Page:The Psychology of Shakespeare.pdf/200

Rh benumbs the

feelings

to every sense, save one.

Noble Kent

comes too late with the prepared surprise of his discovery. The wreck of kinghood sits in the midst, with no eyes, no

thoughts for living friend or dead foe, for no object save one, the voided temple of his love, now a limp carcase in his

nerveless lap. What a group for a sculptor, Lear and Cordelia, types of manly grandeur and female grace, with but half a life between the two

The feather test has failed, and the

sweet breath refuses to mist or stain the clear surface of the

stone ; conviction arrives that “now she's gone for ever,” and there is no fire left in the once ardent heart for one more angry word, no thought except the passing one of satisfied revenge. She's gone for ever—doubt of the stern fact is past, and death presses on his own heart; feeling is mercifully blunted and thought obscured; imagination is the last to congeal; desire,

father to the thought, makes the dear lips move, and the soft voice invite to follow :

“Cordelia, Cordelia, stay a little. Ha! What is't thou say'st?—Her voice was ever soft, Gentle, and low ; an excellent thing in woman :”—

The loyal friends around, Albany and Kent and Edgar, strive to arouse his attention from the gathering stupor, which they do not yet recognize as that of death; and in banished Kent, now reinstated in the appurtenances and lendings of his rank, an object bound to stimulate attention and curiosity is at hand. But he has put off the revelation of his faithful service, until it is too late to be understood. The king recognizes his person, indeed, even through the gathering mists of death, which beginning at the heart, weakens the circulation through the brain and dims the sight. How constantly does the dying man complain that the room is dark, or that he cannot see. “Where is your servant Caius?” brings a mechanical thought, trifling as it seems, but in true place. The unreflecting move ment of the mind, the excito-motory action of the brain, as