Legitimate Edgar, I must have your land: Our father's love is to the bastard Edmund As to the legitimate: fine word,—legitimate! Well, my legitimate, if this letter speed, And my invention thrive, Edmund the base Shall top the legitimate. I grow; I prosper: Now, gods, stand up for bastards!
If he dislike it, let him to our sister, Whose mind and mine, I know, in that are one, Not to be over-ruled. Idle old man, That still would manage those authorities That he hath given away! Now, by my life, Old fools are babes again; and must be used With cheques as flatteries,—when they are seen abused.
By day and night he wrongs me; every hour He flashes into one gross crime or other, That sets us all at odds: I'll not endure it: His knights grow riotous, and himself upbraids us On every trifle. When he returns from hunting, I will not speak with him; say I am sick: If you come slack of former services, You shall do well; the fault of it I'll answer.
A credulous father! and a brother noble, Whose nature is so far from doing harms, That he suspects none: on whose foolish honesty My practises ride easy! I see the business. Let me, if not by birth, have lands by wit: All with me's meet that I can fashion fit.
