Hear not my fteps, which way they walk, for fear
The very ftones prate of my where-about;
And take the prefent horror from the time,
Which now fuits with it.-Whilft I threat, he lives-
I go, and it is done; the bell invites me.

Hear it not, Duncan; for it is a knell
That fummons thee to heaven or to hell.

CHA P. XXIII.

MACDUFF, MALCOLM, AND ROSSE.

SE

SHAKESPEAR.

MAL. My countryman; but yet I know him not. MACD. My ever-gentle coufin, welcome hither. MAL. I know him, now. Good God, betimes remove

The means that makes us ftrangers!

Rosse. Sir, Amen.

MACD. Stands Scotland where it did?

Rosse. Alas, poor country,

Almoft afraid to know itfelf. It cannot

Be call'd our mother, but our grave; where nothing,
But who knows nothing, is once seen to smile;
Where fighs and groans, and fhrieks that rend the air,
Are made, not mark'd; where violent forrow feems
A modern ecftafy; the dead man's knell

Is there scarce afk'd, for whom : and good men's lives
Expire before the flowers in their caps;

Dying or e'er they ficken.

MACD. Oh, relation

Too nice, and yet too true!

MAL. What's the newest grief?

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Rossi.

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

ROSSE. Well too.

MACD. The tyrant has not batter'd at their peace?
ROSSE. No; they were at peace when I did leave 'em.
MACD. Be not a niggard of your speech: how goes it?
ROSSE. When I come 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 foldiers, and make women fight,
To doff their dire diftreffes.

MAL. Be't their comfort

We're coming thither: gracious England hath
Lent us good Siward and ten thousand men;
An older, and better foldier, none

children?

That Chriftendom gives out.

ROSSE. Would I could anfwer

This comfort with the like; but I have words
That would be howl'd out in the defert air,

Where hearing fhould not catch them.

MACD. What concern they?

The gen'ral caufe? or is it a free-grief,
Due to fome fingle breast.

ROSSE. No mind that's honest,

But in it shares fome 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 defpife my tongue for ever,
Which shall poffefs them with the heaviest sound,
That ever yet they heard..

MACD. Hum! I guess at it.

Rosse. Your castle is furpris'd, your wife and babes
Savagely flaughter'd; to relate the manner,

Were on the quarry of these murther'd deer
To add the death of you.

ML Merciful Heaven!

What, man! ne'er pull your hat upon your brows,
Give forrow words; the grief that does not speak,
Whispers the o'er-fraught heart, and bids it break.

MACD. My children too!

Rosse. Wife, children, fervants, all that could be found.
MACD. And I must be from thence! my wife kill'd too!
ROSSE. I've faid.

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 fay, all? what all? oh, hell-kite! al?

MAL. Endure it like a man.

MACD. I fhall do fo;

But I muft alfo feel it as a man.

I cannot but remember fuch things were,

That were most precious to me.
Did Heav'n look on,
And would not take their part? Sinful Macduff,
They were all ftruck for thee? naught that I am,
Not for their own demerits, but for mine,

Fell flaughter on their fouls. Heav'n reft them now!

MAL.

MAL. Be this the whet ftone of your fword, let grief Convert to wrath; blunt not the heart, enrage it.

MACD. O, I could play the woman with mine eyes, And braggart with my tongue. But, gentle Heav'n! Cut fhort all intermiffion : front to front,

Bring thou this fiend of Scotland and myself;
Within my fword's length fet hira, if he 'fcape,
Then Heav'n, 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 fhaking, and the powers above

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

SHAKESPEAR.

CHA P. XXIV.

ANTONY'S SOLILOQUY OVER CESAR'S BODY.

PARDON me, thou bleeding piece of earth!

That I am meek and gentle with these butchers. Thou art the ruins of the noblest man

That ever lived in the tide of times.

Woe to the hand that shed this coftly blood!
Over thy wounds now do I prophesy,

(Which, like dumb mouths, do ope their ruby lips,
To beg the voice and utterance of my tongue)
A curfe fhall light upon the line of men ;
Domestic fury, and fierce civil ftrife,
Shall cumber all the parts of Italy;
Blood and deftruction shall be so in ufe,
And dreadful objects fo familiar,

That

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That mothers fhall but smile, when they behold
Their infants quarter'd by the hands of war;
All pity chok'd with cuftom of fell deeds;
And Cæfar's fpirit, ranging for revenge,
With Até by his fide come hot from hell,
Shall in these confines, with a monarch's voice,
Cry, Havock, and let flip the dogs of war.

CHA P. XXV.

SHAKESPEAR.

ANTONY's FUNERAL ORATION OVER CESAR'S BODY.

FRI

RIENDS, Romans, Countrymen, lend me your ears, I come to bury Cæfar, not to praise him. The evil that men do lives after them; The good is oft interred with their bones; So let it be with Cæfar! Noble Brutus Hath told you, Cæfar was ambitious; If it were so, it was a grievous fault; And grievously hath Cæfar anfwer'd it. Here, under leave of Brutus, and the rest, (For Brutus is an honourable man, So are they all, all honourable men) Come I to speak in Cæfar's funeral. He was my friend, faithful and just to me; But Brutus. fays, he was ambitious;

And Brutus is an honourable man.

He hath brought many captives home to Rome,
Whose ranfoms did the general coffers fill;

Did this in Cæfar feem ambitious?

When that the poor have cry'd, Cæfar hath wept ;

Ambition