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ACT I SCENE I

King Lear’s palace.

{Enter KENT, GLOUCESTER, and BASTARD [EDMUND].}

KENT:

I thought the King had more affected[1] the Duke of Albany than Cornwall.

GLOUCESTER:

It did always seem so to us: but now, in the division of the kingdom, it appears not which of the Dukes he values most; for equalities are so weigh’d, that curiosity in neither can make choice of either’s moiety[2].

KENT:

Is not this your son, my Lord?

GLOUCESTER:

His breeding, sir, hath been at my charge: I have so often blush’d to acknowledge[3] him, that now I am braz’d to’t.

KENT:

I cannot conceive[4] you.

GLOUCESTER:

Sir, this young fellow’s mother could: whereupon she grew round‑womb’d, and had, indeed, sir, a son for her cradle ere she had a husband for her bed. Do you smell a fault[5]?

KENT:

I cannot wish the fault undone, the issue of it being so proper[6].

GLOUCESTER:

But I have, sir, a son by order of law, some year elder than this, who yet is no dearer in my account[7]: though this knave came somewhat saucily into the world before he was sent for, yet was his mother fair; there was good sport at his making, and the whoreson must be acknowledged. Do you know this noble gentleman, Edmund?

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

No, my Lord.

GLOUCESTER:

My Lord of Kent: remember him hereafter as my honourable friend.

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

My services to your Lordship.

KENT:

I must love you, and sue to know you better[8].

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

Sir, I shall study deserving[9].

GLOUCESTER:

He hath been out[10] nine years, and away he shall again. The King is coming.

{Sennet. Enter KING LEAR, CORNWALL, ALBANY,

GONERIL, REGAN, CORDELIA, and Attendants.}

LEAR:

Attend the Lords of France and Burgundy, Gloucester.

GLOUCESTER:

I shall, my liege.

[Exeunt GLOUCESTER and BASTARD [EDMUND].]

LEAR:

Meantime, we shall express our darker[11] purpose.

Give me the map there. Know that we have divided

In three our kingdom[12]: and ’tis our fast[13] intent[14]

To shake all cares and business from our age;

Conferring them on younger strengths, while we

Unburthen’d crawl toward death. Our son of Cornwall,

And you, our no less loving son of Albany,

We have this hour a constant[15] will to publish

Our daughters’ several dowers[16], that future strife

May be prevented now. The princes, France and Burgundy,

Great rivals in our youngest daughter’s love,

Long in our court have made their amorous sojourn,

And here are to be answer’d. Tell me, my daughters,‑‑

Since now we will divest us both of rule,

Interest of territory, cares of state,‑‑

Which of you shall we say doth love us most[17]?

That we our largest bounty may extend

Where nature doth with merit challenge[18]. Goneril,

Our eldest‑born, speak first.

GONERIL:

Sir, I love you more than words can wield the matter;

Dearer than eye‑sight, space, and liberty;

Beyond what can be valued, rich or rare;

No less than life, with grace, health, beauty, honour;

As much as child e’er loved, or father found;

A love that makes breath poor, and speech unable;

Beyond all manner of so much I love you.

CORDELIA:

[Aside] What shall Cordelia do[19]? Love, and be silent[20].

LEAR:

Of all these bounds, even from this line to this,

With shadowy forests and with champains rich’d,

With plenteous rivers and wide‑skirted meads,

We make thee lady: to thine and Albany’s issue

Be this perpetual. What says our second daughter

Our dearest Regan, wife to Cornwall? Speak.

REGAN:

Sir, I am made

Of the self‑same metal that my sister is,

And prize me at her worth. In my true heart

I find she names my very deed of love;

Only she comes too short: that I profess

Myself an enemy to all other joys,

Which the most precious square of sense possesses,

And find I am alone felicitate[21]

In your dear Highness’ love.

CORDELIA:

[Aside] Then poor Cordelia!

And yet not so; since, I am sure, my love’s

More ponderous[22] than my tongue.

LEAR:

To thee and thine hereditary ever

Remain this ample third of our fair kingdom;

No less in space, validity, and pleasure,

Than that conferr’d on Goneril. Now, our joy,

Although the last, not least; to whose young love

The vines of France and milk of Burgundy

Strive to be interess’d; what can you say to draw

A third more opulent than your sisters? Speak.

CORDELIA:

Nothing[23], my Lord.

LEAR:

Nothing!

CORDELIA:

Nothing.

LEAR:

Nothing will come of nothing[24]: speak again.

CORDELIA:

Unhappy that I am, I cannot heave

My heart into my mouth: I love your Majesty

According to my bond; no more nor less.

LEAR:

How, how, Cordelia! mend your speech a little,

Lest it may mar your fortunes.

CORDELIA:

Good my Lord,

You have begot me, bred me, loved me: I

Return those duties back as are right fit,

Obey you, love you, and most honour you.

Why have my sisters husbands, if they say

They love you all? Haply, when I shall wed,

That Lord whose hand must[25] take my plight[26] shall carry

Half my love with him, half my care and duty:

Sure, I shall never marry like my sisters,

To love my father all.

LEAR:

But goes thy heart with this?

CORDELIA:

Ay, good my Lord.

LEAR:

So young, and so untender?

CORDELIA:

So young, my Lord, and true.

LEAR:

Let it be so; thy truth, then, be thy dower:

For, by the sacred radiance of the sun,

The mysteries of Hecate, and the night;

By all the operation of the orbs

From whom we do exist, and cease to be;

Here I disclaim all my paternal care,

Propinquity[27] and property of blood,

And as a stranger to my heart and me

Hold thee, from this, for ever. The barbarous Scythian,

Or he that makes his generation messes

To gorge his appetite[28], shall to my bosom

Be as well neighbour’d, pitied, and reliev’d,

As thou my sometime daughter.

KENT:

Good my liege,‑‑

LEAR:

Peace, Kent!

Come not between the dragon and his wrath.

I lov’d her most, and thought to set my rest

On her kind nursery[29]. Hence, and avoid my sight![30]

So be my grave my peace, as here I give

Her father’s heart from her! Call France; who stirs?

Call Burgundy. Cornwall and Albany,

With my two daughters’ dowers digest this third:

Let pride, which she calls plainness, marry her.

I do invest you jointly with my power,

Pre‑eminence, and all the large effects

That troop with majesty. Ourself, by monthly course,

With reservation of an hundred knights,

By you to be sustain’d, shall our abode

Make with you by due turns. Only we still retain

The name, and all th’addition to a King;

The sway, revenue, execution of the rest,

Beloved sons, be yours: which to confirm,

This coronet[31] part betwixt you. [Giving the crown.]

KENT:

Royal Lear,

Whom I have ever honour’d as my King,

Lov’d as my father, as my master follow’d,

As my great patron thought on in my prayers,‑‑

LEAR:

The bow is bent and drawn, make from the shaft.

KENT:

Let it fall rather, though the fork invade

The region of my heart: be Kent unmannerly[32],

When Lear is mad. What wilt thou do, old man?

Think’st thou that duty shall have dread to speak,

When power to flattery bows? To plainness honour’s bound,

When majesty stoops to folly. Reverse thy doom;

And, in thy best consideration, check

This hideous rashness: answer my life my judgment,

Thy youngest daughter does not love thee least;

Nor are those empty‑hearted whose low sound

Reverbs no hollowness.

LEAR:

Kent, on thy life, no more.

KENT:

My life I never held but as a pawn

To wage against thy enemies; nor fear to lose it,

Thy safety being the motive.

LEAR:

Out of my sight!

KENT:

See better[33], Lear; and let me still remain

The true blank of thine eye[34].

LEAR:

Now, by Apollo,‑‑

KENT:

Now, by Apollo, King,

Thou swear’st thy gods in vain.

LEAR:

O, vassal! miscreant[35]! [Laying his hand on his sword.]

ALBANY, CORNWALL:

Dear sir, forbear.

KENT:

Kill thy physician, and the fee bestow

Upon thy foul disease. Revoke thy doom;

Or, whilst I can vent clamour from my throat,

I’ll tell thee thou dost evil.

LEAR:

Hear me, recreant[36]!

On thine allegiance, hear me!

Since thou hast sought to make us break our vow[37],

Which we durst never yet, and with strain’d pride

To come between our sentence and our power,

Which nor our nature nor our place can bear,

Our potency made good, take thy reward.

Five days we do allot thee, for provision

To shield thee from disasters of the world;

And on the sixth to turn thy hated back

Upon our kingdom: if, on the tenth day following,

Thy banish’d trunk be found in our dominions,

The moment is thy death. Away! by Jupiter,

This shall not be revoked.

KENT:

Fare thee well, King: sith thus thou wilt appear,

Freedom lives hence[38], and banishment is here.

[To CORDELIA.] The gods to their dear shelter take thee, maid,

That justly think’st, and hast most rightly said!

[To REGAN and GONERIL.] And your large speeches may your deeds approve,

That good effects may spring from words of love.

Thus Kent, O Princes, bids you all adieu;

He’ll shape his old course in a country new[39]. [Exit.]

{Flourish. Re‑enter GLOUCESTER, with KING OF

FRANCE, BURGUNDY, and Attendants.}

GLOUCESTER:

Here’s France and Burgundy, my noble Lord.

LEAR:

My Lord of Burgundy.

We first address towards you, who with this King

Hath rivall’d for our daughter. What, in the least,

Will you require in present dower with her,

Or cease your quest of love?

BURGUNDY:

Most royal majesty,

I crave no more than what your Highness offer’d,

Nor will you tender less.

LEAR:

Right noble Burgundy,

When she was dear to us, we did hold her so;

But now her price is fall’n. Sir, there she stands:

If aught within that little-seeming substance[40],

Or all of it, with our displeasure piec’d,

And nothing more, may fitly like your grace,

She’s there, and she is yours.

BURGUNDY:

I know no answer.

LEAR:

Will you, with those infirmities she owes,

Unfriended, new‑adopted to our hate,

Dower’d with our curse, and stranger’d with our oath,

Take her, or leave her?

BURGUNDY:

Pardon me, royal sir;

Election makes not up[41] on such conditions.

LEAR:

Then leave her, sir; for, by the power that made me,

I tell you all her wealth.[To FRANCE.] For you, great King,

I would not from your love make such a stray,

To match you where I hate; therefore beseech you

T’avert your liking a more worthier way

Than on a wretch whom nature is asham’d

Almost t’acknowledge[42] hers.

FRANCE:

This is most strange,

That she, that even but now was your best object,

The argument of your praise, balm of your age,

Most best, most dearest, should in this trice of time[43]

Commit a thing so monstrous, to dismantle

So many folds of favour[44]. Sure, her offence

Must be of such unnatural degree,

That monsters it, or your fore‑vouch’d affection

Fall into taint: which to believe of her,

Must be a faith that reason without miracle

Could never plant in me.

CORDELIA:

I yet beseech your Majesty,‑‑

If for I want that glib and oily art,

To speak and purpose not; since what I well intend[45],

I’ll do’t before I speak[46],‑‑that you make known[47]

It is no vicious blot, murder, or foulness,

No unchaste action, or dishonour’d step,

That hath depriv’d me of your grace and favour;

But even for want of that for which I am richer,

A still‑soliciting eye, and such a tongue

As I am glad I have not, though not to have it

Hath lost me in your liking.

LEAR:

Better thou

Hadst not been born than not t’have pleased me better.

FRANCE:

Is it but this,‑‑a tardiness in nature

Which often leaves the history unspoke

That it intends to do? My Lord of Burgundy,

What say you to the lady? Love’s not love

When it is mingled with regards that stand

Aloof from th’entire point[48]. Will you have her?

She is herself a dowry.

BURGUNDY:

Royal Lear,

Give but that portion which yourself propos’d,

And here I take Cordelia by the hand,

Duchess of Burgundy.

LEAR:

Nothing: I have sworn; I am firm.

BURGUNDY:

I am sorry, then, you have so lost a father

That you must lose a husband.

CORDELIA:

Peace be with Burgundy!

Since that respects of fortune are his love,

I shall not be his wife.

FRANCE:

Fairest Cordelia, that art most rich, being poor;

Most choice, forsaken; and most lov’d, despis’d!

Thee and thy virtues here I seize upon:

Be it lawful I take up what’s cast away.

Gods, gods! ’tis strange that from their cold’st neglect

My love should kindle to inflam’d respect.

Thy dowerless daughter, King, thrown to my chance,

Is Queen of us, of ours, and our fair France:

Not all the Dukes of wat’rish Burgundy

Can buy this unpriz’d precious maid of me.

Bid them farewell, Cordelia, though unkind:

Thou losest here, a better where[49] to find.

LEAR:

Thou hast her, France: let her be thine; for we

Have no such daughter, nor shall ever see

That face of hers again. Therefore be gone

Without our grace, our love, our benison.

Come, noble Burgundy.

[Flourish. Exeunt all but KING OF FRANCE, GONERIL,

REGAN, and CORDELIA.]

FRANCE:

Bid farewell to your sisters.

CORDELIA:

The jewels of our father, with wash’d eyes[50]

Cordelia leaves you: I know you what you are;

And like a sister am most loath to call

Your faults as they are named[51]. Use well our father:

To your professed bosoms I commit him:

But yet, alas, stood I within his grace,

I would prefer him to a better place[52].

So, farewell to you both.

REGAN:

Prescribe not us our duties.

GONERIL:

Let your study

Be to content your Lord, who hath receiv’d you

At fortune’s alms. You have obedience scanted,

And well are worth the want that you have wanted[53].

CORDELIA:

Time shall unfold[54] what plighted cunning hides[55]:

Who cover faults, at last with shame derides.

Well may you prosper!

FRANCE:

Come, my fair Cordelia.

[Exeunt KING OF FRANCE and CORDELIA.]

GONERIL:

Sister, it is not a little I have to say of what most nearly appertains to us both. I think our father will hence to‑night.

REGAN:

That’s most certain, and with you; next month with us.

GONERIL:

You see how full of changes his age is; the observation we have made of it hath not been little: he always lov’d our sister most; and with what poor judgment he hath now cast her off appears too grossly.

REGAN:

’Tis the infirmity of his age: yet he hath ever but slenderly known himself.

GONERIL:

The best and soundest of his time hath been but rash; then must we look to receive from his age, not alone the imperfections of long‑engraffed condition, but therewithal the unruly waywardness that infirm and choleric years bring with them.

REGAN:

Such unconstant starts are we like to have from him as this of Kent’s banishment.

GONERIL:

There is further compliment of leave-taking between France and him. Pray you, let’s hit together: if our father carry authority with such dispositions as he bears, this last surrender of his will but offend us.

REGAN:

We shall further think on’t.

GONERIL:

We must do[56] something, and i’th’heat. [Exeunt.]

ACT I SCENE II

The Earl of Gloucester’s castle.

{Enter BASTARD[57] [EDMUND], with a letter[58].}

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

Thou, nature, art my goddess; to thy law

My services are bound. Wherefore should I

Stand in the plague of custom, and permit

The curiosity of nations to deprive me,

For that I am some twelve or fourteen moon‑shines

Lag of a brother? Why bastard? Wherefore base?

When my dimensions are as well compact,

My mind as generous, and my shape as true,

As honest madam’s issue? Why brand they us

With base? with baseness? bastardy? base, base?

Who, in the lusty stealth of nature, take

More composition and fierce quality

Than doth, within a dull, stale, tired bed,

Go to th’creating a whole tribe of fops,

Got ‘tween asleep and wake? Well, then,

Legitimate Edgar, I must have your land:

Our father’s love is to the bastard Edmund

As to th’legitimate: fine word,‑‑legitimate!

Well, my legitimate, if this letter speed,

And my invention[59] thrive, Edmund the base

Shall top th’legitimate. I grow; I prosper:

Now, gods, stand up for bastards!

{Enter GLOUCESTER.}

GLOUCESTER:

Kent banish’d thus! and France in choler parted!

And the King gone to‑night! prescribed his power[60]!

Confin’d to exhibition[61]! All this done

Upon the gad[62]! Edmund, how now! what news?

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

So please your Lordship, none. [Putting up the letter.]

GLOUCESTER:

Why so earnestly seek you to put up that letter?

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

I know no news, my Lord.

GLOUCESTER:

What paper were you reading?

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

Nothing, my Lord.

GLOUCESTER:

No? What needed, then, that terrible dispatch of it into your pocket? The quality of nothing hath not such need to hide itself. Let’s see: come, if it be nothing, I shall not need spectacles.

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

I beseech you, sir, pardon me: it is a letter from my brother, that I have not all o’er‑read; and for so much as I have perus’d, I find it not fit for your o’er‑looking.

GLOUCESTER:

Give me the letter, sir.

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

I shall offend, either to detain or give it. The contents, as in part I understand them, are to blame.

GLOUCESTER:

Let’s see, let’s see[63].

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

I hope, for my brother’s justification, he wrote this but as an essay[64] or taste of my virtue.

GLOUCESTER:

[Reads] ‘This policy and reverence of age makes the world bitter to the best of our times; keeps our fortunes from us till our oldness cannot relish them. I begin to find an idle and fond bondage in the oppression of aged tyranny; who sways, not as it hath power, but as it is suffer’d.[65] Come to me, that of this I may speak more. If our father would sleep till I wak’d him[66], you should half his revenue for ever, and live the beloved of your brother, EDGAR.’

Hum‑‑conspiracy!‑‑’Sleep till I wak’d him,‑‑you should enjoy half his revenue,’‑‑My son Edgar! Had he a hand to write this? a heart and brain to breed it in?‑‑When came this to you? Who brought it?

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

It was not brought me, my Lord; there’s the cunning of it[67]; I found it thrown in at the casement of my closet.

GLOUCESTER:

You know the character to be your brother’s?

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

If the matter were good, my Lord, I durst swear it were his; but, in respect of that, I would fain think it were not.

GLOUCESTER:

It is his.

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

It is his hand, my Lord; but I hope his heart is not in the contents.

GLOUCESTER:

Hath he never heretofore sounded you in this business?

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

Never, my Lord: but I have heard him oft maintain it to be fit, that, sons at perfect age, and fathers declining, the father should be as ward to the son, and the son manage his revenue.[68]

GLOUCESTER:

O villain, villain! His very opinion in the letter! Abhorred villain! Unnatural, detested, brutish villain! worse than brutish! Go, sirrah, seek him; I’ll apprehend him: abominable villain! Where is he?

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

I do not well know, my Lord. If it shall please you to suspend your indignation against my brother till you can derive from him better testimony of his intent, you shall run a certain course; where, if you violently proceed against him, mistaking his purpose, it would make a great gap in your own honour, and shake in pieces the heart of his obedience. I dare pawn down my life for him, that he hath wrote this to feel my affection to your honour, and to no further pretence of danger.

GLOUCESTER:

Think you so?

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

If your honour judge it meet, I will place you where you shall hear us confer of this, and by an auricular assurance have your satisfaction; and that without any further delay than this very evening.

GLOUCESTER:

He cannot be such a monster‑‑

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

Nor is not, sure.

GLOUCESTER:

to his father, that so tenderly and entirely loves him. Heaven and earth! Edmund, seek him out: wind me into him, I pray you: frame the business after your own wisdom. I would unstate myself[69], to be in a due resolution.

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

I will seek him, Sir, presently[70]: convey the business as I shall find means and acquaint you withal.

GLOUCESTER:

These late eclipses in the sun and moon portend no good to us[71]: though the wisdom of nature can reason it thus and thus, yet nature finds itself scourg’d by the sequent effects. Love cools, friendship falls off, brothers divide: in cities, mutinies; in countries, discord; in palaces, treason; and the bond cracked ‘twixt son and father. This villain of mine comes under the prediction; there’s son against father: the King falls from bias of nature; there’s father against child. We have seen the best of our time: machinations, hollowness, treachery, and all ruinous disorders, follow us disquietly to our graves. Find out this villain, Edmund; it shall lose thee nothing; do it carefully. And the noble and true‑hearted Kent banish’d! his offence, honesty! ’Tis strange. [Exit.]

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

This is the excellent foppery of the world, that, when we are sick in fortune, often the surfeit of our own behavior, we make guilty of our disasters the sun, the moon, and the stars[72]: as if we were villains by necessity; fools by heavenly compulsion; knaves, thieves, and treachers, by spherical predominance; drunkards, liars, and adulterers, by an enforc’d obedience of planetary influence; and all that we are evil in, by a divine thrusting on: an admirable evasion of whoremaster man, to lay his goatish disposition to the charge of a star! My father compounded with my mother under the dragon’s tail; and my nativity was under Ursa major; so that it follows, I am rough and lecherous. Fut, I should have been that I am, had the maidenliest star in the firmament twinkled on my bastardizing. Edgar‑‑

{Enter EDGAR.}

and pat he comes like the catastrophe of the old comedy: my cue is villanous melancholy, with a sigh like Tom o’ Bedlam[73]. O, these eclipses do portend these divisions! fa, sol, la, mi.

EDGAR:

How now, brother Edmund! What serious contemplation are you in?

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

I am thinking, brother, of a prediction I read this other day, what should follow these eclipses.

EDGAR:

Do you busy yourself about that?

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

I promise you, the effects he writes of succeed unhappily; as of unnaturalness between the child and the parent; death, dearth, dissolutions of ancient amities; divisions in state, menaces and maledictions against King and Nobles; needless diffidences[74], banishment of friends, dissipation of cohorts, nuptial breaches, and I know not what.

EDGAR:

How long have you been a sectary[75] astronomical?

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

Come, come; when saw you my father last?

EDGAR:

Why, the night gone by.

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

Spake you with him?

EDGAR:

Ay, two hours together.

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

Parted you in good terms? Found you no displeasure in him by word or countenance?

EDGAR:

None at all.

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

Bethink yourself wherein you may have offended him: and at my entreaty forbear his presence till some little time hath qualified the heat of his displeasure; which at this instant so rageth in him, that with the mischief of your person it would scarcely allay.

EDGAR:

Some villain hath done me wrong.

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

That’s my fear. I pray you, have a continent forbearance till the speed of his rage goes slower; and, as I say, retire with me to my lodging, from whence I will fitly bring you to hear my Lord speak. Pray ye, go, there’s my key. If you do stir abroad, go arm’d.

EDGAR:

Arm’d, brother!

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

Brother, I advise you to the best; go

arm’d: I am no honest man if there be any good meaning towards

you: I have told you what I have seen and heard; but faintly, nothing

like the image and horror of it: pray you, away.

EDGAR:

Shall I hear from you anon?

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

I do serve you in this business.

[Exit EDGAR]

A credulous father! and a brother noble,

Whose nature is so far from doing harms,

That he suspects none: on whose foolish honesty

My practices ride easy! I see the business.

Let me, if not by birth, have lands by wit:

All with me’s meet that I can fashion fit. [Exit.]

ACT I SCENE III

The Duke of Albany’s palace.

{Enter GONERIL, and a Gentleman [OSWALD].}

GONERIL:

Did my father strike my gentleman for chiding of his Fool[76]?

GENTLEMAN [OSWALD]:

I madam.

GONERIL:

By day and night he wrongs me; every hour

He flashes into one gross crime or other,

That sets us all at odds: I’ll not endure it:

His knights grow riotous, and himself upbraids us

On every trifle. When he returns from hunting,

I will not speak with him; say I am sick:

If you come slack of former services[77],

You shall do well; the fault of it I’ll answer.

GENTLEMAN [OSWALD]:

He’s coming, madam; I hear him.

[Horns within.]

GONERIL:

Put on what weary negligence you please,

You and your fellows; I’d have it come to question:

If he dislike it, let him to our sister,

Whose mind and mine, I know, in that are one,

Not to be over‑rul’d. Idle old man,

That still would manage those authorities

That he hath given away! Now, by my life,

Old fools are babes again; and must be us’d

With checks as flatteries,‑‑when they are seen abus’d.

Remember what I tell you.

GENTLEMAN [OSWALD]:

Well, Madam.

GONERIL:

And let his knights have colder looks among you;

What grows of it, no matter; advise your fellows so:

I would breed from hence occasions, and I shall,

That I may speak: I’ll write straight to my sister,

To hold my very course. Prepare for dinner. [Exeunt.]

ACT I SCENE IV

A hall in the same.

{Enter KENT, disguised.}

KENT:

If but as well I other accents borrow,

That can my speech defuse, my good intent

May carry through itself to that full issue

For which I raz’d my likeness. Now, banish’d Kent,

If thou canst serve where thou dost stand condemn’d,

So may it come, thy master, whom thou lov’st,

Shall find thee full of labours.[78]

{Horns within. Enter KING LEAR, Knights, and Attendants.} LEAR: Let me not stay a jot for dinner; go get it ready.

[Exit an Attendant.]

How now! what art thou?

KENT:

A man, Sir.

LEAR:

What dost thou profess? what would’st thou with us?

KENT:

I do profess to be no less than I seem; to serve him truly that will put me in trust: to love him that is honest; to converse with him that is wise, and says little; to fear judgment; to fight when I cannot choose; and to eat no fish.

LEAR:

What art thou?

KENT:

A very honest‑hearted fellow, and as poor as the King.

LEAR:

If thou be as poor for a subject as he is for a King, thou art poor enough. What would’st thou?

KENT:

Service.

LEAR:

Who would’st thou serve?

KENT:

You.

LEAR:

Dost thou know me, fellow?

KENT:

No, sir; but you have that in your countenance which I would fain call master.

LEAR:

What’s that?

KENT:

Authority.

LEAR:

What services can’st thou do?

KENT:

I can keep honest counsel, ride, run, mar a curious tale in telling it, and deliver a plain message bluntly: that which ordinary men are fit for, I am qualified in; and the best of me is diligence.

LEAR:

How old art thou?

KENT:

Not so young, Sir, to love a woman for singing, nor so old to dote on her for anything: I have years on my back forty-eight.

LEAR:

Follow me; thou shalt serve me: if I like thee no worse after dinner, I will not part from thee yet[79]. Dinner, ho, dinner! Where’s my knave? my Fool? Go you, and call my Fool hither. [Exit an Attendant.]

{Enter STEWARD[80] [OSWALD].}

You, you, sirrah, where’s my daughter?

STEWARD [OSWALD]:

So please you,‑‑ [Exit.]

LEAR:

What says the fellow there? Call the clotpoll[81] back.

[Exit a Servant/Knight [82][France disguised]]

Where’s my Fool[83], ho? I think the world’s asleep.

{Re‑enter Servant/Knight [France disguised].}

How now! where’s that mongrel?

SERVANT/KNIGHT [France disguised]:

He says, my Lord, your daughter is not well.

LEAR:

Why came not the slave back to me when I call’d him.

SERVANT/KNIGHT [France disguised]:

Sir, he answered me in the roundest manner, he would not.

LEAR:

He would not!

SERVANT/KNIGHT [France disguised]:

My Lord, I know not what the matter is; but, to my judgment, your Highness is not entertain’d with that ceremonious affection as you were wont; there’s a great abatement of kindness appears as well in the general dependants as in the Duke himself also and your daughter.[84]

LEAR:

Ha! say’st thou so?[85]

SERVANT/KNIGHT [France disguised]:

I beseech you, pardon me, my Lord, if I be mistaken; for my duty cannot be silent when I think your Highness wronged.

LEAR:

Thou but rememb’rest me of mine own conception: I have perceived a most faint neglect of late; which I have rather blamed as mine own jealous curiosity than as a very pretence and purpose of unkindness: I will look further into’t. But where’s my Fool? I have not seen him this two days.

SERVANT/KNIGHT [France disguised]:

Since my young Lady’s going into France, Sir, the Fool hath much pined away. [86]

LEAR:

No more of that; I have noted it well. Go you, and tell my daughter I would speak with her. [Exit an Attendant.]

Go you, call hither my Fool. [Exit Servant/Knight (France disguised)]

{Re‑enter STEWARD [OSWALD].}

O, you sir, you, come you hither, sir: who am I, sir?

STEWARD [OSWALD]:

My Lady’s father.

LEAR:

‘My Lady’s father’! my Lord’s knave: your whoreson dog! you slave! you cur!

STEWARD [OSWALD]:

I am none of these, my Lord; I beseech your pardon.

LEAR:

Do you bandy looks with me[87], you rascal? [Striking him.]

STEWARD [OSWALD]:

I’ll not be strucken, my Lord.

KENT:

Nor tripped neither, you base football player.

[Tripping up his heels.]

LEAR:

I thank thee, fellow; thou serv’st me, and I’ll love thee.

KENT:

Come, sir, arise, away! I’ll teach you differences: away, away! if you will measure your lubber’s length again, tarry: but away! go to; have you wisdom? So. [Pushes STEWARD [OSWALD] out.][88]

LEAR:

Now, my friendly knave, I thank thee: there’s earnest of thy service. [Giving KENT money.]

{Enter FOOL [Cordelia disguised][89].}

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Let me hire him too: here’s my coxcomb.

LEAR:

How now, my pretty knave[90]! how dost thou?

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Sirrah, you were best take my coxcomb.

KENT:

Why, Fool?

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Why, for taking one’s part that’s out of favour. Nay, and thou canst not smile as the wind sits, thou’lt catch cold shortly: there, take my coxcomb. Why, this fellow has banish’d two on’s daughters, and did the third a blessing against his will[91]; if thou follow him, thou must needs wear my coxcomb. How now, nuncle! Would I had two coxcombs and two daughters!

LEAR:

Why, my boy[92]?

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

If I gave them all my living, I’d keep my coxcombs myself. There’s mine; beg another of thy daughters.

LEAR:

Take heed, sirrah; the whip.

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Truth’s a dog must to kennel; he must be whipped out, when Lady’s the brach may stand by the fire and stink.

LEAR:

A pestilent gall to me!

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Sirrah, I’ll teach thee a speech.

LEAR:

Do.

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Mark it, Nuncle:

Have more than thou showest,

Speak less than thou knowest[93],

Lend less than thou owest,

Ride more than thou goest,

Learn more than thou trowest,

Set less than thou throwest;

Leave thy drink and thy whore,

And keep in‑a‑door,

And thou shalt have more

Than two tens to a score.

KENT:

This is nothing, Fool.

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Then ’tis like the breath of an unfee’d lawyer; you gave me nothing for’t. Can you make no use of nothing, Nuncle?[94]

LEAR:

Why, no, boy; nothing can be made out of nothing.

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

[To KENT] Prithee, tell him, so much the rent of his land comes to: he will not believe a Fool.

LEAR:

A bitter Fool!

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Dost thou know the difference, my boy[95], between a bitter Fool and a sweet Fool?

LEAR:

No, lad; teach me.

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

That Lord that counsell’d thee

To give away thy land[96],

Come place him here by me,

Do thou for him stand:

The sweet and bitter Fool

Will presently appear;

The one in motley here,

The other found out there[97].

LEAR:

Dost thou call me Fool, boy[98]?

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

All thy other titles thou hast given away; that thou wast born with.

KENT:

This is not altogether Fool[99], my Lord.

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

No, faith, lords and great men will not let me; if I had a monopoly out, they would have part on’t: and ladies too, they will not let me have all Fool to myself; they’ll be snatching. Give me an egg, nuncle, and I’ll give thee two crowns.

LEAR:

What two crowns shall they be?

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Why, after I have cut the egg i’th’middle, and eat up the meat, the two crowns of the egg. When thou clovest thy crown i’th’middle, and gav’st away both parts, thou bor’st thy ass on thy back o’er the dirt: thou hadst little wit in thy bald crown, when thou gav’st thy golden one away. If I speak like myself [100]in this, let him be whipp’d that first finds it so.

[Singing.]

Fools had ne’er less wit in a year;

For wise men are grown foppish,

They know not how their wits to wear,

Their manners are so apish.[101]

LEAR:

When were you wont to be so full of songs[102], sirrah?

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

I have used it, nuncle, e’er since thou mad’st thy daughters thy mothers: for when thou gav’st them the rod, and put’st down thine own breeches,

[Singing.]

Then they for sudden joy did weep,

And I for sorrow sung,

That such a King should play bo‑peep,

And go the Fools among.

Prithee, Nuncle, keep a schoolmaster that can teach thy Fool to lie: I would fain learn to lie.[103]

LEAR:

And you lie, sirrah, we’ll have you whipped.

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

I marvel what kin thou and thy daughters are: they’ll have me whipp’d for speaking true, thou’lt have me whipp’d for lying; and sometimes I am whipped for holding my peace[104]. I had rather be any kind o’thing than a Fool: and yet I would not be thee, Nuncle; thou hast pared thy wit o’both sides, and left nothing i’th’middle: here comes one o’the parings.

{Enter GONERIL.}

LEAR:

How now, daughter[105]! what makes that frontlet on? Methinks you are too much of late i’th’frown.

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Thou wast a pretty fellow when thou hadst no need to care for her frowning; now thou art an O without a figure[106]: I am better than thou art now; I am a Fool, thou art nothing. [To GONERIL.] Yes, forsooth, I will hold my tongue; so your face bids me, though you say nothing.

Mum, mum,

He that keeps nor crust nor crum,

Weary of all, shall want some.

That’s a shealed peascod. [Pointing to LEAR.]

GONERIL:

Not only, sir, this your all‑licens’d Fool,

But other of your insolent retinue

Do hourly carp and quarrel; breaking forth

In rank and not‑to‑be-endured riots. Sir,

I had thought, by making this well known unto you,

To have found a safe redress; but now grow fearful,

By what yourself too late have spoke and done,

That you protect this course, and put it on

By your allowance[107]; which if you should, the fault

Would not ‘scape censure, nor the redresses sleep,

Which, in the tender of a wholesome weal,

Might in their working do you that offence,

Which else were shame, that then necessity

Will call discreet proceeding.

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

For, you know, Nuncle,

The hedge‑sparrow fed the cuckoo so long,

That it’s had its head bit off by its young.

So, out went the candle, and we were left darkling.

LEAR:

Are you our daughter[108]?

GONERIL:

Come, sir,

I would you would make use of that good wisdom,

Whereof I know you are fraught; and put away

These dispositions, that of late transform you

From what you rightly are.

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

May not an ass know when the cart draws the horse? Whoop, Jug! I love thee.

LEAR:

Doth any here know me? This is not Lear:

Doth Lear walk thus? speak thus? Where are his eyes?

Either his notion weakens, his discernings

Are lethargied‑‑Ha! waking? ’tis not so.

Who is it that can tell me who I am?

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Lear’s shadow.

LEAR:

I would learn that; for, by the marks of sovereignty, knowledge, and reason, I should be false persuaded I had daughters.

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Which they will make an obedient father.

LEAR: Your name, fair gentlewoman[109]?

GONERIL:

This admiration, Sir, is much o’th’savour

Of other your new pranks. I do beseech you

To understand my purposes aright:

As you are old and reverend, you should be wise.

Here do you keep a hundred knights and squires;

Men so disorder’d, so debosh’d and bold,

That this our court, infected with their manners,

Shows like a riotous inn: epicurism and lust

Make it more like a tavern or a brothel

Than a grac’d palace. The shame itself doth speak

For instant remedy: be then desir’d

By her, that else will take the thing she begs,

A little to disquantity your train;

And the remainder, that shall still depend,

To be such men as may besort your age,

And know themselves and you.

LEAR:

Darkness and devils!

Saddle my horses; call my train together:

Degenerate bastard! I’ll not trouble thee.

Yet have I left a daughter[110].

GONERIL:

You strike my people; and your disorder’d rabble

Make servants of their betters.

{Enter ALBANY.}

LEAR:

Woe, that too late repents,

[To ALBANY.] O, sir, are you come?

Is it your will? Speak, Sir. Prepare my horses.

Ingratitude, thou marble‑hearted fiend,

More hideous when thou show’st thee in a child

Than the sea‑monster!

ALBANY

Pray, sir, be patient.

LEAR:

[To GONERIL] Detested kite! thou liest.

My train are men of choice and rarest parts,

That all particulars of duty know,

And in the most exact regard support

The worships of their name. O most small fault,

How ugly didst thou in Cordelia show[111]!

That, like an engine, wrench’d my frame of nature

From the fix’d place; drew from heart all love,

And added to the gall. O Lear, Lear, Lear!

Beat at this gate, that let thy folly in, [Striking his head.]

And thy dear judgment out! Go, go, my people.

ALBANY:

My Lord, I am guiltless, as I am ignorant

Of what hath moved you.

LEAR:

It may be so, my Lord.

Hear, nature, hear; dear goddess, hear!

Suspend thy purpose, if thou didst intend

To make this creature fruitful!

Into her womb convey sterility!

Dry up in her the organs of increase;

And from her derogate body never spring

A babe to honour her! If she must teem,

Create her child of spleen; that it may live,

And be a thwart disnatur’d torment to her!

Let it stamp wrinkles in her brow of youth;

With cadent tears fret channels in her cheeks;

Turn all her mother’s pains and benefits

To laughter and contempt; that she may feel

How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is

To have a thankless child! Away, away! [Exit.]

ALBANY:

Now, gods that we adore, whereof comes this?

GONERIL:

Never afflict yourself to know the cause;

But let his disposition have that scope

That dotage gives it[112].

{Re‑enter LEAR.}

LEAR:

What, fifty of my followers at a clap?

Within a fortnight?[113]

ALBANY:

What’s the matter, Sir?

LEAR:

I’ll tell thee: [To GONERIL.] Life and death! I am ashamed

That thou hast power to shake my manhood thus;

That these hot tears, which break from me perforce,

Should make thee worth them. Blasts and fogs upon thee!

Th’untented woundings of a father’s curse

Pierce every sense about thee! Old fond eyes,

Beweep this cause again, I’ll pluck ye out,

And cast you, with the waters that you loose,

To temper clay. Yea, is’t come to this?

Ha! Let it be so: yet have I left a daughter,

Who, I am sure, is kind and comfortable[114]:

When she shall hear this of thee, with her nails

She’ll flay thy wolvish visage. Thou shalt find

That I’ll resume the shape[115] which thou dost think

I have cast off for ever: thou shalt,

I warrant thee. [Exeunt LEAR, KENT, and Attendants.]

GONERIL:

Do you mark that, my Lord?

ALBANY:

I cannot be so partial, Goneril,

To the great love I bear you,‑‑

GONERIL:

Pray you, content. What, Oswald, ho[116]!

[To the Fool [Cordelia disguised].] You, sir, more knave than Fool, after your master.[117]

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Nuncle Lear, Nuncle Lear, tarry and take the Fool with thee.

A fox[118], when one has caught her,

And such a daughter[119],

Should sure to the slaughter,

If my cap would buy a halter[120]:

So the Fool[121] follows after. [Exit.]

GONERIL:

This man hath had good counsel:‑‑a hundred knights!

’Tis politic and safe to let him keep

At point a hundred knights: yes, that, on every dream,

Each buzz, each fancy, each complaint, dislike,

He may enguard his dotage with their powers,

And hold our lives in mercy. Oswald, I say[122]!

ALBANY:

Well, you may fear too far.

GONERIL:

Safer than trust too far:

Let me still take away the harms I fear,

Not fear still to be taken: I know his heart.

What he hath utter’d I have writ my sister

If she sustain him and his hundred knights

When I have show’d the unfitness,‑‑

(Enter Steward[Oswald])

How now, Oswald!

What, have you writ that letter to my sister?

OSWALD:

Ay madam.

GONERIL:

Take you some company, and away to horse:

Inform her full of my particular fear;

And thereto add such reasons of your own

As may compact it more. Get you gone;

And hasten your return. [Exit OSWALD.]

No, no, my Lord,

This milky gentleness and course of yours

Though I condemn not, yet, under pardon,

You are much more attaskt for want of wisdom

Than prais’d for harmful mildness.

ALBANY:

How far your eyes may pierce I can not tell:

Striving to better, oft we mar what’s well.

GONERIL:

Nay, then‑‑

ALBANY:

Well, well; th’event. [Exeunt.]

ACT I SCENE V

Court before the same.

{Enter LEAR, KENT, and Fool [Cordelia disguised].}

LEAR:

Go you before to Gloucester with these letters. Acquaint my daughter no further with any thing you know than comes from her demand out of the letter. If your diligence be not speedy, I shall be there afore you.

KENT:

I will not sleep, my Lord, till I have delivered your letter.

[Exit.]

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

If a man’s brains were in’s heels, were’t not in danger of kibes?

LEAR:

Ay, boy.

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Then, I prithee, be merry; thy wit shall ne’er go slip‑shod.

LEAR:

Ha, ha, ha!

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Shalt see thy other daughter will use thee kindly; for though she’s as like this as a crab’s like an apple, yet I can tell what I can tell.

LEAR:

Why, what canst thou tell, my boy?

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

She will taste as like this as a crab does to a crab. Thou canst tell why one’s nose stands i’th’middle on’s face?

LEAR:

No.

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Why, to keep one’s eyes of either side’s nose; that what a man cannot smell out, he may spy into[123].

LEAR:

I did her wrong‑‑[124]

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Canst tell how an oyster makes his shell?

LEAR:

No.

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Nor I neither; but I can tell why a snail has a house.

LEAR:

Why?

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Why, to put his head in; not to give it away to his daughters, and leave his horns without a case.

LEAR:

I will forget my nature. So kind a father! Be my horses ready?

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Thy asses are gone about ‘em. The reason why the seven stars are no more than seven is a pretty reason.

LEAR:

Because they are not eight?

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Yes, indeed: thou would’st make a good Fool.

LEAR:

To take’t again perforce! Monster ingratitude!

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

If thou wert my Fool, Nuncle, I’d have thee beaten for being old before thy time.

LEAR:

How’s that?

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Thou should’st not have been old till thou hadst been wise.

LEAR:

O, let me not be mad, not mad, sweet heaven

Keep me in temper: I would not be mad!

{Enter Servant/Gentleman - [France disguised].}

How now! are the horses ready?

SERVANT/GENTLEMAN [France disguised]:

Ready, my Lord.

LEAR:

Come, boy.

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

She[125] that’s a maid now[126], and laughs at my departure[127],

Shall not be a maid long[128], except things be cut shorter[129]. [130] [Exeunt.]

ACT II SCENE I

GLOUCESTER’s castle.

{Enter BASTARD [EDMUND], and CURAN[131] meets him.}

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

Save thee, Curan.

CURAN:

And you, sir. I have been with your father, and given him notice that the Duke of Cornwall and Regan his Duchess will be here with him this night.

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

How comes that?

CURAN:

Nay, I know not. You have heard of the news abroad; I mean the whisper’d ones[132], for they are yet but ear‑kissing arguments?

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

Not I: pray you, what are they?

CURAN:

Have you heard of no likely wars toward, ‘twixt the Dukes of Cornwall and Albany?

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

Not a word.

CURAN:

You may do, then, in time. Fare you well, sir. [Exit.]

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

The Duke be here to‑night? The better! best!

This weaves itself perforce into my business.

My father hath set guard to take my brother;

And I have one thing, of a queasy[133] question,

Which I must act: briefness and fortune, work!

Brother, a word; descend: brother, I say!

{Enter EDGAR.}

My father watches: O sir, fly this place;

Intelligence is given where you are hid;

You have now the good advantage of the night:

Have you not spoken ‘gainst the Duke of Cornwall?

He’s coming hither: now, i’th’night, i’th’haste,

And Regan with him: have you nothing said

Upon his party ‘gainst the Duke of Albany?

Advise yourself.

EDGAR:

I am sure on’t, not a word.

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

I hear my father coming: pardon me:

In cunning I must draw my sword upon you;

Draw; seem to defend yourself; now quit you well.

Yield: come before my father. Light, ho, here!

Fly, brother. Torches, torches! So, farewell. [Exit EDGAR.]

Some blood drawn on me would beget opinion. [Wounds his arm.]

Of my more fierce endeavour: I have seen drunkards

Do more than this in sport. Father, father!

Stop, stop! No help?

{Enter GLOUCESTER, and Servants with torches.}

GLOUCESTER:

Now, Edmund, where’s the villain?

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

Here stood he in the dark, his sharp sword out,

Mumbling of wicked charms, conjuring the moon

To stand auspicious mistress,‑‑

GLOUCESTER:

But where is he?

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

Look, sir, I bleed.

GLOUCESTER:

Where is the villain, Edmund?

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

Fled this way, Sir. When by no means he could‑‑

GLOUCESTER:

Pursue him, ho! Go after.

[Exeunt some Servants.]

By no means what?

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

Persuade me to the murder of your Lordship;

But that I told him, the revenging gods

‘Gainst parricides did all their thunders bend;

Spoke with how manifold and strong a bond

The child was bound to th’father; Sir, in fine[134],

Seeing how loathly opposite I stood

To his unnatural purpose, in fell motion[135],

With his prepared sword, he charges home

My unprovided body, lanc’d mine arm:

But when he saw my best alarum’d spirits,

Bold in the quarrel’s right, roused to th’encounter,

Or whether gasted[136] by the noise I made,

Full suddenly he fled.

GLOUCESTER:

Let him fly far:

Not in this land shall he remain uncaught;

And found‑‑dispatch. The noble Duke my master,

My worthy arch and patron, comes to‑night:

By his authority I will proclaim it,

That he which finds him shall deserve our thanks,

Bringing the murderous coward to the stake;

He that conceals him, death.

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

When I dissuaded him from his intent,

And found him pight[137] to do it, with curst speech

I threaten’d to discover[138] him: he replied,

‘Thou unpossessing bastard! dost thou think,

If I would stand against thee, would the reposal[139]

Of any trust, virtue, or worth in thee

Make thy words faith’d[140]? No: what I should deny,‑‑

As this I would: ay, though thou didst produce

My very character,‑‑I’ld turn it all

To thy suggestion, plot, and damned practice:

And thou must make a dullard of the world[141],

If they not thought the profits of my death

Were very pregnant and potential spurs

To make thee seek it.’

GLOUCESTER:

Strong and fasten’d villain!

Would he deny his letter? I never got him[142]. [Tucket within.]

Hark, the Duke’s trumpets! I know not why he comes.

All ports I’ll bar; the villain shall not ‘scape;

The Duke must grant me that: besides, his picture

I will send far and near, that all the kingdom

May have the due note of him; and of my land,

Loyal and natural boy, I’ll work the means

To make thee capable[143].

{Enter CORNWALL, REGAN, and Attendants.}

CORNWALL:

How now, my noble friend! since I came hither,

Which I can call but now, I have heard strange news.

REGAN:

If it be true, all vengeance comes too short

Which can pursue th’offender. How dost, my Lord?

GLOUCESTER:

O, Madam, my old heart is crack’d, it’s crack’d!

REGAN:

What, did my father’s godson seek your life?

He whom my father nam’d? your Edgar?

GLOUCESTER:

O, Lady, Lady, shame would have it hid!

REGAN:

Was he not companion with the riotous knights

That tend upon my father?

GLOUCESTER:

I know not, Madam: ’tis too bad, too bad.

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

Yes, Madam, he was of that consort.

REGAN:

No marvel, then, though he were ill affected:

’Tis they have put him on the old man’s death,

To have th’expense and waste of his revenues.

I have this present evening from my sister

Been well inform’d of them; and with such cautions,

That if they come to sojourn at my house,

I’ll not be there.

CORNWALL:

Nor I, assure thee, Regan.

Edmund, I hear that you have shown your father

A child‑like office.

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

’Twas my duty, sir.

GLOUCESTER:

He did bewray his practise; and receiv’d

This hurt you see, striving to apprehend him.

CORNWALL:

Is he pursued?

GLOUCESTER:

Ay, my good Lord.

CORNWALL:

If he be taken, he shall never more

Be fear’d of doing harm: make your own purpose,

How in my strength you please. For you, Edmund,

Whose virtue and obedience doth this instant

So much commend itself, you shall be ours:

Natures of such deep trust we shall much need;

You we first seize on.

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

I shall serve you, Sir,

Truly, however else.

GLOUCESTER:

For him I thank your Grace.

CORNWALL:

You know not why we came to visit you,‑‑

REGAN:

Thus out of season, threading dark‑ey’d night:

Occasions, noble Gloucester, of some prize,

Wherein we must have use of your advice:

Our father he hath writ, so hath our sister,

Of differences, which I least thought it fit

To answer from our home; the several messengers

From hence attend dispatch. Our good old friend,

Lay comforts to your bosom; and bestow

Your needful counsel to our business,

Which craves the instant use.

GLOUCESTER:

I serve you, Madam:

Your Graces are right welcome. [Exeunt.]

ACT II SCENE II

Before Gloucester’s castle.

{Enter KENT and STEWARD [OSWALD], severally.}

STEWARD [OSWALD]:

Good dawning[144] to thee, friend: art of this house?

KENT:

Ay.

STEWARD [OSWALD]:

Where may we set our horses?

KENT:

I’th’mire.

STEWARD [OSWALD]:

Prithee, if thou lov’st me, tell me.

KENT:

I love thee not.

STEWARD [OSWALD]:

Why, then, I care not for thee.

KENT:

If I had thee in Lipsbury pinfold, I would make thee care for me.

STEWARD [OSWALD]:

Why dost thou use me thus? I know thee not.

KENT:

Fellow, I know thee.

STEWARD [OSWALD]:

What dost thou know me for?

KENT:

[145]A knave[146]; a rascal; an eater of broken meats; a base, proud, shallow, beggarly, three‑suited, hundred‑pound, filthy, worsted‑stocking knave; a lily‑livered, action‑taking knave, a whoreson, glass‑gazing[147], super‑serviceable finical rogue; one‑trunk‑inheriting slave; one that wouldst be a bawd, in way of good service, and art nothing but the composition of a knave, beggar, coward, pandar, and the son and heir of a mongrel bitch: one whom I will beat into clamorous whining, if thou deni’st the least syllable of thy addition[148].

STEWARD [OSWALD]:

Why, what a monstrous fellow art thou, thus to rail on one that is neither known of thee nor knows thee!

KENT:

What a brazen‑fac’d varlet art thou, to deny thou knowest me! Is it two days ago[149] since I tripp’d up thy heels, and beat thee before the King? Draw, you rogue: for, though it be night, yet the moon shines; I’ll make a sop o’th’moonshine of you: draw, you whoreson cullionly barber‑monger, draw.

[Drawing his sword.]

STEWARD [OSWALD]:

Away! I have nothing to do with thee.

KENT:

Draw, you rascal: you come with letters against the King; and take vanity the puppet’s part against the royalty of her father: draw, you rogue, or I’ll so carbonado your shanks: draw, you rascal; come your ways.

STEWARD [OSWALD]:

Help, ho! murder! help![150]

KENT:

Strike, you slave; stand, rogue, stand; you neat slave, strike. [Beating him.]

STEWARD [OSWALD]:

Help, ho! murder! murder!

{Enter EDMUND, with his rapier drawn, CORNWALL,

REGAN, GLOUCESTER, and Servants.}

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

How now! What’s the matter? Part!

KENT:

With you, goodman boy, an[151] you please: come, I’ll flesh ye; come on, young master. [152]

GLOUCESTER:

Weapons! arms! What’s the matter here?

CORNWALL:

Keep peace, upon your lives:

He dies that strikes again. What is the matter?

REGAN:

The messengers from our sister and the King.

CORNWALL:

What is your difference? speak.

STEWARD [OSWALD]:

I am scarce in breath, my Lord.

KENT:

No marvel, you have so bestirr’d your valour. You cowardly rascal, nature disclaims in thee: a tailor made thee.

CORNWALL:

Thou art a strange fellow: a tailor make a man?

KENT:

Ay, a tailor, sir: a stone‑cutter or painter could not have made him so ill, though he had been but two hours o’th’trade.

CORNWALL:

Speak yet, how grew your quarrel?

STEWARD [OSWALD]:

This ancient ruffian, Sir, whose life I have spar’d at suit of his gray beard,‑‑

KENT:

Thou whoreson zed! thou unnecessary letter! My Lord, if you will give me leave, I will tread this unbolted villain into mortar, and daub the wall of a jakes with him. Spare my gray beard, you wagtail?

CORNWALL:

Peace, sirrah!

You beastly knave, know you no reverence?

KENT:

Yes, sir; but anger hath a privilege.

CORNWALL:

Why art thou angry?

KENT:

That such a slave as this should wear a sword,

Who wears no honesty. Such smiling rogues as these,

Like rats, oft bite the holy cords a‑twain

Which are too intrinse t’unloose; smooth every passion

That in the natures of their Lords rebel;

Bring oil to fire, snow to their colder moods;

Renege, affirm, and turn their halcyon beaks

With every gale and vary of their masters,

Knowing nought, like dogs, but following.

A plague upon your epileptic visage!

Smile you my speeches, as I were a Fool[153]?

Goose, if I had you upon Sarum plain,

I’d drive ye cackling home to Camelot.

CORNWALL:

Why, art thou mad, old fellow?

GLOUCESTER:

How fell you out? say that.

KENT:

No contraries hold more antipathy

Than I and such a knave.

CORNWALL:

Why dost thou call him a knave? What’s his offence?

KENT:

His countenance likes me not.

CORNWALL:

No more, perchance, does mine, nor his, nor hers.

KENT:

Sir, ’tis my occupation to be plain:

I have seen better faces in my time

Than stands on any shoulder that I see

Before me at this instant.

CORNWALL:

This is some fellow,

Who, having been prais’d for bluntness, doth affect

A saucy roughness, and constrains the garb

Quite from his nature: he cannot flatter, he,

An honest mind and plain, he must speak truth!

And they will take it, so; if not, he’s plain.

These kind of knaves I know, which in this plainness

Harbour more craft and more corrupter ends

Than twenty silly-ducking observants,

That stretch their duties nicely.

KENT:

Sir, in good sooth, in sincere verity,

Under th’allowance of your great aspect,

Whose influence, like the wreath of radiant fire

On flick’ring Phoebus’ front,‑‑

CORNWALL:

What mean’st by this?

KENT:

To go out of my dialect, which you discommend so much. I know, sir, I am no flatterer: he that beguil’d you in a plain accent was a plain knave; which for my part I will not be, though I should win your displeasure to entreat me to’t.

CORNWALL:

What was the offence you gave him?

STEWARD [OSWALD]:

I never gave him any:

It pleas’d the King his master very late

To strike at me, upon his misconstruction;

When he, conjunct and flattering his displeasure,

Tripp’d me behind; being down, insulted, rail’d,

And put upon him such a deal of man,

That worthied him, got praises of the King

For him attempting who was self‑subdued;

And, in the fleshment of this dread exploit,

Drew on me here again.

KENT:

None of these rogues and cowards

But Ajax is their Fool.

CORNWALL:

Fetch forth the stocks!

You stubborn ancient knave, you reverend braggart,

We’ll teach you‑‑

KENT:

Sir, I am too old to learn:

Call not your stocks for me: I serve the King;

On whose employment I was sent to you:

You shall do small respect, show too bold malice

Against the grace and person of my master,

Stocking his messenger.

CORNWALL:

Fetch forth the stocks!

As I have life and honour, There shall he sit till noon.

REGAN:

Till noon! till night, my Lord; and all night too.

KENT:

Why, Madam, if I were your father’s dog,

You should not use me so.

REGAN:

Sir, being his knave, I will.

CORNWALL:

This is a fellow of the self‑same colour

Our sister speaks of. Come, bring away the stocks! [Stocks brought out.]

GLOUCESTER:

Let me beseech your grace not to do so:

His fault is much, and the good King his master

Will check him for’t: your purpos’d low correction

Is such as basest and contemned’st wretches

For pilf’rings and most common trespasses

Are punish’d with: the King must take it ill,

That he’s so slightly valued in his messenger,

Should have him thus restrain’d.

CORNWALL:

I’ll answer that.

REGAN:

My sister may receive it much more worse,

To have her gentleman abus’d, assaulted,

For following her affairs. Put in his legs.

[KENT is put in the stocks.]

Come, my good Lord, away.

[Exeunt all but GLOUCESTER and KENT.]

GLOUCESTER:

I am sorry for thee, friend; ’tis the Duke’s pleasure,

Whose disposition, all the world well knows,

Will not be rubb’d nor stopp’d: I’ll entreat for thee.

KENT:

Pray, do not, Sir: I have watch’d and travell’d hard;

Some time I shall sleep out, the rest I’ll whistle.

A good man’s fortune may grow out at heels:

Give you good morrow!

GLOUCESTER:

The Duke’s to blame in this; ‘twill be ill taken.

[Exit.]

KENT:

Good King, that must approve the common saw,

Thou out of heaven’s benediction com’st

To the warm sun!

Approach, thou beacon to this under globe[154],

That by thy comfortable beams I may

Peruse this letter! Nothing almost sees miracles[155]

But misery: I know ’tis from Cordelia,

Who hath most fortunately been inform’d

Of my obscured course; and shall find time

From this enormous state[156], seeking to give

Losses their remedies. All weary and o’erwatch’d,

Take vantage, heavy eyes, not to behold

This shameful lodging.

Fortune, good night: smile once more: turn thy wheel! [Sleeps.]

ACT II SCENE III

A wood.

{Enter EDGAR.}

EDGAR:

I heard myself proclaim’d;

And by the happy hollow of a tree

Escaped the hunt. No port is free; no place,

That guard, and most unusual vigilance,

Does not attend my taking. Whiles I may ‘scape,

I will preserve myself: and am bethought

To take the basest and most poorest shape

That ever penury, in contempt of man,

Brought near to beast: my face I’ll grime with filth;

Blanket my loins: elf all my hair in knots;

And with presented nakedness out‑face

The winds and persecutions of the sky.

The country gives me proof and precedent

Of Bedlam beggars, who, with roaring voices,

Strike in their numb’d and mortified bare arms

Pins, wooden pricks, nails, sprigs of rosemary;

And with this horrible object, from low farms,

Poor pelting villages, sheep‑cotes, and mills,

Sometime with lunatic bans, sometime with prayers,

Enforce their charity. Poor Turlygod! poor Tom!

That’s something yet: Edgar I nothing am[157]. [Exit.]

ACT II SCENE IV

Before GLOUCESTER’s castle. KENT in the stocks.

{Enter LEAR, Fool [Cordelia disguised], and Knight/Gentleman [France disguised].}

LEAR:

’Tis strange that they should so depart from home,

And not send back my messenger.

KNIGHT/GENTLEMAN[France disguised]:

As I learn’d,

The night before there was no purpose in them

Of this remove[158].

KENT:

Hail to thee, noble master!

LEAR:

Ha!

Makest thou this shame thy pastime?

KENT:

No, my Lord.

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Ha, ha! he wears cruel garters. Horses are tied by the heads, dogs and bears by th’neck, monkeys by th’loins, and men by th’legs: when a man’s over‑lusty at legs, then he wears wooden nether‑stocks.

LEAR:

What’s he that hath so much thy place mistook

To set thee here?

KENT:

It is both he and she;

Your son and daughter.

LEAR:

No.

KENT:

Yes.

LEAR:

No, I say.

KENT:

I say, yea.

LEAR:

No, no, they would not.

KENT:

Yes, they have.

LEAR:

By Jupiter, I swear, no.

KENT:

By Juno, I swear, ay.

LEAR:

They durst not do’t;

They could not, would not do’t; ’tis worse than murder,

To do upon respect such violent outrage:

Resolve me, with all modest haste, which way

Thou might’st deserve, or they impose, this usage,

Coming from us.

KENT:

My Lord, when at their home

I did commend your Highness’ letters to them,

Ere I was risen from the place that show’d

My duty kneeling, came there a reeking post,

Stew’d in his haste, half breathless, panting forth

From Goneril his mistress salutations;

Deliver’d letters, spite of intermission,

Which presently they read: on whose contents,

They summon’d up their meiny, straight took horse;

Commanded me to follow, and attend

The leisure of their answer; gave me cold looks:

And meeting here the other messenger,

Whose welcome, I perceiv’d, had poison’d mine,‑‑

Being the very fellow that of late

Display’d so saucily against your Highness,‑‑

Having more man than wit about me, drew:

He rais’d the house with loud and coward cries.

Your son and daughter found this trespass worth

The shame which here it suffers.

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Winter’s not gone yet, if the wild‑geese fly that way.

Fathers that wear rags

Do make their children blind;

But fathers that bear bags

Shall see their children kind.

Fortune, that arrant whore,

Ne’er turns the key to the poor.

But, for all this, thou shalt have as many dolours for thy daughters as thou canst tell in a year.

LEAR:

O, how this mother swells up toward my heart!

Hysterica passio, down, thou climbing sorrow,

Thy element’s below! Where is this daughter?

KENT:

With the Earl, Sir, here within.

LEAR:

Follow me not; Stay here. [Exit.]

KNIGHT/GENTLEMAN [France disguised]:

Made you no more offence but what you speak of?

KENT:

None.

How chance the King comes with so small a train?

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

And[159] thou hadst been set i’th’stocks for that question, thou’dst well deserv’d it.

KENT:

Why, Fool?

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

We’ll set thee to school to an ant, to teach thee there’s no labouring i’th’winter. All that follow their noses are led by their eyes but blind men; and there’s not a nose among twenty but can smell him that’s stinking. Let go thy hold when a great wheel runs down a hill, lest it break thy neck with following it: but the great one that goes up the hill, let him draw thee after. When a wise man gives thee better counsel, give me mine again: I would have none but knaves follow it, since a Fool gives it.

That sir which serves and seeks for gain,

And follows but for form,

Will pack when it begins to rain,

And leave thee in the storm,

But I will tarry; the Fool will stay,

And let the wise man fly:

The knave turns Fool that runs away;

The Fool no knave, perdy[160].

KENT:

Where learned you this, Fool?

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Not i’th’stocks, Fool.

LEAR:

Deny to speak with me? They are sick? They are weary?

They have travell’d all the night? Mere fetches;

The images of revolt and flying off.

Fetch me a better answer.

GLOUCESTER:

My dear Lord,

You know the fiery quality of the Duke;

How unremoveable and fix’d he is

In his own course.

LEAR:

Vengeance! plague! death! confusion!

Fiery? what quality? Why, Gloucester, Gloucester,

I’d speak with the Duke of Cornwall and his wife.

GLOUCESTER:

Well, my good Lord, I have inform’d them so.

LEAR:

Inform’d them! Dost thou understand me, man?

GLOUCESTER:

Ay, my good Lord.

LEAR:

The King would speak with Cornwall; the dear father

Would with his daughter speak, commands her service:

Are they inform’d of this? My breath and blood!

Fiery? the fiery Duke? Tell the hot Duke that‑‑

No, but not yet: may be he is not well:

Infirmity doth still neglect all office

Whereto our health is bound; we are not ourselves

When nature, being oppress’d, commands the mind

To suffer with the body: I’ll forbear;

And am fall’n out with my more headier will,

To take the indispos’d and sickly fit

For the sound man. Death on my state! wherefore [Looking on KENT.]

Should he sit here? This act persuades me

That this remotion of the Duke and her

Is practice only. Give me my servant forth.

Go tell the Duke and’s wife I’d speak with them,

Now, presently: bid them come forth and hear me,

Or at their chamber‑door I’ll beat the drum

Till it cry sleep to death.

GLOUCESTER:

I would have all well betwixt[161] you. [Exit.]

LEAR:

O me, my heart, my rising heart! but, down!

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Cry to it, Nuncle, as the cockney did to the eels when she put ‘em i’th’paste alive; she knapped ‘em o’th’coxcombs with a stick, and cried ‘Down, wantons, down!’ ’Twas her brother that, in pure kindness to his horse, buttered his hay.

{Enter CORNWALL, REGAN, GLOUCESTER, and Servants.}

LEAR:

Good morrow to you both.

CORNWALL:

Hail to your grace! [KENT is set at liberty.]

REGAN:

I am glad to see your Highness.

LEAR:

Regan, I think you are; I know what reason

I have to think so: if thou shouldst not be glad,

I would divorce me from thy mother’s tomb,

Sepulchring an adult’ress. [To KENT.] O, are you free?

Some other time for that. Beloved Regan, [Exeunt KENT.]

Thy sister’s naught[162]: O Regan, she hath tied

Sharp‑tooth’d unkindness, like a vulture, here: [Points to his heart.]

I can scarce speak to thee; thou’lt not believe

With how deprav’d a quality‑‑O Regan!

REGAN:

I pray you, Sir, take patience: I have hope.

You less know how to value her desert

Than she to scant her duty.

LEAR:

Say, how is that?

REGAN:

I cannot think my sister in the least

Would fail her obligation. If, Sir, perchance

She have restrain’d the riots of your followers,

’Tis on such ground, and to such wholesome end,

As clears her from all blame.

LEAR:

My curses on her!

REGAN:

O, Sir, you are old.

Nature in you stands on the very verge

Of her confine: you should be rul’d and led

By some discretion, that discerns your state

Better than you yourself. Therefore, I pray you,

That to our sister you do make return;

Say you have wrong’d her, Sir.

LEAR:

Ask her forgiveness?

Do you but mark how this becomes the house:

‘Dear daughter, I confess that I am old; [Kneeling.]

Age is unnecessary: on my knees I beg

That you’ll vouchsafe me raiment, bed, and food.’

REGAN:

Good Sir, no more; these are unsightly tricks:

Return you to my sister.

LEAR:

[Rising] Never, Regan:

She hath abated me of half my train;

Look’d black upon me; struck me with her tongue,

Most serpent‑like, upon the very heart:

All the stor’d vengeances of heaven fall

On her ingrateful top! Strike her young bones,

You taking airs, with lameness!

CORNWALL:

Fie, Sir, fie!

LEAR:

You nimble lightnings, dart your blinding flames

Into her scornful eyes! Infect her beauty,

You fen‑suck’d fogs, drawn by the pow’rful sun,

To fall and blast her pride!

REGAN:

O the blest gods! so will you wish on me,

When the rash mood is on.

LEAR:

No, Regan, thou shalt never have my curse:

Thy tender‑hefted nature shall not give

Thee o’er to harshness: her eyes are fierce; but thine

Do comfort and not burn. ’Tis not in thee

To grudge my pleasures, to cut off my train,

To bandy hasty words, to scant my sizes,

And in conclusion to oppose the bolt

Against my coming in: thou better know’st

The offices of nature, bond of childhood,

Effects of courtesy, dues of gratitude;

Thy half o’th’kingdom hast thou not forgot,

Wherein I thee endow’d.

REGAN:

Good sir, to th’purpose.

LEAR:

Who put my man i’th’stocks? [Tucket within.]

CORNWALL:

What trumpet’s that?

REGAN:

I know’t, my sister’s: this approves her letter,

That she would soon be here.

{Enter STEWARD [OSWALD]}

Is your Lady come?

LEAR:

This is a slave, whose easy‑borrow’d[163] pride

Dwells in the fickle grace of her he follows[164].

Out, varlet, from my sight!

CORNWALL:

What means your Grace?

LEAR:

Who stock’d my servant? Regan, I have good hope

Thou didst not know on’t. Who comes here? O heavens,

{Enter GONERIL.}

If you do love old men, if your sweet sway

Allow obedience, if yourselves are old,

Make it your cause; send down, and take my part!

[To GONERIL.]

Art not asham’d to look upon this beard?

O Regan, wilt thou take her by the hand?

GONERIL:

Why not by the hand, sir? How have I offended?

All’s not offence that indiscretion finds

And dotage terms so.

LEAR:

O sides, you are too tough;

Will you yet hold? How came my man i’th’stocks?

CORNWALL:

I set him there, Sir: but his own disorders

Deserved much less advancement.

LEAR:

You! did you?

REGAN:

I pray you, father, being weak, seem so.

If, till the expiration of your month[165],

You will return and sojourn with my sister,

Dismissing half your train[166], come then to me:

I am now from home, and out of that provision

Which shall be needful for your entertainment.

LEAR:

Return to her, and fifty men dismiss’d?

No, rather I abjure all roofs, and choose

To wage against the enmity o’th’air;

To be a comrade with the wolf and owl,‑‑

Necessity’s sharp pinch! Return with her?

Why, the hot‑blooded France, that dowerless took

Our youngest born, I could as well be brought

To knee his throne, and, squire‑like; pension beg

To keep base life afoot[167]. Return with her?

Persuade me rather to be slave and sumpter[168]

To this detested groom.

GONERIL:

At your choice, Sir.

LEAR:

I prithee, daughter, do not make me mad:

I will not trouble thee, my child; farewell:

We’ll no more meet, no more see one another:

But yet thou art my flesh, my blood, my daughter;

Or rather a disease that’s in my flesh,

Which I must needs call mine: thou art a boil,

A plague‑sore, an embossed carbuncle,

In my corrupted blood. But I’ll not chide thee;

Let shame come when it will, I do not call it:

I do not bid the thunder‑bearer shoot,

Nor tell tales of thee to high‑judging Jove:

Mend when thou canst; be better at thy leisure:

I can be patient; I can stay with Regan,

I and my hundred knights.

REGAN:

Not altogether so:

I look’d not for you yet, nor am provided

For your fit welcome. Give ear, Sir, to my sister;

For those that mingle reason with your passion

Must be content to think you old, and so‑‑

But she knows what she does.

LEAR:

Is this well spoken?

REGAN:

I dare avouch it, Sir: what, fifty followers?

Is it not well? What should you need of more?

Yea, or so many, sith that both charge and danger

Speak ‘gainst so great a number? How, in one house,

Should many people, under two commands,

Hold amity? ’Tis hard; almost impossible.

GONERIL:

Why might not you, my Lord, receive attendance

From those that she calls servants or from mine?

REGAN:

Why not, my Lord? If then they chanc’d to slack you,

We could control them. If you will come to me,‑‑

For now I spy a danger,‑‑I entreat you

To bring but five and twenty: to no more

Will I give place or notice.

LEAR:

I gave you all‑‑

REGAN:

And in good time you gave it.

LEAR:

Made you my guardians, my depositaries;

But kept a reservation to be follow’d

With such a number. What, must I come to you

With five and twenty, Regan? said you so?

REGAN:

And speak’t again, my Lord; no more with me.

LEAR:

Those wicked creatures yet do look well‑favour’d,

When others are more wicked: not being the worst

Stands in some rank of praise. [To GONERIL.] I’ll go with thee:

Thy fifty yet doth double five and twenty,

And thou art twice her love.

GONERIL:

Hear me, my Lord;

What need you five and twenty, ten, or five,

To follow in a house where twice so many

Have a command to tend you?

REGAN:

What need one[169]?

LEAR:

O, reason not the need: our basest beggars

Are in the poorest thing superfluous:

Allow not nature more than nature needs,

Man’s life’s as cheap as beast’s: Thou art a lady;

If only to go warm were gorgeous,

Why, nature needs not what thou gorgeous wear’st,

Which scarcely keeps thee warm. But, for true need,‑‑

You heavens, give me that patience, patience I need!

You see me here, you gods, a poor old man,

As full of grief as age; wretched in both!

If it be you that stir these daughters’ hearts

Against their father, Fool me not so much

To bear it tamely; touch me with noble anger,

And let not women’s weapons, water‑drops,

Stain my man’s cheeks! No, you unnatural hags,

I will have such revenges on you both,

That all the world shall‑‑I will do such things,‑‑

What they are, yet I know not: but they shall be

The terrors of the earth. You think I’ll weep

No, I’ll not weep:

I have full cause of weeping; but this heart

Shall break into a hundred thousand flaws,

Or ere I’ll weep. O Fool, I shall go mad!

[Exeunt LEAR, GLOUCESTER, and FOOL [Cordelia disguised].]

[Storm at a distance.]

CORNWALL:

Let us withdraw; ‘twill be a storm.

REGAN:

This house is little: the old man and his people

Cannot be well bestow’d.

GONERIL:

’Tis his own blame; hath put himself from rest,

And must needs taste his folly.

REGAN:

For his particular, I’ll receive him gladly,

But not one follower.

GONERIL:

So am I purposed.

Where is my Lord of Gloucester?

CORNWALL:

Follow’d the old man forth. He is return’d.

{Re‑enter GLOUCESTER.}

GLOUCESTER:

The King is in high rage.

CORNWALL:

Whither is he going?

GLOUCESTER:

He calls to horse; but will I know not whither.

CORNWALL:

’Tis best to give him way; he leads himself.

GONERIL:

My Lord, entreat him by no means to stay.

GLOUCESTER:

Alack, the night comes on, and the bleak winds[170]

Do sorely ruffle; for many miles about

There’s scarce a bush.

REGAN:

O, sir, to wilful men,

The injuries that they themselves procure

Must be their schoolmasters. Shut up your doors:

He is attended with a desperate train;

And what they may incense him to, being apt

To have his ear abused, wisdom bids fear.

CORNWALL:

Shut up your doors, my Lord; ’tis a wild night:

My Regan counsels well; come out o’th’storm. [Exeunt.]

ACT III SCENE I

A heath.

{Storm still. Enter KENT and a GENTLEMAN [France disguised], meeting.}

KENT:

Who’s there, besides foul weather?

GENTLEMAN [France disguised]:

One minded like the weather, most unquietly[171].

KENT:

I know you. Where’s the King[172]?

GENTLEMAN [France disguised]:

Contending with the fretful elements:

Bids the winds blow the earth into the sea,

Or swell the curled water ‘bove the main,

That things might change or cease; tears his white hair,

Which the impetuous blasts, with eyeless rage,

Catch in their fury, and make nothing of;

Strives in his little world of man to out‑scorn

The to‑and‑fro‑conflicting wind and rain.

This night, wherein the cub‑drawn bear would couch,

The lion and the belly‑pinched wolf

Keep their fur dry, unbonneted he runs,

And bids what will take all[173].

KENT:

But who is with him?

GENTLEMAN [France disguised]:

None but the Fool; who labours to out‑jest

His heart‑struck injuries[174].

KENT:

Sir, I do know you;

And dare, upon the warrant of my note,

Commend a dear thing to you. There is division,

Although as yet the face of it be cover’d

With mutual cunning[175], ‘twixt Albany and Cornwall;

Who have‑‑as who have not, that their great stars

Thron’d and set high ‑‑servants, who seem no less,

Which are to France the spies and speculations

Intelligent of our state[176]. What hath been seen,

Either in snuffs and packings of the Dukes,

Or the hard rein which both of them have borne

Against the old kind King; or something deeper,

Whereof perchance these are but furnishings;

But, true it is, from France there comes a power

Into this scatter’d kingdom; who already,

Wise in our negligence, have secret feet[177]

In some of our best ports, and are at point

To show their open banner[178]. Now to you:

If on my credit you dare build so far[179]

To make your speed to Dover, you shall find

Some that will thank you, making just report

Of how unnatural and bemadding sorrow

The King hath cause to plain[180].

I am a gentleman of blood and breeding;

And, from some knowledge and assurance, offer

This office to you.

GENTLEMAN [France disguised]:

I will talk further with you.

KENT:

No, do not.

For confirmation that I am much more

Than my out‑wall, open this purse, and take

What it contains. If you shall see Cordelia,‑‑

As fear not but you shall,‑‑show her this ring[181];

And she will tell you who your fellow is

That yet you do not know. [182] Fie on this storm!

I will go seek the King.

GENTLEMAN [France disguised]:

Give me your hand: have you no more to say[183]?

KENT:

Few words, but, to effect, more than all yet;

That, when we have found the King,‑‑in which your pain

That way, I’ll this,‑‑he that first lights on him

Holla the other[184]. [Exeunt severally.]

ACT III SCENE II

Another part of the heath. Storm still.

{Enter LEAR and FOOL [Cordelia disguised].}

LEAR:

Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! rage! blow!

You cataracts and hurricanoes, spout

Till you have drench’d our steeples, drown’d the cocks!

You sulphurous and thought‑executing fires,

Vaunt‑couriers to oak‑cleaving thunderbolts,

Singe my white head! And thou, all‑shaking thunder,

Smite flat the thick rotundity o’th’world!

Crack nature’s moulds, all germens spill at once,

That make ingrateful man!

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

O Nuncle, court holy‑water in a dry house is better than this rain‑water out o’door. Good Nuncle, in, and ask thy daughters’ blessing: here’s a night pities neither wise man nor Fool.

LEAR:

Rumble thy bellyful! Spit, fire! spout, rain!

Nor rain, wind, thunder, fire, are my daughters:

I tax not you, you elements, with unkindness;

I never gave you kingdom, call’d you children,

You owe me no subscription: then let fall

Your horrible pleasure: here I stand, your slave,

A poor, infirm, weak, and despis’d old man:

But yet I call you servile ministers,

That have with two pernicious daughters join’d

Your high engender’d battles ‘gainst a head

So old and white as this. O! ho! ’tis foul!

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

He that has a house to put’s head in has a good head‑piece.

The cod‑piece that will house

Before the head has any,

The head and he shall louse;

So beggars marry many.

The man that makes his toe

What he his heart should make

Shall of a corn cry woe,

And turn his sleep to wake[185].

For there was never yet fair woman but she made mouths in a glass[186].

LEAR:

No, I will be the pattern of all patience;

I will say nothing[187].

{Enter KENT.}

KENT:

Who’s there?

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

Marry, here’s grace and a cod‑piece; that’s a wise man and a fool[188].

KENT:

Alas, sir, are you here? things that love night

Love not such nights as these; the wrathful skies

Gallow the very wanderers of the dark,

And make them keep their caves. Since I was man,

Such sheets of fire, such bursts of horrid thunder,

Such groans of roaring wind and rain, I never

Remember to have heard: man’s nature cannot carry

Th’affliction nor the fear.

LEAR:

Let the great gods,

That keep this dreadful pudder o’er our heads,

Find out their enemies now[189]. Tremble, thou wretch,

That hast within thee undivulged crimes,

Unwhipp’d of justice: hide thee, thou bloody hand;

Thou perjur’d, and thou simular man of virtue

That art incestuous: caitiff, to pieces shake,

That under covert and convenient seeming

Hast practis’d on man’s life: close pent‑up guilts,

Rive your concealing continents, and cry

These dreadful summoners grace[190]. I am a man

More sinn’d against than sinning.

KENT:

Alack, bare‑headed!

Gracious my Lord, hard by here is a hovel;

Some friendship will it lend you ‘gainst the tempest:

Repose you there while I to this hard house‑‑

More harder than the stones whereof ’tis rais’d;

Which even but now, demanding after you,

Denied me to come in‑‑return, and force

Their scanted courtesy.

LEAR:

My wits begin to turn.

Come on, my boy: how dost, my boy? art cold?

I am cold myself. Where is this straw[191], my fellow?

The art of our necessities is strange,

That can make vile things precious. Come, your hovel.

Poor Fool and knave, I have one part in my heart

That’s sorry yet for thee[192].

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

[Singing.]

He that has and a little tiny wit‑‑

With hey, ho, the wind and the rain,‑‑

Must make content with his fortunes fit,

For the rain it raineth every day.

LEAR:

True, my good boy. Come, bring us to this hovel.

[Exeunt LEAR and KENT.]

FOOL [Cordelia disguised]:

This is a brave night to cool a courtezan.[193]

I’ll speak a prophecy ere I go:

When priests are more in word than matter;

When brewers mar their malt with water;

When nobles are their tailors’ tutors;

No heretics burn’d, but wenches’ suitors;

When every case in law is right;

No squire in debt, nor no poor knight;

When slanders do not live in tongues;

Nor cutpurses come not to throngs;

When usurers tell their gold i’th’field;

And bawds and whores do churches build;

Then shall the realm of Albion

Come to great confusion:

Then comes the time, who lives to see’t[194],

That going shall be used with feet.

This prophecy Merlin shall make; for I live before his time. [Exit.]

ACT III SCENE III

Gloucester’s castle.

{Enter GLOUCESTER and BASTARD [EDMUND].}

GLOUCESTER:

Alack, alack, Edmund, I like not this unnatural dealing. When I desir’d their leave that I might pity him, they took from me the use of mine own house; charg’d me, on pain of perpetual displeasure, neither to speak of him, entreat for him, nor any way sustain him.

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

Most savage and unnatural!

GLOUCESTER:

Go to; say you nothing. There’s a division betwixt the Dukes; and a worse matter than that: I have received a letter this night; ’tis dangerous to be spoken; I have lock’d the letter in my closet. These injuries the King now bears will be revenged home; there’s part of a power already footed: [195] we must incline to the King. I will seek him, and privily relieve him: go you and maintain talk with the Duke, that my charity be not of him perceiv’d. If he ask for me, I am ill, and gone to bed. Though I die for it, as no less is threatened me, the King my old master must be reliev’d. There is some strange thing toward, Edmund; pray you, be careful. [Exit.]

BASTARD [EDMUND]:

This courtesy, forbid thee, shall the Duke

Instantly know; and of that letter too:

This seems a fair deserving, and must draw me

That which my father loses; no less than all:

The younger rises when the old doth fall. [Exit.]

ACT III SCENE IV

The heath. Before a hovel.

{Enter LEAR, KENT, and Fool [Cordelia disguised].}

KENT:

Here is the place, my Lord; good my Lord, enter:

The tyranny of the open night’s too rough

For nature to endure. [Storm still.]

LEAR:

Let me alone.

KENT:

Good my Lord, enter here.

LEAR:

Wilt break my heart?

KENT:

I had rather break mine own. Good my Lord, enter.

LEAR:

Thou think’st ’tis much that this contentious storm

Invades us to the skin: so ’tis to thee;

But where the greater malady is fix’d,

The lesser is scarce felt. Thou’ldst shun a bear;

But if thy flight lay toward the raging sea,

Thou’ldst meet the bear i’th’mouth. When the mind’s free,

The body’s delicate: the tempest in my mind

Doth from my senses take all feeling else

Save what beats there. Filial ingratitude![196]