Macd. What three things does drink especially provoke?

Port. Marry, sir, nose-painting, sleep, and urine. Lechery, sir, it provokes, and unprovokes it provokes the desire, but it takes away the performance: Therefore, much drink may be said to be an equivocator with lechery: it makes him, and it mars him; it sets him on, and it takes him off; it persuades him, and disheartens him; makes him stand to, and not stand to: in conclusion, equivocates him in a sleep, and, giving him the fie, leaves him.

Macd. I believe, drink gave thee the lie last night.

Port. That it did, sir, i' the very throat o' me: But I requited him for his lie; and, I think, being too strong for him, though he took up my legs sometime, yet I made a shift to cast him. Macd. Is thy master stirring ?

Our knocking has awak'd him; here he comes. Enter MACBETH.

Len. Good-morrow, noble sir!

Macb.

Good-morrow, both! Macd. Is the king stirring, worthy thane? Macb.

Not yet.

Macd. He did command me to call timely on

him;

I have almost slipp'd the hour.

Macb.

I'll bring you to him. Macd. I know, this is a joyful trouble to you; But yet, 'tis one.

Mach. The labour, we delight in, physicks pain.

This is the door.

Macd.

I'll make so bold to call,

For 'tis my limited service.

[Exit MACDUFF. Len. Goes the king hence to-day? Macb. Len. The night has been unruly; Where we

lay,

He does:-he did appoint so.

Our chimneys were blown down: and, as they say,

Lamentings heard i' the air; strange screams of death;

And prophesying, with accents terrible,

Of dire combustion, and confus'd events, New hatch'd to the woful time. The obscure bird

Clamour'd the livelong night: some say, the

earth

'Twas a rough night.

Len. My young remembrance cannot parallel A fellow to it.

Re-enter MACDuff.

Macd. O horror! horror! horror! Tongue, nor heart,

Cannot conceive, nor name thee!

Macb. Len.

What's the matter?

Macd. Confusion now hath made his masterpiece!

Most sacrilegious murder hath broke ope

The Lord's anointed temple, and stole thence The life o' the building.

Macb.

What is't you say? the life?

Len. Mean you his majesty?

Macd. Approach the chamber, and destroy your sight

awake!

With a new Gorgon:-Do not bid me speak; See, and then speak yourselves. Awake! [Exeunt MACB. and LEN. 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 sprights,

To countenance this horror!

Enter LADY MACBETH.

[Bell rings.

Lady M. What's the business, That such a hideous trumpet calls to parley The sleepers of the house? speak, speak, Macd. O, gentle lady, 'Tis not for you to hear what I can speak:

The repetition, in a woman's ear,

Would murder as it fell-O Banquo! Banquo!

Enter BANQUO.

Our royal master's murder'd!

Lady M.

Woe, alas!

What, in our house?

Ban.

Too cruel, any where,

Dear Duff, I pr'ythee, contradict thyself,

And say, it is not so.

Re-enter MACBETH and LENOX.

Macb. Had I but died an hour before this

chance,

I had lived 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 it: 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.

Mach. O, yet I do repent me of my fury, That I did kill them.

Macd.

Wherefore did you so? Macb. Who can be wise, amazed, temperate, and furious,

Loyal and neutral, in a moment? No man:
The expedition of my violent love

Outran 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 his 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, bid in an augre-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 further. Fears and scruples shake us: In the great hand of God I stand; and, thence, Against the undivulg'd pretence I fight

Of treasonous malice.

Macb. All.

And so do I.

So all.

Macb. Let's briefly put on manly readiness, And meet i' the hall together.

All.

Well contented.

[Exeunt all but MAL. and DON. Mal. What will you do? Let's not consort with them:

To show an unfelt sorrow, is an 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.

[Exeunt.

SCENE IV. Without the Castle.

Enter ROSSE and an Old Man.

Old M. 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.

Rosse. Ah, good father, Thou seest, the heavens, as troubled with man's

act,

Threaten his bloody stage: by the clock, 'tis day,

And yet dark night strangles the travelling lamp: Is it night's predominance, or the day's shame, That darkness does the face of earth entomb, When living light should kiss it?

Old M. 'Tis unnatural, Even like the deed that's done. On Tuesday

last,

A falcon, tow'ring 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 the amazement of mine