BULLER.
Are you serious, sir?
NORTH.
So serious that I can scarcely hope to recover my usual spirits to-day. Have you, gentlemen, among you any more plausible solution to offer? All mum. One word more with you. Lenox tells the "other Lord"
"From broad words, and 'cause he fail'd
His presence at the tyrant's feast, I hear,
Macduff lives in disgrace; Sir, can you tell
Where he bestows himself?"
And the "other Lord," who is wonderfully well informed for a person "strictly anonymous," replies that Macduff—
"Is gone to pray the holy king, (Edward) on his aid
To wake Northumberland, and warlike Siward."
Nay, he minutely describes Macduff's surly reception of the King's messenger, sent to invite him to the Banquet, and the happy style of that official on getting the Thane of Fife's "absolute, Sir, not I," and D. I. O.! And the same nameless "Lord in waiting" says to Lenox, that
"this report
Hath so exasperate the king, that he
Prepares for some attempt of war."