You, as you're old and reverend, should be wife.
Here do you keep a hundred Knights and Squires,
Men so disorder'd, so debauch'd and bold,
That this our Court, infected with their manners,
Shews like a riotous Inn; Epicurism and luft
Make it more like a tavern or a brothel,
Than a grac'd Palace. Shame itself doth speak
For instant remedy. Be then defir'd
By her, that else will take the thing she begs,
† Of fifty to disquantity your train;
And the remainders, that shall still depend,
To be such men as may befort your age,

And know themselves and you.
Lear. Darkness and devils!

Saddle my horfes, call my train together. -
Degen'rate bastard! I'll not trouble thee;

Yet have I left a daughter.

Gon. You strike my people, and your disorder'd rabble Make fervants of their betters.

To them, Enter Albany.

Lear. Woe! that too late repents-O, Sir, are you Is it your will, speak, Sir? prepare my horses.- [come? [To Alb.

Ingratitude! thou marble-hearted fiend,
More hideous when thou shew'st thee in a child,
Than the fea-monster.

Alb. Pray, Sir, be patient.

Lear. Detested kite! thou lieft.

My train are men of choice and rarest parts,

That all particulars of duty know;

And in the most exact regard support

[To Gonerill.

The worships of their names. O most small fault!

How ugly didst thou in Cordelia shew?

Which, like an engine, wrencht my frame of nature
From the fixt place; drew from my heart all love,

† A little is the common reading; but it appears, from what Lear says in the next Scene, that this number fifty was requir'd to be cut off, which (as the editions (food) is no where specify'd by Gonerill.

:

Mr. Pope.
And

And added to the gall. O Lear, Lear, Lear!
Beat at this gate that let thy folly in, [Striking his Lead.
And thy dear judgment out. -Go, go, my people.

Alb. My lord, I'm guiltless, as I'm ignorant,

Of what hath moved you.

Lear. It may be fo, my lord

Hear, Nature, hear; dear Goddess, hear a Father!
Suspend thy purpose, if thou didst intend

:

:

To make this creature fruitful:
Into her womb convey fterility,
Dry up in her the organs of increase,
And from her derogate body never spring
A Babe to honour her! If she must teem,
Create her child of spleen, that it may live,
And be a thwart difnatur'd torment to her ;
Let it stamp wrinkles in her brow of youth,
With candent tears fret chanels in her cheeks: (II)
Turn all her mother's pains and benefits

To laughter and contempt; that the may feel,

How sharper than a ferpent's tooth it is,

To have a thankless child. Go, go, my people.

Alb. Now, Gods, that we adore, whereof comes this?

Gon. Never afflict your self to know of it:

But let his difpofition have that scope,

That dotage gives it.

Lear. What, fifty of my followers at a clap ?

Within a fortnight?

Alb. What's the matter, Sir?
Lear. I'll tell thee

life and death! I am asham'd,

That thou haft power to shake my manhood thus;

[To Gon.

That these hot tears, which break from me perforce,

(11) With cadent Tears,] Mr. Warburton very happily here suspects our Author wrote, candent; as an Epithet of much more Energy, and more likely to effect Lear's Imprecation. He brings in Confirmation, what the King says presently after;

That these hot Tears, that break from me perforce,

And what he says towards the End of the 4th Act :

- but I am bound

Upon a Wheel of Fire, that mine own Tears
Do scald like molten Lead.

VOL. V.

I

Should

Th' untented woundings of a father's curse (12)
Pierce every sense about thee! Old fond eyes,
Beweep this Cause again, I'll pluck ye out,
And cast you, with the waters that you lose,
To temper clay. Ha! is it come to this?
Let it be fo: I have another daughter,
Who, I am fure, is kind and comfortable;
When she shall hear this of thee, with her nails
She'll flea thy wolfish visage. Thou shalt find,
That I'll refume the shape, which thou dost think
I have caft off for ever.

Gon. Do you mark that?

[Ex. Lear and attendants.

Alb. I cannot be so partial, Gonerill,

To the great love I bear you,

Gon. Pray you, be content. What, Oswald, ho!

You, Sir, more knave than fool, after your master.

Fool. Nuncle Lear, nuncle Lear, tarry, take the fool

A Fox, when one has caught her,

And fuch a daughter,

Should fure to the flaughter,

If my cap would buy a halter,

So the fool follows after.

[with thee :

Gon. This man hath had good counsel, a hundred

'Tis politick, and fafe, to let him keep

A hundred Knights; yes, that on ev'ry dream,
Each buz, each fancy, each complaint, dislike,

[Exit.

[Knights!

(12) Th' untender Woundings, I have here reftor'd the Reading of all the genuine Copies, which Mr. Pope had degraded; as it seems the most expressive, and conveys an Image exactly suiting with the Poet's Thought. 'Tis true, untender signifies, sharp, fevere, harsh, and all the Opposites to the Idea of tender. But as a Wound untented is apt to rankle inwards, fmart, and fester, I doubt not, but Shakespeare meant to intimate here; that a Father's Curse shall be a Wounding of such a fharp, inveterate Nature, that nothing shall be able to tent it; i. e. to search the Bottom, and help in the Cure of it. We have a Passage in Cymbeline, that very strongly confirms this Meaning.

I've heard, I am a Strumpet ; and mine Ear
(Therein false struck) can take no greater Wound,
Nor Tent to bottom that.

He may enguard his dotage with their pow'rs,
And hold our lives at mercy. Ofwald, I fay.

Alb. Well, you may fear too far ;-
Gon. Safer than trust too far.

Let me still take away the harms I fear,
Not fear still to be harm'd. I know his heart;
What he hath utter'd, I have writ my sister;
If she'll sustain him and his hundred Knights,
When I have shew'd th' unfitness-

How now, Oswald?

Enter Steward.

What, have you writ that letter to my sister ?

Stew. Ay, Madam.

Gon. Take you some company, and away to horse;

Inform her full of my particular fears,
And thereto add such reasons of your own,
As may compact it more. So get you gone,
And haften your return.

--No, no, my lord,

コープ

[Exit Steward.

This milky gentleness and course of yours,
Though I condemn it not, yet, under pardon,
You are much more at task for want of wisdom,

Than prais'd for harmful mildness.

Alb. How far your eyes may pierce, I cannot tell;

Striving to better, oft we mar what's well.

Gon. Nay, then

Alb. Well, well, th' event.

[Exeunt.

SCENE, a Court-Yard belonging to the Duke of

Lear.

Albany's Palace.

Re-enter Lear, Kent, Gentleman and Fool.

G

to Glo'fter with these letters;

O you before acquaint my daughter no further with any thing you know, than comes from her demand out of the letter; if your diligence be not speedy, I shall be there afore you.

Kent. I will not fleep, my lord, 'till I have delivered

your letter.

12

[Exit.

Fool.

Fool. If a man's brain were in his heels, wer't not in

danger of kibes ?

Lear. Ay, boy.

Fool. Then, I pr'ythee, be merry, thy wit shall not go flip-fhod.

Lear. Ha, ha, ha.

Fool. Shalt fee, thy other daughter will use thee kindly; for though she's as like this as a crab's like an apple, yet I can tell what I can tell.

Lear. What can'st tell, boy?

Fool. She will taste as like this, as a crab does to a crab. Can'ft thou tell, why one's nose stands i'th' middle of one's face?

Lear. No.

Fool. Why, to keep one's eyes of either side one's nose; that what a man cannot smell out, he may spy into.

Lear. I did Her wrong

Fool. Can'st tell how an oyfter makes his shell?
Lear. No.

Fool. Nor I neither ; but I can tell, why a snail has a houfe.

Lear. Why?

Fool. Why, to put's head in, not to give it away to his daughters, and leave his horns without a cafe.

Lear. I will forget my nature : fo kind a father! be my horfes ready?

Fool. Thy affes are gone about 'em; the reason, why the seven stars are no more than seven, is a pretty reason.

Lear. Because they are not eight.

Fool. Yes, indeed, thou wouldst make a good fool.

Lear. To take't again perforce!

titude!

monster ingra

Fool. If you were my fool, nuncle, I'd have thee beaten

for being old before thy time.

Lear. How's that?

Fool. Thou should'st not have been old, 'till thou hadst been wife.

Lear, O, let me not be mad, not mad, sweet heav'n! Keep me in temper, I would not be mad.

Enter