The performers were all strangers to her.

At the conclusion of her first soliloquy, a messenger should enter to announce the coming of King Duncan.

But what was her amazement to hear, in answer to her demand, "What is your tidings ?" not the usual reply, "The king comes here to-night," but the whisper, spoken from behind a Scotch bonnet, upheld to prevent the words reaching the ears of the audience, "Hush! I'm Macbeth.

We've cut the messenger out--go on, please!" Another disconcerted performer must have been the provincial Richard III., to whom the Ratcliffe of the theatre--who ordinarily played harlequin, and could not enter without something of that tripping and twirling gait peculiar to pantomime--brought the information, long before it was due, that "the Duke of Buckingham is taken!" "Not yet, you fool," whispered Richard.

"Beg pardon; thought he was," cried Harlequin Ratcliffe, as, carried away by his feelings or the force of habit, he threw what tumblers call "a Catherine wheel," and made a rapid exit.
We conclude with noting a stage whisper of an old-established and yet most mysterious kind.