afterwards a farther impression of her benign sweetness is conveyed in a simple and beautiful manner, when we are told that "since the lady Cordelia went to France, her father's poor fool had much pined away." We have her sensibility “when patience and sorrow strove which should express her goodliest and all her filial tenderness when she commits her poor father to the care of the physician, when she hangs over him as he is sleeping, and kisses him as she contemplates the wreck of grief and majesty.

O my dear father! restoration hang

Its medicine on my lips; and let this kiss
Repair those violent harms that my two sisters
Have in thy reverence made!

Had you not been their father, these white flakes
Had challenged pity of them! Was this a face
To be exposed against the warring winds,

To stand against the deep dread-bolted thunder,

In the most terrible and nimble stroke

Of quick cross lightning? to watch, (poor perdu !)

With thin helm ? mine enemy's dog,

Though he had bit me, should have stood that night
Against my fire.

Her mild magnanimity shines out in her farewell to her sisters, of whose real character she is perfectly aware:

Ye jewels of our father! with washed eyes
Cordelia leaves you! I know ye what ye are,
And like a sister am most loath to call

Your faults as they are nam'd. Use well our father,

To your professed bosoms 1 commit him.

But yet, alas! stood I within his grace,

I would commend him to a better place;
So farewell to you both.

GONERIL.

Prescribe not us our duties!

The modest pride with which she replies to the Duke of Burgundy is admirable: this whole passage is too illustrative of the peculiar character of Cordelia, as well as too exquisite to be mutilated.

I yet beseech your majesty,

(If, for I want that glib and oily heart,

To speak and purpose not, since what I well intend

I'll do't before I speak,) that you make known,

. It is no vicious blot, murder, or foulness,

No unchaste action, or dishonoured step

That hath deprived me of your grace and favour;

But even for want of that, for which I am richer;

A still soliciting eye, and such a tongue

I am glad I have not, tho' not to have it

Hath lost me in your liking.

LEAR.

Better thou

Hadst not been born, than not to have pleased me better.

FRANCE.

Is it but this? a tardiness of nature,

That often leaves the history unspoke

Which it intends to do ?-My lord of Burgundy,

What say you to the lady? love is not love

When it is mingled with respects that stand

Aloof from the entire point. Will you have her?

She is herself a dowry.

BURGUNDY.

Royal Lear,

Give but that portion which yourself proposed,

And here I take Cordelia by the hand

Duchess of Burgundy.

LEAR.

Nothing I have sworn; I am firm.

BURGUNDY.

I am sorry, then, you have so lost a father

That you must lose a husband.

CORDELIA.

Peace be with Burgundy!

Since that respects of fortune are his love,

I shall not be his wife.

FRANCE.

Fairest Cordelia! thou art most rich, being poor,

Mest choice, forsaken, and most lov'd, despised!
Thee and thy virtues here I seize upon.

She takes up arms, "not for ambition, but a dear father's right." In her speech after her defeat, we have a calm fortitude and elevation of soul, arising from the consciousness of duty, and lifting her above all consideration of self. She ob

serves,

We are not the first

Who with best meaning have incurred the worst!

She thinks and fears only for her father.

For thee, oppressed king, am I cast down;

Myself would else out-frown false fortune's frown.

To complete the picture, her very voice is characteristic, "ever soft, gentle, and low; an excellent thing in woman."

But it will be said that the qualities here exemplified as sensibility, gentleness, magnanimity, fortitude, generous affection-are qualities which belong, in their perfection, to others of Shakspeare's characters-to Imogen for instance, who unites them all: and yet Imogen and Cordelia are wholly unlike each other. Even though we should reverse their situations, and give to Imogen the filial devotion of Cordelia, and to Cordelia the conjugal virtues of Imogen, still they would remain perfectly distinct as women. What is it, then, which lends to Cordelia that peculiar and individual truth of character which distinguishes her from every other human being?

It is a natural reserve, a tardiness of disposition, "which often leaves the history unspoke which it intends to do;" a subdued quietness of deportment and expression a veiled shyness thrown over all her emotions, her language and her manner; making the outward demonstration invariably fall short of what we know to be the feeling within. Not only is the portrait singularly beautiful and interesting in itself, but the conduct