So speaking as I think, alas, I die. It is a sword of Spain, the ice-brook's temper a ;- Thou hast no weapon, and perforce must suffer. Behold! I have a weapon; A better never did itself sustain Upon a soldier's thigh: I have seen the day, O cursed, cursed slave!-Whip me, ye devils, O Desdemona b! dead? Desdemona! dead? Oh, oh! [Dies. Enter LODOVICO, MONTANO, CASSIO, carried in a chair, and Officers, with IAGO, prisoner. LOD. Where is this rash and most unfortunate man? ОTH. That's he that was Othello; here I am. LOD. Where is that viper? bring the villain forth. ОTH. I look down towards his feet;-but that's a fable: If that thou be'st a devil I cannot kill thee. [OTHELLO wounds IAGO. a Ice-brook's temper. Pope and others would read Ebro's temper. The practice of the Spaniards to temper their swords by plunging them, when hot from the forge, into waters of an icy coldness, is noticed by Martial and Justin. The folio has Desdemon. LOD. Wrench his sword from him. IAGO. I bleed, sir; but not kill'd. OTH. I am not sorry neither; I'd have thee live; For, in my sense, 't is happiness to die. LOD. O thou Othello, that was once so good, Fall 'n in the practice of a cursed slave, What shall be said to thee? CAS. Dear general, I never gave you cause. Will you, I pray, demand that demi-devil, Why he hath thus ensnar'd my soul and body? GRA. Oтн. Well, thou dost best. Torments will ope your lips. LOD. Sir, you shall understand what hath befall'n, Which, as I think, you know not: Here is a letter, Found in the pocket of the slain Roderigo; And here, another: the one of them imports The death of Cassio to be undertook LOD. Now here's another discontented paper, Found in his pocket too; and this, it seems, But that, belike, Iago in the interim Came in and satisfied him. Your power and your command is taken off, That can torment him much, and hold him long, I have done the state some service, and they know 't; Nor set down aught in malice: then must you speak Of one, not easily jealous, but, being wrought, Richer than all his tribe; of one, whose subdu'd eyes, Drop tears as fast as the Arabian trees Their medicinable gum: Set you down this: LOD. O bloody period! OTH. I kiss'd thee, ere I kill'd thee;-No way but this, Killing myself, to die upon a kiss. CAS. This did I fear, but thought he had no weapon; [Stabs himself. [Dies. [To IAGO. Indian. The first and second quartos read distinctly, Indian-the first folio, Iudean. We might have thought that there was only a substitution in this reading of u for n, had we not turned to all the passages in that edition where Indian occurs, and found it invariably spelt I-n-d-i-a-n. (See Illustration 16.) This is thy work: the object poisons sight;- [Exeunt. "Ir appears," says Hanmer, "from many passages of this play, rightly understood, that Cassio was a Florentine, and Iago a Venetian." We may as well dispose of this question at once, to avoid the repetition in subsequent notes. Iago here calls Cassio a Florentine. But there are some who maintain that Cassio was not therefore a Florentine. It is not to be forgotten that Iago, throughout the whole course of his extraordinary character, is represented as utterly regardless of the differences between truth and falsehood. The most absolute lie,-the half lie, -the truth in the way of telling it distorted into a lie, are the instruments with which Iago constantly works. This ought to be borne in mind with reference to his assertion that Cassio was a Florentine. But in the second Act we find, in the modern editions, the following lines spoken by a gentleman of Cyprus "The ship is here put in. A Veronesé; Michael Cassio, Lieutenant to the warlike Moor, Othello, Here the ship is the Veronese. But, although the text looks plausible, the editors stumble at it because Verona is an inland city. They settle it, however, in the usual way, by saying that Shakspere knew nothing of the topography of Italy. But the original quarto and folio each agree in the punctuation of the passage: "The ship is here put in: A Veronessa, Michael Cassio, Lieutenant to the warlike Moor, Othello, Here Cassio is the Veronesé. But we retain the word Veronessa, because we apprehend that it must be taken as a feminine, and as such applicable to the ship, and we alter the punctuation accordingly. The city of Verona, subject to Venice, might furnish ships for the Republic. In the third Act Cassio, when Iago is proffering his services to him, says, "I humbly thank you for 't. I never knew One meaning of his words is, that Iago being a Florentine, Cassio never knew one of that country more kind and honest. The other meaning is, that Cassio never knew even a Florentine, even one of his own countrymen, more kind and honest. This is Malone's interpretation; and Iago," he adds, "is a Venetian," because he says, speaking of Desdemona, "I know our country disposition well;" |