Macd. Approach the chamber, and destroy your sight With a new Gorgon. Do not bid me speak:

See, and then speak yourselves. — Awake! awake!

[Exeunt MACBETH and LENOX.

Ring the alarum-bell. - Murder, and treason!
Banquo, and Donalbain! Malcolm, awake!
Shake off this downy sleep, death's counterfeit,
And look on death itself! - up, up, and see
The great doom's image! - Malcolm! Banquo!
As from your graves rise up, and walk like sprites
To countenance this horror! Ring the bell.

[Bell rings.

Lady M.

Enter Lady Macbeth.

What's the business,

That such a hideous trumpet calls to parley
The sleepers of the house? speak, speak!
Macd.

'T is not for you to hear what I can speak:
The repetition, in a woman's ear,

Enter BANQUO.

O, gentle lady!

Re-enter MACBETH and LENOX.

Macb. Had I but died an hour before this chance,

I had liv'd a blessed time, for from this instant

There's nothing serious in mortality;

All is but toys: renown and grace, is dead;
The wine of life is drawn, and the mere lees
Is left this vault to brag of.

Enter MALCOLM and DONALBAIN.

Don. What is amiss?

Macb.

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.

Macd. Your royal father 's murder'd.

Mal.

O! by whom?

Len. Those of his chamber, as it seem'd, had done 't.
Their hands and faces were all badg'd with blood;

So were their daggers, which, unwip'd, we found
Upon their pillows: they star'd, and were distracted.
No man's life was to be trusted with them.

Macb. O! yet I do repent me of my fury,

That I did kill them.

Macd.

Wherefore did you so?

Macb. Who can be wise, amaz'd, temperate and furious, Loyal and neutral, in a moment? No man:

The expedition of my violent love

Out-ran the pauser reason.

- Here lay Duncan,
His silver skin lac'd 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, and in that heart

Courage, to make 's love known?

Lady M.

Macd. Look to the lady.

Mal.

Help me hence, ho!

Why do we hold our tongues,

That most may claim this argument for ours?

Don. What should be spoken

Here, where our fate, hid in an auger-hole,
May rush, and seize us? Let's away: our tears

Are not yet brew'd.

Mal.

Nor our strong sorrow

Upon the foot of motion.

Ban.

Look to the lady.

[Lady MACBETH is carried out.

And when we have our naked frailties hid,
That suffer in exposure, let us meet,

And question this most bloody piece of work,
To know it farther. Fears and scruples shake us:
In the great hand of God I stand; and, thence,
Against the undivulg'd pretence I fight

Mal. What will you do?

Let's briefly put on manly readiness,

To show an unfelt sorrow is an

Well contented.

[Exeunt all but MAL. and DON. Let's not consort with them: office

Which the false man does easy. I'll to England.

Don. To Ireland, I: our separated fortune

Shall keep us both the safer; where we are,

There's daggers in men's smiles: the near in blood,
The nearer bloody.

Mal.

This murderous shaft that's shot

Hath not yet lighted, and our safest way
Is to avoid the aim: therefore, to horse;
And let us not be dainty of leave-taking,
But shift away. There's warrant in that theft
Which steals itself, when there's no mercy left.

Old M.

SCENE IV.

Without the Castle.

Enter Rosse and an Old Man.

Threescore and ten I can remember well;

Within the volume of which time I have seen

Hours dreadful, and things strange, but this sore night

Hath trifled former knowings.

[Exeunt.

Rosse.

Ah! good father,

Thou seest, the heavens, as troubled with man's act,
Threaten his bloody stage: by the clock 't is day,
And yet dark night strangles the travailing 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?

Old M.

'T is unnatural,

Even like the deed that 's done. On Tuesday last,

A falcon, towering in her pride of place,

Was by a mousing owl hawk'd at, and kill'd.

Rosse. And Duncan's horses (a thing most strange and certain),

Beauteous and swift, the minions of their race,

Turn'd wild in nature, broke their stalls, flung out,
Contending 'gainst obedience, as they would

Make war with mankind.

Old M.

'Tis said, they ate each other.

Rosse. They did so; to th' amazement of mine eyes, That look'd upon 't. Here comes the good Macduff.

Enter MACDuff.

Why, see you not?

How goes the world, Sir, now?

Macd.

Rosse. Is 't known, who did this more than bloody deed? Macd. Those that Macbeth hath slain.

Rosse.

What good could they pretend?

Macd.

Alas, the day!

They were suborn'd.
Malcolm, and Donalbain, the king's two sons,
Are stol'n away and fled; which puts upon them
Suspicion of the deed.

Thriftless ambition, that will ravin up

Thine own life's means! - Then, 't is most like,

The sovereignty will fall upon Macbeth.

Macd. He is already nam'd, and gone to Scone

To be invested.

Rosse.

Where is Duncan's body?

Macd. Carried to Colme-kill;

The sacred store-house of his predecessors,

And guardian of their bones.

Rosse.

Macd. No, cousin; I'll to Fife.

Rosse.

Will you to Scone?

Well, I will thither.

adieu

Macd. Well, may you see things well done there: Lest our old robes sit easier than our new!

Rosse. Farewell, father.

Old M. God's benison go with you; and with those, That would make good of bad, and friends of foes!

[Exeunt.

Bun. Thou hast it now, King, Cawdor, Glamis, all, As the weird women promis'd; 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 thec made good,
May they not be my oracles as well,

And set me up in hope? But, hush; no more.

Senet sounded. Enter MACBETH, as King; Lady MACBETH, us Queen; LENOX, Rosse, Lords, Ladies, and Attendants.

Macb. Here's our chief guest.

Lady M.

It had been as a gay in our great feast,
And all thing unbecoming.

If he had been forgotten,