Macd. Be not a niggard of your speech: how goes 't?[4487] 180
Ross. When I came hither to transport the tidings,
Which I have heavily borne, there ran a rumour
Of many worthy fellows that were out;
Which was to my belief witness'd the rather,
For that I saw the tyrant's power a-foot: 185
Now is the time of help; your eye in Scotland
Would create soldiers, make our women fight,[4488]
To doff their dire distresses.
Mal. Be't their comfort
We are coming thither: gracious England hath[4489]
Lent us good Siward and ten thousand men;[4490] 190
An older and a better soldier none
That Christendom gives out.
Ross. Would I could answer
This comfort with the like! But I have words
That would be howl'd out in the desert air,
Where hearing should not latch them.
Macd. What concern they?[4491][4492]195
The general cause? or is it a fee-grief[4492]
Due to some single breast?
Ross. No mind that's honest
But in it shares some woe, though the main part
Pertains to you alone.
Macd. If it be mine,
Keep it not from me, quickly let me have it. 200
Ross. Let not your ears despise my tongue for ever,
Which shall possess them with the heaviest sound
That ever yet they heard.
Macd. Hum! I guess at it.[4493]
Ross. Your castle is surprised; your wife and babes
Savagely slaughter'd: to relate the manner, 205
Were, on the quarry of these murder'd deer,
To add the death of you.