Oth. I will chop her into messes!—Cuckold me! Oth. Get me some poison, Iago; this night:I'll not expostulate with her, lest her body and beauty unprovide my mind again: this night, Iago. Iago. Do it not with poison, strangle her in her bed, even the bed she hath contaminated. Oth. Good, good: the justice of it pleases; very good. Iago. And, for Cassio,-let me be his undertaker: You shall hear more by midnight. [A Trumpet within. Oth. Excellent good.-What trumpet is that same: Iago. Something from Venice, sure. "Tis Lodo vico, Come from the duke: and, see, your wife is with him. Enter LODOVICO, DesdemonA, and Attendants. Lod. 'Save you, worthy general 22 ! Oth. With all my heart, sir. Lod. The duke and senators of Venice greet you. [Gives him a Packet. Oth. I kiss the instrument of their pleasures. [Opens the Packet and reads. 22 The quarto reads ' God save the worthy general.' Malone says that the reply of Othello does not relate to what Lodovico has just said, but is spoken by Othello while he salutes him. Steevens, on the contrary, thinks that The distracted Othello, considering his happiness in this world at an end, readily catches at the idea of future felicity suggested by the words Save you, general!' He adds, "If it be urged that the words only mean preserve you in this world, my sense of the passage will not be much weakened; as our protection, even here, depends on the Almighty.'-In Measure for Measure (Act ii. Sc. 2) two replies of Angelo to similar salutations from Isabel are equally equivocal. Des. And what's the news, good cousin Lodovico? Iago. I am very glad to see you, signior; Welcome to Cyprus. Lod. I thank you: How does lieutenant Cassio? Iago. Lives, sir. Des. Cousin, there's fallen between him and my lord An unkind breach: but you shall make all well. Oth. Are you sure of that? Des. My lord? Oth. This fail you not to do, as you will [Reads. Lod. He did not call; he's busy in the paper. Is there division 'twixt thy lord and Cassio? Des. A most unhappy one; I would do much To atone 23 them, for the love I bear to Cassio. Oth. Fire and brimstone! For, as I think, they do command him home, Deputing Cassio in his government. Des. By my troth, I am glad on't. Lod. My lord, this would not be believ'd in Venice, Though I should swear I saw it: "Tis very much; Make her amends, she weeps. Oth. O devil, devil! 23 i. e. make them one, reconcile them. See vol. iii. p. 211, note 15. : If that the earth could teem with woman's tears, I will not stay to offend you. Lod. Truly, an obedient lady :— I do beseech your lordship, call her back. [Going. What would you with her, sir? Lod. Who, I, my lord? Oth. Ay; you did wish, that I would make her turn; Sir, she can turn, and turn 25, and yet go on, And turn again; and she can weep, sir, weep; And she's obedient, as you say,—obedient,— Very obedient:-Proceed you in your tears.Concerning this, sir,-O well painted passion! I am commanded home 26:-Get you away; I'll send for you anon.-Sir, I obey the mandate, And will return to Venice;-Hence, avaunt! [Exit DESDEMONA. Cassio shall have my place. And,—sir,-to-night, I do entreat that we may sup together. 24 If women's tears could impregnate the earth.' By the doctrine of equivocal generation new animals were supposed producible by new combinations of matter. See Bacon, v. iii. p. 70, edit. 1740. Shakspeare here alludes to the fabulous accounts which make the crocodile the most deceitful of animals, whose tears are proverbially fallacious. It is written that he will weep over a man's head when he hath devoured the body, and will then eat up the head too.' Wherefore in Latin there is a proverb, Crocodile lachrymæ, crocodiles teares, to signifie such teares as are feigned, and spent only with intent to deceive or do harm.'-Bullokar's Expositor, 1616. To fall, in this passage, is a verb active. 25 So in King Henry VI. Part I. : 'Done like a Frenchman; turn and turn again.' 26 The quarto reads, I am commanded here.' You are welcome, sir, to Cyprus.-Goats, and monkeys 27 ! [Exit. Lod. Is this the noble Moor whom our full senate Call-all-in-all sufficient?-This the noble nature Whom passion could not shake? whose solid virtue The shot of accident, nor dart of chance, Could neither graze, nor pierce? Iago. He is much chang'd. Lod. Are his wits safe? is he not light of brain? Iago. He is that he is; I may not breathe my censure. What he might be,-if what he might, he is not,I would to heaven, he were. Lod. What, strike his wife! Iago. 'Faith, that was not so well; Yet 'would I knew, That stroke would prove the worst. Lod. Is it his use? Or did the letters work upon his blood, Iago. Alas, alas! It is not honesty in me, to speak What I have seen and known. You shall observe him; And his own courses will denote him so, That I may save my speech: Do but go after, Lod. I am sorry, that I am deceiv'd in him. [Exeunt. 27 In this exclamation Shakspeare has shown great art. Iago in the first scene, in which he endeavours to awaken his suspicion, being urged to give some evident proof of the guilt of Cassio and Desdemona, tells him it were impossible to have occular demonstration of it, though they should be as prime as goats, as hot as monkeys. These words, we may suppose, still ring in the ears of Othello, who, being now fully convinced of his wife's infidelity, rushes out with this emphatic exclamation: 'Iago's words were but too true; now, indeed, I am convinced that they are as hot as goats and monkeys.' SCENE II1. A Room in the Castle. Enter OTHELLO and EMILIA. Oth. You have seen nothing then? Emil. Nor ever heard; nor ever did suspect. Oth. Yes, you have seen Cassio and she together. Emil. But then I saw no harm: and then I heard Each syllable that breath made up between them. Oth. What, did they never whisper? Emil. Never, my lord. Oth. Nor send you out o'the way? Emil. Never. Oth. To fetch her fan, her gloves, her mask, nor nothing? Emil. Never, my lord. Oth. That's strange. Emil. I durst, my lord, to wager she is honest, Let heaven requite it with the serpent's curse! 1 There are great difficulties in ascertaining the place of this scene. What Othello says in an early part of it to Emilia'Leave procreants alone, and shut the door'-and his subsequent address to her as he goes out, decisively point out a room in Othello's Castle as the place of the scene; and compel us to place the interlocutors there, however inconsistent with Roderigo's entry, and Iago's address to Desdemona, 'Go in and weep not.' The truth is, that our poet and his audience, in this instance, as in many others, were content, from want of scenery, to consider the very same spot, at one and the same time, as the outside and inside of a house. See the Historical Account of the English Stage, &c. [Boswell's edition of Malone's Shakspeare, vol. iii.]—Malone. 2 The quarto reads of her sex.' VOL. X. TT |