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More tedious than the dial eight score times?

O weary reckoning!

ACT IV.

Othello's Disordered Mind described.

The lethargy must have his quiet course;
If not, he foams at mouth; and, by and by,
Breaks out to savage madness. Look, he stirs :
Do you withdraw yourself a little while,
He will recover straight; when he is gone,
I would on great occasion speak with you.

Woman's Tears.

If that the earth could teem with woman's tears, Each drop she falls would prove a crocodile.

Scene between Othello and Desdemona.

DESDEMONA. Alas, the heavy day!-Why do you weep?

Am I the occasion of these tears, my lord?

If, haply, you my father do suspect,

An instrument of this your calling back,

Lay not your blame on me; if you have lost him,
Why, I have lost him too.

OTHELLO.

Had it pleas'd Heaven
To try me with affliction; had he rain'd
All kinds of sores and shames on my bare head;
Steep'd me in poverty to the very lips;

Given to captivity me and my utmost hopes;
I should have found in some part of my soul
A drop of patience: but, alas! to make me
A fixed figure, for the hand of scorn
To point his slow unmoving finger at,-

Yet I could bear that too; well, very well:
But there, where I have garner'd up my heart;
Where either I must live, or bear no life;

The fountain from the which my current runs,
Or else dries up; to be discarded thence!
Or keep it as a cistern for foul toads

To knot and gender in !-Turn thy complexion there!
Patience, thou young and rose-lipp'd cherubim ;
Ay, there, look grim as hell!

Emilia's Indignation against Slanderers.

I will be hang'd, if some eternal villain,
Some busy and insinuating rogue,

Some cogging cozening slave, to get some office,
Hath not devis'd this slander; I'll be hanged else.

*

*

*

*

*

The Moor's abus'd by some most villanous knave,
Some base notorious knave, some scurvy fellow :-
O heaven, that such companions* thou'dst unfold,
And put in every honest hand a whip,

To lash the rascals naked through the world,
Even from the east to the west!

Desdemona's Presentiment of her Death.

My mother had a maid call'd-Barbara ; She was in love; and he, she lov'd, prov'd mad, And did forsake her: she had a song of—" willow," An old thing 'twas, but it express'd her fortune, And she died singing it: That song, to-night, Will not go from my mind; I have much to do, But to go hang my head all at one side, And sing it like poor Barbara.

* Fellows.

ACT V.

Othello's Scene with Desdemona in the Bed-chamber before he kills her.

It is the cause, it is the cause, my soul,—
Let me not name it to you, you chaste stars!-
It is the cause.-Yet I'll not shed her blood:
Nor scar that whiter skin of hers than snow,
And smooth as monumental alabaster.
Yet she must die, else she'll betray more men.
Put out the light, and then-put out the light!
If I quench thee, thou flaming minister,
I can again thy former light restore,
Should I repent me: but once put out thine,
Thou cunning'st pattern of excelling nature,
I know not where is that Promethean heat,

That can thy light relume. When I have pluck'd thy

rose,

I cannot give it vital growth again,

It needs must wither:-I'll smell it on the tree.

[Kissing her.

O balmy breath, that dost almost persuade
Justice to break her sword !-One more, one more.—
Be thus when thou art dead, and I will kill thee,
And love thee after.-One more, and this the last :
So sweet was ne'er so fatal. I must weep,

But they are cruel tears: this sorrow's heavenly:
It strikes where it doth love.

Othello's Perplexity after the Murder.

Yes! 'tis Emilia :-by and by.

She's dead.

'Tis like she comes to speak of Cassio's death; The noise was high.-Ha! no more moving?

Still as the grave. Shall she come in? Were't good?
I think she stirs again :-No.-What's the best?
If she come in, she'll sure speak to my wife:
My wife! my wife! what wife?—I have no wife :
O, insupportable! O heavy hour!

Methinks it should be now a huge eclipse

Of sun and moon: and that the affrighted globe
Should yawn at alteration.

Othello's Love for Desdemona.

If heaven would make me such another world Of one entire and perfect chrysolite,*

I'd not have sold her for it.

Othello's Remorse.

Behold! I have a weapon;

A better never did itself sustain

Upon a soldier's thigh: I have seen the day,
That, with this little arm, and this good sword,
I have made my way through more impediments
Than twenty times your stop.-But, O vain boast!
Who can control his fate? 'tis not so now.-
Be not afraid, though you do see me weapon'd
Here is my journey's end, here is my butt,
And very sea-mark of my utmost sail.
Do you go back dismay'd? 'tis a lost fear;
Man but a rush against Othello's breast,
And he retires! where should Othello go?-

Now, how dost thou look now? O ill-starr'd wench!
Pale as thy smock! when we shall meet at compt,†
This look of thine will hurl my soul from heaven,
And fiends will snatch at it.

* A precious stone.

At our account hereafter.

Othello's Speech before he Kills himself.

Soft you;

a word or two before you go.

I have done the state some service, and they know it;
No more of that. I pray you, in your letters,
When you shall these unlucky deeds relate,
Speak of me as I am; nothing extenuate,

Nor set down aught in malice: then must you speak
Of one, that loved not wisely, but too well:
Of one not easily jealous, but, being wrought,
Perplex'd in the extreme; of one, whose hand,
Like the base Judean, threw a pearl away,

Richer than all his tribe; of one whose subdu'd eyes,
Albeit unus'd to the melting mood,

Drop tears as fast as the Arabian trees
Their medicinal gum. Set you down this:
And say besides,—that in Aleppo once,
Where a malignant and a turban'd Turk
Beat a Venetian, and traduc'd the state,
I took by the throat the circumcised dog,
And smote him—thus.

[Stabs himself.

Ludovico's Denunciation of Iago.

O Spartan dog,

More fell than anguish, hunger, or the sea!
Look on the tragic loading of this bed ;
This is thy work-the object poisons sight ;-
Let it be hid.-Gratiano, keep the house,
And seize upon the fortunes of the Moor,
For they succeed to you.—To you, lord governor,
Remains the censure of this hellish villain;
The time, the place, the torture,—O enforce it!
Myself will straight aboard; and, to the state,
This heavy act with heavy heart relate.

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