Your name, fair gentlewoman?

Gon. This admiration, Sir, is much o' th' favour
Of other your new pranks. I do beseech you,
To understand my purposes aright.

You, as you're old and reverend, fhould be wife.
Here do you keep a hundred Knights and Squires,
Men fo diforder'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 inftant remedy. Be then defir'd

By her, that else will take the thing she begs,
Of fifty to difquantity your train;
And the remainders that fhall ftill depend,
To be fuch men as may befort your age,
And know themselves and you.

Lear. Darkness and devils!

Saddle my horfes, call my train together.
Degen'rate baftard! I'll not trouble thee!
Yet have I left a daughter.

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

To them, Enter Albany.

[come? Lear. Woe! that too late repents-O, Sir, are you Is it your will, fpeak, Sir, prepare my horfes.

Ingratitude! thou marble-hearted fiend,

[To Albany.

More hideous when thou fhew'ft thee in a child,
Than the fea-monster.

Alb. Pray, Sir, be patient.

Lear. Detefted 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!

A little is the common reading; but it appears, from what Lear says

in the next Scene, that this number fifty was required to be cut off, which (as the editions flood) is no where specified by Gonerill.

Mr. Pope,

How

How ugly didft thou in Cordelia shew?

Which, like an engine, wrencht my frame of nature
From the fixt place; drew from my heart all love,
And added to the gall. O Lear, Lear, Lear!

Beat at this gate that let thy folly in, [Striking his head.
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 so, my lord.

Hear, Nature, hear; dear Goddess, hear a Father!
Sufpend 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 the muft teem,
Create her child of fpleen, that it may live,
And be a thwart difnatur'd torment to her;
Let it ftamp wrinkles in her brow of youth,
With candent tears fret chanels in her cheeks: (11)
Turn all her mother's pains and benefits

To laughter and contempt; that the may f
How sharper than a ferpent's tooth it is,

feel,

To have a thanklefs child.-Go, go, my people.

Alb. Now, Gods, that we adore, whereof comes this? Gon. Never afflict yourself 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?

(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 fays prefently after;

That thefe hot tear, that break from me perforce And what he fays towards the end of the 4th act: -but I am bound

Upon a wheel of fire, that mine own tears

Do fcald like molt.■ lead.

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, Should make thee worth them.--Blasts and fogs upon

thee!

Th' untented woundings of a father's curse (12)
Pierce every fense 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 the 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 :

[Exit.

(12) Th' untender woundings,] I have here restor'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 fignifies, sharp, fevere, harsh, and all the oppofites to the idea of tender. But as a wound untented is apt to rankle inwards, fimart, and fester, I doubt not, but Shakespeare meant to intimate here; that a father's curse shall be a wounding of fuch a sharp, 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 paflage 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,

A

Gon.

Gon. This man hath had good counfel,-a hundred "Tis politick, and fafe, to let him keep [Knights!

A hundred Knights; yes, that on ev'ry dream,
Each buz, each fancy, each complaint, diflike,
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 ftill take away the harms I fear,
Not fear ftill to be harm'd. I know his heart;
What he hath utter'd I have writ my fitter;
If she'll sustain him and his hundred Knights,
When I have fhew'd th' unfitnefs-

How now, Ofwald!

Enter Steward.

What, have you writ that letter to my fifter?
Stew. Ay, Madam.

Gon. Take you fome company, and away to horse;
Inform her full of my particular fears,

And thereto add fuch reasons of your own,

As may compact it more. So get you gone,
And haften your return.

-No, no, my lord,

[Exit Steward.

This milky gentleness and courfe 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 Albany's Palace.

Re-enter Lear, Kent, Gentleman and Fool.

O you before to Glofter with thefe letters;

Lear. G acquaint my daughter no further with any

thing you know, than comes from her demand out of

B 4

the

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 [Exit.

your letter.

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 is as like this as a crab's like an apple, yet I can tell what I can tell.

Lear. What can'ît tell, boy?

Fool. She will taste as like this, as a crab does to a crab. Can'st 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'ft tell how an oyster makes his shell ?
Lear. No.

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

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: so kind a father! be my horses ready?

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

Lear. Because they are not eight.

Fool. Yes, indeed; thou wouldst make a good fool. Lear. To take't again perforce! - monster ingratitude!

Fool. If you were my fool, nuncle, I'd have thee beaten for being old before thy time.

Lear.