Line 445. Winter's not gone yet, &c.] If this be their behaviour, the king's troubles are not yet at an end. JOHNSON. Line 453. -dolours-] Quibble intended between dolours and dollars. HANMER. Line 523. —this remotion-] From their own house to that of the Earl of Gloster. MALONE. Line 524. Is practice only.] Practice is, in Shakspeare, and other old writers, used commonly in an ill sense for unlawful artifice. Line 533. JOHNSON. -the eels, when she put them i' the paste-] Hinting that the eel and Lear are in the same danger. JOHNSON. Sharp-tooth'd unkindness, like a vulture, here,] Al- luding to the fable of Prometheus. Line 593. Thy tender-hefted nature-] Hefted seems to mean the same as heaved. Tender-hefted, i. e. whose bosom is agitated by tender passions. STEEVENS. Line 598. to scant my sizes,] To contract my allowances or proportions settled. JOHNSON. Line 633. -much less advancement.] The word advancement is ironically used for conspicuousness of punishment; as we now say, a man is advanced to the pillory. JOHNSON. Line 635. I pray you, father, being weak, seem so.] The meaning is, since you are weak, be content to think yourself weak. JOHNSON. Line 649. base life-]i. e. In a servile state. JOHNSON. ·650. —and sumpter-] Sumpter is a horse that carries necessaries on a journey, though sometimes used for the case to carry them in. STEEVENS. Line 660. embossed carbuncle,] Embossed is swelling, pro tuberant. JOHNSON. Line 758. Do sorely ruffle ;] A ruffler, in our author's time, was a noisy, boisterous, swaggerer. MALONE. Line 14. This night, wherein the cup-drawn bear would couch,] The meaning is, "that even hunger, and the support of its young, would not force the bear to leave his den in such a night." WARBURTON. Line 33. Either in snuffs and packings-] Snuffs are dislikes; and packings, underhand contrivances. Line 36. STEEVENS. —are but furnishings;] Furnishings are what we now call colours, external pretences. JOHNSON. ACT III. SCENE II, Line 72. -thought-executing-] Doing execution with rapidity equal to thought. JOHNSON. Line 77. Crack nature's moulds, all germens spill at once,] Crack nature's mould, and spill all the seeds of matter, that are hoarded within it. THEOBALD. Line 88. You owe me no subscription;] Subscription for obedience. WARBURTON. Line 94. -tis foul!] Shameful; dishonourable. JOHNS. 100. So beggars marry many.] i. e. A beggar marries a wife and lice. JOHNSON. Line 110. -grace, and a cod-piece; that's a wise man and a fool.] In Shakspeare's time, "the king's grace" was the usual expression. In the latter phrase, the speaker perhaps alludes to an old notion concerning fools. MALONE. Line 115. Gallow the very wanderers of the dark,] Gallow, a west-country word, signifies to scare or frighten. WARB. Line 134. concealing continents,] Continents stands for that which contains or incloses. JOHNSON. Line 137. Alack, bare-headed!] Kent's faithful attendance on the old king, as well as that of Perillus, in the old play which preceded Shakspeare's, is founded on an historical fact. Lear, says Geoffrey of Monmouth, "when he betook himself to his youngest daughter in Gaul, waited before the city where she resided, while he sent a messenger to inform her of the misery he was fallen into, and to desire her relief to a father that suffered both hunger and nakedness. Cordelia was startled at the news, and wept bitterly, and with tears asked him, how many men her father had with him. The messenger answered he had none but one man, who had been his armour-bearer, and was staying with him without the town." MALONE. Line 164. When nobles are their tailors' tutors ;] i. e. invent fashions for them. WARBURTON, Line 165. No hereticks burn'd, but wenches' suitors:] The disease to which wenches' suitors are particularly exposed was called, in Shakspeare's time, the brenning or burning. JOHNS. Vide also Isaiah, iii. 24. ACT III. SCENE IV. Line 237. In, boy; go first. &c.] These two lines are very judiciously intended to represent that humility, or tenderness, or neglect of forms, which affliction forces on the mind. JOHNSON. Line 265. --led through fire and through flame,] Alluding to the ignis fatuus, supposed to be lights kindled by mischievous beings to lead travellers into destruction. JOHNSON. Line 267. —laid knives under his pillow,] He recounts the temptations by which he was prompted to suicide; the opportunities of destroying himself, which often occurred to him in his melancholy moods. JOHNSON. Line 273. —taking!] To take is to blast, or strike with malignant influence. Line 294. JOHNSON. pelican daughters.] The young pelican is fabled to suck the mother's blood. JOHNSON. Line 305.- wore gloves in my cap,] i. e. His mistress's favours which was the fashion of that time. WARBURTON. light of ear,] Credulous of evil, ready to re Line 312. Line 427. but a provoking merit,] Cornwall, I sup pose, means the merit of Edmund, which, being noticed by Gloster, provoked or instigated Edgar to seek his father's death. MALONE. ACT III. SCENE VI. Line 451. Frateretto calls me; and tells me, Nero is an angler &c.] Nero is introduced in the present play above 800 years before he was born. MALONE. Line 490. Sleepest, or wakest &c.] This seems to be a stanza of JOHNSON. some pastoral song. Line 519. brach, or lym; &c.] A brache signified a particular kind of hound, and also a bitch. A lym or lyme, was a blood-hound. Line 525. MALONE. thy horn is dry.] Men that begged under pretence of lunacy used formerly to carry a horn, and blow it through the streets. JOHNSON. Line 532. -you will say, they are Persian attire;] Alluding, perhaps, to Clytus refusing the Persian robes offered him by Alexander. Line 566.free things,] States clear from distress. STEEVENS. JOHNSON. 575. Mark the high noises;] Attend to the great events that are approaching, and make thyself known when that false opinion now prevailing against thee shall, in consequence of just proof of thy integrity, revoke its erroneous sentence, and recall thee to honour and reconciliation. JOHNSON. Line 591. ACT III. SCENE VII. my lord of Gloster.] Meaning Edmund, newly invested with his father's titles. The Steward, speaking immediately after, mentions the old earl by the same title. JOHNSON. Line 596. Hot questrists after him.] A questrist is one who goes in search or quest of another. STEEVENS. Line 606. Though well we may not pass upon his life -yet our power Shall do a courtesy to our wrath,] To do a courtesy is to gratify, to comply with. To pass, is to pass a judicial sen tence. JOHNSON. Line 612. corky arms.] Dry, withered, husky arms. 650. JOHNSON. -the course.] The running of the dogs upon me. JOHNSON. Line 695, -the overture of thy treasons-] Overture is here used for an opening or discovery. MALONE. ACT IV. SCENE I. Line 25. Our mean secures us ;] Mean, i. e, a moderate or middle state (substantive). Line 71. -I cannot daub it—] i. e. Disguise. WARB. -90. Let the superfluous,] Lear has before uttered the same sentiment, which indeed cannot be too strongly impressed, though it may be too often repeated. JOHNSON. Line 91. That slaves your ordinance, &c.] To slave an ordinance, is to treat it as a slave, to make it subject to us, instead of acting in obedience to it. STEEVENS. ACT IV. SCENE II. Line 106. -our mild husband—] It must be remembered that Albany, the husband of Goneril, disliked, in the end of the first Act, the scheme of oppression and ingratitude. JOHNS. Line 141. I have been worth the whistle.] This expression is a reproach to Albany for having neglected her. JOHNSON, Line 147. She that herself will sliver and disbranch-] To sliver signifies to tear off or disbranch. WARBURTON. Line 163, like monsters of the deep.] Fishes are the only animals that are known to prey upon their own species. JOHNSON, Line 179. Thou changed and self-cover'd thing,] I think that by self-cover'd the author meant, thou that hast disguised nature by wickedness; thou that hast hid the woman under the fiend. JOHNSON. Enter ACT IV. SCENE III. and a Gentleman.] The gentleman whom he sent in the foregoing act with letters to Cordelia. JOHNSON, Line 263. Let pity not be believed!] i. e. Let not such a thing as pity be supposed to exist. Line 265. accompanied with tears. STEEVENS. JOHNSON. clamour moisten'd;] That is, her out-cries were |