The Dramatic Works of William Shakspeare

Thoughts speculative their unsure hopes relate; | I care not if thou dost for me as much.-
But certain issue strokes must arbitrate:
I pull in resolution; and begin
Towards which, advance the war.
To doubt the equivocation of the fiend,

[Exeunt, marching. That lies like truth: Fear not, till Birnam wood Do come to Dunsinane;-and now a wood Comes toward Dunsinane.-Arm, arm,

SCENE V.

Dunsinane. Within the castle.

Enter, with drums and colours, MACBETH,
SEYTON, and Soldiers.

Macb. 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 forc'd with those, that should be
ours,

We might have met them dareful, beard to beard,
And beat them backward home. What is that
noise ? [A cry within, of Women.
Sey. It is the cry of women, my good lord.
Macb. 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 disinal treatise rouse, and stir

As life were in't: I have supp'd full with hor

out!

and

I'll

Yo. Siw. Thou liest, abhorred tyrant; with my | That palter with us in a double sense;

sword

prove the lie thou speak'st.

[They fight, and young Siward is slain.
Macb.
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. Macd. That way the noise is:-Tyrant, show thy face:

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,

Macb.

And live to be the show and gaze o'the time.
We'll have thee, as our rare monsters are,
Painted upon a pole; and underwrit,
Here may you see the tyrant.
I'll not yield,
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,
Yet I will try the last: Before my body
throw my warlike shield: lay on, Macduff;
And damn'd be him that first cries, Hold, enough.
[Exeunt, fighting.

If thou be'st slain, and with no stroke of mine,
My wife and children's ghosts will haunt me still.
I cannot strike at wretched kernes, whose arms
Are hir'd to bear their staves; either thou, Mac-I
beth,

Or else my sword, with an unbatter'd edge,
I sheathe again undeeded. There thou should'st
be;

By this great clatter, one of greatest note
Seems bruited: Let me find him, fortune!
And more I beg not.
[Exit. Alarum.

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.

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 may'st thou the intrenchant air
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.

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

Mucb. 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,

Retreat. Flourish. Re-enter, with drum and
colours, MALCOLM, old SIWARD, ROSSE, LE-
NOX, 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.

Then he is dead?

Siw.
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 burts before?
Rosse. Ay, on the front.
Siw.

Why then, God's soldier be he!

Had I as many sons as I have hairs,
I would not wish them to a fairer death:
And so his knell is knoll'd.
Mal.

He's worth more sorrow,

Mal. We shall not spend a large expence of] Producing forth the cruel ministers

time,

Before we reckon with your several loves,
And make us even with you. My thanes and
kinsmen,

Henceforth be earls; the first, that ever Scotland
In such an honour nam'd. 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;

Of this dead butcher, and his fiend-like 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.

KING JOHN.

King JOHN:

PERSONS OF THE DRAMA.

Prince HENRY,his son; afterwards king HenryIII. ARTHUR, duke of Bretagne, son of Geffrey, late duke of Bretagne, the elder brother of king John.

WILLIAM MARESHALL, earl of Pembroke. GEFFREY FITZ-PETER, earl of Essex, chief justi ciary of England.

WILLIAM LONGSWORD, earl of Salisbury.
ROBERT BIGOT, earl of Norfolk.

HUBERT DE BURGH, chamberlain to the king. ROBERT FAULCONBRIDGE, son of sir Robert Faulconbridge:

PHILIP FAULCONBRIDGE,his half-brother,bastard son to king Richard the first.

JAMES GURNEY, servant to lady Faulconbridge,

PETER of Pomfret, a prophet.

ELINOR, the widow of king Henry II. and motker of king John.

CONSTANCE, mother to Arthur.
BLANCH, daughter to Alphonso, king of Castile,
and niece to king John.
LadyFAULCONBRIDGE, mother tothe bastard, and
Robert Faulconbridge.

Lords, Ladies, Citizens of Angiers, Sheriff, Herald's, Officers, Soldiers, Messengers, and other Attendants.

peace:

Be thou as lightning in the eyes of France;
For ere thou canst report I will be there,
The thunder of my cannon shall be heard:
So hence! Be thou the trumpet of our wrath,
And sullen presage of your own decay.—
An honourable conduct let him have:
Pembroke, look to't: Farewell, Chatillon.

[Exeunt Chatillon and Pembroke. Eli. What now, my son? have I not ever said, How that ambitious Constance would not cease, Till she had kindled France, and all the world, Upon the right and party of her son? This might have been prevented, and made whole,

With very easy arguments of love;
Which now the manage of two kingdoms must
With fearful bloody issue arbitrate.

K, John. Our strong possession, and our right,

for us.

Eh. Your strong possession, much more than your right;

Or else it must go wrong with and me: you, So much my conscience whispers in your ear; Which none but heaven, and you, and I, shall

hear.

Enter the Sheriff of Northamptonshire, who whispers ESSEX.

Esser. My liege, here is the strangest controversy,

Come from the country to be judg'd by you,
That e'er I heard: shall I produce the men?

K. John. Let them approach. [Exit Sheriff. Our abbies, and our priories, shall pay

Re-enter Sheriff, with ROBERT FAULCONBRIDGE,

and PHILIP, his bastard brother.

This expedition's charge.-What men are you?
Bust. Your faithful subject I, a gentleman,
Born in Northamptonshire; and eldest son,
As I suppose, to Robert Faulconbridge;
A soldier, by the honour-given hand
Of Coeur-de-lion knighted in the field.

K. John. What art thou?
Rob. The son and heir to that same Faulcon-

bridge.

K. John. Is that the elder, and art thou the heir?

You came not of one mother then, it seems.

Bast. Most certain of one mother, mighty king, That is well known; and, as I think, one father: But, for the certain knowledge of that truth, I put you o'er to heaven, and to my mother: Of that I doubt, as all men's children may.

Eli. Out on thee, rude man! thou dost shame
thy mother,

And wound her honour with this diffidence.
Bast. I, madam? no, I have no reason for it;
That is my brother's plea, and none of mine;
The which if he can prove, 'a pops me out
At least from fair five hundred pounds a year:
Heaven guard my mother's honour, and my land!
K. John. A good blunt fellow :-Why, being
younger born,

Doth he lay claim to thine inheritance?

Bast. I know not why, except to get the land. But once he slander'd me with bastardy: But whe'r I be as true begot, or no, That still I lay upon my mother's head; But, that I am as well begot, my liege, (Fair fall the bones that took the pains for me!) Compare our faces, and be judge yourself. If old sir Robert did beget us both, And were our father, and this son like him ;~ O old sir Robert, father, on my knee I give heaven thanks, I was not like to thee. K. John. Why, what a madcap hath heaven lent us here!

Eli. He hath a trick of Coeur-de-lion's face, The accent of his tongue affecteth him: Do

In the large composition of this man? you not read some tokens of my son

K. John. Minc eye hath well examined his

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The Dramatic Works of William Shakspeare, Volume 1