The Tragedy Of King Lear

1 Enter Gloucester, Lear, Kent,
2 Fool and Edgar.
3 GLOUCESTER.
4 Here is better than the open air; take it thankfully. I will
5 piece out the comfort with what addition I can: I will not be
6 long from you.
7 KENT.
8 All the power of his wits have given way to his impatience:—
9 the gods reward your kindness!
10 [_Exit Gloucester._]
11 EDGAR.
12 Frateretto calls me; and tells me Nero is an angler in the lake
13 of darkness. Pray, innocent, and beware the foul fiend.
14 FOOL.
15 Prithee, nuncle, tell me whether a madman be a gentleman or a
16 yeoman.
17 LEAR.
18 A king, a king!
19 FOOL.
20 No, he’s a yeoman that has a gentleman to his son; for he’s a mad
21 yeoman that sees his son a gentleman before him.
22 LEAR.
23 To have a thousand with red burning spits
24 Come hissing in upon ’em.
25 EDGAR.
26 The foul fiend bites my back.
27 FOOL.
28 He’s mad that trusts in the tameness of a wolf, a horse’s health,
29 a boy’s love, or a whore’s oath.
30 LEAR.
31 It shall be done; I will arraign them straight.
32 [_To Edgar._] Come, sit thou here, most learned justicer;
33 [_To the Fool._] Thou, sapient sir, sit here. Now, you she-foxes!—
34 EDGAR.
35 Look, where he stands and glares! Want’st thou eyes at trial, madam?
36 Come o’er the bourn, Bessy, to me.
37 FOOL.
38 Her boat hath a leak,
39 And she must not speak
40 Why she dares not come over to thee.
41 EDGAR.
42 The foul fiend haunts poor Tom in the voice of a nightingale.
43 Hoppedance cries in Tom’s belly for two white herring. Croak not, black
44 angel; I have no food for thee.
45 KENT.
46 How do you, sir? Stand you not so amaz’d;
47 Will you lie down and rest upon the cushions?
48 LEAR.
49 I’ll see their trial first. Bring in their evidence.
50 [_To Edgar._] Thou, robed man of justice, take thy place.
51 [_To the Fool._] And thou, his yokefellow of equity,
52 Bench by his side. [_To Kent._] You are o’ the commission,
53 Sit you too.
54 EDGAR.
55 Let us deal justly.
56 Sleepest or wakest thou, jolly shepherd?
57 Thy sheep be in the corn;
58 And for one blast of thy minikin mouth
59 Thy sheep shall take no harm.
60 Purr! the cat is grey.
61 LEAR.
62 Arraign her first; ’tis Goneril. I here take my oath before
63 this honourable assembly, she kicked the poor King her father.
64 FOOL.
65 Come hither, mistress. Is your name Goneril?
66 LEAR.
67 She cannot deny it.
68 FOOL.
69 Cry you mercy, I took you for a joint-stool.
70 LEAR.
71 And here’s another, whose warp’d looks proclaim
72 What store her heart is made on. Stop her there!
73 Arms, arms! sword! fire! Corruption in the place!
74 False justicer, why hast thou let her ’scape?
75 EDGAR.
76 Bless thy five wits!
77 KENT.
78 O pity! Sir, where is the patience now
79 That you so oft have boasted to retain?
80 EDGAR.
81 [_Aside._] My tears begin to take his part so much
82 They mar my counterfeiting.
83 LEAR.
84 The little dogs and all,
85 Trey, Blanch, and Sweetheart, see, they bark at me.
86 EDGAR.
87 Tom will throw his head at them. Avaunt, you curs!
88 Be thy mouth or black or white,
89 Tooth that poisons if it bite;
90 Mastiff, greyhound, mongrel grim,
91 Hound or spaniel, brach or him,
92 Or bobtail tike or trundle-tail,
93 Tom will make them weep and wail;
94 For, with throwing thus my head,
95 Dogs leap the hatch, and all are fled.
96 Do, de, de, de. Sessa! Come, march to wakes and fairs and market towns.
97 Poor Tom, thy horn is dry.
98 LEAR.
99 Then let them anatomize Regan; see what breeds about her
100 heart. Is there any cause in nature that makes these hard
101 hearts? [_To Edgar._] You, sir, I entertain you for one of my
102 hundred; only I do not like the fashion of your garments. You’ll
103 say they are Persian; but let them be changed.
104 KENT.
105 Now, good my lord, lie here and rest awhile.
106 LEAR.
107 Make no noise, make no noise; draw the curtains.
108 So, so. We’ll go to supper i’ the morning.
109 FOOL.
110 And I’ll go to bed at noon.
111 Enter Gloucester.
112 GLOUCESTER.
113 Come hither, friend;
114 Where is the King my master?
115 KENT.
116 Here, sir; but trouble him not, his wits are gone.
117 GLOUCESTER.
118 Good friend, I prithee, take him in thy arms;
119 I have o’erheard a plot of death upon him;
120 There is a litter ready; lay him in’t
121 And drive towards Dover, friend, where thou shalt meet
122 Both welcome and protection. Take up thy master;
123 If thou shouldst dally half an hour, his life,
124 With thine, and all that offer to defend him,
125 Stand in assured loss. Take up, take up;
126 And follow me, that will to some provision
127 Give thee quick conduct.
128 KENT.
129 Oppressed nature sleeps.
130 This rest might yet have balm’d thy broken sinews,
131 Which, if convenience will not allow,
132 Stand in hard cure. Come, help to bear thy master;
133 [_To the Fool._] Thou must not stay behind.
134 GLOUCESTER.
135 Come, come, away!
136 [_Exeunt Kent, Gloucester and the Fool bearing off Lear._]
137 EDGAR.
138 When we our betters see bearing our woes,
139 We scarcely think our miseries our foes.
140 Who alone suffers, suffers most i’ the mind,
141 Leaving free things and happy shows behind:
142 But then the mind much sufferance doth o’erskip
143 When grief hath mates, and bearing fellowship.
144 How light and portable my pain seems now,
145 When that which makes me bend makes the King bow;
146 He childed as I fathered! Tom, away!
147 Mark the high noises; and thyself bewray,
148 When false opinion, whose wrong thoughts defile thee,
149 In thy just proof repeals and reconciles thee.
150 What will hap more tonight, safe ’scape the King!
151 Lurk, lurk.
152 [_Exit._]