EMIL. I will not charm my tongue; I am bound My mistress here lies murder'd in her bed. EMIL. And your reports have fet the murder on. MON. O monstrous act! EMIL. Villainy, villainy, villainy!I think upon't,—I think,-I smell't;-O villainy! I thought fo then;-I'll kill myself for grief.O villainy, villainy! LAGO. What, are you mad? I charge you, get you home. EMIL. Good gentlemen, let me have leave to speak; 'Tis proper I obey him, but not now:Perchance, Iago, I will ne'er go home. Отн. О! О! 0! 0! [Hanging over bis wife. Nay, lay thee down, and roar ; EMIL. For thou haft kill'd the sweetest innocent, That e'er did lift up eye. OTH. O, fhe was foul! [Rifing. I fcarce did know you, uncle: There lies your niece, Whofe breath, indeed, thefe hands have newly ftopp'd: Pliny informs us, that farvete linguis was the conftant exclamation before any religious charm was applied. From this circumftance the phrafe, to charm a tongue, might have originated. STEEVENS. 9 My miftrefs &c.] This line, and the following fix fpeeches, are wanting in the firft quarto. STEEVENS. I know, this act shows horrible and grim. GRA. Poor Desdemona! I am glad thy father's dead; Thy match was mortal to him, and pure grief OTH. 'Tis pitiful: but yet Iago knows, 3 Yea, curse his better angel from his fide, And fall to reprobation.] So, in our author's 144th Sonnet: my female evil 66 66 Tempteth my better angel from my fide." MALONE. -reprobation.] Both the firft and fecond folio readreprobance. STEEVENS. • A thousand times committed;] This is another paffage which feems to fuppofe a longer fpace comprised in the action of this play than the scenes include. JOHNSON. That he with Caffio hath the act of shame A thousand times committed ; And again: 'Tis not a year or two shows us a man. I am not convinced from thefe paffages only, that a longer space is comprised in the action of this play than the scenes include. What Othello mentions in the firit inftance, might have paffed ftill more often, before they were married, when Caffio went between them; for fhe, who could find means to elude the vigilance of her father in refpect of Othello, might have done fo in refpect of Caffio, when there was time enough for the occurrence fuppofed to have happened. A jealous perfon will aggravate all he thinks, or fpeaks of; and might ufe a thousand for a much less number, only to give weight to his cenfure: nor would it have answered any purpose to have made Othello a little nearer or further off from truth in his calculation. We might apply the poet's own words in Cymbeline: fpare your arithmetick; "Once, and a million." And she did gratify his amorous works The latter is a proverbial expreffion, and might have been introduced with propriety, had they been married only a day or two. Emilia's reply perhaps was dictated by her own private experience; and feems to mean only, " that it is too foon to judge of a husband's difpofition; or that Desdemona must not be furprised at the dif covery of Othello's jealoufy, for it is not even a year or two that will difplay all the failings of a man.” Mr. Tollet, however, on this occafion has produced feveral inftances in fupport of Dr. Johnson's opinion; and as I am unable to explain them in favour of my own fuppofition, I fhall lay them before the publick. Act III. fc. iii. Othello says: "What fenfe had I of her stolen hours of luft? "I faw it not, thought it not, it harm'd not me: "On Othello's wedding night he and Caffio embark'd from Venice, where Desdemona was left under the care of Iago. They all meet at Cyprus; and fince their arrival there, the fcenes include only one night, the night of the celebration of their nuptials. Iago had not then infufed any jealoufy into Othello's mind, nor did he fufpect any former intimacy between Caffio and Defdemona, but only thought it apt and of great credit that the loved him.' What night then was there to intervene between Caffio's kiffes and Othello's fleeping the next night well? Iago has faid, ‹ I lay with Caffio lately, which he could not have done, unless they had been longer at Cyprus than is reprefented in the play; nor could Caffio have kept away, for the space of a whole week, from Bianca.” STEEVENS. In confirmation of Johnfon's obfervation, that this and feveral other paffages tend to prove that a larger space of time is comprized in the action of this play than the fcenes include, we may cite that in which Emilia fays, "That her husband had a hundred times woo'd her to steal Defdemona's handkerchief." M. MASON. 5 It was a handkerchief, &c.] Othello tells his wife, A&t III. fc. iv: EMIL. O heaven! O heavenly powers! IAGO. Come, hold your peace. EMIL. 'Twill out, 'twill out:-I hold my peace, fir? no; No, I will speak as liberal as the air;" And here he fays: It was a handkerchief,— My father gave my mother. This laft paffage has been cenfured as an overfight in the poet; but perhaps it exhibits only a fresh proof of his art. The first account of the handkerchief, as given by Othello, was purpofely oftentatious, in order to alarm his wife the more. When he mentions it a fecond time, the truth was fufficient for his purpose. This circumftance of the handkerchief is perhaps ridiculed by Ben Jonfon, in his Poetafter: " —you shall see me do the Moor; maiter, lend me your scarf." STEEVENS. I question whether Othello was written early enough to be ridiculed by The Poetafter. There were many other Moors on the stage. It is certain at least, that the paffage, "Our new heraldry is hands, not hearts." could not be inferted before the middle of the year 1611. FARMER. If the allufion in The Poetafter (which was printed in 1601) were to Othello, it would fix its date much earlier than I conceive it to have been written.-But the allufion in the paffage quoted, is not to Othello, but to an old play called The Battle of Alcazar, 1594-In The Poetafter, Pyrgus, who fays, "you fhall fee me do the Moor," proceeds in the fame fcene, and repeats an abfurd fpeech of the Moor's in The Battle of Alcazar, beginning with this line: "Where art thou, boy? where is Calipolis?" which ascertains the allufion to be to that play. MALONE. 6 No, I will speak as liberal as the air;] The folio reads, I'll be in fpeaking liberal as the north. Liberal is free, under no control. So, in Hamlet: "Which liberal fhepherds give a groffer name." This quality of the North wind is also mentioned in The White Devil, or Vittoria Corombona, 1612: "And let th' irregular North wind sweep her up." Let heaven, and men, and devils, let them all, EMIL GRA. I will not. [IAGO offers to ftab his wife. Fye! Your fword upon a woman? EMIL. O thou dull Moor! that handkerchief thou speak'it of, I found by fortune, and did give my husband; (More than, indeed, belong'd to fuch a trifle,) IAGO. Villainous whore! EMIL. She give it Caffio! no, alas; I found it, And I did give't my husband. LAGO. Filth, thou lieft. EMIL. By heaven, I do not; I do not, gentle men : O murd'rous coxcomb! what fhould fuch a fool Do with fo good a wife? Отн. [IAGO ftabs EMILIA, then runs out. Are there no ftones in heaven, But what ferve for the thunder?-Precious villain! Again, in Jeronimo, i. e. the first part of The Sparib Tragedy, 1605: "Now let your bloods be liberal as the fea." STEEVENS. No, I will speak as liberal as the air;] The quarto, 1622, reads, I'll be in speaking liberal as the air. The text is formed out of the two copies. MALONE. Are there no fiones in heaven, But what jerve for the thunder?] Othello does not demand a thunderbolt for lago. He only asks, if there are no leffer degrees of chattisement more proportioned to the guilt of mortals, ready to drop down on fuch villains as Iago, though Omnipotence withholds |