Macbeth

by: William Shakespeare

Act 5 Scene 4

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Original Text	Modern Text
Drum and colors. Enter MALCOLM, SIWARD, MACDUFF, Siward’s SON, MENTEITH, CAITHNESS, ANGUS, LENNOX, ROSS, and SOLDIERS, marching	MALCOLM, old SIWARD and his SON, MACDUFF, MENTEITH, CAITHNESS, ANGUS, LENNOX, ROSS, and SOLDIERS enter marching, with a drummer and flag.
MALCOLM Cousins, I hope the days are near at hand That chambers will be safe.	MALCOLM Kinsmen, I hope the time is coming when people will be safe in their own bedrooms.
MENTEITH We doubt it nothing.	MENTEITH We don’t doubt it.
SIWARD What wood is this before us?	SIWARD What’s the name of this forest behind us?
MENTEITH The wood of Birnam.	MENTEITH Birnam Wood.
MALCOLM Let every soldier hew him down a bough 5And bear ’t before him. Thereby shall we shadow The numbers of our host and make discovery Err in report of us.	MALCOLM Tell every soldier to break off a branch and hold it in front of him. That way we can conceal how many of us there are, and Macbeth’s spies will give him inaccurate reports.
SOLDIERS It shall be done.	SOLDIERS We’ll do it.
SIWARD We learn no other but the confident tyrant Keeps still in Dunsinane and will endure 10Our setting down before ’t.	SIWARD We have no news except that the overconfident Macbeth is still in Dunsinane and will allow us to lay siege to the castle.
MALCOLM 'Tis his main hope: For, where there is advantage to be given, Both more and less have given him the revolt, And none serve with him but constrainèd things Whose hearts are absent too.	MALCOLM He wants us to lay siege. Wherever his soldiers have an opportunity to leave him, they do, whatever rank they are. No one fights with him except men who are forced to, and their hearts aren’t in it.
MACDUFF Let our just censures 15Attend the true event, and put we on Industrious soldiership.	MACDUFF We shouldn’t make any judgments until we achieve our goal. Let’s go fight like hardworking soldiers.

Read the Summary of Act 5, scenes 1–11

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