till then, enough.-Come, friends.

SCENE IV. Fores. A Room in the Palace. Flourish.

Enter DUNCAN, MALCOLM, DONALBAIN, LENOX, and

Attendants.

Dun. Is execution done on Cawdor? Are not Those in commission yet returned?

Mal.

My liege,
They are not yet come back. But I have spoke
With one that saw him die; who did report,
That very frankly he confessed his treasons;
Implored your highness' pardon; and set forth
A deep repentance. Nothing in his life
Became him, like the leaving it; he died
As one that had been studied in his death,
To throw away the dearest thing he owed,
As 'twere a careless trifle.

Dun.

There's no art,

To find the mind's construction in the face.

He was a gentleman on whom I built

An absolute trust.-O worthiest cousin!

Enter MACBETH, BANQUO, ROSSE, and ANGUS.

The sin of my ingratitude even now

Was heavy on me; thou art so far before,
That swiftest wing of recompense is slow

S

To overtake thee. 'Would thou hadst less deserved;
That the proportion both of thanks and payment
Might have been mine! Only I have left to say,
More is thy due than more than all can pay.
Macb. The service and the loyalty I owe,
In doing it, pays itself. Your highness' part
Is to receive our duties; and our duties

Are to your throne and state, children and servants;
Which do but what they should, by doing every thing
Safe toward your love and honor.

Dun. Welcome hither;

I have begun to plant thee, and will labor
To make thee full of growing.-Noble Banquo,
That hast no less deserved, nor must be known
No less to have done so, let me infold thee,
And hold thee to my heart.

Ban.

The harvest is your own.

Dun.

There if I grow,

My plenteous joys,
Wanton in fulness, seek to hide themselves
In drops of sorrow.- Sons, kinsmen, thanes,
And you whose places are the nearest, know,
We will establish our estate upon

Our eldest, Malcolm; whom we name, hereafter,
The prince of Cumberland; which honor must
Not, unaccompanied, invest him only,

But signs of nobleness, like stars, shall shine
On all deservers. From hence to Inverness,
And bind us further to you.

Macb. The rest is labor, which is not used for you.
I'll be myself the harbinger, and make joyful
The hearing of my wife with your approach;
So, humbly take my leave.

My worthy Cawdor!

[Aside.

Dun.
Macb. The prince of Cumberland! This is a step,
On which I must fall down, or else o'erleap.
For in my way it lies. Stars, hide your fires!
Let not light see my black and deep desires.
The eye wink at the hand! yet let that be,
Which the eye fears, when it is done, to see.
Dun. True, worthy Banquo; he is full so valiant ;
And in his commendations I am fed;
It is a banquet to me. Let us after him,
Whose care is gone before to bid us welcome.
It is a peerless kinsman.

[Exit.

[Flourish. Exeunt.

SCENE V. Inverness. A Room in Macbeth's Castle.

Enter LADY MACBETH, reading a letter.

Lady M. They met me in the day of success; and I have learned by the perfectest report, they have more in them than mortal knowledge. When I burned in desire to question them further, they made themselves air, into which they vanished. Whiles I stood rapt in the wonder of it, came missives from the king, who all-hailed me, Thane of Cawdor; by which title, before, these weird sisters saluted me, and referred me to the coming on of time, with, Hail, king that shalt be! This have I thought good to deliver thee, my dearest partner of greatness; that thou mightst not lose the dues of rejoicing, by being ignorant of what greatness is promised thee. Lay it to thy heart, and farewell. Glamis thou art, and Cawdor; and shalt be What thou art promised.-Yet do I fear thy nature; It is too full o' the milk of human kindness,

To catch the nearest way. Thou wouldst be great;
Art not without ambition; but without

The illness should attend it. What thou wouldst highly,
That wouldst thou holily; wouldst not play false,

And yet wouldst wrongly win; thou'dst have, great Glamis, That which cries, Thus thou must do, if thou have it;

And that which rather thou dost fear to do,

Than wishest should be undone. Hie thee hither,
That I may pour my spirits in thine ear;
And chastise with the valor of my tongue
All that impedes thee from the golden round,
Which fate and metaphysical aid doth seem

To have thee crowned withal.-What is your tidings?
Enter an Attendant.

Attend. The king comes here to-night.
Lady M.

Thou'rt mad to say it.

Is not thy master with him? who, wer't so,

Would have informed for preparation.

Attend. So please you, it is true; our thane is coming. One of my fellows had the speed of him;

Who, almost dead for breath, had scarcely more

Than would make up his message.

Lady M.

Give him tending;

He brings great news. The raven himself is hoarse,

[Exit Attendant.

That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan

Under my battlements. Come, come, you spirits
That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here;
And fill me, from the crown to the toe, top-full
Of direst cruelty! Make thick my blood,
Stop up the access and passage to remorse;
That no compunctious visitings of nature
Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between
The effect, and it. Come to my woman's breasts,
And take my milk for gall, you murd'ring ministers,
Wherever in your sightless substances

You wait on nature's mischief! Come, thick night,
And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell!
That my keen knife see not the wound it makes;
Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark,
To cry, Hold, hold! -Great Glamis! worthy Cawdor!

Enter МАСВЕТН.

Greater than both, by the all-hail hereafter!
Thy letters have transported me beyond

This ignorant present, and I feel now

The future in the instant.

Your face, my thane, is as a book, where men
May read strange matters. To beguile the time,
Look like the time; bear welcome in your eye,
Your hand, your tongue: look like the innocent flower,
But be the serpent under it. He that's coming
Must be provided for; and you shall put
This night's great business into my despatch;
Which shall to all our nights and days to come,
Give solely sovereign sway and masterdom.
Macb. We will speak further.
Lady M.

To alter favor ever is to fear.
Leave all the rest to me.

Only look up clear;

[Exeunt.

SCENE VI. The same. Before the Castle. Hautboys. Servants of Macbeth attending.

Enter DUNCAN, MALCOLM, DONALBAIN, BANQUO, Lenox, MACDUFF, ROSSE, ANGUS, and Attendants.

Dun. This castle hath a pleasant seat: the air

Nimbly and sweetly recommends itself

Unto our gentle senses.

Ban.

This guest of summer,
The temple-haunting martlet, does approve,
By his loved mansionry, that the heaven's breath
Smells wooingly here. No jutty, frieze,

Buttress, nor coigne of vantage, but this bird
Hath made his pendent bed, and procreant cradle:
Where they most breed and haunt, I have observed,
The air is delicate.

Dun.

Enter LADY MACBETH.

See, see! our honored hostess!
The love that follows us, sometime is our trouble,
Which still we thank as love. Herein I teach you
How you shall bid God yield us for your pains,
And thank us for your trouble.

Lady M.
All our service,
In every point twice done, and then done double,
Were poor and single business, to contend
Against those honors, deep and broad, wherewith
Your majesty loads our house. For those of old,
And the late dignities heaped up to them,

We rest your hermits.

Dun.

Where's the thane of Cawdor? We coursed him at the heels, and had a purpose To be his purveyor: but he rides well:

And his great love, sharp as his spur, hath holp him To his home before us. Fair and noble hostess,

We are your guest to-night.

Lady M.

Your servants ever

Have theirs, themselves, and what is theirs, in compt, To make their audit at your highness' pleasure,

Still to return your own.

Dun.

Give me your hand:

Conduct me to mine host; we love him highly,
And shall continue our graces towards him.

By your leave, hostess.

[Exeunt.

SCENE VII. The same. A Room in the Castle. Hautboys and torches.

Enter, and pass over the stage, a Sewer, and divers Servants with dishes and service. Then enter МАСВЕТИ.

Macb. If it were done, when 'tis done, then 'twere well It were done quickly: if the assassination

VOL. II.-14