P. 408. (48)

"Hold! the general speaks to you; hold, for shame!"

So the folio.-The quartos have

"Hold, the Generall speakes to you; hold, hold, for shame."

(The usual modern reading—which both Mr. Collier and Delius silently adopt-is

"Hold, hold! the general speaks to you; hold, for shame !")—

1865. Mr. Grant White prints

"Hold, hold! the general speaks to you: for shame!"

Mr. W. N. Lettsom conjectures "Shall lose me ever.- What!"

P. 409. (50)

"on the court and guard of safety!"

Altered by Theobald to "on the court of guard and safety !" and so Mr. Collier's Ms. Corrector.-Steevens defends the old reading, not very satisfactorily.

In all probability, as Malone supposed, a stage-direction which has crept into the text,

“The word ‘humbly' is constantly used with ‘thank,' 'pray,' ' beseech,' and the like: hence, I suppose, a transcriber inserted it here. Cassio was Iago's equal, or rather his superior, and would scarcely have used the word even in his present dejected state." W. N. LETTSOM.-Here, I apprehend, “humbly” is no more to be taken in its literal sense than is "humble" now-a-days, when some very courteous correspondent signs himself "Your humble servant,"

"Why the plural?" Walker's Crit. Exam. &c. vol. i. p. 250.

P. 417. (58)

"Well, do your discretion."

Capell printed

"Well, well,

Do your discretion;"

which is approved of by Walker, Crit. Exam, &c. vol. ii. p. 147.

'Humbled' is a trisyllable." Walker's Crit. Exam. &c. vol. iii. p. 286.

P. 418. (61)

"the wars must make examples

Out of their best,"

The old eds. have "Out of her best;" which I retained in my former edition, observing, "Here, if we consider the wars' as used for war generally, the usual modern alteration' Out of their best' is unnecessary."-Mr. Collier's Ms. Corrector substitutes "Out of our best," &c.; and Mr. Singer (Shakespeare Vindicated, &c. p. 284) says, "ReadOut of the best,'" &c.—" I must own I think 'her' wrong. The' is perhaps better than 'their' or 'our'." W. N. LETTSOM.

P. 418. (62) "Or feed on nourishing dishes, or keep you warm,” "The extra syllable in the body of the line seems hardly allowable, where the pause is so slight; and yet dish' for 'dishes' appears much too harsh." Walker's Shakespeare's Versification, &c. p. 267.

The old eds. have “to doe a peculiar profit.”—“ Malone,” says Mr. Collier, "here omits a, probably for the sake of the measure," &c.: but Malone was not the first editor who very properly rejected it as injurious to the metre.

Here the old eds. have "Desdemona."-But compare (according to the reading of the folio), in p. 416, "With Desdemon alone;" in p. 418, "sweet Desdemon;" in p. 445, "Ah, Desdemon!" in p. 459, "Have you pray'd to-night, Desdemon?" in p. 465, "Poor Desdemon;" and in p. 467, "O Desdemon! dead, Desdemon!"

P. 419. (65)" By heaven, he echoes me,

As if there were some monster in his thought
Too hideous to be shown."

So the quarto of 1622.-The folio has

"Alas, thou ecchos't me;

As if there were some Monster in thy thought," &c.

(which, though rejected even by Mr. Knight, is adopted by Delius).—The quarto of 1630 has

"why dost thou ecchoe me,

As if there were some monster in thy thought," &c.

P. 420. (66) "I dare be sworn I think that he is honest."

Should not this be written with a break, as if Iago were correcting himself? I dare be sworn-I think that he is honest," W. N. LETTSOM.

nonsensically, the transcriber or printer having perhaps by mistake omitted "do not" at the end of the second line.-Both Mr. Knight and Delius retain the "sessions" of the folio, Mr. Knight quoting as author's xxxth Sonnet,

66

a parallel," from our

"When to the sessions of sweet silent thought," &c. But "session" occurs in Shakespeare oftener than "sessions" (e.g. in King Lear, act v. sc. 3, "Where you shall hold your session," and in the present play, act i. sc. 2, course of direct session," &c.); and there are not a few passages in the folio where the final 8 is erroneously added to substantives (so afterwards, p. 423, it has "Foule disproportions, Thoughts vnnaturall," &c.; which Mr. Knight retains).

P. 421. (68)

"It is the green-ey'd monster, which doth mock
The meat it feeds on :"

So the folio. The quarto of 1622 has "That meate it feedes on."-The quarto of 1630 has “It is a green-eyd monster," &c.—Hanmer and Mr. Collier's Ms. Corrector read

66

So the quartos.-The folio has "soundly loues" (with which reading compare Henry V. act v. sc. 2, "O fair Katherine, if you will love me soundly with your French heart," &c.).—Mr. Collier's Ms. Corrector and Mr. Singer's alter "soundly" to "fondly."

Such is the arrangement in the folio; but it omits "you," which is found in the quarto of 1630, where all this stands as a single line.-The quarto of 1622 has "Be not you knowne on't," &c.

P. 425. (72)

"The Moor already changes with my poison:—

Dangerous conceits are, in their natures, poisons," "I once thought that we should read 'with my practice;' but it would seem that the word required should be similar in termination, or general appearance, to poison; for this latter line ['The Moor already changes with my poison'] had dropt out, most probably from that cause, in the quarto 1622. Therefore I conjecture 'potion'." Walker's Crit. Exam, &c. vol. i. p. 288.

P. 426. (73) "I slept the next night well, was free and merry ;” So the quartos.-The folio has

"I slept the next night well, fed well, was free, and merrie;" which Mr. Knight and Delius prefer [and, 1865, Mr. Grant White].

Walker would read "horror :" he says, "the corruption originated in the preceding 'horror's'." Crit. Exam, &c. vol. i. p. 253.

P. 427. (75)

"her name, that was as fresh

As Dian's visage, is now begrim'd and black
As mine own face."

So the quarto of 1630. (This speech is not in the quarto of 1622.)—The folio has "My name that was as fresh," &c., which Mr. Knight adopts; though the word "own" in the last line is alone sufficient to prove that "My" is grossly wrong would Othello say "My name is now as black as mine own face"?

Here the old eds. have “topt” and “top'd ;" but in act i. sc. 1, they have "tupping your white ewe,”—with their usual inconsistency of spelling.

"I would rather arrange with the folio, adding a word;

'I could not sleep. There are a kind of men

So loose of soul, that in their sleeps will mutter

Of their affairs: one of this kind is Cassio'."

Walker's Crit. Exam. &c. vol. iii. p. 287; where his editor adds in a note, "So Capell. Hanmer also follows the folio arrangement, but supplies ‘All,' not' Of."

66

Creature: then kisse me hard,

As if he pluckt vp kisses by the rootes,

That grew vpon my lippes, laid his Leg ore my Thigh,

And sigh, and kisse, and then cry cursed Fate,

That gave thee to the Moore;"

which is adopted by Mr. Knight, who, however, silently introduces in the third line a reading of his own, "lay his leg o'er my thigh," &c.-Perhaps "creature" is here a trisyllable, and the better reading may be, "Cry O sweet creature! and kiss me hard," &c.: see Walker's Crit. Exam. &c. vol. ii. p. 20, and Mr. W. N. Lettsom's note there.

The quartos and the folio have "

or any, it was hers;" which the editor of the second folio altered to "or any, if 't was hers."—Malone restored the obviously right reading.