I will a round unvarnish'd tale deliver

Of my whole course of love; what drugs, what

charms,

What conjuration, and what mighty magick (For such proceeding I am charg'd withal), I won his daughter with 17.

Bra.

A maiden never bold;

Of spirit so still and quiet, that her motion
Blush'd at herself 18; And she,-in spite of nature,
Of years, of country, credit, every thing,—

To fall in love with what she fear'd to look on?
It is a judgment maim'd, and most imperfect,
That will confess-perfection so could err
Against all rules of nature; and must be driven
To find out practices of cunning hell,

Why this should be. I therefore vouch again,
That with some mixtures powerful o'er the blood,
Or with some dram conjur❜d to this effect,

He wrought upon her.

Duke.
To vouch this, is no proof;
Without more certain and more overt test19,
Than these thin habits, and poor likelihoods
Of modern seeming 20, do prefer against him.
1 Sen. But, Othello, speak:-

Did you by indirect and forced courses
Subdue and poison this young maid's affections?

17 The word with, supplied in the second folio, is wanting in the older copies. Malone contends that it is merely an elliptical form of expression, and that the early copies are right.

18 Shakspeare, like other writers of his age, frequently uses the personal instead of the neutral pronoun.

19 Open proofs, external evidence.

20 i. e. weak show of slight appearance. Modern is frequently used for trifling, slight, or trivial, by Shakspeare. The first quarto reads:

'These are thin habits, and poore likelyhoods
Of modern seemings you prefer against him.'

Or came it by request, and such fair question
As soul to soul affordeth?

Oth.

I do beseech you,

Send for the lady to the Sagittary 21,

And let her speak of me before her father:

If

you do find me foul in her report,

The trust, the office, I do hold of you 22,

Not only take away, but let your sentence
Even fall upon my life.

Duke.

Fetch Desdemona hither.

Oth. Ancient, conduct them; you best know the

place.- [Exeunt IAGO and Attendants.

And, till she come, as truly 23 as to heaven

I do confess the vices of my blood,

So justly to your grave ears I'll present
How I did thrive in this fair lady's love,
And she in mine.

Duke. Say it, Othello.

Oth. Her father lov'd me; oft invited me; Still question'd me the story of my life,

From year to year; the battles, sieges, fortunes,
That I have pass'd.

I ran it through, even from my boyish days,
To the very moment that he bade me tell it.
Wherein I spoke of most disastrous chances,
Of moving accidents, by flood, and field:

Of hair-breadth scapes i' the imminent deadly breach;
Of being taken by the insolent foe,

And sold to slavery; of my redemption thence,
And portance 24 in my travel's history:

21 The sign of the fictitious creature so called. See Troilus and Cressida, Act v. Sc. 5, p. 453.

22 This line is wanting in the first quarto.

23 The first quarto reads, as faithful: the next line is omitted in that copy.

24 The first quarto reads:

And with it all my travel's history.'

By my portance in my travel's history,' perhaps, is meant, my

Wherein of antres 25 vast, and deserts wild 26, Rough quarries, rocks, and hills whose heads touch heaven,

It was my hint to speak, such was the process;
And of the cannibals that each other eat,

The anthropophagi, and men whose heads

Do grow beneath their shoulders 27. These things to hear,

carriage or behaviour in my travels, as described in my narration of them. Portance is a word used in Coriolanus :

took from you

The apprehension of his present portance,

Which gibingly, ungravely, he did fashion,' &c. Spenser likewise uses it, Faerie Queene, b. ii. c. 3 :— But for in court gay portaunce he perceiv'd.'

25 i. e. caverns; from antrum, Lat. Warburton observes that Rymer ridicules this whole circumstance; and Shaftesbury obliquely sneers at it. Whoever (says Johnson) ridicules this account of the progress of love, shows his ignorance not only of history, but of nature and manners. It is no wonder that, in any age, or in any nation, a lady, recluse, timorous, and delicate, should desire to hear of events and scenes which she could never see, and should admire the man who had endured dangers, and performed actions, which, however great, were magnified by her timidity.

26 The quarto and first folio read 'desarts idle;' the second folio reads 'desarts wilde;' and this reading was adopted by Pope; at which Dr. Johnson expresses his surprise.

Mr. Malone taxes the editor of the second folio with ignorance of Shakspeare's meaning; and idle is triumphantly reinstated in the text. It does not seem to have occurred to the commentators that wild might add a feature of some import, even to a desert; whereas idle, i. e. sterile, leaves it just as it found it, and is (without a pun) the idlest epithet which could be applied. Mr. Pope, too, had an ear for rhythm; and as his reading has some touch of Shakspeare, which the other has not, and is besides better poetry, I should hope that it would one day resume its proper place in the text.'-Gifford. Notes on Sejanus. Ben Jonson's Works, vol. iii. p. 14.-I have followed the suggestion of Mr. Gifford, and restored the reading of the second folio; convinced by his reasoning, and believing that idle might easily be substituted for wilde, in the earlier copies, by a mere typographical error.

27 Nothing excited more universal attention than the accounts VOL. X.

L L

Would Desdemona seriously incline:

But still the house affairs would draw her thence;
Which ever as she could with haste despatch,
She'd come again, and with a greedy ear

Devour up my discourse: Which I observing,
Took once a pliant hour; and found good means
To draw from her a prayer of earnest heart,
That I would all my pilgrimage dilate,
Whereof by parcels she had something heard,
But not intentively 28: I did consent;
And often did beguile her of her tears,
When I did speak of some distressful stroke,
That my youth suffer'd. My story being done,
She
gave me for my pains a world of sighs:

She swore 29,-In faith, 'twas strange, 'twas passing strange;

'Twas pitiful, 'twas wondrous pitiful:

She wish'd, she had not heard it; yet she wish'd That heaven had made her such a man: she thank'd

me;

brought by Sir Walter Raleigh, on his return from his celebrated voyage to Guiana in 1595, of the cannibals, amazons, and especially of the nation

Do grow beneath their shoulders.'

See his Narrative in Hackluyt's Voyages, vol. iii. ed. 1600, fol. p. 652, et seq. and p. 677, &c. A short extract of the more wonderful passages was also published in Latin and in several other languages, in 1599, adorned with copper-plates, representing these cannibals, amazons, and headless people, &c. A copy of one of the plates is given in the variorum editions of Shakspeare. These extraordinary reports were universally credited; and Othello therefore assumes no other character but what was very common among the celebrated commanders of the poet's time.

28 Intention and attention were once synonymous. 'Intentive, which listeneth well and is earnestly bent to a thing,' says Bullokar, in his Expositor, 1616.

29 To aver upon faith or honour was considered swearing, equally with a solemn appeal to God. See Whitaker's Vindication of Mary Queen of Scots, vol. ii. p. 487.

And bade me, if I had a friend that lov'd her,
I should but teach him how to tell my story,
And that would woo her. Upon this hint, I spake :
She lov'd me for the dangers I had pass'd;

And I lov'd her, that she did pity them.
This only is the witchcraft I have us'd;
Here comes the lady, let her witness it.

Enter DESDEMONA, IAGO, and Attendants.
Duke. I think, this tale would win my daughter
too.-

Good Brabantio,

Take up this mangled matter at the best:
Men do their broken weapons rather use,
Than their bare hands.

Bra.
If she confess, that she was half the wooer,
Destruction on my head, if my bad blame
Light on the man!-Come hither, gentle mistress;
Do you perceive in all this noble company,
Where most you owe obedience?

I pray you, hear her speak;

Des.

I do perceive here a divided duty:

My noble father,

Το you, I am bound for life, and education;
My life, and education, both do learn me

How to respect you; you are the lord of duty,
I am hitherto your daughter: But here's my husband;
And so much duty as my mother show'd
To you, preferring you before her father,
So much I challenge that I may profess
Due to the Moor, my lord.

Bra. God be with you!—I have done :-
Please it your grace, on to the state affairs;
I had rather to adopt a child, than get it.-
Come hither, Moor:

I here do give thee that with all my heart,