This feems a fair deferving, and muft draw me Changes to a part of the beath with a hovel. Enter Lear, Kent, and Fool. [Exit. Kent. Here is the place, my lord; good my lord, Lear. Let me alone. Kent. Good my lord, enter here. Lear. Wilt break my heart? Kent. I'd rather break mine own: good my lord, enter. Lear. Thou think'st 'tis much, that this contentious ftorm Invades us to the fkin: fo 'tis to thee; The leffer is fcarce felt. Thou'dft fhun a bear; But if thy flight lay toward the 3 raging fea, Thou'dft meet the bear i' the mouth. When the mind's free, The body's delicate: the tempeft in my mind. 3 raging fea,] Such is the reading of that which appears to be the elder of the two quartos. The other, with the folio, reads, roaring fea. STEEVENS. Cc 3 Your Your old kind father, whose frank heart gave all,— Kent. Good my lord, enter here. Lear. Pr'ythee, go in thyfelf; feek thine own ease 3 Nay, get thee in. I'll pray, and then I'll fleep.- Edg. [within.] Fathom and half, fathom and half! poor Tom. Fool. Come not in here, nuncle, here's a spirit. Help me, help me! [The Fool runs out from the bovel. Kent. Give me thy hand. Who's there? Fool. A fpirit, a fpirit! he fays his name's poor Tom. Kent. What art thou, that doft grumble there i' the ftraw? Come forth. Enter Edgar, difguis'd like a madman. Edg. Away! the foul fiend follows me! Through the fharp hawthorn blows the cold wind.3 Humph! go to thy cold bed and warm thee. I 1 In, boy; go first.] Thefe two lines were added in the author's revifion, and are only in the folio. They are very judiciously intended to reprefent that humility, or tendernefs, or negle& of forms, which affliction forces on the mind. JOHNS, Humph! go to thy bed- So the folio. The quarto, Go to thy cold bed and warm thee. JOHNSON. 2 Lear. Lear. Didft thou give all to thy daughters? art thou come to this? And Edg. Who gives any thing to poor Tom? whom the foul fiend hath 3 led through fire and through flame, through ford and whirlpool, o'er bog and quagmire; that hath laid knives under his pillow, and halters in his pew; fet ratsbane by his porridge; made him proud of heart, to ride on a bay trotting horfe over four-inch'd bridges, to course his own fhadow for a traitor. Bless thy five wits! Tom's a-cold. O do de, do de, do de. Blefs thee from whirlwinds, ftarblafting, and 5 taking! Do poor Tom fome charity, whom the foul fiend vexes. There could I have him now, and there,—and there,—and there again, and there. [Storm Still Lear. What, have his daughters brought him to this pass? -Couldft thou fave nothing? Didft thou give 'em all? Fool. Nay, he referv'd a blanket, elfe we had been all fhamed. Lear. Now, all the plagues that in the pendulous air Hang fated o'er men's faults, light on thy daughters! Kent. He hath no daughters, Sir. Lear. Death! traitor: nothing could have fubdued nature To fuch a lowness, but his unkind daughters. 3 led through fire and through flame,-] Alluding to the ignis fatuns, fuppofed to be lights kindled by mifchievous beings to lead travellers into deftruction. JOHNSON. 4 laid knives under his pillow,] He recounts the temptations by which he was prompted to fuicide; the opportunities. of deftroying himself, which often occurred to him in his melancholy moods. JOHNSON. Shakespeare found this charge against the fiend, with many others of the fame nature, in Harfenet's Detection, and his ufed the very words of it. The book was printed in 1603. STEEV. s taking!] To take is to blaft, or strike with malignant influence: ftrike her young limbs, Ye taking airs, with lamenefs. JOHNSON. Cc 4 Is Is it the fashion, that discarded fathers Edg. Pillicock fat on pillicock-hill, Halloo, halloo, loo, loo! Fool. This cold night will turn us all to fools and madmen. Edg. Take heed o' the foul fiend. Obey thy parents. Keep thy word juftly. Swear not. Commit not with man's fworn fpoufe. Set not thy fweet heart on proud array. Tom's a-cold. Lear. What haft thou been? Edg. A ferving-man, proud in heart and mind; that curl'd my hair, 7 wore gloves in my cap, ferv'd the luft of my miftrefs's heart, and did the act of darkness with her; fwore as many oaths as I fpake words, and broke them in the fweet face of heaven. One that slept in the contriving luft, and wak'd to do it. Wine lov'd I deeply; dice dearly; and in woman, out-paramour'd the Turk. Falfe of heart, light of ear, bloody of 6 8 pelican daughters.] The young pelican is fabled to fuck the mother's blood. JOHNSON. 7 wore gloves in my cap,-] i. e. His mistress's favours : which was the fashion of that time. So in the play called Campafpe, Thy men turned to women, thy foldiers to lovers, gloves worn in velvet caps, infead of plumes in graven "helmets." WARBURTON. 66 It was the custom to wear gloves in the hat on three diftin&t occafions, viz. as the favour of a mistress, the memorial of a friend, and as a mark to be challenged by an enemy. Prince Henry boats that he will plk a glove from the commoneft creature, and fix it in his helmet. Portia, in her affumed character, afks Baffanio for his gloves, which the fays she will wear for his fake: and King Henry V. gives the pretended glove of Alenfon to Fluellen, which afterwards occafions his quarrel with the English foldier. STEEVENS. 8 - - light of ear,-] i. e. Credulous, WARBURTON. Not merely credulous, but credulous of evil, ready to receive malicious reports. JOHNSON, hand; hand'; hog in floth, fox in stealth, wolf in greediness, dog in madnefs, lion in prey. Let not the creaking of fhoes, nor the rustling of filks, betray thy poor heart to woman. Keep thy foot out of brothels, thy hand out of plackets, thy pen from lenders' books, and defy the foul fiend. Still through the hawthorn blows the cold wind: fays fuum, mun, ha no nonny, 'dolphin my boy, boy, Seffy: let him trot by. [Stormfill. 9 Lear. bog in floth, fox-in ftealth, quolf in greediness, &c.] The Jefuits pretended to caft the feven deadly fins out of Mainy in the fhape of those animals 'that reprefented them; and before each was caft out, Mainy by geftures acted that particular fin; curling his hair to fhew pride, vomiting for gluttony, gaping and fnoring for floth, &c. Harfenet's book, pp. 279, 280, 226. To this probably our author alludes. STEEVENS. ง Jays fuum, mun, nonny, &c.] Of this paffage I can make hothing. I believe it corrupt: for wildness, nor nonfenfe, is the effect of a difordered imagination. The quarto reads, bay no on ny, dolphins, my boy, cease, let him tret by. Of of interpreting this there is not much hope or much need. But any thing may be tried. The madman, now counterfeiting a proud fit, fuppofes himself met on the road by fome one that difputes the way, and cries Hey!-No-but altering his mind, condefcends to let him pafs, and calls to his boy Dolphin (Rodolph) not to contend with him. On-Dolphins my boy, ceafe. Let him trot by. JOHNSON. The reading of the quarto is right. Hey no nonný is the burthen of a fong in The Two Noble Kinsmen (faid to be written by Shakespeare in conjunction with Fletcher) and was probably common to many others. Dolphin, my boy, my boy, Ceafe, let him trot by; It feemeth not that such a foe From me or you would fly. This is a ftanza from a very old ballad written on fome battle fought in France, during which the king, unwilling to put the fufpected valour of his fon the Dauphin, f. e. Dolphin fo called and fpelt at thofe times) to the trial, is reprefented as wishing to reftrain him from any attempt to establish an opinion of his courage on an adverfary who wears the least appearance of ftrength; and at laft affilts in propping up a dead body against a tree for him to try his manhood upon. Therefore as different champions are fuppofed creffing the field, the king always discovers fome objection to his attacking each of |