SCENE V.

_Macbeth_. You know your own degrees, sit down: At first and last, the hearty welcome.

As this passage stands, not only the numbers are very imperfect, but the sense, if any can be found, weak and contemptible. The numbers will be improved by reading,

--sit down at first, And last a hearty welcome.

But for _last_ should then be written _next_. I believe the true reading is,

You know your own degrees, sit down--_To_ first And last the hearty welcome.

_All of whatever degree, from the highest to the lowest, may be assured that their visit is well received_.

NOTE XXIX

_Macbeth._--There's blood upon thy face. [--_To the murderer, aside at the door_.] _Murderer_. 'Tis Banquo's then. _Macbeth_. 'Tis better thee without, than _he_ within.

The sense apparently requires that this passage should be read thus:

'Tis better thee without, than _him_ within.

That is, _I am more pleased that the blood of Banquo should be on thy face, than in his body_.

NOTE XXX.

_Lady Macbeth_. O proper stuff! This is the very painting of your fear: [_Aside to Macbeth_. This is the air-drawn dagger, which, you said, Led you to Duncan. Oh, these flaws and starts, _Impostures to true fear_, would well become A woman's story at a winter's fire, Authoriz'd by her grandam. Shame itself! Why do you make such faces? When all's done, You look but on a stool.

As _starts_ can neither with propriety nor sense be called _impostures to true fear_, something else was undoubtedly intended by the author, who, perhaps, wrote,

--These flaws and starts, _Impostures true to fear_, would well become A woman's story.--

These symptoms of terrour and amazement might better become _impostors true_ only _to fear, might become a coward at the recital of such falsehoods, as no man could credit, whose understanding was not weakened by his terrours; tales, told by a woman over a fire on the authority of her grandam_.

NOTE XXXI.

_Macbeth_.--Love and health to all! Then I'll sit down: give me some wine, fill full:-- I drink to the general joy of the whole table, And to our dear friend Banquo, whom we miss; Would he were here! to all, and him, we thirst, _And all to all_.--

Though this passage is, as it now stands, capable of more meanings than one, none of them are very satisfactory; and, therefore, I am inclined to read it thus:

--to all, and him, we thirst, _And hail to all_.

Macbeth, being about to salute his company with a bumper, declares that he includes Banquo, though absent, in this act of kindness, and wishes _health_ to all. _Hail_ or _heil_ for _health_ was in such continual use among the good-fellows of ancient times, that a drinker was called a _was-heiler_, or a _wisher of health_, and the liquor was termed _was-heil_, because _health_ was so often _wished_ over it. Thus in the lines of Hanvil the monk,

Jamque vagante scypho, discincto gutture _was-heil_ Ingeminant _was-heil_: labor est plus perdere vini Quam sitis.--

These words were afterwards corrupted into _wassail_ and _wassailer_.

NOTE XXXII.

_Macbeth_.--Can such things be, And overcome us, like a summer's cloud, Without our special wonder? You make me strange Even to the disposition that I _owe_, When now I think, you can behold such sights, And keep the natural ruby of your cheek, When mine is blanched with fear.

This passage, as it now stands, is unintelligible, but may be restored to sense by a very slight alteration:

--You make me strange Ev'n to the disposition that I _know_.

_Though I had before seen many instances of your courage, yet it now appears in a degree altogether_ new. _So that my long_ acquaintance _with your_ disposition _does not hinder me from that astonishment which_ novelty _produces_.

NOTE XXXIII.

It will have blood, they say, blood will have blood, Stones have been known to move, and trees to speak; Augurs, that understand relations, have By magpies, and by choughs, and rooks, brought forth The secret'st man of blood.--

In this passage the first line loses much of its force by the present punctuation. Macbeth having considered the prodigy which has just appeared, infers justly from it, that the death of Duncan cannot pass unpunished;

It will have blood:--

then, after a short pause, declares it as the general observation of mankind, that murderers cannot escape:

--they say, blood will have blood.

Murderers, when they have practised all human means of security, are detected by supernatural directions:

Augurs, that understand relations, &c.

By the word _relation_ is understood the _connexion_ of effects with causes; to _understand relations_ as _an augur_, is to know how those things _relate_ to each other, which have no visible combination or dependence.

NOTE XXXIV.