I have seen him do. How he solicits heaven,
Himself best knows: but strangely-visited people,
All swoln and ulcerous, pitiful to the eye,
The mere despair of surgery, he cures ;
Hanging a golden stamp* about their necks,
Put on with holy prayers: and 'tis spoken,
To the succeeding royalty he leaves

The healing benediction. With this strange virtue,
He hath a heavenly gift of prophecy;

And sundry blessings hang about his throne,

That speak him full of grace.

Macd. See, who comes here?

Mal. My countryman; but yet I know him not.

Enter ROSSE.

Maed. My ever-gentle cousin, welcome hither.
Mal. I know him now: Good God, betimes remove
The means that make us strangers!

Rosse. Sir, Amen.

Macd. Stands Scotland where it did?

Rosse. Alas, poor country;

Almost afraid to know itself! It cannot

Be call'd our mother, but our grave: where nothing,
But who knows nothing, is once seen to smile;

Where sighs and groans, and shrieks that rend the air,
Are made, not mark'd; where violent sorrow seems
A modern ecstasy ;t the dead man's knell

Is there scarce ask'd, for who; and good men's lives,
Expire before the flowers in their caps,
Dying, or ere they sicken.

Macd. O, relation,

Too nice, and yet too true!

Mal. What is the newest grief?

Rosse. That of an hour's age doth hiss the speaker;

Each minute teems a new one.

Macd. How does my wife?

Rosse. Why, well.

Macd. And all my children?

Rosse. Well too.

Macd. The tyrant has not batter'd at their peace?

Rosse. No; they were well at peace, when I did leave them. Macd. Be not a niggard of your speech; How goes it?

Rosse. When I came hither to transport the tidings,

Which I have heavily borne, there ran a rumour

Of many worthy fellows that were out;
Which was to my belief witness'd the rather,
For that I saw the tyrant's power a-foot:
Now is the time of help; your eye in Scotland
Would create soldiers, make our women fight,
To doff their dire distresses.

The coin called an angel.

+ Common distress.

Mal. Be it their comfort,

We are coming thither: gracious England hath
Lent us good Siward, and ten thousand men;
An older, and a better soldier, none

That Christendom gives out.

Rosse. 'Would I could answer

This comfort with the like! But I have words,
That would be howl'd out in the desert air,
Where hearing should not latch* them.
Macd. What concern they?

The general cause? or is it a fee-grief,
Due to some single breast?

Rosse. No mind, that's honest,

But in it shares some woe; though the main part
Pertains to you alone.

Macd. If it be mine,

Keep it not from me, quickly let me have it.

Rosse. Let not your ears despise my tongue for ever, Which shall possess them with the heaviest sound, That ever yet they heard.

Macd. Humph! I guess at it.

Rosse. Your castle is surprised: your wife, and babes, Savagely slaughter'd: to relate the manner,

Were, on the quarryt of these murder'd deer,
To add the death of you.

Mal. Merciful heaven!

What, man! ne'er pull your hat upon your brows;
Give sorrow words: the grief that does not speak,
Whispers the o'er-fraught heart, and bids it break.
Macd. My children too?

Rosse. Wife, children, servants, all

That could be found.

Macd. And I must be from thence!

My wife kill'd too?

Rosse. I have said.

Mal. Be comforted:

Let's make us med'cines of our great revenge,

To cure this deadly grief.

Macd. He has no children.-All my pretty ones?

Did you say, all ?-O, hell-kite!-All?

What, all my pretty chickens, and their dam,

At one fell swoop?

Mal. Dispute it like a man.

Macd. I shall do so;

But I must also feel it as a man:

I cannot but remember such things were,

That were not precious to me.-Did heaven look on,
And would not take their part? Sinful Macduff,
They were all struck for thee! naught that I am,
Not for their own demerits, but for mine,

Fell slaughter on their souls: Heaven rest them now!

* Catch.

+ The game after it is killed.

Mal. Be this the whetstone of your sword: let grief Convert to anger; blunt not the heart, enrage it.

Macd. O, I could play the woman with mine eyes,
And braggart with my tongue!- -But, gentle heaven,
Cut short all intermission;* front to front,

Bring thou this fiend of Scotland, and myself:
Within my sword's length set him; if he 'scape,
Heaven forgive him too!

Mal. This tune goes manly.

Come, go we to the king; our power is ready;
Our lack is nothing but our leave: Macbeth

Is ripe for shaking, and the powers above

Put on their instruments. Receive what cheer you may;
The night is long, that never finds the day.

[Exeunt.

ACT V.

SCENE I-Dunsinane.

A Room in the Castle.

Enter a DOCTOR of Physic, and a waiting GENTLEWOMAN. Doct. I have two nights watched with you, but can perceive no truth in your report. When was it she last walked ?

Gent. Since his majesty went into the field, I have seen her rise from her bed, throw her nightgown upon her, unlock her closet, take forth paper, fold it, write upon it, read it, afterwards seal it, and again return to bed; yet all this while in a most fast sleep.

Doct. A great perturbation in nature! to receive at once the benefit of sleep, and do the effects of watching. In this slumbry agitation, besides her walking, and other actual performances, what, at any time, have you heard her say?

Gent. That, Sir, which I will not report after her.

Doct. You may, to me; and 'tis most meet you should.

Gent. Neither to you, nor any one; having no witness to confirm my speech.

Enter LADY MACBETH with a Taper.

Lo you, here she comes! This is her very guise; and upon my life, fast asleep. Observe her; stand close.

Doct. How came she by that light?

Gent. Why, it stood by her: she has light by her continually; 'tis her command.

Doct. You see, her eyes are open.

Gent. Ay, but their sense is shut.

Doct. What is it she does now? Look, how she rubs her hands.

* Pause.

Gent. It is an accustomed action with her, to seem thus washing her hands; I have known her continue in this a quarter of an hour.

Lady M. Yet here's a spot.

Doct. Hark, she speaks: I will set down what comes from her, to satisfy my remembrance the more strongly.

Lady M. Out, damned spot! out, I say!-One; Two; Why, then 'tis time to do't:- Hell is murky! Fie, my lord, fie! a soldier, and afear'd? What need we fear who knows it, when none can call our power to account!-Yet who would have thought the old man to have had so much blood in him?

Doct. Do you mark that?

Lady M. The thane of Fife had a wife, Where is she now? What, will these hands ne'er be clean ?-No more o' that, my lord, no more o' that: you mar all with this starting.

Doct. Go to, go to; you have known what you should not. Gent. She has spoke what she should not, I am sure of that: Heaven knows what she has known.

Lady M. Here's the smell of the blood still: all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. Oh! oh! oh!

Doct. What a sight is there! The heart is sorely charged. Gent. I would not have such a heart in my bosom, for the dignity of the whole body.

Doct. Well, well, well,

Gent. 'Pray God, it be, Sir.

Doct. This disease is beyond my practice: Yet I have known those which have walked in their sleep, who have died holily in their beds.

Lady M. Wash your hands, put on your nightgown; look not so pale: I tell you yet again, Banquo's buried; he cannot come out of his grave.

Doct. Even so?

Lady M. To bed, to bed; there's knocking at the gate. Come, come, come, come, give me your hand; What's done, cannot be undone: To bed, to bed, to bed. [Exit LADY MACBETH.

Doct. Will she go now to bed?
Gent. Directly.

Doct. Foul whisperings are abroad: Unnatural deeds

Do breed unnatural troubles: Infected minds

To their deaf pillows will discharge their secrets.
More needs she the divine, than the physician.-
God, God, forgive us all! Look after her;
Remove from her the means of all annoyance,
And still keep eyes upon her:-So, good night:
My mind she has mated,* and amazed my sight:
I think, but dare not speak.

Gent. Good night, good doctor.

*Confounded.

[Exeunt.

SCENE II.-The Country near Dunsinane.

Enter, with Drum and Colours, MENTETH, CATHNESS, ANGUS, LENOX, and Soldiers.

Ment. The English power is near, led on by Malcolm, His uncle Siward, and the good Macduff.

Revenges burn in them; for their dear causes

Would, to the bleeding, and the grim alarm,
Excite the mortified man.*

Ang. Near Birnam wood

Shall we well meet them; that way are they coming.
Cath. Who knows, if Donalbain be with his brother?
Len. For certain, Sir, he is not: I have a file

Of all the gentry; there is Siward's son,

And many unrough youths, that even now
Protest their first of manhood.

Ment. What does the tyrant?

Cath. Great Dunsinane he strongly fortifies:
Some say, he's mad; others, that lesser hate him,
Do call it valiant fury: but, for certain,
He cannot buckle his distemper'd cause
Within the belt of rule.

Ang. Now does he feel

His secret murders sticking on his hands:

Now minutely revolts upbraid his faith-breach;
Those he commands, move only in command,
Nothing in love: now does he feel the title
Hang loose about him, like a giant's robe
Upon a dwarfish thief.

Ment. Who then shall blame

His pester'd senses to recoil, and start,
When all that is within him does condemn

Itself, for being there?

Cath. Well, march we on,

To give obedience where 'tis truly owed:

Meet we the medecin† of the sickly weal;

And with him pour we, in our country's purge,

Each drop of us.

Len. Or so much as it needs,

To dew the sovereign flower, and drown the weeds.
Make we our march towards Birnam.

[Exeunt, marching.

SCENE III.-Dunsinane. A Room in the Castle.

Enter MACBETH, DOCTOR, and Attendants.
Macb. Bring me no more reports; let them fly all;
Till Birnam wood remove to Dunsinane,

I cannot taint with fear. What's the boy Malcolm!
Was he not born of woman? The spirits that know
†The physician.

* Ascetic.