Lady.
What's the business
That such an hideous trumpet calls to parley
The sleepers of the house? speak.

Macd.
Gentle lady,
'Tis not for you to hear what I can speak.
The repetition in a woman's ear
Would murther as it fell. Enter Banquo.
O Banquo, Banquo, our royal master's murther'd.

Lady.
Woe, alas!
What, in our house?—

Ban.
Too cruel, any where.
Macduff, I pr'ythee contradict thy self,
And say, it is not so. Enter Macbeth, Lenox, and Rosse.

Macb.
Had I but dy'd 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 Malcolme, and Donalbaine.

Don.
What is amiss?

Macb.
You are, and do not know't:

The spring, the head, the fountain of your blood
Is stopt; the very source of it is stopt.

Macd.
Your royal father's murder'd.

Mal.
Oh, by whom?

Len.
Those of his chamber, as it seem'd, had don'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, temp'rate and furious,
Loyal and neutral in a moment? no man.
The expedition of my violent love
Out-run the pauser, reason. Here lay Duncan,
His silver skin lac'd with his ^{c note}goary blood,
And his gash'd stabs look'd like a breach in nature,
For ruin's wasteful entrance; there the murtherers,
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.
Help me hence, ho!— [Seeming to faint.

Macd.
Look to the lady.

Mal.
Why do we hold our tongues,
That most may claim this argument for ours?

Don.
What should be spoken here,
Where our fate hid within an augre-hole,
May rush, and seize us? Let's away, our tears
Are not yet brew'd.

Mal.
Nor our strong sorrow on
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 treas'nous malice.

Macb.
So do I.

All.
So all.

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

All.
Well contented. [Exeunt.

Mal.
What will you do? let's not consort with them:
To shew an unfelt sorrow, is an office
Which the false man does easie. I'll to England.

Don.
To Ireland, I; our separated fortune
Shall keep us both the safer; where we are,
There's daggers in mens 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 it self when there's no mercy left. [Exeunt.

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