wrath the more, and like a frantic patient who kills his physician, and
loves his mortal disease, he banished this true servant, and allotted
him but five days to make his preparations for departure; but if on the
sixth his hated person was found within the realm of Britain, that
moment was to be his death. And Kent bade farewell to the king, and
said, that since he chose to show himself in such fashion, it was but
banishment to stay there; and before he went, he recommended Cordelia to
the protection of the gods, the maid who had so rightly thought, and so
discreetly spoken; and only wished that her sisters' large speeches
might be answered with deeds of love; and then he went, as he said, to
shape his old course to a new country.
The King of France and Duke of Burgundy were now called in to hear the
determination of Lear about his youngest daughter, and to know whether
they would persist in their courtship to Cordelia, now that she was
under her father's displeasure, and had no fortune but her own person to
recommend her: and the Duke of Burgundy declined the match, and would
not take her to wife upon such conditions; but the King of France,
understanding what the nature of the fault had been which had lost her
the love of her father, that it was only a tardiness of speech, and the
not being able to frame her tongue to flattery like her sisters, took
this young maid by the hand, and saying that her virtues were a dowry
above a kingdom, bade Cordelia to take farewell of her sisters and of
her father, though he had been unkind, and she should go with him, and
be queen of him and of fair France, and reign over fairer possessions
than her sisters: and he called the Duke of Burgundy in contempt a
waterish duke, because his love for this young maid had in a moment run
all away like water.
Then Cordelia with weeping eyes took leave of her sisters, and besought
them to love their father well, and make good their professions: and
they sullenly told her not to prescribe to them, for they knew their
duty; but to strive to content her husband, who had taken her (as they
tauntingly expressed it) as Fortune's alms. And Cordelia with a heavy
heart departed, for she knew the cunning of her sisters, and she wished
her father in better hands than she was about to leave him in.
Cordelia was no sooner gone, than the devilish dispositions of her
sisters began to show themselves in their true colours. Even before the
expiration of the first month, which Lear was to spend by agreement with
his eldest daughter Goneril, the old king began to find out the
difference between promises and performances. This wretch having got
from her father all that he had to bestow, even to the giving away of
the crown from off his head, began to grudge even those small remnants
of royalty which the old man had reserved to himself, to please his
fancy with the idea of being still a king. She could not bear to see him
and his hundred knights. Every time she met her father, she put on a
frowning countenance; and when the old man wanted to speak with her, she
would feign sickness, or anything to get rid of the sight of him; for it
was plain that she esteemed his old age a useless burden, and his
attendants an unnecessary expense: not only she herself slackened in her
expressions of duty to the king, but by her example, and (it is to be
feared) not without her private instructions, her very servants affected
to treat him with neglect, and would either refuse to obey his orders,
or still more contemptuously pretend not to hear them. Lear could not
but perceive this alteration in the behaviour of his daughter, but he
shut his eyes against it as long as he could, as people commonly are
unwilling to believe the unpleasant consequences which their own
mistakes and obstinacy have brought upon them.
True love and fidelity are no more to be estranged by _ill_, than
falsehood and hollow-heartedness can be conciliated by _good_, _usage_.
This eminently appears in the instance of the good Earl of Kent, who,
though banished by Lear, and his life made forfeit if he were found in
Britain, chose to stay and abide all consequences, as long as there was
a chance of his being useful to the king his master. See to what mean
shifts and disguises poor loyalty is forced to submit sometimes; yet it
counts nothing base or unworthy, so as it can but do service where it
owes an obligation!
In the disguise of a serving man, all his greatness and pomp laid aside,
this good earl proffered his services to the king, who, not knowing him
to be Kent in that disguise, but pleased with a certain plainness, or
rather bluntness in his answers, which the earl put on (so different
from that smooth oily flattery which he had so much reason to be sick
of, having found the effects not answerable in his daughter), a bargain
was quickly struck, and Lear took Kent into his service by the name of
Caius, as he called himself, never suspecting him to be his once great
favourite, the high and mighty Earl of Kent.
This Caius quickly found means to show his fidelity and love to his
royal master: for Goneril's steward that same day behaving in a
disrespectful manner to Lear, and giving him saucy looks and language,
as no doubt he was secretly encouraged to do by his mistress, Caius, not
enduring to hear so open an affront put upon his majesty, made no more
ado but presently tripped up his heels, and laid the unmannerly slave in
the kennel; for which friendly service Lear became more and more
attached to him.
Nor was Kent the only friend Lear had. In his degree, and as far as so
insignificant a personage could show his love, the poor fool, or jester,
that had been of his palace while Lear had a palace, as it was the
custom of kings and great personages at that time to keep a fool (as he
was called) to make them sport after serious business: this poor fool
clung to Lear after he had given away his crown, and by his witty
sayings would keep up his good humour, though he could not refrain
sometimes from jeering at his master for his imprudence in uncrowning
himself, and giving all away to his daughters; at which time, as he
rhymingly expressed it, these daughters
For sudden joy did weep
And he for sorrow sung,
That such a king should play bo-peep
And go the fools among.
And in such wild sayings, and scraps of songs, of which he had plenty,
this pleasant honest fool poured out his heart even in the presence of
Goneril herself, in many a bitter taunt and jest which cut to the quick:
such as comparing the king to the hedge-sparrow, who feeds the young of
the cuckoo till they grow old enough, and then has its head bit off for
its pains; and saying, that an ass may know when the cart draws the
horse (meaning that Lear's daughters, that ought to go behind, now
ranked before their father); and that Lear was no longer Lear, but the
shadow of Lear: for which free speeches he was once or twice threatened
to be whipped.
The coolness and falling off of respect which Lear had begun to
perceive, were not all which this foolish fond father was to suffer from
his unworthy daughter: she now plainly told him that his staying in her
palace was inconvenient so long as he insisted upon keeping up an
establishment of a hundred knights; that this establishment was useless
and expensive, and only served to fill her court with riot and feasting;
and she prayed him that he would lessen their number, and keep none but
old men about him, such as himself, and fitting his age.
Lear at first could not believe his eyes or ears, nor that it was his
daughter who spoke so unkindly. He could not believe that she who had
received a crown from him could seek to cut off his train, and grudge
him the respect due to his old age. But she, persisting in her undutiful
demand, the old man's rage was so excited, that he called her a detested
kite, and said that she spoke an untruth; and so indeed she did, for
the hundred knights were all men of choice behaviour and sobriety of
manners, skilled in all particulars of duty, and not given to rioting or
feasting, as she said. And he bid his horses to be prepared, for he
would go to his other daughter, Regan, he and his hundred knights; and
he spoke of ingratitude, and said it was a marble-hearted devil, and
showed more hideous in a child than the sea-monster. And he cursed his
eldest daughter Goneril so as was terrible to hear; praying that she
might never have a child, or if she had, that it might live to return
that scorn and contempt upon her which she had shown to him: that she
might feel how sharper than a serpent's tooth it was to have a thankless
child. And Goneril's husband, the Duke of Albany, beginning to excuse
himself for any share which Lear might suppose he had in the unkindness,
Lear would not hear him out, but in a rage ordered his horses to be
saddled, and set out with his followers for the abode of Regan, his
other daughter. And Lear thought to himself how small the fault of
Cordelia (if it was a fault) now appeared, in comparison with her
sister's, and he wept; and then he was ashamed that such a creature as
Goneril should have so much power over his manhood as to make him weep.
Regan and her husband were keeping their court in great pomp and state
at their palace; and Lear despatched his servant Caius with letters to
his daughter, that she might be prepared for his reception, while he and
his train followed after. But it seems that Goneril had been before-hand
with him, sending letters also to Regan, accusing her father of
waywardness and ill humours, and advising her not to receive so great a
train as he was bringing with him. This messenger arrived at the same
time with Caius, and Caius and he met: and who should it be but Caius's
old enemy the steward, whom he had formerly tripped up by the heels for
his saucy behaviour to Lear. Caius not liking the fellow's look, and
suspecting what he came for, began to revile him, and challenged him to
fight, which the fellow refusing, Caius, in a fit of honest passion,
beat him soundly, as such a mischief-maker and carrier of wicked
messages deserved; which coming to the ears of Regan and her husband,
they ordered Caius to be put in stocks, though he was a messenger from
the king her father, and in that character demanded the highest respect:
so that the first thing the king saw when he entered the castle, was his
faithful servant Caius sitting in that disgraceful situation.
This was but a bad omen of the reception which he was to expect; but a
worse followed, when, upon inquiry for his daughter and her husband, he
was told they were weary with travelling all night, and could not see
him; and when lastly, upon his insisting in a positive and angry manner
to see them, they came to greet him, whom should he see in their company
but the hated Goneril, who had come to tell her own story, and set her
sister against the king her father!
This sight much moved the old man, and still more to see Regan take her
by the hand; and he asked Goneril if she was not ashamed to look upon
his old white beard. And Regan advised him to go home again with
Goneril, and live with her peaceably, dismissing half of his attendants,
and to ask her forgiveness; for he was old and wanted discretion, and
must be ruled and led by persons that had more discretion than himself.
And Lear showed how preposterous that would sound, if he were to go down
on his knees, and beg of his own daughter for food and raiment, and he
argued against such an unnatural dependence, declaring his resolution
never to return with her, but to stay where he was with Regan, he and
his hundred knights; for he said that she had not forgot the half of the
kingdom which he had endowed her with, and that her eyes were not fierce
like Goneril's, but mild and kind. And he said that rather than return
to Goneril, with half his train cut off, he would go over to France,
and beg a wretched pension of the king there, who had married his
youngest daughter without a portion.
But he was mistaken in expecting kinder treatment of Regan than he had
experienced from her sister Goneril. As if willing to outdo her sister
in unfilial behaviour, she declared that she thought fifty knights too
many to wait upon him: that five-and-twenty were enough. Then Lear, nigh
heart-broken, turned to Goneril and said that he would go back with her,
for her fifty doubled five-and-twenty, and so her love was twice as much
as Regan's. But Goneril excused herself, and said, what need of so many
as five-and-twenty? or even ten? or five? when he might be waited upon
by her servants, or her sister's servants? So these two wicked
daughters, as if they strove to exceed each other in cruelty to their
old father, who had been so good to them, by little and little would
have abated him of all his train, all respect (little enough for him
that once commanded a kingdom), which was left him to show that he had
once been a king! Not that a splendid train is essential to happiness,
but from a king to a beggar is a hard change, from commanding millions
to be without one attendant; and it was the ingratitude in his
daughters' denying it, more than what he would suffer by the want of it,
which pierced this poor king to the heart; insomuch, that with this
double ill-usage, and vexation for having so foolishly given away a
kingdom, his wits began to be unsettled, and while he said he knew not
what, he vowed revenge against those unnatural hags, and to make
examples of them that should be a terror to the earth!
While he was thus idly threatening what his weak arm could never
execute, night came on, and a loud storm of thunder and lightning with
rain; and his daughters still persisting in their resolution not to
admit his followers, he called for his horses, and chose rather to
encounter the utmost fury of the storm abroad, than stay under the same
roof with these ungrateful daughters: and they, saying that the injuries
which wilful men procure to themselves are their just punishment,
suffered him to go in that condition and shut their doors upon him.
The winds were high, and the rain and storm increased, when the old man
sallied forth to combat with the elements, less sharp than his
daughters' unkindness. For many miles about there was scarce a bush; and
there upon a heath, exposed to the fury of the storm in a dark night,
did King Lear wander out, and defy the winds and the thunder; and he bid
the winds to blow the earth into the sea, or swell the waves of the sea
till they drowned the earth, that no token might remain of any such
ungrateful animal as man. The old king was now left with no other
companion than the poor fool, who still abided with him, with his merry
conceits striving to outjest misfortune, saying it was but a naughty
night to swim in, and truly the king had better go in and ask his
daughter's blessing:--
But he that has a little tiny wit.
With heigh ho, the wind and the rain!
Must make content with his fortunes fit.
Though the rain it raineth every day:
and swearing it was a brave night to cool a lady's pride.
Thus poorly accompanied, this once great monarch was found by his
ever-faithful servant the good Earl of Kent, now transformed to Caius,
who ever followed close at his side, though the king did not know him to
be the earl; and he said, "Alas! sir, are you here? creatures that love
night, love not such nights as these. This dreadful storm has driven the
beasts to their hiding places. Man's nature cannot endure the affliction
or the fear." And Lear rebuked him and said, these lesser evils were not
felt, where a greater malady was fixed. When the mind is at ease, the
body has leisure to be delicate, but the tempest in his mind did take
all feeling else from his senses, but of that which beat at his
heart. And he spoke of filial ingratitude, and said it was all one as if
the mouth should tear the hand for lifting food to it; for parents were
hands and food and everything to children.
[Illustration: THERE UPON A HEATH, EXPOSED TO THE FURY OF THE STORM ON A
DARK NIGHT, DID KING LEAR WANDER OUT]
But the good Caius still persisting in his entreaties that the king
would not stay out in the open air, at last persuaded him to enter a
little wretched hovel which stood upon the heath, where the fool first
entering, suddenly ran back terrified, saying that he had seen a spirit.
But upon examination this spirit proved to be nothing more than a poor
Bedlam beggar, who had crept into this deserted hovel for shelter, and
with his talk about devils frighted the fool, one of those poor lunatics
who are either mad, or feign to be so, the better to extort charity from
the compassionate country people, who go about the country, calling
themselves poor Tom and poor Turlygood, saying, "Who gives anything to
poor Tom?" sticking pins and nails and sprigs of rosemary into their
arms to make them bleed; and with such horrible actions, partly by
prayers, and partly with lunatic curses, they move or terrify the
ignorant country-folks into giving them alms. This poor fellow was such
a one; and the king seeing him in so wretched a plight, with nothing but
a blanket about his loins to cover his nakedness, could not be persuaded
but that the fellow was some father who had given all away to his
daughters, and brought himself to that pass: for nothing he thought
could bring a man to such wretchedness but the having unkind daughters.
And from this and many such wild speeches which he uttered, the good
Caius plainly perceived that he was not in his perfect mind, but that
his daughters' ill usage had really made him go mad. And now the loyalty
of this worthy Earl of Kent showed itself in more essential services
than he had hitherto found opportunity to perform. For with the
assistance of some of the king's attendants who remained loyal, he had
the person of his royal master removed at daybreak to the castle of
Dover, where his own friends and influence, as Earl of Kent, chiefly
lay; and himself embarking for France, hastened to the court of
Cordelia, and did there in such moving terms represent the pitiful
condition of her royal father, and set out in such lively colours the
inhumanity of her sisters, that this good and loving child with many
tears besought the king her husband that he would give her leave to
embark for England, with a sufficient power to subdue these cruel
daughters and their husbands, and restore the old king her father to his
throne; which being granted, she set forth, and with a royal army landed
at Dover.
Lear having by some chance escaped from the guardians which the good
Earl of Kent had put over him to take care of him in his lunacy, was
found by some of Cordelia's train, wandering about the fields near
Dover, in a pitiable condition, stark mad, and singing aloud to himself,
with a crown upon his head which he had made of straw, and nettles, and
other wild weeds that he had picked up in the corn-fields. By the advice
of the physicians, Cordelia, though earnestly desirous of seeing her
father, was prevailed upon to put off the meeting, till by sleep and the
operation of herbs which they gave him, he should be restored to greater
composure. By the aid of these skilful physicians, to whom Cordelia
promised all her gold and jewels for the recovery of the old king, Lear
was soon in a condition to see his daughter.
A tender sight it was to see the meeting between this father and
daughter; to see the struggles between the joy of this poor old king at
beholding again his once darling child, and the shame at receiving such
filial kindness from her whom he had cast off for so small a fault in
his displeasure; both these passions struggling with the remains of his
malady, which in his half-crazed brain sometimes made him that he scarce
remembered where he was, or who it was that so kindly kissed him and
spoke to him: and then he would beg the standers-by not to laugh at
him, if he were mistaken in thinking this lady to be his daughter
Cordelia! And then to see him fall on his knees to beg pardon of his
child; and she, good lady, kneeling all the while to ask a blessing of
him, and telling him that it did not become him to kneel, but it was her
duty, for she was his child, his true and very child Cordelia! and she
kissed him (as she said) to kiss away all her sisters' unkindness, and
said that they might be ashamed of themselves, to turn their old kind
father with his white beard out into the cold air, when her enemy's dog,
though it had bit her (as she prettily expressed it), should have stayed
by her fire such a night as that, and warmed himself. And she told her
father how she had come from France with purpose to bring him
assistance; and he said that she must forget and forgive, for he was old
and foolish, and did not know what he did; but that to be sure she had
great cause not to love him, but her sisters had none. And Cordelia said
that she had no cause, no more than they had.
So we will leave this old king in the protection of his dutiful and
loving child, where, by the help of sleep and medicine, she and her
physicians at length succeeded in winding up the untuned and jarring
senses which the cruelty of his other daughters had so violently shaken.
Let us return to say a word or two about those cruel daughters.
These monsters of ingratitude, who had been so false to their old
father, could not be expected to prove more faithful to their own
husbands. They soon grew tired of paying even the appearance of duty and
affection, and in an open way showed they had fixed their loves upon
another. It happened that the object of their guilty loves was the same.
It was Edmund, a natural son of the late Earl of Gloucester, who by his
treacheries had succeeded in disinheriting his brother Edgar, the lawful
heir, from his earldom, and by his wicked practices was now earl
himself; a wicked man, and a fit object for the love of such wicked
creatures as Goneril and Regan. It falling out about this time that the
Duke of Cornwall, Regan's husband, died, Regan immediately declared her
intention of wedding this Earl of Gloucester, which rousing the jealousy
of her sister, to whom as well as to Regan this wicked earl had at
sundry times professed love, Goneril found means to make away with her
sister by poison; but being detected in her practices, and imprisoned by
her husband, the Duke of Albany, for this deed, and for her guilty
passion for the earl which had come to his ears, she, in a fit of
disappointed love and rage, shortly put an end to her own life. Thus the
justice of Heaven at last overtook these wicked daughters.
While the eyes of all men were upon this event, admiring the justice
displayed in their deserved deaths, the same eyes were suddenly taken
off from this sight to admire at the mysterious ways of the same power
in the melancholy fate of the young and virtuous daughter, the Lady
Cordelia, whose good deeds did seem to deserve a more fortunate
conclusion: but it is an awful truth, that innocence and piety are not
always successful in this world. The forces which Goneril and Regan had
sent out under the command of the bad Earl of Gloucester were
victorious, and Cordelia, by the practices of this wicked earl, who did
not like that any should stand between him and the throne, ended her
life in prison. Thus, Heaven took this innocent lady to itself in her
young years, after showing her to the world an illustrious example of
filial duty. Lear did not long survive this kind child.
Before he died, the good Earl of Kent, who had still attended his old
master's steps from the first of his daughters' ill usage to this sad
period of his decay, tried to make him understand that it was he who had
followed him under the name of Caius; but Lear's care-crazed brain at
that time could not comprehend how that could be, or how Kent and Caius
could be the same person: so Kent thought it needless to trouble him
with explanations at such a time; and Lear soon after expiring, this
faithful servant to the king, between age and grief for his old master's
vexations, soon followed him to the grave.
How the judgment of Heaven overtook the bad Earl of Gloucester, whose
treasons were discovered, and himself slain in single combat with his
brother, the lawful earl; and how Goneril's husband, the Duke of Albany,
who was innocent of the death of Cordelia, and had never encouraged his
lady in her wicked proceedings against her father, ascended the throne
of Britain after the death of Lear, is needless here to narrate; Lear
and his Three Daughters being dead, whose adventures alone concern our
story.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
MACBETH