Macd.
See, who comes here!

Mal.
My country-man; but yet I know him not.

Macd.
My ever-gentle cousin, welcome hither.

Mal.
I know him now. Good God betimes remove
The means that makes us strangers.

Rosse.
Sir, Amen.

Macd.
Stands Scotland where it did?

&plquo;Rosse.
&plquo;Alas poor country,
&plquo;Almost afraid to know it self. It cannot
&plquo;Be call'd our mother, but our grave; where nothing,
&plquo;But who knows nothing, is once seen to smile:
&plquo;Where sighs and groans, and shrieks that rend the air
&plquo;Are made, not mark'd; where violent sorrow seems
&plquo;A modern ecstasie: the dead-man's knell
&plquo;Is there scarce ask'd, for whom? and good mens lives
&plquo;Expire before the flowers in their caps,
&plquo;Dying, or ere they sicken.

Macd.
Oh relation! too nice, and yet too true.

Mal.
What's the newest grief?

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 children?

Rosse.
Well too.

Macd.
The tyrant has not batter'd at their peace?

Rosse.
No, they were well at peace when I did leave 'em.

Macd.
Be not a niggard of your speech: how goes it?

Rosse.
When I came hither to transport the tidings
Which I have heavily born, 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 soldiers, and make women fight,
To doff their dire distresses.

Mal.
Be't their comfort
We're coming thither: gracious England hath
Lent us good Seyward and ten thousand men;
An older, and a better soldier, none
That christendom gives out.

Rosse.
Would I could answer
This comfort with the like. But I have words
That would be howl'd out in the desart air,
Where hearing should not catch them.

Macd.
What? concern they
The gen'ral cause? or is it a fee-grief
Due to some single breast?

Rosse.
No mind that's honest
But in it shares some 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 despise my tongue for ever,
Which shall possess them with the heaviest sound
That ever yet they heard.

Macd.
Hum! I guess at it.

Rosse.
Your castle is surpriz'd, your wife and babes
Savagely slaughter'd; to relate the manner,
Were on the quarry of these murther'd deer

To add the death of you.

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

Macd.
My children too!—

Rosse.
Wife, children, servants, all that could be found.

Macd.
And I must be from thence! my wife kill'd too!

Rosse.
I've said.

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 say all? what, all?* ^note

Mal.
^{b note}Endure it like a man.

Macd.
I shall:
But I must also feel it as a man.
I cannot but remember such things were,
That were most precious to me: did heav'n look on
And would not take their part? sinful Macduff,
They were all struck for thee! naught that I am,
Not for their own demerits but for mine
Fell slaughter on their souls: heav'n rest them now!

Mal.
Be this the whetstone of your sword, 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 short all intermission: front to front,
Bring thou this fiend of Scotland and my self,

Within my sword's length set him, if he 'scape,
Then heaven 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 shaking, and the powers above
Put on their instruments. Receive what cheer you may;
The night is long that never finds the day. [Exeunt.

Previous section