Shall top the legitimate:—I grow, I prosper;
Now, gods, stand up for bastards!
Enter Gloucester.
Glo. Kent banished thus! And France in choler parted!
And the king gone to-night! subscrib'd his power! 24
Confin'd to exhibition! All this done
Upon the gad! Edmund, how now! what news?
Edm. So please your lordship, none.
Glo. Why so earnestly seek you to put up
that letter? 29
Edm. I know no news, my lord.
Glo. What paper were you reading?
Edm. Nothing, my lord. 32
Glo. No? What needed then that terrible
dispatch of it into your pocket? the quality of
nothing hath not such need to hide itself. Let's
see; come; if it be nothing, I shall not need
spectacles. 37
Edm. I beseech you, sir, pardon me; it is a
letter from my brother that I have not all o'er-
read, and for so much as I have perused, I find
it not fit for your o'er-looking. 41
Glo. Give me the letter, sir.
Edm. I shall offend, either to detain or give
it. The contents, as in part I understand them,
are to blame. 45
Glo. Let's see, let's see.
Edm. I hope, for my brother's justification,
he wrote this but as an essay or taste of my
virtue. 49
24 subscrib'd: transferred
25 exhibition: allowance, maintenance
26 gad: spur
48 essay: trial
