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A Chamber in a Farmhouse adjoining the Castle. | |
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Enter GLOUCESTER, LEAR, KENT, Fool, and EDGAR. | |
| Glo. Here is better than the open air; take it thankfully. I will piece out the comfort with what addition I can: I will not be long from you. | |
| Kent. All the power of his wits has given way to his impatience. The gods reward your kindness! [Exit GLOUCESTER. | |
| Edg. Frateretto calls me, and tells me Nero is an angler in the lake of darkness. Pray, innocent, and beware the foul fiend. | 5 |
| Fool. Prithee, 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 hizzing in upon ’em,— | 10 |
| 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. | |
| Lear. It shall be done; I will arraign them straight. | |
| [To EDGAR.] Come, sit thou here, most learned justicer; | |
| [To the Fool.] Thou, sapient sir, sit here. Now, you she foxes! | 15 |
| Edg. Look, where he stands and glares! wantest thou eyes at trial, madam? | |
| Come o’er the bourn, Bessy, to me,— | |
| Fool. Her boat hath a leak, | |
| And she must not speak | |
| Why she dares not come over to thee. | 20 |
| Edg. The foul fiend haunts poor Tom in the voice of a nightingale. Hopdance cries in Tom’s belly for two white herring. Croak not, black angel; I have no food for thee. | |
| 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 their evidence. | |
| [To EDGAR.] Thou robed man of justice, take thy place; | 25 |
| [To the Fool.] And thou, his yoke-fellow of equity, | |
| Bench by his side. [To KENT.] You are o’ the commission, | |
| Sit you too. | |
Edg. Let us deal justly. | Sleepest or wakest thou, jolly shepherd? |
| Thy sheep be in the corn; |
| And for one blast of thy minikin mouth, |
| Thy sheep shall take no harm. |
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| Purr! the cat is grey. | 30 |
| Lear. Arraign her first; ’tis Goneril. I here take my oath before this honourable assembly, she kicked the poor king her father. | |
| Fool. Come hither, mistress. Is your name Goneril? | |
| Lear. 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 | 35 |
| What store her heart is made on. Stop her there! | |
| Arms, arms, sword, fire! Corruption in the place! | |
| False justicer, why hast thou let her ’scape? | |
| Edg. Bless thy five wits! | |
| Kent. O pity! Sir, where is the patience now | 40 |
| That you so oft have boasted to retain? | |
| Edg. [Aside.] My tears begin to take his part so much, | |
| They’ll mar my counterfeiting. | |
| Lear. The little dogs and all, | |
| Tray, Blanch, and Sweet-heart, see, they bark at me. | 45 |
| 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, | 50 |
| Hound or spaniel, brach or lym; | |
| 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. | 55 |
| Do de, de, de. Sessa! Come, march to wakes and fairs and market-towns. Poor Tom, thy horn is dry. | |
| Lear. Then let them anatomize Regan, see what breeds about her heart. Is there any cause in nature that makes these hard hearts? [To EDGAR.] You, sir, I entertain you for one of my hundred; only I do not like the fashion of your garments: you will say, they are Persian attire; but let them be changed. | |
| Kent. Now, good my lord, lie here and rest awhile. | |
| Lear. Make no noise, make no noise; draw the curtains: so, so, so. We’ll go to supper i’ the morning: so, so, so. | |
| Fool. And I’ll go to bed at noon. | 60 |
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Re-enter GLOUCESTER. | |
| Glo. Come hither, friend: where is the king my master? | |
| Kent. Here, sir; but trouble him not, his wits are gone. | |
| Glo. Good friend, I prithee, take him in thy arms; | |
| I have o’erheard a plot of death upon him. | 65 |
| There is a litter ready; lay him in ’t, | |
| And drive toward Dover, friend, where thou shalt meet | |
| Both welcome and protection. Take up thy master: | |
| If thou shouldst dally-half an hour, his life, | |
| With thine, and all that offer to defend him, | 70 |
| Stand in assured loss. Take up, take up; | |
| And follow me, that will to some provision | |
| Give thee quick conduct. | |
| Kent. Oppress’d nature sleeps: | |
| This rest might yet have balm’d thy broken sinews, | 75 |
| Which, if convenience will not allow, | |
| Stand in hard cure.—[To the Fool.] Come, help to bear thy master; | |
| Thou must not stay behind. | |
| Glo. Come, come, away. [Exeunt KENT, GLOUCESTER, and the Fool, bearing away LEAR. | |
| Edg. When we our betters see bearing our woes, | 80 |
| We scarcely think our miseries our foes. | |
| Who alone suffers suffers most i’ the mind, | |
| Leaving free things and happy shows behind; | |
| But then the mind much sufferance doth o’erskip, | |
| When grief hath mates, and bearing fellowship. | 85 |
| How light and portable my pain seems now, | |
| When that which makes me bend makes the king bow; | |
| He childed as I father’d! Tom, away! | |
| Mark the high noises, and thyself bewray | |
| When false opinion, whose wrong thought defiles thee, | 90 |
| In thy just proof repeals and reconciles thee. | |
| What will hap more to-night, safe ’scape the king! | |
| Lurk, lurk. [Exit. | |
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