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The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works

Page 290

by William Shakespeare

Maugre thy strength, youth, place and eminence,

  Despite thy victor sword and fire-new fortune,

  130

  Thy valour and thy heart, thou art a traitor:

  False to thy gods, thy brother and thy father,

  Conspirant ‘gainst this high illustrious prince,

  And from th’extremest upward of thy head

  To the descent and dust below thy foot

  135

  A most toad-spotted traitor. Say thou no,

  This sword, this arm and my best spirits are bent

  To prove upon thy heart, whereto I speak,

  Thou liest.

  EDMUND In wisdom I should ask thy name,

  But since thy outside looks so fair and warlike,

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  And that thy tongue some say of breeding breathes,

  What safe and nicely I might well delayFF

  By rule of knighthood, I disdain and spurn.

  Back do I toss these treasons to thy head,

  With the hell-hated lie o’erwhelm thy heart,

  145

  Which for they yet glance by and scarcely bruise,

  This sword of mine shall give them instant way,

  Where they shall rest for ever. Trumpets, speak.

  [F Alarums. Fight.F [Edmund falls].]

  ALBANY [to Edgar] Save him, save him!

  GONERIL This is Q mereQ practice, Gloucester.

  By the law of war thou wast not bound to answer

  150

  An unknown oppposite. Thou art not vanquished,

  But cozened and beguiled.

  ALBANY Shut your mouth, dame,

  Or with this paper shall I stop it.

  [to Edmund] FHold, sir,F

  Thou worse than any name, read thine own evil.

  [to Goneril] Q NayQ, no tearing, lady; I perceive you know it.

  155

  GONERIL Say if I do, the laws are mine, not thine.

  Who can arraign me for’t?Exit.

  ALBANY Most monstrous! FO!F

  [to Edmund] Knowst thou this paper?

  EDMUND Ask me not what I know.

  ALBANY [to an officer, who follows Goneril]

  Go after her; she’s desperate, govern her.

  EDMUND

  What you have charged me with, that have I done,

  160

  And more, much more; the time will bring it out.

  ’Tis past and so am I. [to Edgar] But what art thou

  That hast this fortune on me? If thou’rt noble,

  I do forgive thee.

  EDGAR Let’s exchange charity:

  I am no less in blood than thou art, Edmund;

  165

  If more, the more thou’st wronged me.

  My name is Edgar and thy father’s son.

  The gods are just and of our pleasant vices

  Make instruments to plague us:

  The dark and vicious place where thee he got

  170

  Cost him his eyes.

  EDMUND Thou’st spoken Fright, ’tisF true;

  The wheel is come full circle, I am here.

  ALBANY [to Edgar]

  Methought thy very gait did prophesy

  A royal nobleness. I must embrace thee.

  Let sorrow split my heart if ever I

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  Did hate thee or thy father.

  EDGAR Worthy prince, I know’t.

  ALBANY Where have you hid yourself?

  How have you known the miseries of your father?

  EDGAR By nursing them, my lord. List a brief tale,

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  And when ’tis told, O, that my heart would burst!

  The bloody proclamation to escape

  That followed me so near – O, our lives’ sweetness,

  That we the pain of death would hourly die

  Rather than die at once! – taught me to shift

  185

  Into a madman’s rags, t’assume a semblance

  That very dogs disdained; and in this habit

  Met I my father with his bleeding rings,

  Their precious stones new lost; became his guide,

  Led him, begged for him, saved him from despair,

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  Never – O fault! – revealed myself unto him

  Until some half-hour past, when I was armed,

  Not sure, though hoping of this good success.

  I asked his blessing and from first to last

  Told him our pilgrimage. But his flawed heart,

  195

  Alack, too weak the conflict to support,

  ’Twixt two extremes of passion, joy and grief,

  Burst smilingly.

  EDMUND This speech of yours hath moved me,

  And shall perchance do good; but speak you on,

  You look as you had something more to say.

  200

  ALBANY If there be more, more woeful, hold it in,

  For I am almost ready to dissolve

  Hearing of this.

  QEDGAR This would have seemed a period

  To such as love not sorrow, but another

  To amplify too much would make much more

  205

  And top extremity.

  Whilst I was big in clamour, came there in a man

  Who, having seen me in my worst estate,

  Shunned my abhorred society, but then finding

  Who ’twas that so endured, with his strong arms,

  210

  He fastened on my neck and bellowed out

  As he’d burst heaven, threw him on my father,

  Told the most piteous tale of Lear and him

  That ever ear received, which in recounting

  His grief grew puissant and the strings of life

  215

  Began to crack. Twice then the trumpets sounded

  And there I left him tranced.

  ALBANY But who was this?

  EDGAR Kent, sir, the banished Kent, who in disguise

  Followed his enemy king and did him service

  Improper for a slave.Q

  220

  Enter a Gentleman Qwith a bloody knife. Q

  GENTLEMAN Help, help, FO, help!F

  EDGAR What kind of help?

  FALBANY Speak, man.

  EDGARF What means this bloody knife?

  GENTLEMAN ’Tis hot, it smokes,

  It came even from the heart of – FO, she’s dead!F

  ALBANY Who FdeadF? Speak, man.

  GENTLEMAN Your lady, sir, your lady; and her sister

  225

  By her is poisoned; she confesses it.

  EDMUND I was contracted to them both; all three

  Now marry in an instant.

  EDGAR Here comes Kent.

  Enter KENT.

  ALBANY Produce the bodies, be they alive or dead.

  Goneril’s and Regan’s bodies brought out.

  This judgement of the heavens that makes us tremble

  230

  Touches us not with pity – O, is this he?

  The time will not allow the compliment

  Which very manners urges.

  KENT I am come

  To bid my King and master aye good night.

  Is he not here?

  ALBANY Great thing of us forgot!

  235

  Speak, Edmund, where’s the King? And where’s Cordelia?

  Seest thou this object, Kent?

  KENT Alack, why thus?

  EDMUND Yet Edmund was beloved:

  The one the other poisoned for my sake,

  And after slew herself.

  ALBANY Even so; cover their faces.

  240

  EDMUND I pant for life. Some good I mean to do,

  Despite of mine own nature. Quickly send –

  Be brief in it – to the castle, for my writ

  Is on the life of Lear and on Cordelia;

  Nay, send in time.

  ALBANY Run, run, O run.

  245

  EDGAR

  T
o who, my lord? Who has the office?

  [to Edmund] Send

  Thy token of reprieve.

  EDMUND

  Well thought on, take my sword; Q the captain,Q

  Give it the captain.

  EDGAR [to Gentleman] Haste thee for thy life.

  [Exit Gentleman.]

  EDMUND He hath commission from thy wife and me

  250

  To hang Cordelia in the prison and

  To lay the blame upon her own despair,

  That she fordid herself.

  ALBANY The gods defend her. Bear him hence awhile.

  [Edmund is carried off.]

  Enter LEAR with CORDELIA in his arms [followed by the Gentleman].

  LEAR

  Howl, howl, howl, QhowlQ! O, you are men of stones!

  255

  Had I your tongues and eyes, I’d use them so

  That heaven’s vault should crack: she’s gone for ever.

  I know when one is dead and when one lives;

  She’s dead as earth. [He lays her down.]

  Lend me a looking-glass;

  If that her breath will mist or stain the stone,

  260

  Why then she lives.

  KENT Is this the promised end?

  EDGAR Or image of that horror?

  ALBANY Fall, and cease.

  LEAR This feather stirs, she lives: if it be so,

  It is a chance which does redeem all sorrows

  That ever I have felt.

  KENT O, my good master!

  265

  LEAR Prithee, away!

  EDGAR ’Tis noble Kent, your friend.

  LEAR A plague upon you murderers, traitors all;

  I might have saved her; now she’s gone for ever.

  Cordelia, Cordelia, stay a little. Ha?

  What is’t thou sayst? Her voice was ever soft,

  270

  Gentle and low, an excellent thing in woman.

  I killed the slave that was a-hanging thee.

  GENTLEMAN ’Tis true, my lords, he did.

  LEAR Did I not, fellow?

  I have seen the day, with my good biting falchion

  I would have made him skip. I am old now

  275

  And these same crosses spoil me.

  [to Kent] Who are you?

  Mine eyes are not o’the best, I’ll tell you straight.

  KENT If Fortune brag of two she loved and hated,

  One of them we behold.

  LEAR FThis is a dull sight:F are you not Kent?

  KENT The same;

  280

  Your servant Kent; where is your Servant Caius?

  LEAR He’s a good fellow, I can tell FyouF that;

  He’ll strike and quickly too. He’s dead and rotten.

  KENT No, my good lord, I am the very man –

  LEAR I’ll see that straight.

  285

  KENT That from your first of difference and decay

  Have followed your sad steps –

  LEAR You’re welcome hither.

  KENT

  Nor no man else. All’s cheerless, dark and deadly;

  Your eldest daughters have fordone themselves

  And desperately are dead.

  LEAR Ay, so I think.

  290

  ALBANY He knows not what he says and vain is it

  That we present us to him.

  Enter a Messenger.

  EDGAR Very bootless.

  MESSENGER [to Albany] Edmund is dead, my lord.

  ALBANY That’s but a trifle here.

  You lords and noble friends, know our intent:

  295

  What comfort to this FgreatF decay may come

  Shall be applied. For us, we will resign

  During the life of this old majesty

  To him our absolute power;

  [to Edgar and Kent] you to your rights,

  With boot and such addition as your honours

  300

  Have more than merited. All friends shall taste

  The wages of their virtue and all foes

  The cup of their deservings. O, see, see!

  LEAR And my poor fool is hanged. No, no, FnoF life!

  Why should a dog, a horse, a rat have life

  305

  And thou no breath at all? Q OQ thou’lt come no more,

  Never, never, never, Fnever, never.F

  [to Edgar?] Pray you undo this button. Thank you, sir. Q O, o, o, o.Q

  FDo you see this? Look on her: look, her lips,

  Look there, look there! [He dies.F]

  EDGAR He faints: my lord, my lord!

  310

  KENT Break, heart, I prithee break.

  EDGAR Look up, my lord.

 

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