[heavens!

Enter GONERIL.

If you do love old men, if your sweet sway Allow obedience, if yourselves are old,

a

Make it your cause; send down, and take my part! Art not asham'd to look upon this beard?

[To GONERIL. O Regan wilt thou take her by the hand? Gon. 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' the
stocks?

Corn. I set him there, sir; but his own disorders

Deserv'd much less advancement.

Lear.

You! did you? Reg. I pray you, father, being weak, seem so. If, till the expiration of your month, You will return and sojourn with my sister, Dismissing half your train, 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' the air; To be a comrade with the wolf and howl 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.-Return with her? Persuade me rather to be slave and sumpter To this detested groom. [Looking at OSWALD. At your choice, sir.

Gon.

Lear. I pr'ythee, 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.

Reg.

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 their passion, Must be content to think you old, and soBut she knows what she does.

Lear. Is this well spoken? Reg. 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.

Gon. Why might not you, my lord, receive attendance

From those that she calls servants, or from mine? Reg. Why not, my lord? If then they chanc'd

to slack you,

"Allow," i. e., approve.-Sumpter," i. e., sumpter. horse, that carries necessaries on a journey." Embossed," Le., swelling; protuberant. Since,

need,

You heavens, give me 3 but 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.
O! let not women's weapons, water-drops,
I will have such revenges on you both,
Stain my man's cheeks.-No, you unnatural hags,

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

[Storm heard at a distance. Shall break into a hundred thousand, & flaws, Or ere I'll weep.-O, fool! I shall go mad.

[Exeunt LEAR, GLOSTER, KENT, and Fool. Corn. Let us withdraw, 'twill be a storm. Reg. This house is little: the old man and 's people Cannot be well bestow'd. [rest;

Gon. 'Tis his own blame hath put himself from 4 He must needs taste his folly.

Reg. For his particular, I'll receive him gladly, But not one follower.

Gon.

Where is my lord of Gloster?

So am I purpos'd.

Kent. Who's here, beside foul weather? Gent. One minded, like the weather, most unquietly.

Kent. I know you. Where's the king? Gent. Contending with the fretful elements; Bids the wind blow the earth into the sea, Or swell the curled waters 'bove the main, Chair, That things might change or cease: tears his white 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 The lion and the belly-pinched wolf Keep their fur dry, unbonneted he runs, And bids what will take all.

Kent.

[couch,

But who is with him? Gent. None but the fool, who labors to outjest His heart-struck injuries.

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, '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 1 spectators
Intelligent of our state; 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 flourishings;-
But, true it is, from France there comes a power
Into this scatter'd kingdom; who already,
Wise in our negligence, have secret 'feet
In some of our best ports, and are at point
To show their open banner.-Now to you:
If on my credit you dare build so far
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.

I am a gentleman of blood and breeding,
And from some knowledge and assurance offer
This office to you.

Gent. I will talk farther 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,

You sulphurous and thought-executing fires, iVaunt-couriers to oak-cleaving thunder-bolts, [der, Singe my white head! And thou, all-shaking thun Strike flat the thick rotundity o' the world: Crack nature's moulds, all germins spill at once, That make ingrateful man!

k

Fool. O nuncle, court holy-water in a dry house is better than this rain-water out o' door. Good nuncle, in, and ask thy daughter's blessing: here's a night pities neither wise men nor fools.

3[Thunder.
Lear. Rumble thy bellyfull! 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 will with two pernicious daughters join
Your high-engender'd battles 'gainst a head
So old and white as this.
O! O! 'tis foul!
Fool. 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. -for there was never yet fair woman, but she made mouths in a glass.

Fool. Marry, here's grace, and a cod-piece; that's a wise man, and a fool.

Kent. Alas, sir! are you here? Things that love night,

Love not such nights as these; the wrathful skies
m 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

Thought-executing,'

Lear. Let the great gods, That keep this dreadful pother o'er our heads, Find out their enemies now. Tremble, thou wretch, That hast within thee undivulged crimes, Unwhipp'd of justice: hide thee, thou bloody hand; Thou 'perjure, and thou simuler 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.-I am a man, More sinn'd against, than sinning.

Kent.

d

Alack bare-headed.

With heigh, 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. This is a brave night to cool a courtezan.
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' the 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, That going shall be us'd with feet. This prophecy Merlin shall make; for I live before his time. [Exit.

SCENE III-A Room in GLOSTER's Castle.

Enter GLOSTER and EDMUND. Glo. Alack, alack! Edmund, I like not this unnatural dealing. When I desired their leave that I might pity him, they took from me the use of mine own house; charged me, on pain of their perpetual displeasure, neither to speak of him, entreat for him, nor any way sustain him.

Edm. Most savage, and unnatural!

Glo. Go to; say you nothing. There is division between the dukes, and a worse matter than that. I have received a letter this night;-'tis dangerous to be spoken:-I have locked the letter in my closet. These injuries the king now bears will be revenged

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 perceived. If he ask for me, I am ill, and gone to bed. If I die for it, as no less is threatened me, the king, my old master, must be relieved. There is some strange thing toward, Edmund; pray you, be careful. [Exit.

Edm. 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.

Lear. Thou think'st 'tis much, that this contentious Invades us to the skin: so 'tis to thee; But where the greater malady is fix'd, The lesser is scarce felt. Thou'dst shun a bear; But if thy flight lay toward the roaring sea, Thou'dst meet the bear i' the mouth.

mind's free,

When the

The body's delicate: the tempest in my mind
Doth from my senses take all feeling else,
Save what beats there.-Filial ingratitude!
Is it not as this mouth should tear this hand,
For lifting food to't?-But I will punish home.-
No, I will weep no more.-In such a night
To shut me out!-Pour on;-I will endure.-
In such a night as this! O Regan! Goneril!—
Your old kind father, whose frank heart gave all.-
O! that way madness lies; let me shun that;
No more of that.

Kent.

Good my lord, enter here. Lear. Pr'ythee, go in thyself; seek thine own ease: This tempest will not give me leave to ponder On things would hurt me more.-But I'll go in: In, boy; go first.-[To the Fool.] You houseless poverty,

Nay, get thee in. I'lll pray, and then I'll sleep.-
[Fool goes in.

Poor naked wretches, wheresoe'er you are,
That bide the pelting of this pitiless storm,
How shall your houseless heads, and unfed sides,
Your loop'd and 'window'd raggedness, defend you
From seasons such as these? O! I have ta'en
Too little care of this. Take physic, pomp;
Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel,
That thou may'st shake the superflux to them,
And show the heavens more just.

Edg. [Within.] Fathom and half, fathom and half!
Poor Tom!

[The Fool runs out from the Hovel. Fool. Come not in here, nuncle; here's a spirit. Help me! help me!

Kent. Give me thy hand.-Who's there?
Fool. A spirit, a spirit: he says his name's poor
Tom.

"Footed," i. e., on foot- Loop'd and window'd signifies full of holes and apertures.

Enter EDGAR, disguised as a Madman. Edg. Away! the foul fiend follows me !"Through the sharp hawthorn blows the cold wind."

Humph! go to thy cold bed, and warm thee.
Lear. Hast thou given all to thy two daughters?

And art thou come to this?

Edg. Who gives any thing to poor Tom? whom the foul fiend hath led through fire and through flame, through swamp and whirlpool, over bog and quagmire; that hath laid knives under his pillow, and halters in his pew; set ratsbane by his porridge; made him proud of heart, to ride on a bay trotting horse over four-inched bridges, to course his own shadow for a traitor.-Bless thy five wits! Tom's a-cold.-O! do de, do de, do de.-Bless thee from whirlwinds, star-blasting, and taking! Do poor Tom some charity, whom the foul fiend vexes.There could I have him now,-and there,-and there, and there again, and there.

2[Strikes. Storm continues. Lear. What! have his daughters brought him to this pass?

[all? Could'st thou save nothing? Didst thou give them Fool. Nay, he reserved a blanket, else we had been all ashamed.

Lear. Now, all the plagues, that in the pendulous air Hang fated o'er men's faults, light on thy daughters! Kent. He hath no daughters, sir. [nature Lear. Death, traitor! nothing could have subdued To such a lowness, but his unkind daughters.Is it the fashion, that discarded fathers Should have thus little mercy 3 of their flesh? Judicious punishment! 'twas this flesh begot Those pelican daughters.

b

Edg. Pillicock sat on Pillicock-hill:

Halloo, halloo, loo, loo!

Fool. This cold night will turn us all to fools and madmen.

Edg. Take heed o' the foul fiend. Obey thy parents; keep thy word; do justice; swear not; commit not with man's sworn spouse; set not thy sweet heart on proud array. Tom's a-cold.

Lear. What hast thou been?

c

Edg. A serving-man, proud in heart and mind; that curled my hair, wore gloves in my cap, served the lust of my mistress's heart, and did the act of darkness with her; swore as many oaths as I spake words, and broke them in the sweet face of heaven: one, that slept in the contriving of lust, and waked to do it. Wine loved I deeply; dice dearly; and in woman, out-paramoured the Turk: false of heart, light of ear, bloody of hand; hog in sloth, fox in stealth, wolf in greediness, dog in madness, lion in prey. Let not the creaking of shoes, nor the rustling of silks, betray thy poor heart to woman: keep thy foot out of brothels, thy hand out of plackets, thy pen from lenders' books, and defy the foul fiend."Still through the hawthorn blows the cold wind;" says suum, mun, ha no nonny. Dolphin my boy, my boy; sessa! let him trot by.

[Storm still continues. Lear. Why, thou wert better in thy grave, than to answer with thy uncovered body this extremity of the skies.-Is man no more than this? Consider him well. Thou owest the worm no silk, the beast

1

And her troth plight,

And, aroint thee, witch, aroint thee! Kent. How fares your grace?

Enter GLOSTER, with a Torch.

Lear. What's he?

Kent. Who's there? What is't you seek? Glo. What are you there? Your names? Edg. Poor Tom; that eats the swimming frog, the toad, the tadpole, the wall-newt, and the water; that in the fury of his heart, when the for! fiend rages, eats cow-dung for sallets; swallows the old rat, and the ditch-dog; drinks the green mantle of the standing pool: who is whipped from tything to tything, and stocked, punished, and imprisoned; who hath had three suits to his back, six shirts to his body, horse to ride, and weapon to wear,— But mice, and rats, and such small deer, Have been Tom's food for seven long year. Beware my follower.-Peace, Smulkin! peace, thou fiend!

Glo. What! hath your grace no better company? Edg. The prince of darkness is a gentleman; Modo he's call'd, and Mahu.

Glo. Our flesh and blood, my lord, is grown so vile, That it doth hate what gets it.

Edg. Poor Tom's a-cold.

Glo. Go in with me. My duty cannot suffer To obey in all your daughters' hard commands: Though their injunction be to bar my doors, And let this tyrannous night take hold upon you, Yet have I ventur'd to come seek you out, And bring you where both fire and food is ready. Lear. First let me talk with this philosopher.What is the cause of thunder? [house. Kent. Good my lord, take his offer: go into the Lear. I'll talk a word with this same learned What is your study? [ThebanEdg. How to prevent the fiend, and to kill vermin. Lear. Let me ask you one word in private. [They talk apart. Kent. Importune him once more to go, my lord, His wits begin t' unsettle.

Glo.

7

Canst thou blame him! His daughters seek his death.-Ah, that good Kent!He said it would be thus, poor banish'd man! Thou say'st, the king grows mad: I'll tell thee, friend, I am almost mad myself. I had a son, Now outlaw'd from my blood; he sought my life, But lately, very late: I lov'd him, friend, No father his son dearer: true to tell thee,

SCENE V.-A Room in GLOSTER'S Castle.

Enter CORNWALL and EDMUND. Corn. I will have my revenge, ere I depart his house.

Edm. How, my lord, I may be censured, that nature thus gives way to loyalty, something fears me to think of.

Corn. I now perceive, it was not altogether your brother's evil disposition made him seek his death; but a provoking merit, set a-work by a reprovable badness in himself.

Edm. How malicious is my fortune, that I must repent to be just! This is the letter which he spoke of, which approves him an intelligent party to the advantages of France. O heavens! that this treason were not, or not I the detector!

Corn. Go with me to the duchess."

Edm. If the matter of this paper be certain, you have mighty business in hand.

Corn. True, or false, it hath made thee earl of Gloster. Seek out where thy father is, that he may be ready for our apprehension.

Edm. [Aside.] If I find him comforting the king, it will stuff his suspicion more fully.-[To him.] will persevere in my course of loyalty, though the conflict be sore between that and my blood. Corn. I will lay trust upon thee; and thou shalt find a dearer father in my love. [Exeunt.

Edg. Frateretto calls me, and tells me, Nero is an angler in the lake of darkness. Pray innocent, and beware the foul fiend.

Fool. Pr'ythee, nuncle, tell me, whether a madman be a gentleman, or a yeoman? Lear. A king, a king!

Fool. No: he's a yeoman, that has a gentleman to his son; for he's a mad yeoman, that sees his son a gentleman before him.

Lear. To have a thousand with red burning spits Come whizzing in upon them.—

Edg. The foul fiend bites my back. Fool. He's mad, that trusts in the tameness of a wolf, a horse's health, a boy's love, or a whore's oath. [straight.Lear. It shall be done; I will arraign them Come, sit thou here, most learned justicer;[To EDGAR. Thou, sapient sir, sit here. Now, you she foxes!Edg. Look, where he stands and glares!Wantest thou eyes at trial, madam?

Come o'er the bourne, Bessy, to me :Fool. Her boat hath a leak,

And she must not speak

Why she dares not come over to thee. Edg. The foul fiend haunts poor Tom in the voice of a nightingale. Hopdance cries in Tom's belly have no food for thee. for two white herring. Croak not, black angel; I

Kent. How do you, sir? Stand you not so amaz'd: Will you lie down and rest upon the cushions? Lear. I'll see their trial first.-Bring in the evidence.

Thou robed man of justice, take thy place;

[To EDGAR. And thou, his yoke-fellow of equity, [To the Fool. Bench by his side.-You are o' the commission, Sit you too. [To KENT.

Edg. Let us deal justly.

Sleepest, or wakest thou, jolly shepherd?

Thy sheep be in the corn;

e

And for one blast of thy minikin mouth,
Thy sheep shall take no harm.

Pur! the cat is grey.

Lear. Arraign her first; 'tis Goneril. I here take my oath before this honorable assembly, she kicked the poor king her father. [eril? Fool. Come hither, mistress. Is your name GonLear. She cannot deny it.

Fool. Cry you mercy, I took you for a joint-stool. Lear. And here's another, whose warp'd looks

proclaim

Arms, arms, sword, fire !-Corruption in the place! What store her heart is made on.-Stop her there! False justicer, why hast thou let her 'scape?"

Edg. Bless thy five wits!

That you so oft have boasted to retain ?
Kent. O pity!-Sir, where is the patience now,

[much, Edg. [Aside.] My tears begin to take his part so They'll mar my counterfeiting.

Lear. The little dogs and all,

Tray, Blanch, and Sweet-heart, see, they bark at me. Edg. Tom will throw his head at them.-Avaunt, you curs!

Be thy mouth or black or white, Tooth that poisons if it bite; Mastiff, greyhound, mongrel, grim, Hound, or spaniel, brach, or flym; Or bobtail & tike, or trundle-tail, Tom will make them weep and wail: For with throwing thus my head, Dogs leap the hatch, and all are fled. Do, de, de, de. See, see! Come, march to wakes and fairs, and market-towns.-Poor Tom, thy horn is dry.

breeds about her heart. Is there any cause in naLear. Then, let them anatomize Regan, see what ture that makes these hard hearts?-You, sir, [To