the Spirit, and the ambiguous oracles, in _2 Henry VI._ I.
iv. The 'Hyrcan tiger' of _Macbeth_ III. iv. 101, which is also alluded
to in _Hamlet_, appears first in _3 Henry VI._ I. iv. 155. Cf. _Richard
III._ II. i. 92, 'Nearer in bloody thoughts, but not in blood,' with
_Macbeth_ II. iii. 146, 'the near in blood, the nearer bloody'; _Richard
III._ IV. ii. 64, 'But I am in So far in blood that sin will pluck on
sin,' with _Macbeth_ III. iv. 136, 'I am in blood stepp'd in so far,'
etc. These are but a few instances. (It makes no difference whether
Shakespeare was author or reviser of _Titus_ and _Henry VI._).]

NOTE FF.

THE GHOST OF BANQUO.

I do not think the suggestions that the Ghost on its first appearance is
Banquo's, and on its second Duncan's, or _vice versa_, are worth
discussion. But the question whether Shakespeare meant the Ghost to be
real or a mere hallucination, has some interest, and I have not seen it
fully examined.

The following reasons may be given for the hallucination view:

(1) We remember that Macbeth has already seen one hallucination, that of
the dagger; and if we failed to remember it Lady Macbeth would remind us
of it here:

This is the very painting of your fear;
This is the air-drawn dagger which, you said,
Led you to Duncan.

(2) The Ghost seems to be created by Macbeth's imagination; for his
words,

now they rise again
With twenty mortal murders on their crowns,

describe it, and they echo what the murderer had said to him a little
before,

Safe in a ditch he bides
With twenty trenched gashes on his head.

(3) It vanishes the second time on his making a violent effort and
asserting its unreality:

Hence, horrible shadow!
Unreal mockery, hence!

This is not quite so the first time, but then too its disappearance
follows on his defying it:

Why what care I? If thou canst nod, speak too.

So, apparently, the dagger vanishes when he exclaims, 'There's no such
thing!'

(4) At the end of the scene Macbeth himself seems to regard it as an
illusion:

My strange and self-abuse
Is the initiate fear that wants hard use.

(5) It does not speak, like the Ghost in _Hamlet_ even on its last
appearance, and like the Ghost in _Julius Caesar_.

(6) It is visible only to Macbeth.

I should attach no weight to (6) taken alone (see p. 140). Of (3) i