Edmund in the meanwhile, wounded to death by his own brave half-brother Edgar, who had appeared as champion to punish Edmund for his many horrible acts of treachery and wickedness, now confessed that he and Goneril had given private instructions that Cordelia was to be hanged in prison, and had intended to lay the blame on her own despair, which had caused her to do this desperate deed.
Messengers were sent in haste to arrest this fatal order, but, alas! it was too late. As Edmund was borne away, King Lear entered, bearing the dead body of Cordelia in his arms. The old man’s reason was again tottering on the brink of madness, and the spectators could only listen in pitying sorrow to his frenzied grief over his murdered child. One moment he mourned her as dead; the next he tried to persuade himself she was still living. He called for a looking-glass, to see if her breath would mist or stain it, a proof that she lived; and held a feather to her lips, and thought it stirred. The Earl of Kent came and knelt before him, but the King turned from him impatiently, and bent again over Cordelia, where she lay on the ground.
“Cordelia, Cordelia! Stay a little!” he implored in piteous accents. “Ha! What is it thou sayest?” He leant his ear to listen, and with eager self-deception tried to explain his failure to hear a sound. “Her voice was ever soft, gentle, and low, an excellent thing in woman.” Then, with a sudden change, he drew himself up, and, looking round, cried exultingly: “I killed the slave that was a-hanging thee!”
“’Tis true, my lords, he did,” said an officer who was standing by.
“Did I not, fellow?” said the King proudly. “I have seen the time, with my good biting falchion, I would have made them skip. I am old now, and these same crosses spoil me.—Who are you? Mine eyes are not of the best; I’ll tell you in a minute. Are you not Kent?”
“The same—your servant Kent.”
But the King’s last gleam of reason was going, and Kent in vain tried to make him realise the fact of his own loyal fidelity, and that the cruel Goneril and Regan were dead. The King’s thoughts were again with his beloved child.
“And my poor fool is hanged! No, no, no life!” he wailed in heart-broken accents. “Why should a dog, a horse, a rat, have life, and thou no breath at all? Thou’lt come no more—never, never, never, never, never! Pray, you, undo this button.” He made a choking movement at the cloak at his throat, and someone stepped forward and gently unclasped it for him. “Thank you, sir. Do you see this? Look on her—look, her lips—look there, look there!” and with a strange cry of mingled joy and anguish King Lear fell dead on the body of his dear child Cordelia.
And so, with all his faults and follies, which had assuredly wrought out their own bitter retribution, the fiery-hearted King passed into the realm of eternal rest.