3 Witch. That will be ere th' fet of fun. 2 Witch. and confirm this opinion. The king, who was much celebrated for his knowledge, had, before his arrival in England, not only examined in perion a woman accufed of witchcraft, but had given a very formal account of the practices and illufions of evil fpirits, the compacts of witches, the ceremonies ufed by them, the manner of detecting thein, and the justice of punishing them, in his dialogues of Damonologie, written in the Scottish dialect, and published at Edinburgh. This book was, foon after his acceflion, reprinted at London, and as the ready way to gain king James's favour was to flatter his fpeculations, the fyftem of Demonologie was immediately adopted by all who defired either to gain preferment or not to lofe it. Thus the doctrine of witchcraft was very powerfully inculcated; and as the greatest part of mankind have no other reafon for their opinions than that they are in fashion, it cannot be doubted but this perfuafion made a rapid progrefs, fince vanity and credulity co-operated in its favour. The infec tion foon reached the parliament, who, in the first year of king. James, made a law, by which it was enacted, chap. xii. That if any perfon fhall ufe any invocation or conjuration of any evil or wicked fpirit; 2. or fhall confult, covenant with, entertain, employ, feed or reward any evil or curfed fpirit to or for any intent or purpose; 3. or take up any dead man, woman or child out of the grave, or the fkin, bone, or any part of the dead perfon, to be employed or ufed in any manner of witchcraft, forcery, charm, or enchantment; 4. or fhall ufe, practise or exercife any fort of witchcraft, forcery, charm, or enchantment; 5. whereby any perfon fhall be destroyed, killed, wafted, confumed, pined, or lamed in any part of the body; 6. That every fuch perfon being convicted fhall suffer death,' This law was repealed in our own time. Thus, in the time of Shakespeare, was the doctrine of witchcraft at once established by law and by the fafhion, and it became not only unpolite, but criminal, to doubt it; and as prodigies are always feen in proportion as they are expected, witches were every day difcovered, and multiplied fo faft in fome places, that bishop Hall mentions a village in Lancashire, where their number was greater than that of the houses. The jefuits and fectaries took advantage of this univerfal error, and endeavoured to promote the intereft of their parties by pretended cures of perfons afflicted by evil fpirits; but they were detected and expofed by the clergy of the established church. Upon this general infatuation Shakespeare might be eafily alJowed to found a play, especially fince he has followed with great exactness 2 Witch. Upon the heath: 2 3 3 Witch. There to meet with Macbeth, Anon 4. Fair is foul, and foul is fair: Hover through the fog and filthy air, SCENE exactness fuch hiftories as were then thought true; nor can it be doubted that the fcenes of enchantment, however they may now be ridiculed, were both by himself and his audience thought awful and affecting. JOHNSON. 2 There to meet with Macbeth.] Thus the old copy. Mr. Pope, and after him other editors read: There I go to meet Macbeth. The infertion, however, feems to be injudicious. To meet with Macbeth was the general defign of all the witches in going to the heath, and not the particular business or motive of any one of them in diftinction from the reft; as the interpolated words, I go, in the mouth of the third witch, would moft certainly imply. ŠTEEVENS. 3 Gray-malkin!] From a little black letter book, entitled, Beware the Cat, 1584. I find it was permitted to a Witch to take on her a cattes body nine times. Mr. Upton obferves, that to understand this paffage we fhould fuppofe one familiar calling with the voice of a cat, and another with the croaking of a toad. STEEVENS. 4 Paddock calls:- -Anon.-] This, as well as the two following lines, is given in the folio to the three Witches. Preceding editors have appropriated the first of them to the second Witch. According to the late Dr. Goldfmith, and fome other naturalists, a frog is called a paddock in the North; as in the following instance in Cefar and Pompey, by Chapman, 1602: 66 Paddockes, todes, and waterfnakes." In Shakespeare, however, it certainly means a toad. The representation of St. James in the witches' houfe (one of the fet of prints taken from the painter called Hellish Breugel, 1566) exhibits witches flying up and down the chimney on brooms; and before the fire fit grimalkin and paddock, i. e. a cat and a toad, with feveral baboons. There is a cauldron boiling, with a witch near it, cutting out the tongue of a snake, as an ingredient for the charm. STEEVENS. 5 Fair is foul, and foul is fair:] SCENE II. Alarum within. Enter King Duncan, Malcolm, Donalbain, Lenox, with Attendants, meeting a bleeding Captain. King. What bloody man is that? He can report, As feemeth by his plight, of the revolt The newest state. Mal. This is the ferjeant 6, Who like a good and hardy foldier fought i. e. we make these fudden changes of the weather. And Macbeth, fpeaking of this day, foon after says: So foul and fair a day I have not feen. WARBURton. The common idea of witches has always been, that they had abfolute power over the weather, and could raise storms of any kind, or allay them, as they pleafed. In conformity to this notion, Macbeth addreffes them in the fourth act: Though you untye the winds, &c. STEEVENS. I believe the meaning is, that to us, perverse and malignant as we are, fair is foul, and foul is fair. JOHNSON. This expreffion feems to have been proverbial. Spenfer has it in the 4th book of the Faery Queen: "Then fair grew foul, and foul grew fair in fight." FARMER. 6 This is the ferjeant,] Holinfhed is the best interpreter of Shakespeare in his historical plays; for he not only takes his facts from him, but often his very words and expreffions. That hiftorian, in his account of Macdowald's rebellion, mentions, that on the first appearance of a mutinous spirit among the people, the king fent a ferjeant at arms into the country, to bring up the chief offenders to anfwer the charge preferred against them, but they, inftead of obeying, mifufed the messenger with fundry reproaches, and finally flew him. This ferjeant at arms is certainly the origin of the bleeding Serjeant introduced on this occafion. Shakespeare just caught the name from Holinshed, but the rest of the story not fuiting his purpofe, he does not adhere to it. The stage direction of entrance, where the bleeding Captain is mentioned, was probably the work of the player editors, and not of Shakespeare. STEEVENS. As As thou didst leave it. Cap. Doubtful it ftood 7; As two spent fwimmers, that do cling together 7 Doubtful long it food;] Shew'd Mr. Pope, who firft introduced the word long to affift the metre, has thereby injured the fenfe. If the comparison was meant to coincide in all circumftances, the ftruggle could not be long. STEEVENS. Macdonel According to Holinfhed we fhould read Macdowald: The folio reads Macdonwald. STEEVENS. 9 from the western ifles Of Kernes and Gallow-glafjes is fupply'd ;] Whether Supply'd of, for Jupply'd from or with, was a kind of Grecifm of Shakespeare's expreffion; or whether of be a corrup tion of the editors, who took Kernes and Gallow-glaffes, which were only light and heavy-armed foot, to be the names of two of the western islands, I don't know. Hinc conjecture vigorem etiam adjiciunt arma quædam Hibernica, Gallicis antiquis fimilia, jacula nimirum peditum levis armaturæ quos Kernos vocant, nec non fecures lorica ferrea peditum illorum gravioris armaturæ, quos Galloglaffios appellant. Warai Antiq. Hiber. cap. vi. WARBURTON. Of and with are indifcriminately ufèd by our ancient writers. So, in the Spanish Tragedy: Perform'd of pleafure by your fon the prince." Again, in God's Revenge againft Murder, hist. vi: "Sypontus in the mean time is prepared of two wicked gondaliers, &c." Again, in The Hiftory of Helyas Knight of the Sun, bl. 1. no date: "—he was well garnifhed of fpear, fword, and armoure, &c." Thefe are a few out of a thousand inftances which might be brought to the fame purpose: STEEVENS. And fortune, on his damned quarry Smiling,] Thus the old copy; but I am inclined to read quarrel. Quar rel was formerly used for caufe, or for the occafion of a quarrel, and is to be found in that fenfe in Hotinthed's account of the ftory of Macbeth, who, upon the creation of the prince of Cum berland, thought, fays the hiftorian, that he had a juft quarrel to endeavour Shew'd like a rebel's whore: But all's too weak: For brave Macbeth, (well he deserves that name) Difdaining fortune, with his brandifh'd ftcel, Which fmoak'd with bloody execution, Like valour's minion, carved out his paffage, 'Till he fac'd the flave: And ne'er fhook hands, nor bade farewel to him, 'Till 3he unfeam'd him from the nave to the chops, And fix'd his head upon our battlements. King. endeavour after the crown. The fenfe therefore is, Fortune fmiling on bis execrable caufe, &c. This is followed by Dr. Warburton. JOHNSON. The word quarrel occurs in Holinfhed's relation of this very fact, and may be regarded as a fufficient proof of its having been the term here employed by Shakespeare: "Out of the western ifles there came to Macdowald a great multitude of people, to affift him in that rebellious quarrel." Befides, Macdowald's quarry, (i. e. game) muft have confifted of Duncan's friends, and would the fpeaker then have applied the epithet-damned to them? and what have the fmiles of fortune to do over a carnage, when we have defeated our enemies? Her business is then at an end. Her finiles or frowns are no longer of any confequence. We only talk of thefe, while we are purfuing our quarrel, and the event of it is uncertain. STEEVENS. The old 2 And ne'er fhook hands, &c.] 3 copy reads which newer. STEEVENS. be unfeam'd him from the nave to the chops,] We seldom hear of fuch terrible cross blows given and received but by giants and mifcreants in Amadis de Gaule. Befides it muft be a strange aukward stroke that could unrip him upwards from the navel to the chops. But Shakespeare certainly wrote: he unfeam'd him from the nape to the chops, i.e. cut his skull in two; which might be done by a Highlan der's fword. This was a reasonable blow, and very naturally expreffed, on fuppofing it given when the head of the wearied com batant was reclining downwards at the latter end of a long duel. For the nape is the hinder part of the neck, where the vertebras join to the bone of the fkull. So, in Coriclanus: "O! that you could turn your eyes towards the парся of your necks." The word unfeamed likewife, becomes very proper; and alludes to the future which goes cross the crown of the head in that direc sion called the futura fagittalis; and which, confequently, muft be |