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EDGAR
Let's exchange charity.
I am no less in blood than thou art, Edmund;
If more, the more thou hast wrong'd me.
My name is Edgar, and thy father's son.
The gods are just, and of our pleasant vices
Make instruments to plague us:
The dark and vicious place where thee he got
Cost him his eyes.
EDMUND
Thou hast spoken right, 'tis true;
The wheel is come full circle: I am here.
ALBANY
Methought thy very gait did prophesy
A royal nobleness: I must embrace thee:
Let sorrow split my heart, if ever I
Did hate thee or thy father!
EDGAR
Worthy prince, I know't.
ALBANY
Where have you hid yourself?
How have you known the miseries of your father?
EDGAR
By nursing them, my lord. List a brief tale;
And when 'tis told, O, that my heart would burst!
The bloody proclamation to escape,
That follow'd me so near,--O, our lives' sweetness!
That we the pain of death would hourly die
Rather than die at once!--taught me to shift
Into a madman's rags; to assume a semblance
That very dogs disdain'd: and in this habit
Met I my father with his bleeding rings,
Their precious stones new lost: became his guide,
Led him, begg'd for him, saved him from despair;
Never,--O fault!--reveal'd myself unto him,
Until some half-hour past, when I was arm'd:
Not sure, though hoping, of this good success,
I ask'd his blessing, and from first to last
Told him my pilgrimage: but his flaw'd heart,
Alack, too weak the conflict to support!
'Twixt two extremes of passion, joy and grief,
Burst smilingly.
EDMUND
This speech of yours hath moved me,
And shall perchance do good: but speak you on;
You look as you had something more to say.
ALBANY
If there be more, more woeful, hold it in;
For I am almost ready to dissolve,
Hearing of this.
EDGAR
This would have seem'd a period
To such as love not sorrow; but another,
To amplify too much, would make much more,
And top extremity.
Whilst I was big in clamour came there in a man,
Who, having seen me in my worst estate,
Shunn'd my abhorr'd society; but then, finding
Who 'twas that so endured, with his strong arms
He fastened on my neck, and bellow'd out
As he'd burst heaven; threw him on my father;
Told the most piteous tale of Lear and him
That ever ear received: which in recounting
His grief grew puissant and the strings of life
Began to crack: twice then the trumpets sounded,
And there I left him tranced.
ALBANY
But who was this?
EDGAR
Kent, sir, the banish'd Kent; who in disguise
Follow'd his enemy king, and did him service
Improper for a slave.
Enter a Gentleman, with a bloody knife
Gentleman
Help, help, O, help!
EDGAR
What kind of help?
ALBANY
Speak, man.
EDGAR
What means that bloody knife?
Gentleman
'Tis hot, it smokes;
It came even from the heart of--O, she's dead!
ALBANY
Who dead? speak, man.
Gentleman
Your lady, sir, your lady: and her sister
By her is poisoned; she hath confess'd it.
EDMUND
I was contracted to them both: all three
Now marry in an instant.
EDGAR
Here comes Kent.
ALBANY
Produce their bodies, be they alive or dead:
This judgment of the heavens, that makes us tremble,
Touches us not with pity.
Exit Gentleman
Enter KENT
O, is this he?
The time will not allow the compliment
Which very manners urges.
KENT
I am come
To bid my king and master aye good night:
Is he not here?
ALBANY
Great thing of us forgot!
Speak, Edmund, where's the king? and where's Cordelia?
See'st thou this object, Kent?
The bodies of GONERIL and REGAN are brought in
KENT
Alack, why thus?
EDMUND
Yet Edmund was beloved:
The one the other poison'd for my sake,
And after slew herself.
ALBANY
Even so. Cover their faces.
EDMUND
I pant for life: some good I mean to do,
Despite of mine own nature. Quickly send,
Be brief in it, to the castle; for my writ
Is on the life of Lear and on Cordelia:
Nay, send in time.
ALBANY
Run, run, O, run!
EDGAR
To who, my lord? Who hath the office? send
Thy token of reprieve.
EDMUND
Well thought on: take my sword,
Give it the captain.
ALBANY
Haste thee, for thy life.
Exit EDGAR
EDMUND
He hath commission from thy wife and me
To hang Cordelia in the prison, and
To lay the blame upon her own despair,
That she fordid herself.
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