the dramatic; while the ethical sense underlies them both, and is occasionally forced up through them by their own pressure. May we not say, in short, that the entire drama is, as it were, a tempest set to music? Many writers have spoken strongly against the Porter-scene; Coleridge denounces it as unquestionably none of Shakespeare's work. Which makes us almost afraid to trust our own judgment concerning it; yet we cannot but feel it to be in the true spirit of the Poet's method. This strain of droll broad humour, oozing out, so to speak, amid such a congregation of terrors, has always in our case deepened their effect, the strange but momentary diversion causing them to return with the greater force. Of the murder scene, the banquet scene, and the sleep-walking scene, with their dagger of the mind, and Banquo of the mind, and blood-spots of the mind, it were vain to speak. Yet over these sublimely-terrific passages there hovers a magic light of poetry, at once disclosing the horrors, and annealing them into matter of delight. Hallam sets Macbeth down as being, in the language of Drake," the greatest effort of our author's genius, the most sublime and impressive drama which the world has ever peheld;" - a judgment from which most readers will probably be less inclined to dissent, the older they grow. SIWARD, Earl of Northumberland, General of the Eng Lords, Gentlemen, Officers, Soldiers, Murderers, At tendants, and Messengers. The Ghost of Banquo, and other Apparitions. SCENE, in the end of the fourth Act, in England · through the rest of the Play, in Scotland. 1 Witch. WHEN shall we three meet again, 3 Witch. That will be ere the set of sun. 2 Witch. Upon the heath: 3 Witch. There to meet with Macbeth. The origin and sense of this word are thus given by Peacham in his Garden of Eloquence, 1577: "Onomatopeia, when we invent, devise, fayne, and make a name imitating the sound of that it signifyeth, as hurlyburly, for an uprore and tumultuous stirre." Thus also in Holinshed: "There were such hurlie burlies kept in every place, to the great danger of overthrowing the whole state of all government in this land." Of course the word here refers to the tumult of battle, not to the storm, the latter being their element. The reason of this scene is thus stated by Coleridge: "In Macbeth the Poet's object was to raise the mind at once to the high tragic tone, that the audience might be ready for the pre cipitate consummation of guilt in the early part of the play. The true reason for the first appearance of the Witches is to strike the key note of the character of the whole drama, as is proved by their reappearance in the third scene, after such an order of the king's as establishes their supernatural power of information." H. . So in the original. The is commonly, but very injuriously left out of modern editions. H 1 Witch. I come, Graymalkin! All. Paddock calls:- Anon. Fair is foul, and foul is fair : Hover through the fog and filthy air.' [Witches vanish. SCENE II. A Camp near Fores. Alarum within. Enter DUNCAN, MALCOLM, DONAL Bain, Lenox, with Attendants, meeting a bleeding Soldier. Dun. What bloody man is that? He can report. As seemeth by his plight, of the revolt The newest state. Mal. This is the sergeant,' Who, like a good and hardy soldier, fought Sold. Doubtful it stood; 3 Paddock was an old name for toad, graymalkin for cat, and these animals were supposed to be the familiars of witches. Toadstools were anciently called paddock-stools. H. 4 The Weird Sisters," says Coleridge, "are as true a creation of Shakespeare's, as his Ariel and Caliban, - fates, furies, and materializing witches being the elements. They are wholly different from any representation of witches in the contemporary writers, and yet presented a sufficient external resemblance to the creatures of vulgar prejudice to act immediately on the audience. Their character consists in the imaginative disconnected from the good; they are the shadowy obscure and fearfully anomalous of physical nature, the lawless of human nature, elemental avengers without sex or kin." Elsewhere he speaks of the "direful music, the wild wayward rhythm, and abrupt lyrics of the opening of Macbeth." Words scarcely less true to the Poet's, than the Poet's are to the characters. H. 1 Sergeants, in ancient times, were not the petty officers now distinguished by that title; but men performing one kind of feudal military service, in rank next to esquires. In the stage-direction of the original this sergeant is called a captain. As two spent swimmers, that do cling together, And choke their art. The merciless Macdonwald (Worthy to be a rebel, for to that The multiplying villanies of nature Do swarm upon him) from the western isles But all's too weak: Like valour's minion, carv'd out his passage, And ne'er shook hands, nor bade farewell to him, Dun. O, valiant cousin! worthy gentleman! 2 Of here bears the sense of with, the two words being then used indiscriminately. Thus in Holinshed: "Out of Ireland in hope of the spoile came no small number of Kernes and Galloglasses, offering gladlie toerve under him, whither it should please him to lead them." Barnabe Rich thus describes them in his New Irish Prognostication: "The Galloglas succeedeth the Horseman, and he is commonly armed with a scull, a shirt of maile, and a Galloglas-axe. The Kernes of Ireland are next in request, the very drosse and scum of the countrey, a generation of villaines not worthy to live. These are they that are ready to run out with every rebel, and these are the very hags of hell, fit for nothing but the gallows." H. 3 That is, seemed as in love with him, in order to betray him to ruin. Quarry is that which is hunted or chased, the prey. Thus in Coriolanus, Act i. sc. 1: "Would the nobility lay aside their ruth, And let me use my sword, I'd make a quarry With thousands of these quarter'd slaves, as high As I could pitch my lance.” And in Bullokar's English Expositor: "A quarry among hunters signifieth the reward given to hounds after they have hunted, or the venison which is taken by hunting." —. Damned is doomed, fated to destruction. H. |