When Macbeth arrives in Act 1 Scene 3 we are aware that he has come straight from `the world of battle' where he is used to commanding people to persuade them to obey him. He uses these techniques on the witches who he tries to persuade, rather unsuccessfully, to tell him who they are, what they know and how they know it. Later, in Act 3 Scene 1 we see Macbeth successfully persuades the murderers to kill Banquo and Fleance for him.

Macbeth has not yet adjusted to real life and the idea of battle and commanding people is still apparent to us by the way he converses with others. During Macbeth's first interaction with the witches we see how he tries to persuade the witches into giving him information, a slightly different approach to what many other people would do. Macbeth's first words that we read are: `Speak if you can...