Soon after those shrill cries, as of a string too tightly drawn, have escaped from her, the King arrives at the castle. Contrast the dry color of her language when, as hostess, she welcomes him: we are surprised at its constrained and measured politeness. Her soul seems to have collapsed into the dullest prose:—
"Your servants ever
Have theirs, themselves, and what is theirs, in compt,
To make their audit at your highness' pleasure,
Still to return your own."
It is the talk of a book-keeper to his employer. Has something bereft the fine woman of her tact? No, the fineness of the woman fell instinctively into a protective tone. Her consciousness has been so acutely set to the key of crime that she knows the least touch will sound it. The secret is torture to the mind, but must be borne; as a guilty man, who overhears the pursuit drawing close to his cramped and insupportable place of concealment, turns rigid with stifled groans. So, when Duncan says,—
"See, see! our honor'd hostess!
The love that follows us sometime is our trouble,
Which still we thank as love."
"Fair and noble hostess,
We are your guest to-night,"—
the courtesy, so mild and royal, is a threat that comes too near the pent-up feeling: she grows preternaturally still and cold.
The Amazonian female would have failed in tact through absence of anxiety, as her language effervesced with the congenial occasion. Such a largess of blank verse would be scattered as certainly to raise suspicion in the observant Banquo, who has heard the witches' promise. The awkward parsimony of Lady Macbeth's words might be credited to the suddenness of the visit, to a stately dread of seeming over-pleased at the "late dignities" and over-covetous of more, or to the constraint of feeling unprepared to entertain so many people.
But the other style of woman, as the victim approached, would cram him with fulsomeness to make him fat for slaying, somewhat in this fashion:—
Most gracious highness! the poor wife am I
Of thy good soldier, now the Thane of Cawdor,
But ever less the more thou raisest him.
He should be here: he'd say the castle's thine,
And wring its service to some decent welcome.
Alas, I can but kneel, and droop my lips,
And let them flutter ere they light upon
My perch, thy hand; this violence to plot,
Scarce this, against thy person venturing here;
But see, my knees invoke great Heaven's rest
Upon thy stay and slumber; all good angels
Hie hither to encamp around his bed.
Enter, my lord; treason has bled to death,
And roofs are sacreder than oaths.
The impetuous language and action which hurry along the following scenes, and sweep reflection from every holding-ground, are not the result of an excision of psychological leading-matter by Middleton, or any one else who worked for the theatre and reduced the length of the play to bring it into acting limits. A miner strikes his pick through a thin partition behind which subterranean waters have been slowly gathering: they deluge his tunnel and sweep him away. In Shakspeare's mind the hidden precedent of the tragedy's action accumulated. The first scratch of his pen let it loose to flood the scenes. There was no preliminary warning. The psychological filtration through his brain from the sources of his plot bursted in like a freshet that explains itself without recalling separate rills.
Nor was the swift and unheralded action inspired solely by Lady Macbeth's impatience to be the wife of a king. All women run after their thoughts more eagerly than do the men. They are Atalantas without a weakness for the golden apples which are sent across the path to break up their desire for winning. But, if Atalanta secretly prefers a suitor, she will chase his golden apple. For whenever personal preferences divert a woman from her course, it is because they, too, grow in the Hesperides of her imagination. Men deliberate, study the ground, observe the obstacles, cluster round preponderating judgment and wait for its direction. Women are not heedless: they also can deliberate until the heart has become too deeply involved; but, when the heart is set upon something, they are the swift-footed couriers of the Ideal, and their only turnpike is as the bird flies. If there be any virtuous advantage to be gained, any scheme to carry out, any enthusiasm that beautifies the distance, they go across-lots for it, not minding that they may stumble upon brooks unprovided with a stepping-stone or fallen tree. They fret at obstacles, and instigate the neighborhood against them. They advocate with ardor, consult no selfishness, want to override every thing with the moral feeling that what is worth doing at all ought to be done quickly. Macbeth seizes this trait by his reflection that it would be all very fine if it were done when 'tis done: her quickness would then justify itself to his consideration. For good or evil all women who can be inspired with purposes speak in her ideal tone:—