That made you break this enterprise to me? now Does unmake you. I have given suck; and know How tender 'tis to love the babe that milks me: I would, while it was smiling in my face, Have pluck'd my nipple from his boneless gums, And dash'd the brains out, had I so sworn, as you Have done to this. Macb. If we should fail, We fail! But screw your courage to the sticking-place9, 8 Adhere, in the same sense as cohere. 12, 9 But screw your courage to the sticking-place.' Shakspeare seems to have taken his metaphor from the screwing up the chords of stringed instruments to their proper degree of tension, when the peg remains fast in its sticking-place; i. e. in the place from which it is not to recede, or go back. 10 The circumstance relative to Macbeth's slaughter of Duncan's chamberlains is copied from Holinshed's account of King Duffe's murder by Donwald. 11 Wassel is thus explained by Bullokar in his Expositor, 1616: Wassaile, a term usual heretofore for quaffing and carowsing; but more especially signifying a merry cup (ritually composed, deckt and fill'd with country liquor) passing about amongst neighbours, meeting and entertaining one another on the vigil or eve of the new year, and commonly called the wassail-bol.' See Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 4. 12 To convince is to overcome. See p. 301, Act iv. Sc. 3, of this play. Shall be a fume, and the receipt of reason Macb. Bring forth men-children only! For thy undaunted mettle should compose Nothing but males. Will it not be receiv'd 16, When we have mark'd with blood those sleepy two Of his own chamber, and us'd their very daggers, That they have don't? Lady M. Who dares receive it other, As we shall make our griefs and clamour roar Macb. I am settled, and bend up Each corporal agent to this terrible feat. False face must hide what the false heart doth know. [Exeunt. 13 A limbeck is a vessel through which distilled liquors pass into the recipient. So shall the receipt (i. e. receptacle) of reason be like this empty vessel. 14 i. e. drowned in drink. 15 Quell is murder; from the Saxon quellan, to kill. 15 i. e. apprehended, understood. ACT II. SCENE I. The same. Court within the Castle. Enter BANQUO and FLEANCE, and a Servant, with a Torch before them. Ban. How goes the night, boy? Fle. The moon is down: I have not heard the clock. Ban. And she goes down at twelve. Fle. I take't, 'tis later, sir. Ban. Hold, take my sword:-There's husbandry' in heaven, Their candles are all out.-Take thee that too. And yet I would not sleep: Merciful powers! Enter MACBETH, and a Servant with a Torch. Who's there? Macb. A friend. Ban. What, sir, not yet at rest? The king's a-bed: 1 Husbandry here means thrift, frugality. In Romeo and Juliet we have a similar expression: Night's candles are burnt out.' 2 It is apparent from what Banquo says afterwards, that he had been solicited in a dream to attempt something in consequence of the prophecy of the witches, that his waking senses were shocked at; and Shakspeare has here most exquisitely contrasted his character with that of Macbeth. Banquo is praying against being tempted to encourage thoughts of guilt even in his sleep; while Macbeth is hurrying into temptation, and revolving in his mind every scheme, however flagitious, that may assist him to complete his purpose. The one is unwilling to sleep, lest the same phantoms should assail his resolution again, while the other is depriving himself of rest through impatience to commit the murder. He hath been in unusual pleasure, and By the name of most kind hostess; and shut up5 In measureless content. Macb. Being unprepar'd, Our will became the servant to defect; Ban. All's well. I dreamt last night of the three weird sisters: To you they have show'd some truth. Macb. I think not of them: Yet, when we can entreat an hour to serve, Would spend it in some words upon that business, you would grant the time. If Ban. At your kind'st leisure. Macb. If you shall cleave to 'tis, It shall make honour for you. 3 Largess, bounty. 4 The old copy reads offices. Officers of a household was the common term for servants in Shakspeare's time. He has before called the king's chamberlains his spongy officers.' 5 Steevens has rightly explained 'to shut up' by 'to conclude,' and the examples he has adduced are satisfactory; but Mr. Boswell supposed that it meant enclosed, and quoted a passage from Barrow to support his opinion. The authorities of the poet's time are against Mr. Boswell's interpretation. 6 Being unprepared, our will (or desire to entertain the king honourably) became the servant to defect (i. e. was constrained by defective means), which else should free have wrought (i. e. otherwise our zeal should have been manifest by more liberal entertainments. Which relates not to the last antecedent, defect, but to will. 7 Consent is accord, agreement, a combination for a particular purpose. By if you shall cleave to my consent,' Macbeth means, 'if you shall adhere to me (i. e. agree or accord with my views), when 'tis (i. e. when events shall fall out as they are predicted), it shall make honour for you.' We have the word again in this sense in King Henry IV. Part II., where, speaking of Shallow and his servants, Falstaff says, 'they flock together Ban. So I lose none, In seeking to augment it, but still keep Macb. Good repose, the while! Ban. Thanks, sir; The like to you! [Exit BAN. Macb. Go, bid thy mistress, when my drink is ready, She strike upon the bell. Get thee to bed. [Exit Servant. Is this a dagger, which I see before me, The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee: I have thee not, and yet I see thee still. To feeling, as to sight? or art thou but in consent like so many wild geese.' So again in As You Like It, the usurping Duke says, after the flight of Rosalind and Celia: some villains of my court Are of consent and sufferance in this.' Sir William Davenant's paraphrase of this passage shows that he understood it as I have explained it : If when the prophecy begins to look like, you will Macbeth mentally refers to the crown which he expected to obtain in consequence of the murder that he was about to commit. We comprehend all that passes in his mind; but Banquo is still in ignorance of it. His reply is only that of a man who determines to combat every possible temptation to do ill; and therefore expresses a resolve that, in spite of future combinations of interest or struggles for power, he will attempt nothing that may obscure his present honours, alarm his conscience, or corrupt loyalty. Macbeth could never mean, while yet the success of his attack on the life of Duncan was uncertain, to afford Banquo the most dark or distant hint of his criminal designs on the crown. Had he acted thus incautiously, Banquo would naturally have become his accuser as soon as the murder had been discovered. Malone proposed to read content instead of consent; but his reasons are far from convincing, and there seems no necessity for change. VOL. IV. |