What means your graces? Good my friends, consider

You are my guests. Do me no foul play, friends.

CORNWALL (to Servants)

Bind him, I say.

REGAN Hard, hard! O filthy traitor!

GLOUCESTER

Unmerciful lady as you are, I’m none.

CORNWALL (to Servants)

To this chair bind him. (To Gloucester) Villain, thou shalt find—

Regan plucks Gloucester’s beard

GLOUCESTER

By the kind gods, ’tis most ignobly done,

To pluck me by the beard.

REGAN So white, and such a traitor?

GLOUCESTER Naughty lady,

These hairs which thou dost ravish from my chin

Will quicken and accuse thee. I am your host.

With robbers’ hands my hospitable favours

You should not ruffle thus. What will you do?

CORNWALL

Come, sir, what letters had you late from France?

REGAN

Be simple-answered, for we know the truth.

CORNWALL

And what confederacy have you with the traitors

Late footed in the kingdom?

REGAN To whose hands

You have sent the lunatic King. Speak.

GLOUCESTER

I have a letter guessingly set down,

Which came from one that’s of a neutral heart,

And not from one opposed.

CORNWALL

Cunning.

REGAN

And false.

CORNWALL

Where hast thou sent the King?

GLOUCESTER

To Dover.

REGAN

Wherefore to Dover? Wast thou not charged at peril—

CORNWALL

Wherefore to Dover?—Let him answer that.

GLOUCESTER

I am tied to th’ stake, and I must stand the course.

REGAN Wherefore to Dover?

GLOUCESTER

Because I would not see thy cruel nails

Pluck out his poor old eyes, nor thy fierce sister

In his anointed flesh stick boarish fangs.

The sea, with such a storm as his bare head

In hell-black night endured, would have buoyed up

And quenched the stellèd fires.

Yet, poor old heart, he holp the heavens to rain.

If wolves had at thy gate howled that stern time,

Thou shouldst have said ‘Good porter, turn the key;

All cruels I’ll subscribe.’ But I shall see

The winged vengeance overtake such children.

CORNWALL

See’t shalt thou never.—Fettows, hold the chair.—

Upon these eyes of thine I’ll set my foot.

GLOUCESTER

He that will think to live till he be old

Give me some help!—O cruel! O you gods!

⌈Cornwall pulls out one of Gloucester’s eyes and stamps on it⌉

REGAN (to Cornwall)

One side will mock another; th’other, too.

CORNWALL (to Gloucester)

If you see vengeance—

SERVANT

Hold your hand, my lord.

I have served you ever since I was a child,

But better service have I never done you

Than now to bid you hold.

REGAN

How now, you dog!

SERVANT

If you did wear a beard upon your chin

I’d shake it on this quarrel. ⌈To Cornwall⌉ What do

you mean?

CORNWALL My villein!

SERVANT

Nay then, come on, and take the chance of anger.

They draw and fight

REGAN (to another Servant)

Give me thy sword. A peasant stand up thus!

⌈She takes a sword and runs at him behind⌉

SERVANT (to Gloucester)

O, I am slain. My lord, you have one eye left

To see some mischief on him.

⌈Regan stabs him again⌉

O!

He dies

CORNWALL

Lest it see more, prevent it. Out, vile jelly!

He ⌈pulls out⌉ Gloucester’s other eye

Where is thy lustre now?

GLOUCESTER

All dark and comfortless. Where’s my son Edmond?

Edmond, enkindle all the sparks of nature

To quite this horrid act.

REGAN

Out, treacherous villain!

Thou call’st on him that hates thee. It was he

That made the overture of thy treasons to us,

Who is too good to pity thee.

GLOUCESTER

O, my follies! Then Edgar was abused.

Kind gods, forgive me that, and prosper him!

REGAN (to Servants)

Go thrust him out at gates, and let him smell

His way to Dover.

Exit one or more with Gloucester

How is’t, my lord? How look you?

CORNWALL

I have received a hurt. Follow me, lady.

(To Servants) Turn out that eyeless villain. Throw this

slave

Upon the dunghill. Regan, I bleed apace.

Untimely comes this hurt. Give me your arm.

Exeunt ⌈with the body⌉

4.1 Enter Edgar as a Bedlam beggar

EDGAR

Yet better thus and known to be contemned

Than still contemned and flattered. To be worst,

The low’st and most dejected thing of fortune,

Stands still in esperance, lives not in fear.

The lamentable change is from the best;

The worst returns to laughter. Welcome, then,

Thou unsubstantial air that I embrace.

The wretch that thou hast blown unto the worst

Owes nothing to thy blasts.

Enter the Duke of Gloucester led by an Old Man

But who comes here?

My father, parti-eyed? World, world, O world!

But that thy strange mutations make us hate thee,

Life would not yield to age.

⌈Edgar stands aside⌉

OLD MAN (to Gloucester) O my good lord,

I have been your tenant and your father’s tenant

These fourscore years.

GLOUCESTER

Away, get thee away, good friend, be gone.

Thy comforts can do me no good at all;

Thee they may hurt.

OLD MAN

You cannot see your way.

GLOUCESTER

I have no way, and therefore want no eyes.

I stumbled when I saw. Full oft ’tis seen

Our means secure us, and our mere defects

Prove our commodities. O dear son Edgar,

The food of thy abused father’s wrath-

Might I but live to see thee in my touch

I’d say I had eyes again.

OLD MAN

How, now? Who’s there?

EDGAR (aside)

O gods! Who is’t can say ‘I am at the worst’?