1

And from her derogate body never spring
A babe to honor her! If she must teem,
Create her child of spleen; that it may live,
And be a thwart 2 disnatured 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,3
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.

Alb. Now, gods, that we adore, whereof comes this? Gon. Never afflict yourself to know the cause; But let his disposition have that scope

That dotage gives it.

Re-enter LEAR.

Lear. What, fifty of my followers at a clap! Within a fortnight?

Alb.

What's the matter, sir?

Lear. I'll tell thee;-Life and death! I am ashamed That thou hast power to shake my manhood thus; [To GONERIL. That these hot tears, which break from me perforce, Should make thee worth them.-Blasts and fogs upon

thee!

The untented woundings of a father's curse
Pierce every sense about thee!-Old fond eyes,
Beweep this cause again, I'll pluck you out;
And cast you, with the waters that you lose,

1 Derogate here means degenerate, degraded.

2 Thwart as a noun adjective is not frequent in our language. It is to be found, however, in Promos and Cassandra, 1578:

"Sith fortune thwart doth crosse my joys with care." Disnatured is wanting natural affection.

3 "Pains and benefits," in this place, signify maternal cares and good offices.

4 The untented woundings are the rankling or never-healing wounds inflicted by a parental malediction. Tents are well-known dressings inserted into wounds as a preparative to healing them.

To temper clay.-Ha! is it come to this?
Let it be so.-Yet have I left a daughter,
Who, I am sure, is kind and comfortable;
When she shall hear this of thee, with her nails
She'll flay thy wolfish visage. Thou shalt find
That I'll resume the shape which thou dost think
I have cast off forever; thou shalt, I warrant thee.1
[Exeunt LEAR, KENT, and Attendants.

Gon. Do you mark that, my lord?

Alb. I cannot be so partial, Goneril,

To the great love I bear you,

Gon. 'Pray you, content.-What, Oswald, ho! You sir, more knave than fool, after your master.

[To the Fool. Fool. Nuncle Lear, nuncle Lear, tarry, and take the fool with thee.

A fox, when one has caught her,
And such a daughter,

Should sure to the slaughter,
If my cap would buy a halter;
So the fool follows after.

[Exit.

Gon. [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!-
Alb. Well, you may fear too far.

Gon.
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 uttered, I have writ my sister;
If she sustain him and his hundred knights,

1 This speech is gleaned partly from the folios, and partly from the quartos. The omissions in the one and the other are not of sufficient importance to trouble the reader with a separate notice of each.

2 All within brackets is omitted in the quartos.

3 At point probably means completely armed.

When I have showed the unfitness,-How now, Os

wald ?

Enter Steward.

What, have you writ that letter to my sister?

Stew. Ay, madam.

Gon. 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 Stew.] No, no, my lord,

This milky gentleness, and course of yours,

Though I condemn it not, yet, under pardon,

1

You are much more attasked for want of wisdom,
Than praised for harmful mildness.

Alb. How far your eyes may pierce, I cannot tell; Striving to better, oft we mar what's well.

Gon. Nay, then,

Alb. Well, well; the event.

[Exeunt.

SCENE V. Court before the same."

Enter LEAR, KENT, and Fool.

Lear. Go you before to Gloster 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 before you.2

Kent. I will not sleep, my lord, till I have delivered your letter. [Exit.

1 The word task is frequently used by Shakspeare and his contemporaries in the sense of tax.

2 The word there, in this speech, shows that when the king says, “Go you before to Gloster," he means the town of Gloster, which Shakspeare chose to make the residence of the duke of Cornwall, to increase the probability of their setting out late from thence on a visit to the earl of Gloster. Our old English earls usually resided in the counties whence they took their titles. Lear, not finding his son-in-law and his wife at home, follows them to the earl of Gloster's castle.

Fool. If a man's brains were in his heels, were't

not in danger of kibes?

Lear. Ay, boy.

Fool. Then, I pr'ythee, be merry; thy wit shall not go slip-shod.

Lear. Ha, ha, ha!

1

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

Lear. Why, what canst thou tell, my boy?

Fool. She will taste as like this, as a crab does to a crab. Thou canst tell, why one's nose stands i' the middle of his face?

Lear. No.

Fool. Why, to keep his eyes on either side his nose; that what a man cannot smell out, he may spy into. Lear. I did her wrong."

Fool. Canst tell how an oyster makes his shell?
Lear. No.

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

Lear. Why?

Fool. 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. 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. Yes, indeed; thou wouldest make a good fool.

Lear. To take it again perforce ! 3-Monster ingratitude!

1 The fool quibbles, using the word in two senses; as it means affectionately, and like the rest of her kind, or after their nature. 2 He is musing on Cordelia.

3 The subject of Lear's meditation is the resumption of that moiety of the kingdom he had bestowed on Goneril. This was what Albany apprehended, when he replied to the upbraidings of his wife:-"Well,

Fool. If thou wert my fool, nuncle, I'd have thee beaten for being old before thy time.

Lear. How's that?

Fool. Thou shouldst not have been old, before 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 Gentleman.

How now! are the horses ready?

Gent. Ready, my lord.

Lear. Come, boy.

Fool. She that is maid now, and laughs at my de

parture,

Shall not be a maid long, unless things be cut shorter.

[Exeunt.

ACT II.

SCENE 1. A Court within the Castle of the Earl of Gloster.

Enter EDMUND and CURAN, meeting.

Edm. Save thee, Curan.

Cur. And you, sir.

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 to-night. Edm. How comes that?

well: the event." What Lear himself projected when he left Goneril to go to Regan:

That I'll resume the shape, which thou dost think

I have cast off forever; thou shalt, I warrant thee."

And what Curan afterwards refers to, when he asks Edmund :-" Have you heard of no likely wars toward, 'twixt the dukes of Cornwall and Albany?"

VOL. VII.

6