Enter MALCOLM and old SIWARD.

Siw. This way, my lord;-the castle's gently render'd:

The tyrant's people on both sides do fight;
The noble thanes do bravely in the war;
The day almost itself professes yours,

And little is to do.

Macb. Why should I play the Roman fool, and die3 On mine own sword? whiles I see lives, the gashes Do better upon them.

Macd.

Re-enter MACDUFF.

Turn, hell-hound, turn.

Macb. Of all men else I have avoided thee: But get thee back, my soul is too much charg'd With blood of thine already.

Macd.

I have no words,

My voice is in my sword*; thou bloodier villain

Than terms can give thee out!

[They fight.

Macb. Thou losest labour: As easy mayst thou the intrenchant air5

3 Why should I play the Roman fool, and die.' Alluding probably to the suicide of Cato of Utica. The circumstance is mentioned again in Julius Cæsar:

'I did blame Cato for the death

Which he did give himself.'

4 My voice is in my sword.' Thus Casca, in Julius Cæsar :

Speak, hands, for me.'

5 The intrenchant air,' the air which cannot be cut.

Hamlet :

For it is as the air invulnerable.'

So in

With thy keen sword impress, as make me bleed:
Let fall thy blade on vulnerable crests;

I bear a charmed life, which must not yield
To one of woman born.

Despair thy charm;

Macd. And let the angel, whom thou still hast serv'd, Tell thee, Macduff was from his mother's womb Untimely ripp'd.

Macb. Accursed be that tongue that tells me so, For it hath cow'd my better part of man: And be these juggling fiends no more believ❜d, That palter with us in a double sense; That keep the word of promise to our ear,

And break it to our hope.-I'll not fight with thee.
Macd. Then yield thee, coward,

And live to be the show and gaze o' the time.
We'll have thee, as our rarer monsters are,

Painted upon a pole; and underwrit,

Here may you see the tyrant.

I'll not yield,

Macb. To kiss the ground before young Malcolm's feet, And to be baited with the rabble's curse. Though Birnam wood be come to Dunsinane, And thou oppos'd, being of no woman born,

6 I bear a charmed life.' In the days of chivalry, the champion's arms being ceremoniously blessed, each took an oath that he used no charmed weapons. Macbeth, in allusion to this custom, tells Macduff of the security he had in the prediction of the spirit. To this likewise Posthumus alludes in Cymbeline, Act v.:

I, in mine own woe charm'd,
Could not find death.'

Again in Spenser's Faerie Queene, b. i. c. 4 :—

he bears a charmed shield,

And eke enchanted arms, that none can pierce.'

7That palter with us in a double sense.' That shuffle with ambiguous expressions.

Yet I will try the last: Before my body

I throw my warlike shield; lay on, Macduff; And damn'd be him that first cries, Hold, enough3. [Exeunt, fighting.

Retreat.

Flourish. Re-enter, with Drum and Colours, MALCOLM, old SIWARD, ROSSE, LENOX, ANGUS, CATHNESS, MENTETH, and Soldiers. Mal. I would, the friends we miss were safe arriv’d. Siw. Some must go off: and yet, by these I see, So great a day as this is cheaply bought.

Mal. Macduff is missing, and your noble son. Rosse. Your son, my lord, has paid a soldier's debt; He only liv'd but till he was a man:

The which no sooner had his prowess confirm'd
In the unshrinking station where he fought,
But like a man he died.

Siw.

Then he is dead?

Rosse. Ay, and brought off the field: your cause

of sorrow

Must not be measur'd by his worth, for then

It hath no end.

Siw.

Had he his hurts before?

Rosse. Ay, on the front.

Siw.

Why then, God's soldier be he! Had I as many sons as I have hairs,

8 To cry hold! was the word of yielding (according to Carew's Survey of Cornwall, p. 74), that is, when one of the combatants cries so. To cry hold! when persons were fighting, was an authoritative way of separating them, according to the old military laws. This is shown by the following passage produced by Mr. Tollet: it declares it to be a capital offence Whosoever shall strike stroke at his adversary, either in the heat or otherwise, if a third do cry hold, to the intent to part them.'

Bellay's Instructions for the Wars, 1599. This illustrates the passage in Act i. Sc. 5, of this play :'Nor heav'n peep through the blanket of the dark To cry Hold! hold!'

I would not wish them to a fairer death 9:
And so his knell is knoll'd.

Mal.

And that I'll spend for him.

Siw.

He's worth more sorrow,

He's worth no more;

They say, he parted well, and paid his score: And so, God be with him!-Here comes newer comfort.

Re-enter MACDUFF, with MACBETH'S Head on a Pole 10

Macd. Hail, king! for so thou art: Behold, where stands

The usurper's cursed head: the time is free:
I see thee compass'd with thy kingdom's pearl11,
That speak my salutation in their minds;
Whose voices I desire aloud with mine,-
Hail, king of Scotland!

All.

Hail, king of Scotland!

[Flourish. Mal. We shall not spend a large expense 12 of time, Before we reckon with your several loves, And make us even with you. My thanes and kinsmen,

9 When Siward, the martial Earl of Northumberland, understood that his son, whom he had sent against the Scotchmen, was slain, he demanded whether his wounds were in the fore part or hinder part of his body. When it was answered, “in the fore part;" he replied, "I am right glad; neither wish I any other death to me or mine." .-Camden's Remaines.

The same incident is recorded by Holinshed, vol. i. p. 192. 10 These words, on a pole,' Mr. Steevens added to the stage direction from the Chronicle. The stage directions of the players are often incorrect, and sometimes ludicrous.

11 6 Thy kingdom's pearl,' thy kingdom's wealth or ornament. Rowe altered this to peers, without authority.

12 To spend an expense of time is, it is true, an awkward expression, yet it is probably correct; for, in the Comedy of Errors, Act iii. Sc. 1, Antipholus of Ephesus saysThis jest shall cost me some expense.'

Henceforth be earls, the first that ever Scotland
In such an honour nam'd 13. What's more to do,
Which would be planted newly with the time,-
As calling home our exil'd friends abroad,
That fled the snares of watchful tyranny;
Producing forth the cruel ministers

Of this dead butcher, and his fiendlike queen;
Who, as 'tis thought, by self and violent hands
Took off her life;-This, and what needful else
That calls upon us, by the grace of Grace,
We will perform in measure, time, and place:
So thanks to all at once, and to each one,
Whom we invite to see us crown'd at Scone.

[Flourish. Exeunt.

13 Malcolm, immediately after his coronation, called a parliament at Forfair; in the which he rewarded them with lands and livings that had assisted him against Macbeth. Manie of them that were before thanes were at this time made earles; as Fife, Menteith, Atholl, Levenox, Murrey, Caithness, Rosse, and Angus.'-Holinshed's History of Scotland, p. 176.

VOL. IV.

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