So much commend itfelf, you shall be ours; Natures of fuch deep Truft we shall much need: Edm. 1 fhall ferve you, Sir, Truly, however elfe." Glo. I thank your Grace. Corn. You know not why we came to vifit you Reg.Thus out of feason threading dark-ey'd night; (14) Occafions, noble Glo'fter, of fome prize, Wherein we must have use of your advice.Our father he hath writ, fo hath our fifter, Of diff'rences, which I beft thought it fit To answer from our home: the fev'ral meffengers From hence attend difpatch. Our good old friend, Lay comforts to your bofom; and bestow Your needful counsel to our bufineffes, Which crave the instant ufe. Glo. I ferve you, Madam : Your Graces are right welcome. Enter Kent, and Steward, feverally. [Exeunt. Stew. Good evening to thee, friend; art of this house? Kent. Ay. Stew. Where may we fet our horses ? Kent. I' th' mire. Stew. Pr'ythee, if thou lov'ft me, tell me. Kent. I love thee not. Stew. Why then I care not for thee. Kent. If I had thee in Lipfbury pinfold, I would make thee care for me. Stew. Why doft thou use me thus? I know thee not. Kent. Fellow, I know thee. Stew. What doft thou know me for? (14) threading dark-ey'd night.] I have not ventur'd to difplace this reading, tho' I have great fufpicion that the poet wrote, - treading dark-ey'd night. i. e. travelling in it. The other carries too obfcure, and mean an allufion. It must either be borrow'd from the cant-phrase of threading of alleys, i. e. going thro' bye-paTages to avoid the high streets; to threading a needle in the dark. Kent. Kent. A knave, a rascal, an eater of broken meats, a bafe, proud, fhallow, beggarly, three-fuited, hundred-pound, filthy worfted-ftocking knave; a lilly-liver'd, action-taking, knave; a whorfon, glafs-gazing, fuperferviceable finical rogue; one-trunk-inheriting flave; one that would'st be a bawd in way of good fervice; and art nothing but the compofition of a knave, beggar, coward, pander, and the fon and heir of a mungril bitch; one whom I will beat into clam'rous whining, if thou deny'ft the leaft syllable of thy addition. Stew. Why, what a monftrous fellow art thou, thus to rail on one, that is neither known of thee, nor knows thee? Kent. What a brazen-fac'd varlet art thou, to deny thou know'st me? is it two days ago, fince I tript up thy heels, and beat thee before the King? draw, you rogue; for tho' it be night, yet the moon fhines; I'll make a fop o' th' moonshine of you; you whorfon, cullionly, barber-monger, draw. [Drawing his fword. Stew. Away, I have nothing to do with thee. Kent. Draw, you rafcal; you come with letters against the King; and take Vanity, the Puppet's part, against the royalty of her father; draw, you rogue, or I'll fo carbonado your fhanks-draw, you rafcal, come your ways. Stew. Help, ho! murder! help!. Kent. Strike, you flave; ftand, rogue, ftand, you neat flave, ftrike. [Beating him. Stew. Help ho! murder! murder! Enter Edmund, Cornwall, Regan, Glo'ster, and Servants. Glo. Weapons? arms? what's the matter here? Corn. Keep peace, upon your lives; he dies, that ftrikes again; what's the matter? Reg. The meffengers from our fifter and the King? Corn. What is your difference? speak. Stew. Stew. I am fcarce in breath, my lord. Kent. No marvel, you have fo beftir'd your valour; you cowardly rafcal! nature difclaims all fhare in thee: a taylor made thee. Corn. Thou art a ftrange fellow; a taylor make a man? Kent. I, a taylor, Sir; a ftone-cutter, or a painter could not have made him fo ill, tho' they had been but two hours o' th' trade. Corn. Speak yet, how grew your quarrel? Sterv. This ancient ruffian, Sir, whofe life I have fpar'd at fuit of his grey beard Kent. Thou whorfon zed! thou unneceffary letter! my lord, if you will give me leave, I will tread this unbolted villain into mortar, and daub the wall of a jakes with him. Spare my grey beard? you wagtail!-Corn. Peace, Sirrah! You beaftly knave, know you no reverence? Kent. Yes, Sir, but anger hath a privilege. Kent. That fuch a flave as this fhou'd wear a fword, Who wears no honefty; fuch fmiling rogues as thefe, Like rats, oft bite the holy cords in twain (15) Too (15) Like rats, oft bite the holy cords atwaine, Which are t' intrince, t' unloofe;] Thus the firft editors blunder'd this paffage into unintelligible nonfenfe. Mr. Pope fo far has difengag'd them, as to give us plain fenfe; but by throwing out the epithet boy, 'tis evident, he was not aware of the poet's fine meaning. I'll first establish and prove the reading; then explain the allufion. Thus the poet gave it; Like rats, oft bite the holy cords in train, Too 'intrinficate t' unloofe This word again occurs in our author's Antony and Cleopatra, where fhe is fpeaking to the afpick; Come, mortal wretch; With thy fharp teeth this knot intrinficate Of life at once untie. And we meet with it in Cynthia's Revels by Ben. Jonson. Yet there are certain puntilio's, or (as I may more nakedly infinuate them) certain intr.nficate strokes and wards, to which your activity is not yet amounted; &c. It means, inward, hidden; perplext; as a knot, hard to be unra. vell'd; it is deriv'd from the Latin adverb intrinfecus; from which the s; Too 'intrinficate t' unloofe: footh every paffion, Kent. No contraries hold more antipathy, Corn. Why dost thou call him knave? what is his fault? Kent. His countenance likes me not. Corn. No more, perchance, does mine, nor his, nor hers. Kent. Sir, 'tis my occupation to be plain; I have feen better faces in my time, Than ftand on any fhoulder that I fee Corn. This is fome fellow, Who having been prais'd for bluntnefs, doth affect the Italians have coin'd a very beautiful phrafe, intrinficarsi col uno, i. e, to grow intimate with, to wind one self into another. And now to our author's fenfe. Kent is rating the fteward, as a parafite of Gonerill's; and fuppofes very justly, that he has fomented the quarrel betwixt that princefs and her father: in which office, he compares him to a facrilegious rat: and by a fine metaphor, as Mr. Warburton obferved to me, ftiles the union between parents and children the boly cords. (x6) cackling bome to Camelot.] As Sarum, or Salisbury, plain is mention'd in the preceding verfe, prefume this Camelot to be that mention'd by Holing fhead, and call'd Camaletum, in the marshes of Somerfet hire, where there was an old tradition of a very strong Caftte. Langbam in his account of queen Elizabeth's reception at Kenil worth, fays, from king Arthur's acts, that that Prince kept his royal Court at Camelot: but whether this be the place already mention'd, or fome other of that name in Wales, or the Camelot in Sterling-County in Scotland, I am not able to fay. An An honeft mind and plain, he muft fpeak truth; These kind of knaves I know, which in this plainness That ftretch their duties nicely. Kent. Sir, in good faith, in fincere verity, Under th' allowance of your grand afpect, Whose influence, like the wreath of radiant fire On flickering Phoebus' front Corn. What mean'ft by this? Kent. To go out of my dialect, which you difcommend fo much: I know, Sir, I am no flatterer; he, that beguil'd you in a plain accent, was a plain knave; which for my part I will not be, though I should win your difpleasure to intreat me to't. Corn. What was th' offence you gave him? It pleas'd the King his mafter very lately Kent. None of thefe rogues and cowards, Corn. Fetch forth the Stocks. You ftubborn ancient knave, you rev'rend braggart, We'll teach you Kent. Sir, I am too old to learn: Call not your Stocks for me, I ferve the King; On whofe employment I was fent to you. You fhall do fmall refpect, fhew too bold malice Stocking his meffenger. Corn. Fetch forth the Stocks; As I have life and honour, there fhall he fit 'till noon. Reg. |