b 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: 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. REG. 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. Of the extreme verge for all beneath the moon GLO. Let go my hand. Here, friend, 's another purse; in it a jewel Well worth a poor man's taking fairies and gods, Prosper it with thee! Go thou further off; Bid me farewell, and let me hear thee going. GLO. [Seems to go. With all my heart. EDG. Why I do trifle thus with his despair Is done to cure it. GLO. O, you mighty gods! This world I do renounce; and, in your sights, Shake patiently my great affliction off: If I could bear it longer, and not fall To quarrel with your great opposeless wills, EDG. Gone, sir :-farewell.[GLOUCESTER leaps, and falls along. And yet I know not how conceit may rob The treasury of life, when life itself Yields to the theft: had he been where he thought, By this, had thought been past.-Alive or dead? Ho, you sir! friend!--Hear you, sir?—speak !— Thus might he pass indeed :-yet he revives.— What are you, sir? GLO. Away, and let me die. EDG. Hadst thou been aught but gossamer, 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 seen 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 Were two full moons; he had a thousand noses, Horns whelk'd and wav'd like the enridged* sea: It was some fiend; therefore, thou happy father, Think that the clearest gods, who make them honours Of men's impossibilities, have preserv'd thee. GLO. I do remember now: henceforth I'll bear Affliction till it do cry out itself, Enough, enough, and die. That thing you speak of, I took it for a man ; often 't would say, 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. Thou shalt not die die for adultery! No: 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. (*) First folio, thy. of Gloucester. (1) 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? EDG. Do you hear aught, sir, of a battle toward? GENT. Most sure and vulgar, every one hears that, Which can distinguish sound. 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. Now let thy friendly hand Put strength enough to it. [EDGAR interposes. Osw. Wherefore, bold peasant, Dar'st thou support a publish'd traitor? Hence! Lest that the infection of his fortune take Like hold on thee. Let go his arm. 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, 't would 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.8 [They fight; and EDGAR fells him. 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 shoeing 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. |