1    Where hast thou been, sister?

2    Killing swine.

3    Sister, where thou?

4    A sailor's wife had chestnuts in her lap,
5    And munch'd, and munch'd, and munch'd:--
6    'Give me,' quoth I:
7    'Aroint thee, witch!' the rump-fed ronyon cries.
8    Her husband's to Aleppo gone, master o' the Tiger:
9    But in a sieve I'll thither sail,
10   And, like a rat without a tail,
11   I'll do, I'll do, and I'll do.

12   I'll give thee a wind.

13   Thou'rt kind.

14   And I another.

15   I myself have all the other,
16   And the very ports they blow,
17   All the quarters that they know
18   I' the shipman's card.
19   I will drain him dry as hay:
20   Sleep shall neither night nor day
21   Hang upon his pent-house lid;
22   He shall live a man forbid:
23   Weary se'nnights nine times nine
24   Shall he dwindle, peak and pine:
25   Though his bark cannot be lost,
26   Yet it shall be tempest-tost.
27   Look what I have.

28   Show me, show me.

29   Here I have a pilot's thumb,
30   Wreck'd as homeward he did come.

31   A drum, a drum!
32   Macbeth doth come.

33   The weird sisters, hand in hand,
34   Posters of the sea and land,
35   Thus do go about, about:
36   Thrice to thine and thrice to mine
37   And thrice again, to make up nine.
38   Peace! the charm's wound up.

39   So foul and fair a day I have not seen.

40   How far is't call'd to Forres? What are these
41   So wither'd and so wild in their attire,
42   That look not like the inhabitants o' the earth,
43   And yet are on't? Live you? or are you aught
44   That man may question? You seem to understand me,
45   By each at once her chappy finger laying
46   Upon her skinny lips: you should be women,
47   And yet your beards forbid me to interpret
48   That you are so.

49   Speak, if you can: what are you?

50   All hail, Macbeth! hail to thee, thane of Glamis!

51   All hail, Macbeth, hail to thee, thane of Cawdor!

52   All hail, Macbeth, thou shalt be king hereafter!

53   Good sir, why do you start; and seem to fear
54   Things that do sound so fair? I' the name of truth,
55   Are ye fantastical, or that indeed
56   Which outwardly ye show? My noble partner
57   You greet with present grace and great prediction
58   Of noble having and of royal hope,
59   That he seems rapt withal: to me you speak not.
60   If you can look into the seeds of time,
61   And say which grain will grow and which will not,
62   Speak then to me, who neither beg nor fear
63   Your favours nor your hate.

64   Hail!

65   Hail!

66   Hail!

67   Lesser than Macbeth, and greater.

68   Not so happy, yet much happier.

69   Thou shalt get kings, though thou be none:
70   So all hail, Macbeth and Banquo!

71   Banquo and Macbeth, all hail!

72   Stay, you imperfect speakers, tell me more:
73   By Sinel's death I know I am thane of Glamis;
74   But how of Cawdor? the thane of Cawdor lives,
75   A prosperous gentleman; and to be king
76   Stands not within the prospect of belief,
77   No more than to be Cawdor. Say from whence
78   You owe this strange intelligence? or why
79   Upon this blasted heath you stop our way
80   With such prophetic greeting? Speak, I charge you.

81   The earth hath bubbles, as the water has,
82   And these are of them. Whither are they vanish'd?

83   Into the air; and what seem'd corporal melted
84   As breath into the wind. Would they had stay'd!

85   Were such things here as we do speak about?
86   Or have we eaten on the insane root
87   That takes the reason prisoner?

88   Your children shall be kings.

89   You shall be king.

90   And thane of Cawdor too: went it not so?

91   To the selfsame tune and words. Who's here?

92   The king hath happily received, Macbeth,
93   The news of thy success; and when he reads
94   Thy personal venture in the rebels' fight,
95   His wonders and his praises do contend
96   Which should be thine or his: silenced with that,
97   In viewing o'er the rest o' the selfsame day,
98   He finds thee in the stout Norweyan ranks,
99   Nothing afeard of what thyself didst make,
100  Strange images of death. As thick as hail
101  Came post with post; and every one did bear
102  Thy praises in his kingdom's great defence,
103  And pour'd them down before him.

104  We are sent
105  To give thee from our royal master thanks;
106  Only to herald thee into his sight,
107  Not pay thee.

108  And, for an earnest of a greater honour,
109  He bade me, from him, call thee thane of Cawdor:
110  In which addition, hail, most worthy thane!
111  For it is thine.

112  What, can the devil speak true?

113  The thane of Cawdor lives: why do you dress me
114  In borrow'd robes?

115  Who was the thane lives yet;
116  But under heavy judgment bears that life
117  Which he deserves to lose. Whether he was combined
118  With those of Norway, or did line the rebel
119  With hidden help and vantage, or that with both
120  He labour'd in his country's wreck, I know not;
121  But treasons capital, confess'd and proved,
122  Have overthrown him.

Aside
123   Glamis, and thane of Cawdor!
124  The greatest is behind.
To ROSS and ANGUS
125  Thanks for your pains.
To BANQUO
126  Do you not hope your children shall be kings,
127  When those that gave the thane of Cawdor to me
128  Promised no less to them?

129  That trusted home
130  Might yet enkindle you unto the crown,
131  Besides the thane of Cawdor. But 'tis strange:
132  And oftentimes, to win us to our harm,
133  The instruments of darkness tell us truths,
134  Win us with honest trifles, to betray's
135  In deepest consequence.
136  Cousins, a word, I pray you.

Aside
137   Two truths are told,
138  As happy prologues to the swelling act
139  Of the imperial theme.--I thank you, gentlemen.
Aside
140   This supernatural soliciting
141  Cannot be ill, cannot be good: if ill,
142  Why hath it given me earnest of success,
143  Commencing in a truth? I am thane of Cawdor:
144  If good, why do I yield to that suggestion
145  Whose horrid image doth unfix my hair
146  And make my seated heart knock at my ribs,
147  Against the use of nature? Present fears
148  Are less than horrible imaginings:
149  My thought, whose murder yet is but fantastical,
150  Shakes so my single state of man that function
151  Is smother'd in surmise, and nothing is
152  But what is not.

153  Look, how our partner's rapt.

Aside
154   If chance will have me king, why, chance may crown me,
155  Without my stir.

156  New horrors come upon him,
157  Like our strange garments, cleave not to their mould
158  But with the aid of use.

Aside
159   Come what come may,
160  Time and the hour runs through the roughest day.

161  Worthy Macbeth, we stay upon your leisure.

162  Give me your favour: my dull brain was wrought
163  With things forgotten. Kind gentlemen, your pains
164  Are register'd where every day I turn
165  The leaf to read them. Let us toward the king.
166  Think upon what hath chanced, and, at more time,
167  The interim having weigh'd it, let us speak
168  Our free hearts each to other.

169  Very gladly.

170  Till then, enough. Come, friends.