Ban. O, treachery! Fly, good Fleance, fly, fly, fly; Thou may'st revenge. O slave!

[Dies. Fleance and Servant escape2.

3 Mur. Who did strike out the light?

Was't not the way?

1 Mur. 3 Mur. There's but one down: the son is fled. 2 Mur. We have lost best half of our affair. 1 Mur. Well, let's away, and say how much is done.

SCENE IV. A Room of State in the Palace. A Banquet prepared.

Enter MACBETH, LADY MACBETH, ROSSE, LeNOX, Lords, and Attendants.

Macb. You know your own degrees, sit down: at first1

And last, the hearty welcome.

Lords.

Thanks to your majesty.

Macb. Ourself will mingle with society,
And play the humble host.

Our hostess keeps her state; but, in best time,
We will require her welcome.

Lady M. Pronounce it for me, sir, to all our friends;

For my heart speaks, they are welcome.

2 Fleance, after the assassination of his father, fled into Wales, where, by the daughter of the prince of that country, he had a son named Walter, who afterwards became Lord High Steward of Scotland, and from thence assumed the name of Sir Walter Steward. From him, in a direct line, King James I. was descended; in compliment to whom Shakspeare has chosen to describe Banquo, who was equally concerned with Macbeth in the murder of Duncan, as innocent of that crime.

1 At first and last.' Johnson with great plausibility proposes to read To first and last.'

26

Keeps her state,' continues in her chair of state. A state was a royal chair with a canopy over it.

fate

Enter first Murderer, to the door.

Macb. See, they encounter thee with their hearts'
thanks:-

Both sides are even: Here I'll sit i' the midst:
Be large in mirth; anon, we'll drink a measure

The table round.-There's blood upon thy face.
Mur. 'Tis Banquo's then.

Macb. 'Tis better thee without, than he within 3.
Is he despatch'd?

Mur. My lord, his throat is cut; that I did for him.
Macb. Thou art the best o'the cut-throats: Yet
he's good,

That did the like for Fleance: if thou didst it,
Thou art the nonpareil.

Mur.

Fleance is 'scap'd.

Most royal sir,

Macb. Then comes my fit again: I had else been
perfect;

Whole as the marble, founded as the rock;
As broad, and general, as the casing air:
But now, I am cabin'd, cribb'd, confin'd, bound in
To saucy doubts and fears. But Banquo's safe?
Mur. Ay, my good lord: safe in a ditch he bides,
With twenty trenched 4 gashes on his head;

The least a death to nature.

Thanks for that:

Macb.
There the grown serpent lies; the worm, that's fled,

3'Tis better he without than thee within,' that is, I am better pleased that the blood of Banquo should be on thy face than in his body. He is put for him.

4 With twenty trenched gashes on his head.' From the French trancher, to cut. So in Arden of Feversham:Is deeply trenched on my blushing brow.'

Again, in The Two Gentlemen of Verona :

Hath nature that in time will venom breed,

No teeth for the present.—Get thee gone; to-morrow We'll hear ourselves again.

Lady M.

[Exit Murderer.

My royal lord,

You do not give the cheer: the feast is sold,
That is not often vouch'd, while 'tis a making,
"Tis given with welcome: To feed were best at home;
From thence, the sauce to meat is ceremony;
Meeting were bare without it.

Macb.

Sweet remembrancer!

Now, good digestion wait on appetite,
And health on both!

Len.

May it please your highness sit? [The Ghost of BANQUO rises, and sits in MACBETH'S place.

Macb. Here had we now our country's honour

roof'd,

Were the grac'd person of our Banquo present;
Who may I rather challenge for unkindness,
Than pity for mischance5!

Rosse.

His absence, sir,

Lays blame upon his promise. Please it your high

ness

To grace us with your royal company?

Macb. The table's full.

Len.

Macb.

Here's a place reserv'd, sir.

Where?

Len. Here, my good lord. What is't that moves

your highness?

Macb. Which of you have done this?

Lords.

What, my good lord!

5 Macbeth betrays himself by an overacted regard for Banquo, of whose absence from the feast he affects to complain, that he may not be suspected of knowing the cause, though at the same time he very unguardedly drops an allusion to that cause. May I seems to imply here a wish, not an assertion.

Macb. Thou canst not say, I did it: never shake Thy gory locks at me.

Rosse. Gentlemen, rise; his highness is not well. Lady M. Sit, worthy friends:-my lord is often thus,

And hath been from his youth: 'pray you, keep seat;
The fit is momentary; upon a thought

He will again be well: If much you note him,
You shall offend him, and extend his passion7;
Feed, and regard him not.—Are you a man?

Macb. Ay, and a bold one, that dare look on that Which might appal the devil.

Lady M.

0 proper stuff! This is the very painting of your fear:

This is the air-drawn dagger, which, you said,
Led you to Duncan. O, these flaws 8, and starts,
(Impostors to true fear), would well become
A woman's story at a winter's fire,

Authoriz'd by her grandam. Shame itself!
Why do you make such faces? When all's done,

You look but on a stool.

6 i. e. as speedily as thought can be exerted. So in King Henry IV. Part I.: ' and with a thought, seven of the eleven I paid.'

7 i. e. prolong his suffering, make his fit longer.

8 Flaws are sudden gusts.

9Impostors to true fear.' Warburton's learning serves him not here; his explanation is erroneous. Malone idly suggests that to may be used for of. Mason has hit the meaning, though his way of accounting for it is wrong. It seems strange that none of the commentators should be aware that this was a form of elliptic expression, commonly used even at this day in the phrase, this is nothing to them,' i. e. in comparison to them. We have it again in Romeo and Juliet:- My will to her consent is but a part,' i. e. is but a part in comparison to her consent. Antony Huish, in his Pricianus Ephebus, 1668, says: The English do eclipse many words which the Latines would to be expressed, e. g. There is no enemy-to him we foster in our bosom, i. e. like to or compared to.' Thus in The Two Gentlemen of Verona, D. 127:- There is no woe to his correction.'

Macb. Pr'ythee, see there! behold! look! lo!

how say you?

Why, what care I? If thou canst nod, speak too.—
If charnel-houses, and our graves, must send
Those that we bury, back, our monuments
Shall be the maws of kites 10.

Lady M.

[Ghost disappears.

What! quite unmann'd in folly?

Macb. If I stand here, I saw him.
Lady M.

Fye, for shame!

Macb. Blood hath been shed ere now, i' the olden time,

Ere human statute purg'd the gentle weal;

Ay, and since too, murders have been perform'd
Too terrible for the ear: the times have been,
That, when the brains were out, the man would die,
And there an end: but now, they rise again,
With twenty mortal murders on their crowns,
And push us from our stools: This is more strange
Than such a murder is.

Lady M.

My worthy lord, Your noble friends do lack you.

I do forget:

Macb.
Do not muse 11 at me, my most worthy friends;
I have a strange infirmity, which is nothing

To those that know me. Come, love and health to all ;
Then I'll sit down :--Give me some wine, fill full:
I drink to the general joy of the whole table,

Ghost rises.

And to our dear friend Banquo, whom we miss ; 10 The same thought occurs in Spenser's Faerie Queene, b. ii. c. viii.:

'Be not entombed in the raven or the kight.'

11 Shakspeare uses to muse for to wonder, to be in amaze. So in King Henry IV. Part II. Act iv. :

'I muse, you make so slight a question.'

and in All's Well that Ends Well:

And rather muse than ask why I entreat you.'