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Before the DUKE OF ALBANY’S Palace. | |
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Enter GONERIL and EDMUND. | |
| Gon. Welcome, my lord; I marvel our mild husband | |
| Not met us on the way. [Enter OSWALD.] Now, where’s your master? | |
| Osw. Madam, within; but never man so chang’d. | 5 |
| I told him of the army that was landed; | |
| He smil’d at it: I told him you were coming; | |
| His answer was, ‘The worse:’ of Gloucester’s treachery, | |
| And of the loyal service of his son, | |
| When I inform’d him, then he call’d me sot, | 10 |
| And told me I had turn’d the wrong side out: | |
| What most he should dislike seems pleasant to him; | |
| What like, offensive. | |
| Gon. [To EDMUND.] Then, shall you go no further. | |
| It is the cowish terror of his spirit | 15 |
| That dares not undertake; he’ll not feel wrongs | |
| Which tie him to an answer. Our wishes on the way | |
| May prove effects. Back, Edmund, to my brother; | |
| Hasten his musters and conduct his powers: | |
| I must change arms at home, and give the distaff | 20 |
| Into my husband’s hands. This trusty servant | |
| Shall pass between us; ere long you are like to hear, | |
| If you dare venture in your own behalf, | |
| A mistress’s command. Wear this; spare speech; [Giving a favour. | |
| Decline your head: this kiss, if it durst speak, | 25 |
| Would stretch thy spirits up into the air. | |
| Conceive, and fare thee well. | |
| Edm. Yours in the ranks of death. | |
| Gon. My most dear Gloucester! [Exit EDMUND. | |
| O! the difference of man and man! | 30 |
| To thee a woman’s services are due: | |
| My fool usurps my bed. | |
| Osw. Madam, here comes my lord. [Exit. | |
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Enter ALBANY. | |
| Gon. I have been worth the whistle. | 35 |
| Alb. O Gonerill | |
| You are not worth the dust which the rude wind | |
| Blows in your face. I fear your disposition: | |
| That nature, which contemns its origin, | |
| Cannot be border’d certain in itself; | 40 |
| 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; | 45 |
| 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. | 50 |
| 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, | 55 |
| 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 | 60 |
| 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, | 65 |
| Whilst 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. | 70 |
| 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 | 75 |
| Thy flesh and bones; howe’er thou art a fiend, | |
| A woman’s shape doth shield thee. | |
| Gon. Marry, your manhood.—Mew! | |
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Enter a Messenger. | |
| Alb. What news? | 80 |
| 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, | 85 |
| Oppos’d against the act, bending his sword | |
| To his great master; who, thereat enrag’d, | |
| Flew on him, and amongst them fell’d him dead; | |
| But not without that harmful stroke, which since | |
| Hath pluck’d him after. | 90 |
| Alb. This shows you are above, | |
| You justicers, that these our nether crimes | |
| So speedily can venge! But, O poor Gloucester! | |
| Lost he his other eye? | |
| Mess. Both, both, my lord. | 95 |
| This letter, madam, craves a speedy answer; | |
| ’Tis 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 | 100 |
| Upon my hateful life: another way, | |
| This news is not so tart. [To Messenger.] 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. | 105 |
| Mess. No, my good lord; I met him back again. | |
| Alb. Knows he the wickedness? | |
| Mess. Ay, my good lord; ’twas he inform’d against him, | |
| And quit the house on purpose that their punishment | |
| Might have the freer course. | 110 |
| 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. | |
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