IN THE SHETLANDS GEA 
powers away.” This we learn first through his wife 
Anne, who has been constantly “‘ waked by his timorous 
dreams”—how strangely sounds the word “timorous” 
used of such a character !—and later—almost at the 
end—from himself, in that one terrifying outburst 
which gives the first and only clear view into the 
mental torments which this strong villain has to suffer, 
as soon as that daytime energy, which is to him as an 
armour, is laid aside. Is it not very striking—is it 
not the character-touch of this scene, how—when 
Richard is once fairly awake again, when the things 
of waking life have returned, with Ratcliff at the tent- 
door—how quickly this great load of suffering is 
shifted off ? 
A fortiori Macbeth suffers at night, too, but Ais life 
is all suffering. We never get the idea of his enjoy- 
ing life, which, with Richard, we really do; for he is 
humorous—jocular even—in fact, in tiptop spirits 
often, but all by day, during the bustle and action of 
an energetic career. Later, the wound of guilt begins 
to show itself, and here, too, we may make an in- 
structive comparison between these two practitioners 
in crime, so alike in their motive and careers, so 
different in their fibre and temperament, and yet 
yielding to the same law. Macbeth, indeed, suffers 
so much that his mind becomes, at last, almost un- 
hinged, and, in the very end, conscience, perhaps, 
ceases to afflict him. The machine, too delicate for 
such rough work, has been broken by repeated blows 
—the nerve has throbbed itself out. Shakespearean 
