Lear.
Blow, wind, and crack your cheeks—rage!—blow!
You cataracts and hurricanoes, spout
Till you have drench'd our steeples:
You sulphurous and thought-executing^{7 note} fires,
Vaunt-couriers^{8 note} to oak-cleaving thunder-bolts,
Singe my white head. And thou, all-shaking thunder,
Strike flat the thick rotundity o' the world!
Crack nature's moulds, all germens spill at once,^{9 note}
That make ingrateful man.

Fool.
O, nuncle, in and ask thy daughters' blessing;
Here's a night pities neither wise men nor fools.

Lear.
Rumble thy bellyful! Spit, fire! spout, rain!
Nor rain, wind, thunder, fire, are my daughters:
I tax not you, you elements, with unkindness,
I never gave you kingdom, call'd you children,
You owe me no subscription;^{10 note} then let fall
Your horrible pleasure; here I stand, your slave,
A poor, infirm, weak, and despis'd old man;—
But yet I call you servile ministers,
That have with two pernicious daughters join'd
Your high-engender'd battles, 'gainst a head
So old and white as this. O! O! 'tis foul!^{11 note}

Fool.
He that has a house to put his head in,
Has a good head-piece.

Lear.
No, I will be the pattern of all patience,
I will say nothing. Enter Kent.

Kent.
Who's there?

Fool.
A wise man, and a fool.

Kent.
Alas, Sir, are you here? Things that love night,
Love not such nights as these. Since I was man,
Such sheets of fire, such bursts of horrid thunder,
Such groans of roaring wind and rain, I never
Remember to have heard.

Lear.
Let the great gods,
That keep this dreadful pother^{12 note} o'er our heads,
Find out their enemies now. Tremble, thou wretch,
That hast within thee undivulged crimes,
Unwhipp'd of justice: Hide thee, thou bloody hand;
That under covert and convenient seeming^{13 note}
Hast practis'd on man's life. Close pent-up guilts,

Rive your concealing continents,^{14 note} and cry
These dreadful summoners grace.^{15 note} I am a man,
More sinn'd against, than sinning.

Kent.
Alack, bare-headed.(A)8Q0099
Gracious, my lord, hard by here is a hovel;
Some friendship will it lend you 'gainst the tempest;
Repose you there.

Lear.
My wits begin to turn.—
Come on, my boy. How dost, my boy? Art cold?
I am cold myself. Where is this straw, my fellow?
The art of our necessities is strange,
That can make vile things precious. Come, your hovel;
Poor fool and knave, I have one part in my heart
That's sorry yet for thee.

Fool. (singing.)
He that has a little tiny wit,—
  With heigh, ho, the wind and the rain,
Must make content with his fortunes fit;
  For the rain it raineth every day.^{16 note}

Lear.
True, boy. Come, bring us to this hovel. [Exeunt Lear, Kent, and Fool.

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