SCENE III.-The British Camp, near Dover. Enter, in conquest, with drum and colours, EDMUND; LEAR and CORDELIA, as Prisoners; Captain, Officers, Soldiers, &c. Edm. Some officers take them away: good guard, Until their greater pleasures first be known, That are to censure them. Cor. We two alone will sing like birds i' the cage: Take them away. He that parts us shall bring a brand from heaven, Come. [Exeunt LEAR and CORDELIA, guarded. Take thou this note; [Giving a paper.] go, follow them to prison. One step I have advanc'd thee; if thou dost Mark,-I say, instantly; and carry it so, Capt. I cannot draw a cart, nor eat dried oats; If it be man's work, I will do it. [Exit Captain. Flourish. Enter ALBANY, GONERIL, REGAN, Officers, and Attendants. Alb. Sir, you have shown to-day your valiant strain, And fortune led you well. You have the captives Edm. Sir, I thought it fit My reason all the same; and they are ready Reg. In my rights, By me invested, he compeers the best. Gon. That were the most, if he should husband you. Reg. Jesters do oft prove prophets. Holla, holla! That eye that told you so look'd but a-squint. Reg. Lady, I am not well; else I should answer Gon. Half-blooded fellow, yes. Reg. Let the drum strike, and prove my title thine. [To EDMUND. Alb. Stay yet; hear reason.--Edmund, I arrest thee On capital treason; and, in thy arrest, This gilded serpent. [Pointing to GONERIL.]-For your claim, fair sister, I bar it in the interest of my wife; And I, her husband, contradict your bans. Gon. An interlude! lists of the army, will maintain upon Edmund, supposed earl of Gloster, that he is a manifold traitor, let him appear at the third sound of the trumpet. He is bold in his defence." Upon this call o' the trumpet. Her. Your name? your quality? and why you answer I come to cope withal. Alb. Which is that adversary? My oath, and my profession. I protest, Thou liest. 66 Edm. In wisdom, I should ask thy name; But, since thy outside looks so fair and warlike, And that thy tongue some 'say of breeding breathes, What safe and nicely I might well delay 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; 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. [Alarums. They fight. EDMUND falls. Alb. O, save him! save him! Gon. This is mere practice, Gloster. By the law of arms, thou wast not bound to answer An unknown opposite; thou art not vanquish'd, But cozen'd and beguil'd. Alb. Shut your mouth, dame; Or with this paper shall I stop it ?-Hold, sir!— Thou worse than any name, read thine own evil : No tearing, lady; I perceive, you know it. [Gives the letter to EDMUND. Gon. Say, if I do, the laws are mine, not thine: Who can arraign me for't? Alb. Know'st thou this paper? Gon. Most monstrous! Ask me not what I know. [Exit GONERIL. Alb. Go after her: she's desperate; govern her. [Exit an Officer. Edm. What you have charged me with, that have I done, And more, much more; the time will bring it out: Edg. Let's exchange charity. I am no less in blood than thou art, Edmund; The dark and vicious place where thee he got, Edm. Worthy prince, I know't. And, when 'tis told, O, that my heart would burst!- Edm. This speech of yours hath mov'd me, And shall, perchance, do good; but speak you on: You look as you had something more to say. Alb. If there be more more woful, hold it in, Edg. This would have seem'd a period To such as love not sorrow; but another, To amplify too-much, would make much more, And top extremity. Whilst I was big in clamour, came there a man, As he'd burst heaven; threw me on my father; I know when one is dead, and when one lives; Is this the promis'd end? Lear. Pr'ythee, away. Edg. "Tis noble Kent, your friend. Lear. A plague upon you, murderers, traitors all! I might have sav'd her; now, she's gone for ever!Cordelia, Cordelia! stay a little. Ha! What is't thou say'st?-Her voice was ever soft, Gentle, and low-an excellent thing in woman.I kill'd the slave that was a hanging thee.. Off. 'Tis true, my lords, he did. Lear. Did I not, fellow? I have seen the day, with my good biting faulchion I would have made them skip: I am old now, And these same crosses spoil me.-Who are you? Mine eyes are not o' the best :-I'll tell you straight. Kent. If fortune brag of two she lov'd and hated, One of them we behold. Lear. This is a dull sight.-Are you not Kent? Kent. The same, Your servant Kent. Where is your servant Caius? Lear. He's a good fellow, I can tell you that; He'll strike, and quickly too.-He's dead and rotten. Kent. No, my good lord; I am the very manLear. I'll see that straight. Kent. That from your first of difference and decay, Have follow'd your sad steps. Lear. You are welcome hither. Kent. Nor no man else. All's cheerless, dark, What comfort to this great decay may come, Lear. And my poor fool is hang'd! No, no, no life: Why should a dog, a horse, a rat, have life, Pray you, undo this button: thank you, sir.- Edg. hates him, Is general woe.-Friends of my soul, you twain My master calls me; I must not say, no. Alb. The weight of this sad time we must obey; Speak what we feel, not what we ought to say. The oldest hath borne most: we, that are young, Shall never see so much, nor live so long. [Exeunt, with a dead march "-the division of the kingdoms."-There is something of obscurity or inaccuracy in this preparatory scene. The king has already divided his kingdom, and yet when he enters, he examines his daughters to discover in what proportion he should divide it. Perhaps Kent and Gloster only were privy to his design, which he still kept in his own hands, to be changed or performed, as subsequent reasons should determine him.JOHNSON. Coleridge goes deeper into the character of Lear, and shows that the division having been determined upon, the trial was but a trick in conformity with his peculiar disposition, but resulting contrary to his expectations. See "General Remarks" on Lear's character. "Meantime we shall express," etc.-That is, says Johnson, "We have already made known our desire of parting the kingdom: we will now discover, what has not been told before,-the reasons by which we shall regulate the partition." "Beyond all manner of so MUCH I love you"-Beyond all assignable quantity. I love you beyond limits, and cannot say it is so much, for how much soever I should name, it would be yet more.-JOHNSON. "I am made of that self metal as my sister," etc.That is, "Estimate me at her value; my love has equal claim to your favour: only she comes short of me in this, that I profess myself an enemy to all other joys which the most precious aggregation of sense can bestow." "Square" is here used for the whole complement, as circle is now sometimes used. "No less in space, VALIDITY, and pleasure."-Validity is used here and elsewhere by Shakespeare, in its original sense, according to its Latin derivation, for worth, value, not as now, for legal force or genuineness. Thus, in ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL, he speaks of a ring of "rich validity." "Nothing, my lord."-There is something of disgust at the ruthless hypocrisy of her sisters, and some little faulty admixture of pride and sullenness in Cordelia's "Nothing;" and her tone is well contrived, indeed, to lessen the glaring absurdity of Lear's conduct, but answers the yet more important purpose of forcing away the attention from the nursery-tale, the moment it has served its end, that of supplying the canvass for the picture. This is also materially furthered by Kent's opposition, which displays Lear's moral incapability of resigning the sovereign power in the very act of disposing of it. Kent is, perhaps, the nearest to perfect goodness in all Shakespeare's characters, and yet the most individualized. There is an extraordinary charm in his bluntness, which is that only of a nobleman arising from a contempt of overstrained courtesy; and combined with easy placability where goodness of heart is apparent. His passionate affection for, and fidelity to Lear, act on our feelings in Lear's own favour: virtue itself seems to be in company with him.-COLERIDGE. "Come not between the dragon and his wrath."Mr. Dana, in his beautiful and feeling criticism on "Kean's Acting," in one of the papers of his " Idle Man," thus remarks upon the Poet's design in displaying the violence and uncontrolled passions of Lear in the very opening of the play. After noticing the objections made by some critics to the abrupt violence with which Kean began in LEAR, he thus proceeds: "If this is a fault, it is Shakespeare and not the actor, who is to blame, for we have no doubt that he conceived it according to his author. In most instances, Shakespeare has given us the gradual growth of a passion, with such little accompaniments as agree with it, and go to make up the entire man. In LEAR, his object being to represent the beginning and course of insanity, he has properly gone but little back of it, and introduced to us an old man of good feelings, but one who had lived without any true principle of conduct, and whose ungoverned passions had grown strong with age, and were ready, upon any disappointment, to make shipwreck of an intellect always weak. To bring this about, he begins with an 53 |