Macbeth (Including The Biography of the Infamous Author). William Shakespeare

That will be ere the set of sun.

       FIRST WITCH.

       Where the place?

       SECOND WITCH.

       Upon the heath.

       THIRD WITCH.

       There to meet with Macbeth.

       FIRST WITCH.

       I come, Graymalkin!

       ALL.

       Paddock calls:—anon:—

       Fair is foul, and foul is fair:

       Hover through the fog and filthy air.

       [Witches vanish.]

       SCENE II. A Camp near Forres.

       [Alarum within. Enter King Duncan, Malcolm, Donalbain, Lennox, with Attendants, meeting a bleeding Soldier.]

       DUNCAN.

       What bloody man is that? He can report,

       As seemeth by his plight, of the revolt

       The newest state.

       MALCOLM.

       This is the sergeant

       Who, like a good and hardy soldier, fought

       ‘Gainst my captivity.—Hail, brave friend!

       Say to the king the knowledge of the broil

       As thou didst leave it.

       SOLDIER.

       Doubtful it stood;

       As two spent swimmers that do cling together

       And choke their art. The merciless Macdonwald,—

       Worthy to be a rebel,—for to that

       The multiplying villainies of nature

       Do swarm upon him,—from the Western isles

       Of kerns and gallowglasses is supplied;

       And fortune, on his damned quarrel smiling,

       Show’d like a rebel’s whore. But all’s too weak;

       For brave Macbeth,—well he deserves that name,—

       Disdaining fortune, with his brandish’d steel,

       Which smok’d with bloody execution,

       Like valor’s minion,

       Carv’d out his passag tTill he fac’d the slave;

       And ne’er shook hands, nor bade farewell to him,

       Till he unseam’d him from the nave to the chaps,

       And fix’d his head upon our battlements.

       DUNCAN.

       O valiant cousin! worthy gentleman!

       SOLDIER.

       As whence the sun ‘gins his reflection

       Shipwrecking storms and direful thunders break;

       So from that spring, whence comfort seem’d to come

       Discomfort swells. Mark, King of Scotland, mark:

       No sooner justice had, with valor arm’d,

       Compell’d these skipping kerns to trust their heels,

       But the Norweyan lord, surveying vantage,

       With furbish’d arms and new supplies of men,

       Began a fresh assault.

       DUNCAN.

       Dismay’d not this

       Our captains, Macbeth and Banquo?

       SOLDIER.

       Yes;

       As sparrows eagles, or the hare the lion.

       If I say sooth, I must report they were

       As cannons overcharg’d with double cracks;

       So they

       Doubly redoubled strokes upon the foe:

       Except they meant to bathe in reeking wounds,

       Or memorize another Golgotha,

       I cannot tell:—

       But I am faint; my gashes cry for help.

       DUNCAN.

       So well thy words become thee as thy wounds;

       They smack of honor both.—Go, get him surgeons.

       [Exit Soldier, attended.]

       Who comes here?

       MALCOLM.

       The worthy Thane of Ross.

       LENNOX.

       What a haste looks through his eyes! So should he look

       That seems to speak things strange.

       [Enter Ross.]

       ROSS.

       God save the King!

       DUNCAN.

       Whence cam’st thou, worthy thane?

       ROSS.

       From Fife, great king;

       Where the Norweyan banners flout the sky

       And fan our people cold.

       Norway himself, with terrible numbers,

       Assisted by that most disloyal traitor

       The Thane of Cawdor, began a dismal conflict;

       Till that Bellona’s bridegroom, lapp’d in proof,

       Confronted him with self-comparisons,

       Point against point rebellious, arm ‘gainst arm,

       Curbing his lavish spirit: and, to conclude,

       The victory fell on us.

       DUNCAN.

       Great happiness!

       ROSS.

       That now

       Sweno, the Norways’ king, craves composition;

       Nor would we deign him burial of his men

       Till he disbursed, at Saint Colme’s-inch,

       Ten thousand dollars to our general use.

       DUNCAN.

       No more that Thane of Cawdor shall deceive

       Our bosom interest:—go pronounce his present death,

       And with his former title greet Macbeth.

       ROSS.

       I’ll see it done.

       DUNCAN.

       What he hath lost, noble Macbeth hath won.

       [Exeunt.]

       SCENE III. A heath.

       [Thunder. Enter the three Witches.]

       FIRST WITCH.

       Where hast thou been, sister?

       SECOND WITCH.

       Killing swine.

       THIRD WITCH.

       Sister, where thou?

       FIRST WITCH.

       A sailor’s wife had chestnuts in her lap,

       And mounch’d, and mounch’d, and mounch’d:—“Give me,” quoth I:

       “Aroint thee, witch!” the rump-fed ronyon cries.

       Her husband’s to Aleppo gone, master o’ the Tiger:

       But in a sieve I’ll thither sail,

       And, like a rat without a tail,

       I’ll do, I’ll do, and I’ll do.

       SECOND WITCH.

       I’ll give thee a wind.