to find himself alone. One is the night of a lover, the other that of a murderer. (2) Wither'd murder, Thus with his stealthy pace, With Tarquin's ravishing sides tow'rd his design, This was the reading of this passage in all the editions before that of Mr. Pope, who for sides, inserted in the text strides, which Mr. Theobald has tacitly copied from him, though a more proper alteration might perhaps have been made. A ravishing stride is an action of violence, impetuosity, and tumult, like that of a savage rushing on his prey; whereas the poet is here attempting to exhibit an image of secrecy and caution, of anxious circumspection and guilty timidity, the stealthy pace of a ravisher creeping into the chamber of a virgin, and of an assassin approaching the bed of him whom he proposes to murder, without awaking him; these he describes as moving like ghosts, whose progression is so different from strides, that it has been in all ages represented to be, as Milton expresses it, Smooth sliding without step. This hemistick will afford the true reading of this place, which is, I think, to be corrected thus: And wither'd murder, -Thus with his stealthy pace, With Tarquin ravishing, slides tow'rd his design, Tarquin is in this place the general name of a ravisher, and the sense is, Now is the time in which every one is asleep, but those who are employed in wickedness, the witch who is sacrificing to Hecate, and the ravisher and the murderer, who, like me, are stealing upon their prey. When the reading is thus adjusted, he wishes with great propriety, in the following lines, that the earth may not hear his steps. (3) And take the present horror from the time That now suits with it. I believe every one that has attentively read this dreadful soliloquy is disappointed at the conclusion, which, if not wholly unintelligible, is at least obscure, nor can be explained into any sense worthy of the author. I shall therefore propose a slight alteration. -Thou sound and firm-set earth, Hear not my steps, which way they walk, for fear And talk-the present horror of the time ! That now suits with it Macbeth has, in the foregoing lines, disturbed his imagination by enumerating all the terrours of the night; at length he is wrought up to a degree of frenzy, that makes him afraid of some supernatural discovery of his design, and calls out to the stones not to betray him, not to declare where he walks, nor to talk. As he is going to say of what, he discovers the absurdity of his suspicion, and pauses, but is again o'erwhelmed by his guilt, and concludes that such are the horrours of the present night, that the stones may be expected to cry out against him. That now suits with it. He observes in a subsequent passage, that on such occasions stones have been known to move. It is now a very just and strong picture of a man about to commit a deliberate murder, under the strongest convictions of the wickedness of his design. NOTE XXI. SCENE IV. Lenox. The night has been unruly; where we lay Of dire combustions, and confused events, The obscure bird clamour'd the live-long night, Some say the earth was fev'rous and did shake. These lines I think should be rather regulated thus: -Prophesying with accents terrible, Of dire combustions and confused events. A prophecy of an event new-hatch'd, seems to be a prophecy of an event past. The term new-hatch'd is properly applicable to a bird, and that birds of ill omen should be new-hatch'd to the woful time is very consistent with the rest of the prodigies here mentioned, and with the universal disorder into which nature is described as thrown by the perpetration of this horrid murder. NOTE XXII. -UP! UP! and see The great doom's image Malcolm, Banquo, As from your graves rise up.- The second line might have been so easily completed, that it cannot be supposed to have been left imperfect by the author, who probably wrote, -Malcolm! Banquo! rise! As from your graves rise up. Many other emendations of the same kind might be made, without any greater deviation from the printed copies, than is found in each of them from the rest. NOTE XXIII. Macbeth.Here lay Duncan, His silver skin laced with his golden blood, An unmannerly dagger, and a dagger breech'd, or as in some editions breach'd with gore, are cxpressions not easily to be understood, nor can it be imagined that Shakespeare would reproach the murderer of his king only with want of manners. There are undoubtedly two faults in this passage, which I have endeavoured to take away by reading -Daggers Unmanly drench'd with gore. I saw drench'd with the king's blood the fatal daggers, not only instruments of murder but evidences of cowardice. Each of these words might easily be confounded with that which I have substituted for it by a hand not exact, a casual blot, or a negligent inspection. Mr. Pope has endeavoured to improve one of these lines by substituting goary blood for golden blood, but it may easily be admitted, that he who could on such an occasion talk of lacing the silver skin would lace it with golden blood. No amendment can be made to this line, of which every word is equally faulty, but by a general blot. It is not improbable, that Shakespeare put these forced and unnatural metaphors into the mouth of Macbeth, as a mark of artifice and dissimulation, to show the difference between the studied language of hypocrisy, and the natural outcries of sudden passion. This whole speech, considered in this light, is a remarkable instance of judgment, as it consists entirely of antitheses and metaphors. Macbeth. NOTE XXIV. ACT III. SCENE II. OUR fears in Banquo Stick deep, and in his royalty of nature Reigns that which would be fear'd. "Tis much he dares, And to that dauntless temper of his mind, He hath a wisdom that doth guide his valour To act in safety. There is none but he, |