MOOR OF VENICE And she did gratify his amorous works Emil. Twill out, 'twill out ;-I hold my peace, No, I will speak as liberal as the air; Let heaven, and men, and devils, let them all, Who can control his fate? 'tis not so now.- Oth. I look down towards his feet; +-but If that thou be'st a devil, I cannot kill thee. Lod. O thou Othello, that wast once so good, An honourable murderer, if you will; Oth. Ay. Cas. Dear general, I never gave you cause. Lod. What? not to pray? Gra. Torments will ope your lips. Lod. Sir, you shall understand what hath Which, as I think, you know not: Here is a Found in the pocket of the slain Roderigo, Cas. Most heathenish, and most gross! But that belike, lago in the interim Oth. O the pernicious caitiff! How came you, Cassio, by that handkerchief Cas. I found it in my chamber : Oth. O fool! fool! fool! Cas. There is, besides, in Roderigo's letter,• Account. + To see if his feet be cloven. By the stratagem, How he upbraids lago, that he made him, Lod. You must forsake this room, and Your power and your command is taken off, go That can torment him much, and hold him It shall be his: You shall close prisoner rest, Oth. 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, Of one that lov'd not wisely, but too well; |Their medicinal gum: Set you down this: Lod. O bloody period! [Falling upon DESDEMONA. Killing myself, to die upon a kiss. [Dies, Cas. This did I fear, but thought he had no For he was great of heart. More fell than anguish, hunger, or the sea! [TO IAGO. Remains the censure of this hellish villain; • Sentence. THE reader will frequently be at a loss to reconcile the order and passages of Othello, as given in the present edition, with their accustomed delivery on the stage; but it is considered a trifling inconvenience, when coun teracted by the pleasure of possessing (as nearly as the most authentic resources can afford them,) the actual language and construction of the drama, as given by Shakspeare. In the authorized copies of the prompters' books, and in many editions reprinted from them, the beauty of the original has been somewhat obscured by green-room critics, of conflicting taste, and obsequious managers, more penny-wise than poetical. The scene with the musicians, which introduces Act II.---that incongruous nuisance, the clown---and that equally trouble come excrescence, Bianca the prostitute ---are however, with real judgment, omitted in the representation; and many of the less important passages, such as occur in the scene before the senate---in the soliloquies of lago--in the dialogues between Montano and a gentleman of Cyprus, on the tempest of the preceding night, and between Desdemona and Emilia, on the temptations to adultery, are very considerably abridged. The order of the scenes is also perpetually varied; each theatrical copartnership retaining its peculiar programme of Richard or Othello, in common with its wardrobe, thunder, side-scenes, and mould-candles. LITERARY AND HISTORICAL NOTICE. IN 156 Mr. Arthur Brooke published a poem on "The Tragicall Historie of Romeus and Juliett ;" the materials for which he chiefly obtained from a French translation (by Boisteau) of an Italian novel by Luigi da Porto, a Venetian gentleman, who died in 1529. A prose translation of Boisteau's work was also published 1576, by Paister, in his Palace of Pleasure, vol. II.; and upon the incidents of these two works, especially of the poem, Malone decides that Shakspeare constructed his entertaining tragedy. Dr. Johnson has declared this play to be "one of the most pleasing of Shakspeare's performances:" but it contains some breaches of irregularity--many superfluities, tumid conceits, and bombastic ideas, inexcusable even in a lover; with a continued recurreace of jingling periods and trifling quibbles, which obscure the sense, or disgust the reader. Several of the characters are, however, charmingly designed, and not less happily executed; the catastrophe is intensely affecting; the incidents various and expressive; and as the passion which it delineates is one of universal acceptance in the catalogue of human wishes, the tinder-like character of the lady, and the notable constancy of the gentleman, are forgotten in the dangers and the calamities of both. The numerous rhymes which occur, are probably seedlings from Arthur Brooke's stock plant. "The nurse (says Dr. Johnson) is one of the characters in which Shakspeare delighted: he has, with great subtilty of distinction, drawn her at once loquacious and secret, obsequious and insolent, trusty and dishonest." SCENE, during the greater part of the Play, in Verona: once, in the fifth Act, at Mantua. Gre. No, for then we should be colliers. The fearful passage of their death-mark'd love, move, Is now the two hours' traffic of our stage; Gre. Ay, while you live, draw your neck out of the collar. Sam. I strike quickly, being moved. Sam. A dog of the house of Montague moves me. Gre. To move, is-to stir; and to be valiant, thou run'st away. is-to stand to it: therefore, if thou art mov❜d, Sam. A dog of that house shall move me to A phrase formerly in use to signify the bearing in- stand: I will take the wall of any man or maid of Montague's. Gre. That shows thee a weak slave; for the | Down with the Capulets! down with the Mon weakest goes to the wall. Sam. True; and therefore women, being the weaker vessels, are ever thrust to the wall:therefore I will push Moutague's men from the wall, and thrust his maids to the wall. Gre. The quarrel is between our masters, and us their meu. Sam. 'Tis all one, I will show myself a tyrant: when I have fought with the men, I will be cruel with the maids; I will cut off their heads. Gre. The heads of the maids? Sam. Ay, the heads of the maids, or their maidenheads; take it in what sense thou wilt. Gre. They must take it in sense, that feel it. Sam. Me they shall feel, while I am able to stand and 'tis known I am a pretty piece of flesh. Gre. 'Tis well, thou art not fish: if thou badst, thou hadst been poor John. Draw thy tool; here comes two of the house of the Montagues. Enter ABRAM and BALTHAZER. tagues! come And flourishes his blade in spite of me. Enter MONTAGUE, and LADY MONTAGUE. Mon. Thou villain, Capulet,-Hold me not, let me go. La. Mon. Thou shalt not stir one foot to seek Enter PRINCE, with Attendants. That quench the fire of your pernicious rage Sam. My naked weapon is out; quarrel, I will On pain of torture, from those bloody hands back thee. Gre. How? turn thy back, and run? Sam. Fear me not. Gre. No, marry: I fear thee! Sam. Let us take the law of our sides; let them begin. Cre. I will frown as I pass by: and let them take it as they list. Sam. Nay, as they dare. I will bite my thumb at them; which is a disgrace to them, if they bear it. Abr. Do you bite your thumb at us, Sir? Abr. Do you bite your thumb at us, Sir? Throw your mistemper'd weapons to the ground, And hear the sentence of your moved prince.- Sam. No, Sir, I do not bite my thumb at you, once more, on pain of death, all men depart. Sir; but I bite my thumb, Sir. Gre. Do you quarrel, Sir? Abr. Quarrel, Sir? no, Sir. Sam. If you do, Sir, I am for you; I serve as good a man as you. Abr, No better. Sam. Well, Sir Enter BENVOLIO, at a Distance. [Exeunt PRINCE and Attendants; CAPULET, LADY CAPULET, TYBALT, CITIZENS, and Servants. Mon. Who set this ancient quarrel new abroach? Speak, nephew, were you by when it began ? versary, Gre. Say-better; here comes one of my And your's, close fighting ere I did approach : Till the prince came, who parted either part. Right glad I am, he was not at his fray. Ben. I do but keep the peace; put up thy Peer'd through the golden window of the east, sword, Or manage it to part these men with me. A troubled mind drave me to walk abroad; Tyb. What, drawn, and talk of peace? I hate That westward rooteth from the city's side,— Scene II. ROMEO AND JULIET. But all so soon as the all-cheering sun Ben. My noble uncle, do you know the cause? Is to himself-I will not say, how true,- Ere he can spread his sweet leaves to the air, Could we but learn from whence his sorrows We would as willingly give cure, as know. Bea. See, where he comes: So please you, I'll know his grievance, or be much denied. Ben. Good morrow, cousin. Rom. Ah me! sad hours seem long. Rom. Not having that, which having, makes Ben. In love? Rom. Out of her favour, where I am in love. Yet tell not, for I have heard it all. [love: Here's much to do with hate, but more with health! Still-waking sleep, that is not what it is!- Ben. No, coz, I rather weep. Rom. Good heart, at what? Ben. At thy good heart's oppression. Doth add more grief to too much of mine own. [Going. Ben. Soft, I will go along; not bere ; This is not Romeo, he's some other where. Ben. Tell me in sadness, who she is you love. la seriousness. Rom. What, shall I groan, and tell thee? But sadly tell me, who. Rom. Bid a sick man in sadness make his Ah word ill urg'd to one that is so ill!- Rom. A right good marksman !-And she's Ben. A right fair mark, fair coz, is soonest Rom. Well, in that hit, you miss: she'll not With Cupid's arrow, she hath Dian's wit; She will not stay the siege of loving terms, Rom. She hath, and in that sparing makes For beauty, starv'd with her severity, Ben. Be rul'd by me, forget to think of her. Ben. By giving liberty unto thine eyes: Rom. 'Tis the way To call her's exquisite, in question more: fair; He, that is strucken blind, cannot forget Farewell; thou canst not teach me to forget. SCENE II-A Street. Enter CAPULET, PARIS, and SERVANT. Par. Of honourable reckoning are you both; My child is yet a stranger in the world, Par. Younger than she are happy mothers made. Cap. And too soon marr'd are those so early The earth hath swallow'd all my hopes but she; A complimett to Queen Elizabeth, in whose reign the play was first represented. |