The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works

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The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works Page 286

by William Shakespeare


  Be-monster not thy feature. Were’t my fitness

  To let these hands obey my blood,

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  They are apt enough to dislocate and tear

  Thy flesh and bones. Howe’er thou art a fiend,

  A woman’s shape doth shield thee.

  GONERIL Marry, your manhood, mew! –Q

  Enter a Messenger.

  QALBANY What news?Q

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  MESSENGER

  O my good lord, the Duke of Cornwall’s dead,

  Slain by his servant, going to put out

  The other eye of Gloucester.

  ALBANY Gloucester’s eyes?

  MESSENGER

  A servant that he bred, thrilled with remorse,

  Opposed against the act, bending his sword

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  To his great master, who, thereat enraged,

  Flew on him and amongst them felled him dead;

  But not without that harmful stroke which since

  Hath plucked him after.

  ALBANY This shows you are above,

  You justicers, that these our nether crimes

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  So speedily can venge. But, O, poor Gloucester,

  Lost he his other eye?

  MESSENGER Both, both, my lord.

  [to Goneril] This letter, madam, craves a speedy answer;

  ’Tis from your sister.

  GONERIL [aside] One way I like this well;

  But being widow, and my Gloucester with her,

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  May all the building in my fancy pluck

  Upon my hateful life. Another way

  The news is not so tart.

  [to the Messenger] I’ll read and answer. Q Exit.Q

  ALBANY

  Where was his son when they did take his eyes?

  MESSENGER Come with my lady hither.

  ALBANY He is not here.

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  MESSENGER No, my good lord; I met him back again.

  ALBANY Knows he the wickedness?

  MESSENGER

  Ay, my good lord, ’twas he informed against him

  And quit the house on purpose that their punishment

  Might have the freer course.

  ALBANY Gloucester, I live

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  To thank thee for the love thou showd’st the King

  And to revenge thine eyes. Come hither, friend,

  Tell me what more thou knowst.

  Exeunt.

  4.3 Q Enter KENT[, disguised,] and a Gentleman.

  KENT Why the King of France is so suddenly gone

  back, know you no reason?

  GENTLEMAN Something he left imperfect in the state

  which since his coming forth is thought of, which

  imports to the kingdom so much fear and danger that

  5

  his personal return was most required and necessary.

  KENT Who hath he left behind him General?

  GENTLEMAN The Marshal of France, Monsieur la Far.

  KENT Did your letters pierce the queen to any demonstration of grief?

  10

  GENTLEMAN

  Ay, sir. She took them, read them in my presence,

  And now and then an ample tear trilled down

  Her delicate cheek. It seemed she was a queen

  Over her passion, who, most rebel-like,

  Sought to be king o’er her.

  KENT O, then, it moved her?

  15

  GENTLEMAN Not to a rage; patience and sorrow strove

  Who should express her goodliest. You have seen

  Sunshine and rain at once, her smiles and tears

  Were like a better way. Those happy smilets

  That played on her ripe lip seemed not to know

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  What guests were in her eyes, which parted thence

  As pearls from diamonds dropped. In brief,

  Sorrow would be a rarity most beloved

  If all could so become it.

  KENT Made she no verbal question?

  25

  GENTLEMAN

  Faith, once or twice she heaved the name of father

  Pantingly forth as if it pressed her heart;

  Cried ‘Sisters, sisters, shame of ladies, sisters!

  Kent, father, sisters! What, i’the storm, i’the night?

  Let pity not be believed!’ There she shook

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  The holy water from her heavenly eyes,

  And clamour mastered her; then away she started,

  To deal with grief alone.

  KENT It is the stars,

  The stars above us govern our conditions,

  Else one self mate and make could not beget

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  Such different issues. You spoke not with her since?

  GENTLEMAN No.

  KENT Was this before the King returned?

  GENTLEMAN No, since.

  KENT Well, sir, the poor distressed Lear’s i’the town,

  Who sometime in his better tune remembers

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  What we are come about, and by no means

  Will yield to see his daughter.

  GENTLEMAN Why, good sir?

  KENT

  A sovereign shame so elbows him. His own unkindness

  That stripped her from his benediction, turned her

  To foreign casualties, gave her dear rights

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  To his dog-hearted daughters, these things sting

  His mind so venomously that burning shame

  Detains him from Cordelia.

  GENTLEMAN Alack, poor gentleman.

  KENT

  Of Albany’s and Cornwall’s powers you heard not?

  GENTLEMAN ’Tis so; they are afoot.

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  KENT Well, sir, I’ll bring you to our master, Lear,

  And leave you to attend him. Some dear cause

  Will in concealment wrap me up awhile.

  When I am known aright, you shall not grieve,

  Lending me this acquaintance.

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  I pray you, go along with me. Exeunt.Q

  4.4 Enter Fwith drum and coloursF CORDELIA Gentleman, [officer] Fand soldiers.F

  CORDELIA Alack, ’tis he. Why, he was met even now

  As mad as the vexed sea, singing aloud,

  Crowned with rank fumiter and furrow-weeds,

  With burdocks, hemlock, nettles, cuckoo-flowers,

  Darnel and all the idle weeds that grow

  5

  In our sustaining corn.

  [to officer] A century send forth;

  Search every acre in the high-grown field

  And bring him to our eye. What can man’s wisdom

  In the restoring his bereaved sense,

  He that helps him take all my outward worth.

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  [Exit officer, with soldiers.]

  GENTLEMAN There is means, madam.

  Our foster nurse of nature is repose,

  The which he lacks: that to provoke in him

  Are many simples operative, whose power

  Will close the eye of anguish.

  CORDELIA All blest secrets,

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  All you unpublished virtues of the earth,

  Spring with my tears. Be aidant and remediate

  In the good man’s distress. Seek, seek for him,

  Lest his ungoverned rage dissolve the life

  That wants the means to lead it.

  Enter Messenger.

  MESSENGER News, madam:

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  The British powers are marching hitherward.

  CORDELIA ’Tis known before. Our preparation stands

  In expectation of them. O dear father,

  It is thy business that I go about;

  Therefore great France

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  My mourning and important tears hath pitied.

  No blown ambition doth our arms incite,

  But love, dear love, and our aged father’s right:
>
  Soon may I hear and see him. Exeunt.

  4.5 Enter REGAN and OSWALD.

  REGAN But are my brother’s powers set forth?

  OSWALD Ay, madam.

  REGAN Himself in person FthereF?

  OSWALD Madam, with much ado; your sister is the better soldier.

  5

  REGAN Lord Edmund spake not with your lord at home?

  OSWALD No, madam.

  REGAN What might import my sister’s letter to him?

  OSWALD I know not, lady.

  REGAN Faith, he is posted hence on serious matter.

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  It was great ignorance, Gloucester’s eyes being out,

  To let him live. Where he arrives he moves

  All hearts against us. Edmund, I think, is gone

  In pity of his misery to dispatch

  His nighted life; moreover to descry

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  The strength o’th’ enemy.

  OSWALD I must needs after him, Fmadam,F with my letter.

  REGAN

  Our troops set forth tomorrow; stay with us.

  The ways are dangerous.

  OSWALD I may not, madam;

  My lady charged my duty in this business.

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  REGAN

  Why should she write to Edmund? Might not you

  Transport her purposes by word? Belike –

  Some things, I know not what – I’ll love thee much;

  Let me unseal the letter.

  OSWALD Madam, I had rather –

  REGAN I know your lady does not love her husband,

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  I am sure of that; and at her late being here

  She gave strange oeillades and most speaking looks

  To noble Edmund. I know you are of her bosom.

  OSWALD I, madam?

  REGAN I speak in understanding; y’are, I know’t.

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  Therefore I do advise you take this note.

  My lord is dead; Edmund and I have talked,

  And more convenient is he for my hand

  Than for your lady’s. You may gather more.

  If you do find him, pray you give him this;

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  And when your mistress hears thus much from you,

  I pray desire her call her wisdom to her.

  So fare FyouF well.

  If you do chance to hear of that blind traitor,

  Preferment falls on him that cuts him off.

  40

  OSWALD

  Would I could meet Q himQ, madam, I should show

  What party I do follow.

  REGAN Fare thee well. Exeunt.

  4.6 Enter GLOUCESTER and EDGAR[, in peasant’s clothing and with a staff].

  GLOUCESTER

  When shall I come to the top of that same hill?

  EDGAR You do climb up it now. Look how we labour.

  GLOUCESTER Methinks the ground is even.

  EDGAR Horrible steep.

  Hark, do you hear the sea?

  GLOUCESTER No, truly.

  EDGAR Why then, your other senses grow imperfect

  5

  By your eyes’ anguish.

  GLOUCESTER So may it be indeed.

  Methinks thy voice is altered and thou speak’st

  In better phrase and matter than thou didst.

  EDGAR You’re much deceived; in nothing am I changed

  But in my garments.

  GLOUCESTER Methinks you’re better spoken.

  10

  EDGAR

  Come on, sir, here’s the place. Stand still: how fearful

  And dizzy ’tis to cast one’s eyes so low.

  The crows and choughs that wing the midway air

  Show scarce so gross as beetles. Half-way down

  Hangs one that gathers samphire, dreadful trade;

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  Methinks he seems no bigger than his head.

  The fishermen that walk upon the beach

  Appear like mice, and yon tall anchoring barque

  Diminished to her cock, her cock a buoy

  Almost too small for sight. The murmuring surge

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  That on th’unnumbered idle pebble chafes,

  Cannot be heard so high. I’ll look no more,

  Lest my brain turn and the deficient sight

  Topple down headlong.

  GLOUCESTER Set me where you stand.

  EDGAR Give me your hand: you are now within a foot

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  Of th’extreme verge. For all beneath the moon

  Would I not leap upright.

  GLOUCESTER Let go my hand.

  Here, friend, ‘s another purse, in it a jewel

 

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