To thee a woman's services are due:

My fool usurps my body.

Osw.

Madam, here comes my lord.

Enter ALBANY.

[Exit

Gon. I have been worth the whistle.

Alb.

O Goneril!

You are not worth the dust which the rude wind
Blows in your face. I fear your disposition:
That nature, which contemns it origin,
Cannot be border'd certain in itself;

She that herself will sliver and disbranch
From her material sap, perforce must wither
And come to deadly use.

Gon. No more; the text is foolish.

Alb. Wisdom and goodness to the vile seem vile; Filths savour but themselves. What have you done?

Tigers, not daughters, what have you perform'd ? A father, and a gracious aged man,

Whose reverence the head-lugg'd bear would lick, Most barbarous, most degenerate! have you madded.

Could my good brother suffer you to do it?
A man, a prince, by him so benefited!

If that the heavens do not their visible spirits
Send quickly down to tame these vile offences,
It will come,

Humanity must perforce prey on itself,

Like monsters of the deep.

Gon.

Milk-liver'd man!

That bear'st a cheek for blows, a head for wrongs;

Who hast not in thy brows an eye discerning
Thine honour from thy suffering; that not know'st
Fools do those villains pity who are punish'd
Ere they have done their mischief.
Where's thy

drum ?

France spreads his banners in our noiseless land,
With plumed helm thy slayer begins threats,
Whiles thou, a moral fool, sitt'st still, and criest
'Alack! why does he so?'

Alb.
See thyself, devil!
Proper deformity seems not in the fiend
So horrid as in woman.

Gon.

O vain fool!

Alb. Thou changed and self-cover'd thing, for shame,

Be-monster not thy feature. Were't my fitness
To let these hands obey my blood,

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.

Gon. Marry, your manhood now—

Enter a Messenger.

Alb. What news?

Mess. O! my good lord, the Duke of Cornwall's

dead;

Slain by his servant, going to put out

The other eye of Gloucester.

Alb.

Gloucester's eyes!

Mess. A servant that he bred, thrill'd with

remorse,

Opposed against the act, bending his sword

To his great master; who, thereat enraged,

Flew on him, and amongst them fell'd him dead; But not without that harmful stroke, which since Hath pluck'd him after.

Alb.
You justicers, that these
So speedily can venge!
Lost he his other eye?
Mess.

This shows you are above, our nether crimes

But, O poor Gloucester !

Both, both, my lord.

This letter, madam, craves a speedy answer;

"T is from your sister.

Gon. [Aside.]

One way I like this well; But being widow, and my Gloucester with her, May all the building in my fancy pluck

Upon my hateful life: another way,

The news is not so tart. I'll read, and answer.

[Exit. Alb. Where was his son when they did take his eyes?

Mess. Come with my lady hither.

Alb.

He is not here. Mess. No, my good lord; I met him back again. Alb. Knows he the wickedness?

Mess. Ay, my good lord; 't was he inform'd against him,

And quit the house on purpose that their punish

ment

Might have the freer course.

Alb. Gloucester, I live To thank thee for the love thou show'dst the king, And to revenge thine eyes. Come hither, friend: Tell me what more thou knowest.

[Exeunt.

SCENE III. The French Camp near Dover.

Enter KENT and a Gentleman.

Kent. Why the King of France is so suddenly back know you the reason?

gone

Gent. 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 his personal return was most required and

necessary.

Kent. Who hath he left behind him general?

Gent. The Marshal of France, Monsieur la Far. Kent. Did your letters pierce the queen to any demonstration of grief?

Gent. Ay, sir; she took them, read them in my presence;

And now and then an ample tear trill'd down
Her delicate cheek; it seem'd she was a queen
Over her passion; who, most rebel-like,

Sought to be king o'er her.

Kent.
O! then it moved her.
Gent. 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 play'd on her ripe lip seem'd not to know
What guests were in her eyes; which parted
thence,

As pearls from diamonds dropp'd. In brief,
Sorrow would be a rarity most beloved,

If all could so become it.

Kent.

Made she no verbal question?

Gent. Faith, once or twice she heaved the name of 'father'

Pantingly forth, as if it press'd 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
The holy water from her heavenly eyes,

And clamour-moisten'd, 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 mate could not beget

Such different issues. You spoke not with her

since?

Gent. No.

Kent. Was this before the king return'd?

Gent.

No, since. Kent. Well, sir, the poor distressed Lear's i' the

town;

Who sometime, in his better tune, remembers
What we are come about, and by no means

Will yield to see his daughter.

Gent.

Why, good sir?

Kent. A sovereign shame so elbows him: his own unkindness,

That stripp'd her from his benediction, turn'd her
To foreign casualties, gave her dear rights
To his dog-hearted daughters, these things sting
His mind so venomously that burning shame
Detains him from Cordelia.

Gent.
Alack! poor gentleman.
Kent. Of Albany's and Cornwall's powers you