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The goodness of the night upon you, friends!
What is the news?

CAS.

The duke does greet you, general;

And he requires your hafte-post-hafte appearance, Even on the inftant.

Отн.

What is the matter, think you?

CAS. Something from Cyprus, as I may divine; It is a business of fome heat: the gallies Have fent a dozen fequent meffengers 2 This very night, at one another's heels; And many of the confuls,' rais'd, and met, Are at the duke's already: You have been hotly call'd for;

When, being not at your lodging to be found, The fenate hath fent about three feveral quefts, To fearch you out.

8 The goodness of the night upon you, friends!] So, in Measure for Measure:

"The beft and wholefomeft fpirits of the night.

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Envellop you, good Provolt!" STEEVENS.

9 your bafte-poft-hafte appearance,] The comma, hitherto placed after hafte, fhould be a hyphen. Your hafte-poft-hafte appearance is your immediate appearance. The words " Hafte, poft, hafte,” were in our author's time ufually written on the cover of packets, or letters, fent exprefs. RITSON.

2 - fequent meffengers-] The first quarto reads-frequent meffengers. STEEVENS.

3 - the confuls,] See p. 382, n. 3. STEEVENS.

4 The fenate hath fent about-] The early quartos, and all the modern editors, have,

The fenate fent above three feveral quests,—.

The folio:

The fenate hath fent about &c.

That is, about the city. I have adopted the reading of the folio.

JOHNSON. Quefts are, on this occafion, fearches. So, in Heywood's Brazen Age, 1613:

"Now, if in all his quests, he be witheld." An ancient MS. entitled "The boke of huntyng that is cleped

Отн.

'Tis well I am found by you.

I will but spend a word here in the house,

And go with you.

CAS.

[Exit.

Ancient, what makes he here?

IAGO. 'Faith, he to-night hath boarded a land

carack; +

If it prove lawful prize, he's made for ever.

CAS. I do not understand.

LAGO.

CAS.

He's married.

To who?5

Mayfter of game," has the following explanation of the word queft: "This word queft is a terme of herte hunters of beyonde the fee; and is thus moche to fay as whan the hunter goth to fynde of the hert and to herborow him." STEEVENS.

a land carack;] A carack is a fhip of great bulk, and commonly of great value; perhaps what we now call a galleon.

So, in Beaumont and Fletcher's Coxcomb :

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they'll be freighted;

galleon.

JOHNSON.

"They're made like caracks, all for ftrength and ftowage."

STEEVENS.

The firft fhips that came richly laden from the Weft Indies to Europe were thofe from the Caraccas, part of the Spanish fettlements and fome years ago a Caracca fhip generally proved a very rich prize. M. MASON.

A carack, or carick, (for fo it was more frequently written in Shakspeare's time,) is of higher origin, and was denominated from the Spanish word, caraca, which fignifies a veffel of great bulk, conftructed to carry a heavy burthen. The Spanish caraca, Min fheu thinks, may have been formed from the Italian carico, a lading, or freight. MALONE.

5 To who?] It is fomewhat fingular that Caffio should ask this queftion. In the 3d fcene of the 3d act, Iago says:

"Did Michael Caffio, when you woo'd my lady,
"Know of your love?

"Oth. From first to last."

He who was acquainted with the object courted by his friend, could have little reafon for doubting to whom he would be married.

STEEVENS.

Caffio's feeming ignorance of Othello's courtship or marriage

Re-enter OTHELLO.

LAGO. Marry, to-Come, captain, will you go? Have with you."

Отн.

CAS. Here comes another troop to feek for you.

Enter BRABANTIO, RODERIGO, and Officers of night, with torches and weapons.

LAGO. It is Brabantio:—general, be advis'd;' He comes to bad intent.

Отн.

Hola! ftand there!

Down with him, thief!

[They draw on both fides.

ROD. Signior, it is the Moor.
BRA.

LAGO. You, Roderigo! come, fir, I am for you. Отн. Keep up your bright swords, for the dew will ruft them.

Good fignior, you shall more command with years, Than with your weapons.

might only be affected; in order to keep his friend's fecret, till it became publickly known. BLACKSTONE.

Or he might fear that Othello had proved false to the gentle Desdemona, and married another. MALONE.

How far this fufpicious apprehenfion would have become the benevolent Caffio, the intimate friend of Othello, let the reader judge. STEEVENS.

6 Have with you.] This expreffion denotes readiness. So, in the ancient Interlude of Nature, bl. 1. no date:

"And faw that Glotony wold nedys begone;
"Have with thee, Glotony, quoth he anon,
"For I must go wyth thee."

See Vol. X. p. 571, n. 5. STEEVENS.

7-be advis'd;] That is, be cool; be cautious; be difcreet.

JOHNSON.

BRA. O thou foul thief, where haft thou ftow'd my daughter?

Damn'd as thou art, thou haft enchanted her:
For I'll refer me to all things of fenfe,
If the in chains of magick were not bound,
Whether a maid-so tender, fair, and happy;
So oppofite to marriage, that she shunn'd
The wealthy curled darlings of our nation,3-
Would ever have, to incur a general mock,
Run from her. guardage to the footy bofom
Of fuch a thing as thou; to fear, not to delight."

8 The wealthy curled darlings of our nation,] Curled is elegantly and oftentatiously dreffed. He had not the hair particularly in his thoughts. JOHNSON.

On another occafion Shakspeare employs the fame expreffion, and evidently alludes to the bair:"

"If the first meet the curled Antony," &c.

Sir W. D'Avenant ufes the fame expreffion in his Just Italian, 1630: "The curl'd and filken nobles of the town."

Again:

"Such as the curled youth of Italy."

I believe Shakspeare has the fame meaning in the present instance. Thus, Turnus, in the 12th Eneid, fpeaking of Æneas:

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fœdare in pulvere crines

"Vibratos calido ferro,." STEEVENS.

That Dr. Johnson was mistaken in his interpretation of this line, is afcertained by our poet's Rape of Lucrece, where the hair is not merely alluded to, but exprefsly mentioned, and the epithet curled is added as characteristick of a person of the highest rank : "Let him have time to tear his curled hair."

Edgar, when
MALONE.

Tarquin, a king's fon, is the perfon fpoken of. he was " proud in heart and mind," curl'd his hair. 9 Of fuch a thing as thou; to fear, not to delight.] To fear, in the prefent inftance, may mean-to terrify. So, in K. Henry VI. P.III: "For Warwick was a bug that fear'd us all." The line spoken by Brabantio is redundant in its measure. It might originally have ran

Of fuch as thou; to fear, not to delight.

Mr. Rowe, however, feems to have selected the words I would omit, as proper to be put into the mouth of Horatio, who applies them to Lothario:

"To be the prey of fuch a thing as thou art." STEVENS.

[Judge me the world, if 'tis not grofs in fense, That thou haft practis'd on her with foul charms; Abus'd her delicate youth with drugs, or minerals, That waken motion: -I'll have it difputed on:

-to fear, not to delight.] To one more likely to terrify than delight her. So, in the next fcene (Brabantio is again the speaker): "To fall in love with what he fear'd to look on.'

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Mr. Steevens fuppofes fear to be a verb here, used in the sense of to terrify; a fignification which it formerly had. But fear, I apprehend, is a fubftantive, and poetically used for the object of fear. MALONE.

2

[Judge me the world, &c.] The lines following in crotchets are not in the first edition. [1622.] РОРЕ.

3 Abus'd her delicate youth with drugs, or minerals,

That waken motion:] [Old copy-weaken.] Hanmer reads with probability:

That awaken motion :

JOHNSON.

Motion in a fubfequent fcene of this play is ufed in the very sense in which Sir T. Hanmer would employ it :-" But we have reafon to cool our raging motions, our carnal ftings, our unbitted lufts." STEEVENS.

To weaken motion is, to impair the faculties. It was till very lately, and may with fome be ftill an opinion, that philtres or love potions have the power of perverting, and of course weakening or impairing both the fight and judgement, and of procuring fondness or dotage toward any unworthy object who adminifters them. And by motion, Shakspeare means the fenfes which are depraved and weakened by thefe fafcinating mixtures. RITSON.

The folio, where alone this paffage is found, reads:

That weaken motion :———.

I have adopted Sir Thomas Hanmer's emendation, because I have a good reafon to believe that the words weaken and waken were in Shakspeare's time pronounced alike, and hence the mistake might eafily have happened. Motion is elfewhere ufed by our poet precifely in the fenfe required here. So, in Cymbeline:

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for there's no motion

"That tends to vice in man, but I affirm

"It is the woman's part."

Again, in Hamlet :

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fenfe fure you have,

"Elfe could you not have motion."

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