iv. 1 f., 36 f.). Yet
apparently both Goneril and Lear themselves start at once, so that their
messengers _could_ not return in time. It may be said that they expected
to meet them coming back, but there is no indication of this in the
text.
2. Lear, in despatching Kent, says (I. v. 1):
Go you before to Gloster with these letters. Acquaint my
daughter no further with anything you know than comes from her
demand out of the letter.
This would seem to imply that Lear knew that Regan and Cornwall were at
Gloster's house, and meant either to go there (so Koppel) or to summon
her back to her own home to receive him. Yet this is clearly not so, for
Kent goes straight to Regan's house (II. i. 124, II. iv. 1, 27 ff., 114
ff.).
Hence it is generally supposed that by 'Gloster,' in the passage just
quoted, Lear means not the Earl but the _place_; that Regan's home was
there; and that Gloster's castle was somewhere not very far off. This is
to some extent confirmed by the fact that Cornwall is the 'arch' or
patron of Gloster (II. i. 60 f., 112 ff.). But Gloster's home or house
must not be imagined quite close to Cornwall's, for it takes a night to
ride from the one to the other, and Gloster's house is in the middle of
a solitary heath with scarce a bush for many miles about (II.
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