The Complete Works of William Shakespeare Part 322

MACBETH. Hang out our banners on the outward walls; The cry is still, "They come!" Our castle's strength Will laugh a siege to scorn. Here let them lie Till famine and the ague eat them up.

Were they not forced with those that should be ours, We might have met them dareful, beard to beard, And beat them backward home.

A cry of women within.

What is that noise?

SEYTON. It is the cry of women, my good lord. Exit.

MACBETH. I have almost forgot the taste of fears: The time has been, my senses would have cool'd To hear a night-shriek, and my fell of hair Would at a dismal treatise rouse and stir As life were in't. I have supp'd full with horrors; Direness, familiar to my slaughterous thoughts, Cannot once start me.

Re-enter Seyton.

Wherefore was that cry?

SEYTON. The Queen, my lord, is dead.

MACBETH. She should have died hereafter; There would have been a time for such a word.

Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow Creeps in this petty pace from day to day To the last syllable of recorded time; And all our yesterdays have lighted fools The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!

Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player That struts and frets his hour upon the stage And then is heard no more. It is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing.

Enter a Messenger.

Thou comest to use thy tongue; thy story quickly.

MESSENGER. Gracious my lord, I should report that which I say I saw, But know not how to do it.

MACBETH. Well, say, sir.

MESSENGER. As I did stand my watch upon the hill, I look'd toward Birnam, and anon, methought, The Wood began to move.

MACBETH. Liar and slave!

MESSENGER. Let me endure your wrath, if't be not so.

Within this three mile may you see it coming; I say, a moving grove.

MACBETH. If thou speak'st false, Upon the next tree shalt thou hang alive, Till famine cling thee; if thy speech be sooth, I care not if thou dost for me as much.

I pull in resolution and begin To doubt the equivocation of the fiend That lies like truth. "Fear not, till Birnam Wood Do come to Dunsinane," and now a wood Comes toward Dunsinane. Arm, arm, and out!

If this which he avouches does appear, There is nor flying hence nor tarrying here.

I 'gin to be aweary of the sun And wish the estate o' the world were now undone.

Ring the alarum bell! Blow, wind! Come, wrack!

At least we'll die with harness on our back. Exeunt.

SCENE VI.

Dunsinane. Before the castle.

Enter Malcolm, old Siward, Macduff, and their Army, with boughs.

Drum and colors.

MALCOLM. Now near enough; your leavy screens throw down, And show like those you are. You, worthy uncle, Shall with my cousin, your right n.o.ble son, Lead our first battle. Worthy Macduff and we Shall take upon 's what else remains to do, According to our order.

SIWARD. Fare you well.

Do we but find the tyrant's power tonight, Let us be beaten if we cannot fight.

MACDUFF. Make all our trumpets speak, give them all breath, Those clamorous harbingers of blood and death.

Exeunt.

SCENE VII.

Dunsinane. Before the castle. Alarums.

Enter Macbeth.

MACBETH. They have tied me to a stake; I cannot fly, But bear-like I must fight the course. What's he That was not born of woman? Such a one Am I to fear, or none.

Enter young Siward.

YOUNG SIWARD. What is thy name?

MACBETH. Thou'lt be afraid to hear it.

YOUNG SIWARD. No, though thou call'st thyself a hotter name Than any is in h.e.l.l.

MACBETH. My name's Macbeth.

YOUNG SIWARD. The devil himself could not p.r.o.nounce a t.i.tle More hateful to mine ear.

MACBETH. No, nor more fearful.

YOUNG SIWARD O Thou liest, abhorred tyrant; with my sword I'll prove the lie thou speak'st.

They fight, and young Seward is slain.

MACBETH. Thou wast born of woman.

But swords I smile at, weapons laugh to scorn, Brandish'd by man that's of a woman born. Exit.

Alarums. Enter Macduff.

MACDUFF. That way the noise is. Tyrant, show thy face!

If thou best slain and with no stroke of mine, My wife and children's ghosts will haunt me still.

I cannot strike at wretched kerns, whose arms Are hired to bear their staves. Either thou, Macbeth, Or else my sword, with an unbatter'd edge, I sheathe again undeeded. There thou shouldst be; By this great clatter, one of greatest note Seems bruited. Let me find him, Fortune!

And more I beg not. Exit. Alarums.

Enter Malcolm and old Siward.

SIWARD. This way, my lord; the castle's gently render'd.

The tyrant's people on both sides do fight, The n.o.ble Thanes do bravely in the war, The day almost itself professes yours, And little is to do.

MALCOLM. We have met with foes That strike beside us.

SIWARD. Enter, sir, the castle.

Exeunt. Alarum.

SCENE VIII.

Another part of the field.

Enter Macbeth.

MACBETH. Why should I play the Roman fool and die On mine own sword? Whiles I see lives, the gashes Do better upon them.

Enter Macduff.

MACDUFF. Turn, h.e.l.l hound, turn!

MACBETH. Of all men else I have avoided thee.

But get thee back, my soul is too much charged With blood of thine already.

MACDUFF. I have no words.

My voice is in my sword, thou bloodier villain Than terms can give thee out! They fight.