REG. Why should she write to Edmund ? Might not you Transport her purposes by word? Belike, Something*-I know not what:-I'll love thee much, Let me unseal the letter. Osw. Madam, I had ratherREG. I know your lady does not love her husband; I'm sure of that: and at her late being here REG. I speak in understanding; you are, I know 't; Therefore I do advise you, take this note: I If you do chance to hear of that blind traitor, Preferment falls on him that cuts him off. Osw. Would I could meet him,† madam! I would show What party I do follow. Fare thee well. [Exeunt. (*) First folio, desires. A— important tears-] Important for importunate; the folio has importun'd. b (1) First folio, should. œiliads,-] See note (a), p. 646, Vol. I. GLO. * And dizzy 'tis, to cast one's eyes so low! GLO. EDG. Give me your a foot Set me where you stand. hand::-you are now within Thou 'd'st shiver'd like an egg: but thou dost breathe; Hast heavy substance; bleed'st not; speak'st; art sound! Ten masts at each make not the altitude, EDG. From the dread summit of this chalky bourn! a Look up a-height; the shrill-gorg'd lark so far Cannot be scen or heard: do but look up. GLO. Alack, I have no eyes. Is wretchedness depriv'd that benefit, To end itself by death? 'Twas yet some comfort, EDG. Give me your arm : Up-so.--How is 't? Feel you your legs? You LEAR. Pass. GLO. I know that voice. LEAR. Ha! Goneril!-with a white beard !--They flattered me like a dog; and told me I had * white hairs in my beard ere the black ones were there. To say ay, and no, to every thing that I said!-Ay and no too was no good divinity. When the rain came to wet me once, and the wind to make me chatter; when the thunder would not peace at my bidding, there I found 'em, there I smelt 'em out. Go to, they are not men o' their words: they told me I was every thing; 't is a lie ;-I am not ague-proof. [ber: GLO. The trick of that voice I do well rememIs 't not the king? LEAR. Ay, every inch a king! When I do stare, see how the subject quakes. The wren goes to 't, and the small gilded fly Let copulation thrive, for Gloster's bastard son To 't, luxury, pell-mell! for I lack soldiers.- Whose face between her forks presages snow; The fitchew, nor the soiled horse, goes to 't But to the girdle do the gods inherit, Beneath is all the fiends'; there's hell, there's darkness, there is the sulphurous pit, burning, scalding, stench, consumption !-fie, fie, fie! pah, pah! Give me an ounce of civet, good apothecary, tot sweeten my imagination: there's money for thee. GLO. O, let me kiss that hand! LEAR. Let me wipe it first; it smells of mortality. GLO. O ruin'd piece of nature! This great world Shall so wear out to nought.-Dost thou know me? LEAR. I remember thine eyes well enough. Dost thou squiny at me? No, do thy worst, blind Cupid, I'll not love.-Read thou this challenge; mark but the penning of it. GLO. Ay, sir. LEAR. And the creature run from the cur? There thou mightst behold the great image of authority: a dog's obeyed in office. Thou rascal beadle, hold thy bloody hand! Why dost thou lash that whore? Strip_thine* own back; Thou hotly lust'st to use her in that kind For which thou whipp'st her. The usurer hangs the cozener. Through tatter'd clothes small † vices do appear; Robes and furr'd gowns hide all. Plate sin with gold, And the strong lance of justice hurtless breaks: Arm it in rags, a pigmy's straw does pierce it. None does offend, none,-I say, none; I'll able 'em : Take that of me, my friend, who have the power To seal the accuser's lips. Get thee glass eyes; And, like a scurvy politician, seem To see the things thou dost not.-Now, now, now, now: Pull off my boots :--harder, harder ;-so. EDG. O, matter and impertinency mix'd! Reason in madness! d (*) First folio, thy. of Gloucester. (†) First folio, great. c Plate sin with gold,-] A correction by Pope and Theobald; the old text having, "Place sinnes." This passage down to, "To seal the accuser's lips," inclusive, is only in the folio. dable 'em.] Qualify them. LEAR. I will die bravely, like a † bridegroom: what! I will be jovial; come, come; I am a king, GENT. You are a royal one, and we obey you. LEAR. Then there's life in 't. Nay §an you get it, you shall get it by running. Sa, sa, sa, sa! [Exit, running; Attendants follow. GENT. A sight most pitiful in the meanest wretch, Past speaking of in a king!-Thou hast one|| daughter, Who redeems nature from the general curse EDG. Hail, gentle sir. GENT. Sir, speed you: what's your will? Which can distinguish sound. But, by your favour, a This a good block :-) Upon the king's saying, I will preach to thee, the poet seems to have meant him to pull off his hat, and keep turning it and feeling it, in the attitude of one of the preachers of those times (whom I have seen so represented in ancient prints), till the idea of felt, which the good hat or block was made of, raises the stratagem in his brain of shoring a troop of horse with a substance soft as that which he held and moulded between his hands. This makes him start from his preachment." -STEEVENS. bkill, kill! &c.] This was the ancient cry of assault in the English army. Shakespeare introduces it again in "Coriolanus," Act V. Sc. 5; when the conspirators attack Coriolanus. Osw. Enter OSWALD. A proclaim'd prize! Most happy! That eyeless head of thine was first fram'd flesh To raise my fortunes.-Thou old unhappy traitor, Briefly thyself remember :-the sword is out That must destroy thee. GLO. Put strength enough to Osw. Now let thy friendly hand Dar'st thou support a publish'd traitor? Hence? EDG. Chill not let go, zir, without vurther 'casion. Osw. Let go, slave, or thou diest ! EDG. Good gentleman, go your gait, and let poor volk pass. An chud ha' been zwagger'd out of my life, 'twould not ha' been zo long as 'tis by a vortnight.-Nay, come not near th' old man; keep out, che vor ye, or ise try whether your costard or my ballow be the harder: chill be plain with you. Ösw. Out, dunghill! f EDG. Chill pick your teeth, zir: come; no matter vor your foins." [They fight; and EDGAR fells him. Ay, and laying autumn's dust. GENT. Omitted in the folio. d Good sir,-] the main descry Stands on the hourly thought.] The meaning appears to be, the sight of the main body is expected hourly; but the expression is as harsh and disagreeable as the speaker's "Most sure and vulgar" just before. e't would not ha' been zo long as 't is by a vortnight.-] Steevens has remarked, but the reason is unexplained, that when our ancient writers have occasion to introduce a rustic, they commonly allot him this Somersetshire dialect. fballow-] In some of the provincial dialects, ballow means a pole or staff. 8- foins.] Thrusts. |