That all the world shal- I will do such things,
What they are, yet I know not; but they shall be
The terrors of the earth. You think, I'll weep;
No, I'll not weep: →

I have full cause of weeping; but this heart
Shall break into a hundred thousand flaws,
Or ere I'll weep: - O, fool, I shall go mad!

[Exeunt LEAR, Gloster, Kent, and Fool. Corn. Let us withdraw, 'twill be a storm. [Storm heard at a distance.

Reg. This house Is little; the old man and his people cannot Be well bestow'd. Gon 'Tis his own blame; he hath put Himself from rest, and must needs taste his folly. Reg. For his particular, I'll receive him gladly, But not one follower.

Gon.

Where is my lord of Gloster?

So am I purpos'd.

Glo. The king is in high rage. Corn.

Whither is he going?

Glo. He calls to horse; but will I know not whither.

Corn. 'Tis best to give him way; he leads himself.

Gon. My lord, entreat him by no means to stay.

Glo. Alack, the night comes on, and the bleak winds

Do sorely ruffle; for many miles about
There's scarce a bush.

Reg.
O, sir, to wilful men,
The injuries, that they themselves procure,
Must be their schoolmasters: Shut up your doors;
He is attended with a desperate train;

And what they may incense him to, being apt
To have his ear abus'd, wisdom bids fear.

Corn. Shut up your doors, my lord; 'tis a wild night;

My Regan counsels well; come out o'the storm. [Exeunts

SCENE 1.- A Heath.

▲ storm is heard, with thunder and lightning. KENT and a Gentleman, meeting.

Gent. None but the fool; His heart-struck injuries. Kent.

But who is with him?

who labours to out-jest

Sir, I do know you; And dare, upon the warrant of my art, Commend a dear thing to you. There is division, Although as yet the face of it be cover'd

With mutual cunning, 'twixt Albany and Cornwall; Who have (as who have not, that their great stars Thron'd and set high!) servants, who seem no less; Which are to France the spies and speculations Intelligent of our state; what hath been seen, Either in snuffs and packings of the dukes;

Or the hard rein which both of them have borne Against the old kind king; or something deeper, Whereof, perchance, these are but furnishings; But, true it is, from France there comes a power Into this scatter'd kingdom; who already, Wise in our negligence, have secret feet

To make your speed to Dover, you shall find
Some that will thank you, making just report
Of how unnatural and bemadding sorrow
The king hath cause to plain.

I am a gentleman of blood and breeding;
And, from some knowledge and assurance, offer
This office to you.

Gent. I will talk further with you.
Kent.

No, do not.
For confirmation that I am much more
Than my out wall, open this purse, and take
What it contains: If you shall see Cordelia,
(As fear not but you shall,) show her this ring;
And she will tell you who your fellow is
That yet you do not know. Fye on this storm!
I will go seek the king.

Gent. Give me your hand: Have you no more to

Strike flat the thick rotundity o'the world!
Crack nature's moulds, all germens spill at once,
That make ingrateful man!

Fool. O nuncle, court holy-water in a dry nouse is better than this rain-water out o'door. Good nuncle, in, and ask thy daughters' blessing; here's a night pities neither wise men nor fools.

Lear. Rumble thy bellyfull! Spit, fire! spout, rain !

Nor rain, wind, thunder, fire, are my daughters:
I tax not you, you elements, with unkindness,
I never gave you kingdom, call'd you children,
You owe me no subscription; why then let fall
Your horrible pleasure; here I stand, your slave,
A poor, infirm, weak, and despis'd old man : -
But yet I call you servile ministers,
That have with two pernicious daughters join'd
Your high-engender'd battles, 'gainst a head
Só old and white as this. O! O! 'tis foul!
Fool. He that has a house to put his head in, has
a good head-piece.

The cod-piece that will house,
Before the head has any,
The head and he shall louse;
So beggars marry many.

The man that makes his toe

What he his heart shot d make,

Shall of a corn cry woe,

And turn his sleep to wake.

Come on, my boy: How dost, my boy? Art cold? I am cold myself. -Where is this straw, my fellow? The art of our necessities is strange,

That can make vile things precious. Come, your hovel,

Poor fool and knave, I have one part in my heart That's sorry yet for thee.

Fool. He that has a little tiny wit,—

With heigh, ho, the wind and the rain,— Must make content with his fortunes fit; For the rain it raineth every day.

Lear. True, my good boy.- Come, bring us to this hovel. [Exeunt LEAR and KENT. Fool. This is a brave night to cool a courtezan.— I'll speak a prophecy ere I go :

When priests are more in word than matter;
When brewers mar their malt with water;
When nobles are their tailors' tutors;
No hereticks burn'd, but wenches' suiters
When every case in law is right;
No squire in debt, nor no poor knight;
When slanders do not live in tongues;
Nor cutpurses come not to throngs;

When usurers tell their gold i' the field;

And bawds and whores do churches build,·
Then shall the realm of Albion

Come to great confusion.

Then comes the time, who lives to see't,
That going shall be us'd with feet.

-

Enter KENT.

Lear. No, I will be the pattern of all patience, I will say nothing.

Kent. Who's there?

Fool. Marry, here's grace, and a cod-piece; that's a wise man, and a fool.

Kent. Alas, sir, are you here? things that love night,

Love not such nights as these; the wrathful skies Gallow the very wanderers of the dark,

And make them keep their caves: Since I was man, Such sheets of fire, such bursts of horrid thunder, Such groans of roaring wind and rain, I never Remember to have heard: man's nature cannot carry The affliction, nor the fear.

Lear. Let the great gods, That keep this dreadful pother o'er our heads, Find out their enemies now. Tremble, thou wretch, That hast within thee undivulged crimes, Unwhipp'd of justice: Hide thee, thou bloody hand; Thou perjur'd, and thou simular man of virtue That art incestuous: Caitiff, to pieces shake, That under covert and convenient seeming Hast practis'd on man's life!-Close pent-up guilts, Rive your concealing continents, and cry These dreadful summoners grace. — I am a man, More sinn'd against, than sinning. Kent.

Alack, bare-headed! Gracious my lord, hard by here is a hovel; Some friendship will it lend you 'gainst the tempest; Repose you there: while I to this hard house, (More hard than is the stone whereof 'tis rais'd; Which even but now, demanding after you, Denied me to come in,) return, and force Their scanted courtesy.

Lear.

My wits begin to turn.

his time.

| Ezil. SCENE III.—A Room in Gloster's Castle.

́Enter GLOSTER and EDMUND.

Glo. Alack, alack, Edmund, I like not this un

natural dealing: When I desired their leave that I might pity him, they took from me the use of mine own house; charged me, on pain of their perpetual displeasure, neither to speak of him, entreat for him, nor any way sustain him.

Edm. Most savage, and unnatural!

Glo. Go to; say you nothing: There is division between the dukes; and a worse matter than that: I have received a letter this night; -'tis dangerous to be spoken;-I have locked the letter in my clo set these injuries the king now bears will be revenged home; there is part of a power already footed: we must incline to the king. I will seck him, and privily relieve him: go you, and maintain talk with the duke, that my charity be not of him perceived: If he ask for me, I am ill, and gone to bed. If I die for it, as no less is threatened me, the king my old master must be relieved. There is some strange thing toward, Edmund; pray you, be [Erit.

careful.

Edm. This courtesy, forbid thee, shall the duke Instantly know; and of that letter too: This seems a fair deserving, and must draw me That which my father loses; no less than all: The younger rises, when the old doth fall.

SCENE IV.

A Part of the Heath, with a Hel Enter LEAR, KENT, and Fool.

Kent. Here is the place, my lord; good my lord,

enter:

The body's delicate: the tempest in my mind
Doth from my senses take all feeling else,
Save what beats there. - Filial ingratitude!
Is it not as this mouth should tear this hand,
For lifting food to't?-But I will punish home:-
No, I will weep no more. — In such a night
To shut me out! - Pour on; I will endure : —
In such a night as this! O Regan, Goneril! —
Your old kind father, whose frank heart gave all,-
O, that way madness lies; let me shun that;
No more of that,
Kent.

Good my lord, enter here.' Lear. Pr'ythee, go in thyself; seek thine own

ease;

This tempest will not give me leave to ponder
On things would hurt me more. But I'll go in:
In, boy; go first. - [To the Fool.] You houseless
poverty,

Nay, get thee in. I'll pray, and then I'll sleep.
[Fool goes in.
Poor naked wretches, "wheresoe'er you are,
That bide the pelting of this pitiless storm,
How shall your houseless heads, and unfed sides,
Your loop'd and window'd raggedness, defend you
From seasons such as these? O, I have ta'e
Too little care of this! Take physick, pomp ;
Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel;
That thou may'st shake the superflux to them,
And show the heavens more just.

Edg. [Within.] Fathom and half, fathom and half! Poor Tom!

[The Fool runs out from the hovel. Fool. Come not in here,; nuncle, here's a spirit. Help me, help me!

Kent. Give me thy hand. Who's there?
Fool. A spirit, a spirit; he says his name's poor
Tom.

Kent. What art thou that dost grumble there i'the straw?

Come forth.

Enter EDGAR, disguised as a madman. Edg. Away! the foul fiend follows me ! Through the sharp hawthorn blows the cold wind.— Humph! go to thy cold bed, and warm thee. Lear. Hast thou given all to thy two daughters? And art thou come to this?

Edg. Who gives any thing to poor Tom? whom the foul fiend hath led through fire and through flame, through ford and whirlpool, over bog and quagmire; that hath laid knives under his pillow, and halters in his pew; set ratsbane by his porridge; made him proud of heart, to ride on a bay trottinghorse over four-inched bridges, to course his own shadow for a traitor: Bless thy five wits! Tom's

[Storm continues. Lear. What, have his daughters hrought him to

this pass?

Could'st thou save nothing? Did'st thou give them

all?

Fool. Nay, he reserved a blanket, else we had been all shamed.

Lear. Now, all the plagues that in the pendulous

air

Hang fated o'er men's faults, light on thy daughters! Kent. He hath no daughters, sir.

Lear. Death, traitor! nothing could have subdu'd

nature

To such a lowness, but his unkind daughters. —
Is it the fashion, that discarded fathers
Should have thus little mercy on their flesh?
Judicious punishment! 'twas this flesh begot
Those pelican daughters.

Edg. Pillicock sat on pillicock's-hill;
Halloo, halloo, loo, loo!

Fool. This cold night will turn us all to fools and madmen.

Edg. Take heed o'the foul fiend: Obey thy parents; keep thy word justly; swear not; commit not with man's sworn spouse; set not thy sweet heart on proud array: Tom's a-cold.

Lear. What hast thou been?

Edg. A serving-man, proud in heart and mind; that curled my hair; wore gloves in my cap, served the lust of my mistress's heart, and did the act of darkness with her; swore as many oaths as I spake words, and broke them in the sweet face of heaven: one, that slept in the contriving of lust, and waked to do it: Wine loved I deeply; dice dearly; and in woman, out-paramoured the Turk: False of heart, light of ear, bloody of hand; Hog in sloth, fox in stealth, wolf in greediness, dog in madness, lion in prey. Let not the creaking of shoes, nor the rustling of silks, betray thy poor heart to women: Keep thy foot out of brothels, thy hand out of plackets, thy pen from lenders' books, and defy the foul fiend. Still through the hawthorn blows the cold wind: Says suum, mun, ha no nonny, dolphin my boy, my boy, sessa; let him trot by.

[Storm still continues. Lear. Why, thou were better in thy grave, than to answer with thy uncovered body this extremity of the skies. Is man no more than this? Consider him well: Thou owest the worm no silk, the beast no hide, the sheep no wool, the cat no perfume: Ha! here's three of us are sophisticated! - Thou art the thing itself: unaccommodated man is no more but such a poor, bare, forked animal as thou art. Off, off, you lendings:- Come; unbutton here. [Tearing off his clothes. Fool. Pr'ythee,,nuncle, be contented; this is a naughty night to swim in. Now a little fire in a wild field were like an old lecher's heart; a small spark, all the rest of his body cold. — Look, here comes a walking fire.

Edg. This is the foul fiend Flibbertigibbet: he begins at curfew, and walks till the first cock; he gives the web and the pin, squints the eye, and makes the hare-lip; mildews the white wheat, and hurts the poor creature of earth.

Bid her alight,

And her troth plight,

And, aroint thee, witch, aroînt thee !

Kent. How fares your grace?

Enter GLOSTER, with a torch. ¦

Lear. What's he?

Kent. Who's there? What is't you seek?
Glo. What are you there? Your names?

Edg. Poor Tom; that eats the swimming frog, the toad, the tadpole, the wall-newt, and the water; that in the fury of his heart, when the foul fiend rages, eats cow-dung for sallets; swallows the old rat, and the ditch-dog; drinks the green mantle of the standing pool; who is whipped from tything to tything, and stocked, punished, and imprisoned; who hath had three suits to his back, six shirts to his body, horse to ride, and weapon to wear,

But mice, and rats, and such small deer,
Have been Tom's food for seven long year.

Beware my follower: - Peace, Smolkin; peace,

thou fiend!

Glo. What, hath your grace no better company? Edg. The prince of darkness is a gentleman; Modo he's call'd, and Mahu.

Glo. Our flesh and blood, my lord, is grown so vile,

That it doth hate what gets it.

Edg. Poor Tom's a-cold.

Glo. Go in with me; my duty cannot suffer To obey in all your daughters' hard commands: Though their injunction be to bar my doors, And let this tyrannous night take hold upon you; Yet have I ventur'd to come seek you out, And bring you where both fire and food is ready. Lear. First let me talk with this philosopher: What is the cause of thunder?

Kent. Good my lord, take his offer;

Go into the house.

Lear. I'll talk a word with this same learned

Theban :

What is your study?

Edg. How to prevent the fiend, and to kill vermin. Lear. Let me ask you one word in private. Kent. Impórtune him once more to go, my lord, His wits begin to unsettle. Glo. Can'st thou blame him? His daughters seek his death:➡ Ah, that good Kent!

He said it would be thus: - Poor banish'd man! Thou say'st, the king grows mad; I'll tell thee, friend,

I am almost mad myself: I had a son,
Now outlaw'd from my blood: he sought my life,
But lately, very late; I lov'd him, friend,
No father his son dearer: true to tell thee,
[Storm continues.
The grief hath craz'd my wits. What a night's this!
I do beseech your grace, ——

Lear.

O, cry you mercy,

Noble philosopher, your company.

Edg. Tom's a-cold.

Glo. In, fellow, there, to the hovel: keep thee

Edm. How malicious is my fortune, that I must repent to be just! This is the letter he spoke of, which approves him an intelligent party to the advantages of France. O heavens! that this treason were not, or not I the detector!

Corn. Go with me to the duchess.

Edm. If the matter of this paper be certain, you have mighty business in hand.

Corn. True, or false, it hath made thee earl of Gloster. Seek out where thy father is, that he may be ready for our apprehension.

Edm. [Aside.] If I find him comforting the king, it will stuff his suspicion more fully. - I will perse vere in my course of loyalty, though the conflict be sore between that and my blood.

Corn. I will lay trust upon thee; and thou shalt find a dearer father in my love. [Exeunt.

SCENE VI. — A Chamber in a Farm-House,

adjoining the Castle.

Enter GLOSTER, 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! [Eril GLOSTI. tells me, Nero is Pray, innocent,

Edg. Frateretto calls me; and an angler in the lake of darkness. and beware the foul fiend. Fool. Pr'ythee, 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 them:

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 cath Lear. It shall be done, I will arraign, then

straight:

Come, sit thou here, most learned justicer ;·

(To EDGAR. Thou, sapient sir, sit here. [To the Fool.]-Now, you she foxes!

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.

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 the evidence.

Thou robed man of justice, take thy place;

[To EDGAR. And thou, his yoke-fellow of equity, [To the Fool. Bench by his side:- You are of the commission,

Sit you too.
Edg. Let us deal justly.

[TO KENT.

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.

Pur! the cat is grey.

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

What store her heart is made of. - Stop her there! Arms, arms, sword, fire! - Corruption in the place! False justicer, why hast thou let her 'scape?

Edg. Bless thy five wits!

Tray, Blanch, and Sweet-heart, see, they bark at me. 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, grey-hound, mongrel grim,
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.

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? 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. [To EDGAR.

off the KING,

Edg. When we our betters see bearing our woes,
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.
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,

In thy just proof, repeals, and reconciles thee.
What will håp more to-night, safe scape the
king!/
Lurk, lurk.

SCENE VII.

[Erit.

A Room in Gloster's Castle.

Enter CORNWALL, REGAN, GONERIL, Edmund, arıd Servants.

Corn. Post speedily to my lord your husband; show him this letter:- -the army of France is landed: - Seek out the villain Gloster. : [Exeunt some of the Servants. Reg. Hang him instantly. Gon. Pluck out his eyes. Corn. Leave him to my displeasure. ——— Edmund, keep you our sister company; the revenges we are bound to take upon your traitorous father, are not fit for your beholding. Advise the duke, where you are going, to a most festinate preparation; we are bound to the like. Our posts shall be swift, and intelligent betwixt us. Farewell, dear sister; farewell, my lord of Gloster.