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SCENE IV.

A part of the Heath, with a Hovel.

Enter LEAR, KENT, and Fool.

Kent. Here is the place, my lord; good my lord, enter: The tyranny of the open night's too rough

For nature to endure.

Lear.

[Storm still.

Let me alone.

Wilt break my heart?

Kent. Good my lord, enter here.

Lear.

Kent. I'd rather break mine own: Good my lord, enter. Lear. Thou think'st 'tis much, that this contentious Invades us to the skin: so 'tis to thee;

But where the greater malady is fix'd,

The lesser is scarce felt. Thou'dst shun a bear:

But if thy flight lay toward the raging sea,

[storm

Thou'dst meet the bear i'the mouth. When the mind's free, 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

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

in.

From seasons such as these? O, I have ta'en
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 Come forth.

Enter EDGAR, disguised as a Madman.

[straw?

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 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.

through fire and through flame,] Alluding to the ignis fatuis, supposed to be lights kindled by mischievous beings to lead travellers into destruction. -JOHNSON.

f - laid knives under his pillow, and halters in his pew, &c.] He recounts the temptations by which he was prompted to suicide; the infernal spirits are always represented as urging the wretched to self-destruction.-JOHNSON and STEEVENS.

-PERCY.

thy five wits!] i. e. The five senses. So called by all our old writers.

h taking!] i. e. Striking with malignant influence, or blasting.-JOHNSON.

Lear. What, have his daughters brought 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 mad

men.

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?

k

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

i – pelican daughters.] The young pelican is fabled to suck the mother's blood.-JOHNSON.

k

wore gloves in my cap,] It was anciently the custom to wear gloves in the hat on three distinct occasions, viz. as a favour of a mistress; the memorial of a friend; and as a mark to be challenged by an enemy.-STEEVENS. light of ear,] Credulous of evil, ready to receive malicious reports.

--

JOHNSON.

111

plackets,] i. e. Petticoats.-NARES.

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; unbotton 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.

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!s

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sessa;] i. e. Be quiet, from the French cessez. This conjecture respecting the origin and meaning of this word is Dr. Johnson's, and is approved by Archdeacon Nares, in his Glossary.

• Flibbertigibbet:] "Frateretto, Fliberdigibet, Hoberdidance, Tocobatto, were four devils of the round or morrice..... These four had forty assistants under them, as themselves doe confesse." Harsnet's Declaration, p. 49.PERCY.

P

he begins at curfew, &c.] It is an old tradition that spirits were relieved from the confinement in which they were held during the day, at the time of curfew, i. e. at the close of day, and were permitted to wander at large till the first cock-crowing.-MALONE.

web and the pin,] Diseases of the eye.-JOHNSON.

r Saint Withold, &c.] i. e. Saint Withold traversing the wold or downs, met the night-mare; he obliged her to alight from those persons whom she rides, and plight her troth to do no more mischief. This is taken from a story of him in his legend. Her ninefold means her nine familiars.-WARBURTON and MALONE.

-1

NARES.

arvint thee!] i. e. Stand off. The word is still in use in Cheshire.

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 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 suffera
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.

t the water;] i. e. The water-newt.

·whipped from tything to tything,] A tything is a division of a place, a district; the same in the country, as a ward in the city. In the Saxon times every hundred was divided into tythings.-STEEVens.

* This distich is from the old metrical romance of Sir Bevis.-PERCY. — Smolkin;] "The names of other punie spirits cast out of Trayford were these: Hilco, Smolkin, Hillio, &c." Harsnet, p. 49.-PERCY. 2 The prince of darkness is a gentleman;

Modo he's call'd, and Mahu.] These lines which appear to be spoken in resentment of what Gloster has just said," Has your grace no better company?". are nearly the same as the concluding lines of an old catch, which is introduced by Sir John Suckling in The Goblins. It was most probably not his production, but the original here referred to by Edgar. Modo and Mahu are names of spirits of great power mentioned in Harsnet's Declaration.-STEEVENS and REED.

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· cannot suffer-] i. e. Cannot suffer me.-M. MASON. VOL. VIII.

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