Point against-point rebellious, arm 'gainst arm, King. Great happiness! Roffe. That now Sweno, the Norways' king, craves compofition; 5 King. No more that thane of Cawdor fhall deceive Our bofom intereft:-Go, pronounce his prefent death, blunder upon blunder. The truth is, by him, in this verfe, is meant Norway; as the plain conftruction of the English requires. And the affiftance the thane of Cawdor had given Norway was underhand; which Roffe and Angus, indeed, had discovered; but was unknown to Macbeth. Cawdor being in the court all this while, as appears from Angus's fpeech to Macbeth, when he meets him to falute him with the title, and infinuates his crime to be lining the rebel with hidden help and 'vantage. WARBURTON. The fecond blunderer was the prefent editor. JoHNSON. 4 with felf-comparifons,]. e give him as good as he brought, fhew'd he was his equal. WARBURTON. Colmes-inch, now called Inchcomb, a fmall ifland lying in the Firth of Edinburgh, with an abbey upon it, dedicated to St. Columb called by Camden Inch Colm, or the Isle of Columba. The modern editors, without authority, read; Saint Colmes'-kill Isle; and very erroneously; for Colmes' Inch, and Colm-kill are two different iflands; the former lying on the eastern coaft, near the place where the Danes were defeated; the latter in the western feas, being the famous Iona, one of the Hebrides. Holinfhed thus mentions the whole circumftance: "The Danes that cfcaped, and get once to their hips, obtained of Macbeth for a great fum of gold, that fuch of their friends as were flaine, might be buried in Saint Colmes' Inch. In memory whereof many old fepultures are yet in the faid Inch, graven with the arms of the Danes." Inch, or Infbe in the Irish and Erfe languages, fignifies an ifland. See Lhuyd's Archæologia. STEEVENS. And with his former title greet Macbeth. Roffe. I'll fee it done. King. What he hath loft, noble Macbeth hath won. [Exeunt: Thunder. Enter the three Witches. 1 Witch. Where haft thou been, fifter? 2 Witch. Killing fwine. 3 Witch. Sifter, where thou? 1 Witch. A failor's wife had chefnuts in her lap, And mouncht, and mouncht, and mouncht:-Give 6 me; quoth I, 8 Aroint thee, witch! the 7 rump-fed ronyon cries. Her In one of the folio editions the reading is Anoint thee, in a fenfe very confiftent with the common account of witches, who are re lated to perform many fupernatural acts by the means of unguents, and particularly to fly through the air to the places where they meet at their hellish feftivals. In this fenfe, anoint thee, witch, will mean, Away, witch, to your infernal affembly. This reading I was inclined to favour, because I had met with the word aroint in no other author; till looking into Hearne's Collections I found it in a very old drawing, that he has published, in which St. Patrick is reprefented vifiting hell, and putting the devils in to great confufion by his prefence, of whom one that is driving the damned before him with a prong, has a label iffuing out of his mouth with these words, ouT OUT ARONGT, of which the last is evidently the fame with aroint, and used in the fame sense as in' this paffage. JoHNSON. Rynt you witch, quoth Beffe Locket to her mother, is a north country proverb. The word is used again in K. Lear: "And aroint thee witch, aroint thee." STEEVENs. 7 the rump-fed ronyon- -} The chief cooks in noblemen's families, colleges, religious houfes, hofpitals, &c. anciently claimed the emoluments or kitchen fees of kidneys, fat, trotters, rumps, &c. which they fold to the poor. The weird fifter in this fcene, as an infult on the poverty of the woman who had called her witch, reproaches her poor abject state, as Her husband's to Aleppo gone, mafter o'the Tyger: But in a fieve I'll thither fail, 1 And, like a rat without a tail, I'll do, I'll do, and I'll do. 2 Witch. I'll give thee a wind". I Witch. as not being able to procure better provifion than offals, which are confidered as the refufe of the tables of others. COLEPEPER. So, in Ben Jonson's Staple of News, old Penny-boy fays to the Cook: "And then remember meat for my two dogs; Again, in Wit at feveral Weapons, by B. and Fletcher: "With kidneys, rumps, and cues of fingle beer." In the Book of Haukynge, &c. (commonly called the Book of St. Albans) bl. 1. no date, among the proper terms used in kepyng of haukes, it is faid: "The hauke tyreth upon rumps." STEEVENS. ronyon cries.] 8 i. e. fcabby or mangy woman. Fr. rogneux, royne, scurf. Thus Chaucer, in the Romaunt of the Rofe, p. 551: "Withouten bleine, or fcabbe, or roine." Shakespeare uses the word again in The Merry Wives of Windfor. STEEVENS. in a fieve I'll thither fail,] Reginald Scott, in his Discovery of Witchcraft, 1584, fays it was believed that witches "could fail in an egg fhell, a cockle or muscle fhell, through and under the tempeftuous feas." Again, fir W. Davenant, in his Albovine, 1629: "He fits like a witch failing in a fieve." STEEVENS. ▾ And like a rat without a tail,} It should be remembered (as it was the belief of the times) that though a witch could affume the form of any animal she pleased, the tail would ftill be wanting. The reason given by fome of the old writers, for fuch a deficiency, is, that though the hands and feet, by an eafy change, might be converted into the four paws of a beaft, there was still no part about a woman which correfponded with the length of tail common to almost all four-footed creatures. STEEVENS. I'll give thee a wind.] This free gift of a wind is to be confidered as an act of fifterly friendship, for witches were supposed to fell them. So, in Summer's laft Will and Teftament, 1600: Gg 4 66 -in I Witch. Thou art kind. 3 Witch. And I another. 1 Witch. I myself have all the other; I will drain him dry as hay 5: -in Ireland and in Denmark both, "Witches for gold will fell a man a wind, "Which in the corner of a napkin wrap'd, "Shall blow him fafe unto what coaft he will." Drayton, in his Moon-calf, fays the fame. STEEVENS. 3 And the very points they blow ;] Weary As the word very is here of no other ufe than to fill up the verfe, it is likely that Shakespeare wrote various, which might be eafily miftaken for very, being either negligently read, hastily pronounced, or imperfectly heard. JOHNSON. The very points are the true exact points. Very is ufed here (as in a thousand inftances which might be brought) to exprefs the declaration more emphatically. Inftead of points, however, the ancient copy reads ports. But this-cannot be right; for though the witch, from her power over the winds, might juftly enough fay that fhe had all the points and quarters from whence they blow, the could not with any degree of propriety declare that fhe had the ports to which they were directed. STEEVENS. 4 the Shipman's card.] The card is the paper on which the winds are marked under the pilot's needle. So, in the Loyal Subject, by B. and Fletcher: The card of goodness in your minds, that fhews you "When you fail falfe." STEEVENS. 5 -dry as bay:]. So, Spenfer, in his Faery Queen, b. iii. c. 9 : But he is old and withered as hay." STEEVENS. i. e. as one under a curfe, an interdiction. So, afterwards in this play: By his own interdiction ftands accurs'd.? So among the Romans, an outlaw's fentence was, Aqua & Ignis interdictio; i.e. he was forbid the use of water and fire, which imply'd the neceffity of banishment, THEOBALD, Mr, Weary feven-nights, nine times nine, Look what I have. 2 Witch. Shew me, fhew me. 1 Witch. Here I have a pilot's thumb, Wreck'd, as homeward he did come. [Drum within, 3 Witch. A drum, a drum; Macbeth doth come. 8 All. The weird fifters, hand in hand, Pofters of the fea and land, Thus Mr. Theobald has very juftly explained forbid by accurfed, but without giving any reafon of his interpretation. To bid is origi nally to pray, as in this Saxon fragment: He ir pir bit I bote, &c. He is wife that prays and makes amends. As to forbid therefore implies to prohibit, in oppofition to the word bid in its present fenfe, it fignifies by the fame kind of oppofition to curfe, when it is derived from the fame word in its primitive meaning. JOHNSON. 7 Shall be dwindle, &c.] This mifchief was fuppofed to be put in execution by means of a waxen figure, which reprefented the person who was to be con fumed by flow degrees. So, in Webster's Dutchefs of Malfy, 1623: "Than were't my picture fashion'd out of wax, So, Holinfhed, fpeaking of the witchcraft practised to destroy king 66 found one of the witches roafting upon a wooden broch an image of wax at the fire, refembling in each feature the king's perfon, &c." 66 for as the image did wafte afore the fire, fo did the bodie of the king break forth in fweat. And as for the words of the inchantment, they ferved to keep him ftill waking from fleepe, &c.” This may ferve to explain the foregoing paffage: Sleep fhall neither night nor day, Hang upon his penthouse lid. STEEVENS The witches are here fpeaking of themselves; and it is worth an enquiry |