LADY MACD. What, with worms and flies?

SON. With what I get, I mean; and so do they. LADY MACD. Poor bird! thou 'dst never fear the net, nor lime,

The pit-fall, nor the gin.

SON. Why should I, mother? Poor birds they are not set for.

My father is not dead, for all your saying.

LADY MACD. Yes, he is dead; how wilt thou do for a father?

SON. Nay, how will you do for a husband?

LADY MACD. Why, I can buy me twenty at any market.

SON. Then you 'll buy 'em to sell again.

40

LADY MACD. Thou speak'st with all thy wit; and yet,

i' faith,

With wit enough for thee.

SON. Was my father a traitor, mother?

LADY MACD. Ay, that he was.

SON. What is a traitor?

LADY MACD. Why, one that swears and lies.

SON. And be all traitors that do so?

LADY MACD. Every one that does so is a traitor, and

must be hanged.

50

SON. And must they all be hanged that swear and lie? LADY MACD. Every one.

SON. Who must hang them?

LADY MACD. Why, the honest men.

SON. Then the liars and swearers are fools: for there are liars and swearers enough to beat the honest men, and hang up them.

LADY MACD. Now God help thee, poor monkey! But how wilt thou do for a father?

60

SON. If he were dead, you 'd weep for him: if you would not, it were a good sign that I should quickly have a new father.

LADY MACD. Poor prattler! how thou talkest !

Enter a Messenger.

MESS. Bless you, fair dame! I am not to you known,

42

With all thy wit. And a poor allowance it is. 45 Ay, that he was-a traitor to me and you; hardly to Macbeth, as Gervinus explains it.

Though in your state of honour I am perfect.
I doubt, some danger does approach you nearly :
If you will take a homely man's advice,

Be not found here; hence, with your little ones.
To fright you thus, methinks, I am too savage;
To do worse to you were fell cruelty,
Which is too nigh your person.

I dare abide no longer.

LADY MACD.

I have done no harm.

70

Heaven preserve you!
[Exit Messenger.

Whither should I fly?

But I remember now

I am in this earthly world; where, to do harm,
Is often laudable; to do good, sometime,
Accounted dangerous folly: why then, alas!
Do I put up that womanly defence,

To say, I have done no harm? What are these faces?
Enter Murderers.

MUR. Where is your husband?

LADY MACD. I hope, in no place so unsanctified, Where such as thou mayst find him.

MUR.

He's a traitor.

SON. Thou liest, thou shag-ear'd villain.
MUR.

Young fry of treachery!
SON.

Run away, I pray you.

80

What, you egg? [Stabbing him.

He has kill'd me, mother:

[Dies.

[Exit LADY MACDUFF, crying "Murder," and pursued by the Murderers.

SCENE III.-England. A Room in the King's Palace. Enter MALCOLM and MACDUFF.

MAL. Let us seek out some desolate shade, and there Weep our sad bosoms empty.

MACD.

Let us rather,

66 I am perfect. Thoroughly acquainted with your rank and

name.

72 Which is too nigh. Yet even this is too close at hand. 83 Shag-eared. Possibly 'shag-haired' (shock-headed), as Delius reads the word. Readers of Manzoni will remember the 'ciuffo,' or shock of hair, which marked the hired bravo in Italy. See 2 Hen. VI. iii. 1, 167—“A shag-haired crafty kern." 'Shag-eared' may however mean 'with hanging ears,' a natural enough term of contempt.

Hold fast the mortal sword; and, like good men,
Bestride our down-fall'n birthdom: Each new morn,
New widows howl; new orphans cry; new sorrows
Strike heaven on the face, that it resounds,

As if it felt with Scotland, and yell'd out

Like syllable of dolour.

MAL.

What I believe I'll wail;

ΙΟ

What know, believe; and, what I can redress,
As I shall find the time to friend, I will.

What you have spoke, it may be so, perchance.

This tyrant, whose sole name blisters our tongues,
Was once thought honest; you have lov'd him well;
He hath not touch'd you yet. I am young, but something
You may deserve of him through me; and wisdom
To offer up a weak, poor, innocent lamb,

To appease an angry God.

MACD. I am not treacherous.

MAL.

But Macbeth is.

A good and virtuous nature may recoil

In an imperial charge. But I shall crave your pardon; 20 That which you are my thoughts cannot transpose: Angels are bright still, though the brightest fell :

Though all things foul would wear the brows of grace, Yet grace must still look so.

MACD.

I have lost my hopes. MAL. Perchance, even there, where I did find my doubts.

The word is

4 Birthdom. 'Birthright,' or native country. formed on the analogy of Christendom, heathendom, &c.

9 What know, believe. 'But I will believe nothing without clear evidence.' Malcolm has all the caution which his father, and even the wise Banquo, had so signally wanted: justifying his historic name of 'Ceanmor,' the great-head.

12

This tyrant. But then on the other hand you are a partisan of Macbeth, and may have turned as dishonest as he has; nay, you may be trying to win his favour by entrapping me. 15 Wisdom. Understand' were it.'

19 May recoil. Even a virtuous nature may bely itself and swerve when acting by a king's command. Yet I ought to beg your pardon; my thoughts will not alter what you are inwardly, nor does your fair outside show your spirit to be evil; for good spirits also are fair, though Satan, who fell, was fairer.

24 I have lost my hopes (which depended on your trusting me). 25 Perchance, even there. Is not what shakes your hope the same thing which shakes my confidence?

Why in that rawness left you wife and child,
(Those precious motives, those strong knots of love),
Without leave-taking?-I pray you,

Let not my jealousies be your dishonours,

But mine own safeties :-You may be rightly just, 30 Whatever I shall think.

MACD.

Bleed, bleed, poor country!

Great tyranny, lay thou thy basis sure,

For goodness dares not check thee! wear thou thy wrongs, The title is affeer'd.—Fare thee well, lord:

I would not be the villain that thou think'st

For the whole space that 's in the tyrant's grasp,
And the rich East to boot.

MAL.
Be not offended;
I speak not as in absolute fear of you.
I think, our country sinks beneath the yoke;
It weeps, it bleeds: and each new day a gash
Is added to her wounds: I think, withal,
There would be hands uplifted in my right;
And here, from gracious England, have I offer
Of goodly thousands: But, for all this,
When I shall tread upon the tyrant's head,
Or wear it on my sword, yet my poor country
Shall have more vices than it had before;
More suffer, and more sundry ways than ever,
By him that shall succeed.

MACD.

What should he be ?
MAL. It is myself I mean: in whom I know
All the particulars of vice so grafted,

That, when they shall be open'd, black Macbeth
Will seem as pure as snow; and the poor state
Esteem him as a lamb, being compared

26 In that rawness.

With so little forethought.

40

50

34 The title is affeered. From 'affeurer' (ad forum), to fix a market price; hence 'to affeer an amerciament' is to assess a fine when the law does not prescribe any particular sum; and, here, 6 to affeer a title' is to confirm it.

50 It is myself I mean. This singular scene is taken directly from the chroniclers. 'First,' says Malcolm in Holinshed, 'mine intemperance would be more importable to you than the bloudie tyrannie of Macbeth now is I am also the most avaritious creature in the world. I am furthermore inclined to dissimulation, telling of leasings and all kinds of deceit.'

With my confineless harms.

MACD.

Not in the legions

Of horrid hell, can come a devil more damn'd

In evils, to top Macbeth.

MAL.

I grant him bloody,

Luxurious, avaricious, false, deceitful,

Sudden, malicious, smacking of every sin
That has a name: But there's no bottom, none,

In my voluptuousness: your wives, your daughters,

Your matrons, and your maids, could not fill up
The cistern of my lust; and my desire

All continent impediments would o'erbear,
That did oppose my will: Better Macbeth,
Than such a one to reign.

MACD.

Boundless intemperance

In nature is a tyranny; it hath been
The untimely emptying of the happy throne,
And fall of many kings. But fear not yet
To take upon you what is yours: you may
Convey your pleasures in a spacious plenty,
And yet seem cold, the time you may so hoodwink.
We have willing dames enough; there cannot be
That vulture in you, to devour so many

As will to greatness dedicate themselves,
Finding it so inclin❜d.

MAL.
With this there grows,
In my most ill-compos'd affection, such
A stanchless avarice, that, were I king,
I should cut off the nobles for their lands;
Desire his jewels, and this other's house:
And my more-having would be as a sauce
To make me hunger more; that I should forge
Quarrels unjust against the good, and loyal,
Destroying them for wealth.

MACD.

This avarice

Sticks deeper; grows with more pernicious root

60

70

80

58 Luxurious. This word, as Abp. Trench in his 'Select Glossary' points out, has its sense of lascivious' from the Latin of the schoolmen, and is always so used by Shakspere.

71 Convey your pleasures. Give your desires the rein.
72 Hoodwink the time. Blind all those about you.
80 His jewels. The jewels of one.