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Before GLOUCESTER’S Castle. | |
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Enter KENT and OSWALD, severally. | |
| Osw. Good dawning to thee, friend: art of this house? | |
| Kent. Ay. | |
| Osw. Where may we set our horses? | 5 |
| Kent. I’ the mire. | |
| Osw. Prithee, if thou lovest me, tell me. | |
| Kent. I love thee not. | |
| Osw. Why, then I care not for thee. | |
| Kent. If I had thee in Lipsbury pinfold, I would make thee care for me. | 10 |
| Osw. Why dost thou use me thus? I know thee not. | |
| Kent. Fellow, I know thee. | |
| Osw. What dost thou know me for? | |
| Kent. A knave, a rascal, an eater of broken meats; a base, proud, shallow, beggarly, three-suited, hundred-pound, filthy, worsted-stocking knave; a lily-liver’d, action-taking knave; a whoreson, glass-gazing, superserviceable, 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 deniest the least syllable of thy addition. | |
| Osw. Why, what a monstrous fellow art thou, thus to rail on one that is neither known of thee nor knows thee! | 15 |
| Kent. What a brazen-faced varlet art thou, to deny thou knowest me! Is it two days since I tripped 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’ the moonshine of you. [Drawing his sword.] Draw, you whoreson, cullionly, barber-monger, draw. | |
| Osw. 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. | |
| Osw. Help, ho! murder! help! | |
| Kent. Strike, you slave; stand, rogue, stand; you neat slave, strike. [Beating him. | 20 |
| Osw. Help, oh! murder! murder! | |
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Enter EDMUND with his rapier drawn. | |
| Edm. How now! What’s the matter? [Parting them. | |
| Kent. With you, goodman boy, if you please: come, | |
| I’ll flesh ye; come on, young master. | 25 |
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Enter CORNWALL, REGAN, GLOUCESTER, and Servants. | |
| Glo. Weapons! arms! What’s the matter here? | |
| Corn. Keep peace, upon your lives: | |
| He dies that strikes again. What is the matter? | |
| Reg. The messengers from our sister and the king. | 30 |
| Corn. What is your difference? speak. | |
| Osw. I am scarce in breath, my lord. | |
| Kent. No marvel, you have so bestirred your valour. You cowardly rascal, nature disclaims in thee: a tailor made thee. | |
| Corn. Thou art a strange fellow; a tailor make a man? | |
| Kent. Ay, a tailor, sir: a stone-cutter or a painter could not have made him so ill, though they had been but two hours o’ the trade. | 35 |
| Corn. Speak yet, how grew your quarrel? | |
| Osw. This ancient ruffian, sir, whose life I have spar’d at suit of his grey 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 grey beard, you wagtail? | |
| Corn. Peace, sirrah! | |
| You beastly knave, know you no reverence? | 40 |
| Kent. Yes, sir; but anger hath a privilege. | |
| Corn. 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 | 45 |
| 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, | 50 |
| Knowing nought, like dogs, but following. | |
| A plague upon your epileptic visage! | |
| Smile you my speeches, as I were a fool? | |
| Goose, if I had you upon Sarum plain, | |
| I’d drive ye cackling home to Camelot. | 55 |
| Corn. What! art thou mad, old fellow? | |
| Glo. How fell you out? say that. | |
| Kent. No contraries hold more antipathy | |
| Than I and such a knave. | |
| Corn. Why dost thou call him knave? What is his fault? | 60 |
| Kent. His countenance likes me not. | |
| Corn. 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 | 65 |
| Before me at this instant. | |
| Corn. 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, | 70 |
| An honest mind and plain, he must speak truth: | |
| An 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, | 75 |
| That stretch their duties nicely. | |
| Kent. Sir, in good sooth, in sincere verity, | |
| Under the allowance of your grand aspect, | |
| Whose influence, like the wreath of radiant fire | |
| On flickering Phœbus’ front,— | 80 |
| Corn. 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 beguiled 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. | |
| Corn. What was the offence you gave him? | |
| Osw. I never gave him any: | |
| It pleas’d the king his master very late | 85 |
| 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 | 90 |
| For him attempting who was self-subdu’d; | |
| 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. | 95 |
| Corn. 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, | 100 |
| 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. | |
| Corn. Fetch forth the stocks! As I have life and honour, | 105 |
| There shall he sit till noon. | |
| Reg. 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. | |
| Reg. Sir, being his knave, I will. | 110 |
| Corn. This is a fellow of the self-same colour | |
| Our sister speaks of. Come, bring away the stocks. [Stocks brought out. | |
| Glo. 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 | 115 |
| Is such as basest and contemned’st wretches | |
| For pilferings and most common trespasses | |
| Are punish’d with: the king must take it ill, | |
| That he, so slightly valu’d in his messenger, | |
| Should have him thus restrain’d. | 120 |
| Corn. I’ll answer that. | |
| Reg. 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. | 125 |
| Glo. 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. | 130 |
| A good man’s fortune may grow out at heels: | |
| Give you good morrow! | |
| Glo. 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 | 135 |
| To the warm sun. | |
| Approach, thou beacon to this under globe, | |
| That by thy comfortable beams I may | |
| Peruse this letter. Nothing almost sees miracles | |
| But misery: I know ’tis from Cordelia, | 140 |
| Who hath most fortunately been inform’d | |
| Of my obscured course; and shall find time | |
| From this enormous state, seeking to give | |
| Losses their remedies. All weary and o’er-watch’d, | |
| Take vantage, heavy eyes, not to behold | 145 |
| This shameful lodging. | |
| Fortune, good night, smile once more; turn thy wheel! [He sleeps. | |
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