:

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 scattered kingdom; who already,
Wise in our negligence, have secret feet
In some of our best ports, and are at point
To shew their open banner.-Now to you:
If on my credit you dare build so far

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.

Lear. Blow, wind, and crack your cheeks! rage! blow!

You cataracts and hurricanoes, spout Till you have drenched our steeples, drowned the cocks!

You sulphurous and thought-executing fires, Vaunt couriers to oak-cleaving thunderbolts, Singe my white head!—And thou, all-shaking thunder,

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 house 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, called you children;
You owe me no subscription: why then let fall
Your horrible pleasure: here I stand your slave,
A poor, infirm, weak, and despised old man :-
But yet I call you servile ministers,
That have with two pernicious daughters joined
Your high-engendered battles 'gainst a head
So 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 codpiece 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 should make,

Shall of a corn cry woe,

And turn his sleep to wake.

-for there was never yet fair woman but she made mouths in a glass.

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

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 heretics burned but wenches' suitors; 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 used with feet. This prophecy Merlin shall make; for I live before his time.

[Exit.

SCENE III-A Room in GLOSTER'S Castle.

Enter GLOSTER and EDMUND.

Glo. Alack, alack, Edmund, I like not this unnatural 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;-'t is dangerous to be spoken;-I have locked the

letter in my closet: 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 seek 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 careful.

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'y thee, 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 looped and windowed raggedness, defend you
From seasons such as these? O, I have ta'en
Too little care of this! Take physic, pomp:
Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel;
That thou mayst shake the superflux to them,
And shew 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 anything 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 trotting-horse over four-inched bridges, to course his own shadow for a traitor.-Bless thy five wits! Tom's a-cold.-O do de, do de, do de.-Bless thee from whirlwinds, star-blasting, and taking! Do poor Tom some charity, whom the foul fiend vexes. There could I have him now, and there,—and there,—and there again; and there. [Storm continues.

Lear. What, have his daughters brought him to this pass?

Couldst thou save nothing? Didst 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
subdued 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! 't was 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, outparamoured 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 wert 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'y thee, 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.

Saint Withold footed thrice the wold;
He met the night-mare and her nine-fold;
Bid her alight,

And her troth plight,

And, Aroint thee, witch, aroint 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 cowdung 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 called, and Mahu.