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men,

Yet do I hold it very stuff o'the conscience,
To do no contriv'd murder; I lack iniquity
Sometimes, to do me service: Nine or ten times
I had thought to have yerk'd him here under
the ribs.

Oth. 'Tis better as it is.

Iago. Nay, but he prated,

And spoke such scurvy and provoking terms Against your honour,

That, with the little godliness I have,

I did full hard forbear him. But, I pray, Sir,
Are you fast married? for, be sure of this,-
That the magnificot is much beloved;
And hath, in his effect, a voice potential

As double as the duke's; he will divorce you ;
Or put upon you what restraint and grievance
The law (with all his might, to enforce it on,)
Will give him cable.

Oth. Let him do his spite:

My services, which I have done the signiory, Shall out-tongue his complaints. 'Tis yet to know, [our, (Which, when I know that boasting is an honI shall promulgate,) I fetch my life and being From men of royal siege; and my demerits May speak, unbonnetted,|| to as proud a for

tune

As this that I have reach'd: For know, lago,
But that I love the gentle Desdemona,
I would not my unhoused¶ free condition

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Put into circumspection and confine For the sea's worth. But, look! what lights come yonder?

Enter CASSIO, at a distance, and certain Officers with Torches.

Iago. These are the raised father, and his You were best go in. [friends:

Oth. Not I: I must be found;

My parts, my title, and my perfect soul,
Shall manifest me rightly. Is it they?
Iugo. By Janus, I think no.

Oth. The servants of the duke, and my lieu

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Oth. Have with you.

Cas. Here comes another troop to seek for you.

Enter BRABANTIO, RODERIGO, and Officers of
night, with Torches and Weapons.
Iago. It is Brabantio:-general, be advis'd;
He comes to bad intent.

Oth. Hola! stand there!
Rod. Signior, it is the Moor.
Bra. Down with him, thief!

[They draw on both sides. Iago. You, Roderigo! come, Sir, I am for you.

Oth. Keep up your bright swords, for the

dew will rust them.[years, Good signior, you shall more command with Than with your weapons.

Bra. O thou foul thief, where hast thou Damp'd as thou art, thou hast enchanted her: stow'd my daughter? For I'll refer me to all things of sense, If she in chains of magic were not bound, Whether a maid-so tender, fair, and happy; So opposite to marriage, that she shunn'd The wealthy curled darlings of our nation,Would ever have, to incur a general mock, Run from her guardage to the sooty-bosom Of such a thing as thou: to fear, not to delight.§

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Both you of my inclining, and the rest: [it Were it my cue to fight, I should have known Without a prompter.-Where will you that I To answer this your charge?

Bra. To prison: till fit time

Of law, and course of direct session,
Call thee to answer.

Oth. What if I do obey?

How may the duke be therewith satisfied;
Whose messengers are here about my side,
Upon some present business of the state,
To bring me to him?

[go

Off. 'Tis true, most worthy signior, The duke's in council; and your noble self, I am sure, is sent for.

Bra. How! the duke in council! In this time of the night!-Bring him away: Mine's not an idle cause: the duke himself, Or any of my brothers of the state, [own: Cannot but feel this wrong, as 'twere their For if such actions may have passage free, Bond-slaves and pagans,* shall our statesmen be. [Exeunt.

So may he with more facile question* bear it,
For that it stands not in such warlike brace,†
But altogether lacks the abilities
That Rhodes is dress'd in:-if we make thought
of this,

We must not think, the Turk is so unskilful,
To leave that latest which concerns him first;
Neglecting an attempt of ease and gain,
To wake, and wage, a danger profitless.
Duke. Nay, in all confidence, he's not for
Rhodes.

Off. Here is more news.

Enter a MESsenger.

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SCENE III.-The same.-A Council Chamber. Enter BRABANTIO, OTHELLO, IAGO, RODERIGO,

The DUKE, and SENATORS, sitting at a Table;

Officers attending.

and Officers.

Duke. Valiant Othello, we must straight employ you

Duke. There is no compositiont in these Against the general enemy Ottoman.

news,

That gives them credit.

1 Sen. Indeed, they are disproportion'd; My letters say, a hundred and seven gallies. Duke. And mine, a hundred and forty. 2 Sen. And mine, two hundred : But though they jump not on a just account, (As in these cases, where the aim‡ reports, "Tis oft with difference,) yet do they all confirm A Turkish fleet, and bearing up to Cyprus. Duke. Nay, it is possible enough to judgement;

I do not so secure me in the error,
But the main article I do approve
In fearful sense.

Sailor. [Within.] What ho! what ho! what ho!

Enter an OFFICER, with a SAILOR.

Off. A messenger from the gallies.
Duke. Now? the business?

I did not see you; welcome, gentle Signior;
[To BRABANTIO.
We lack'd your counsel and your help to-night.
Bra. So did I yours: Good your grace, par-
don me;
[ness,
Neither my place, nor aught I heard of busi-
Hath rais'd me from my bed; nor doth the ge-
neral care

Take hold on me; for my particular grief
Is of so flood-gate and o'erbearing nature,
That it engluts and swallows other sorrows,
And it is still itself.

Duke. Why, what's the matter?

Bru. My daughter! O, my daughter!
Sen. Dead?

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For nature so preposterously to err,
Being not deficient, blind, or lame of sense,

Sailor. The Turkish preparation makes for Sans witchcraft could not

Rhodes;

So was I bid report here to the state,

By signior Angelo.

Duke. How say you by this change? 1 Sen. This cannot be,

By no assay of reason; 'tis a pageant,

To keep us in false gaze: When we consider
The importancy of Cyprus to the Turk;
And let ourselves again but understand,
That, as it more concerns the Turk than
Rhodes,

The pagans and bond-slaves of Africa.

+ Consistency. * Conjecture.

Duke. Whoe'er he be, that, in this foul proceeding,

Hath thus beguil'd your daughter of herself,
And you of her, the bloody book of law
You shall yourself read in the bitter letter,
After your own sense; yea, though our proper

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It is most true; true, I have married her;
The very head and front of my offending
Hath this extent, no more. Rude am I in my
speech,

And little bless'd with the set phrase of peace;
For since these arms of mine had seven years'
pith,
[us'd
Till now some nine moons wasted, they have
Their dearest action in the tented field;
And little of this great world can I speak,
More than pertains to feats of broil and battle;
And therefore little shall I grace my cause,
In speaking for myself: Yet, by your gracious
patience,

I will a round unvarnish'd tale deliver Of my whole course of love; what drugs, what charms,

What conjuration, and what mighty magic, (For such proceeding I am charg'd withal,) I won his daughter with.

Bra. A maiden never bold;

Of spirit so still and quiet, that her motion Blush'd at herself; And she,-in spite of nature,

Of years, of country, credit, every thing,-
To fall in love with what she fear'd to look on?
It is a judgement maim'd, and most imperfect,
That will confess-perfection so could err
Against all rules of nature; and must be driven
To find out practices of cunning hell,
Why this should be. I therefore vouch again,
That with some mixtures powerful o'er the
blood,

Or with some dram conjur'd to this effect,
He wrought upon her.

Duke. To vouch this, is no proof;
Without more certain and more overt test,t
Than these thin habits, and poor likelihoods
Of modern seeming,‡ do prefer against him.
1 Sen. But, Othello, speak ;-
Did you by indirect and forced courses
Subdue and poison this young maid's affec-
tions?

Or came it by request, and such fair question
As soul to soul affordeth?

Oth. I do beseech you,
Send for the lady to the Sagittary.§
And let her speak of me before her father:
If you do find me foul in her report,
The trust, the office, I do hold of you,
Not only take away, but let your sentence
Even fall upon my life.

Duke. Fetch Desdemona hither.

Oth. Ancient, conduct them; you best know the place.

[Exeunt IAGO and Attendants. And, till she come, as truly as to heaven I do confess the vices of my blood, So justly to your grave ears I'll present How I did thrive in this fair lady's love, And she in mine.

Duke. Say it, Othello.

Oth. Her father lov'd me; oft invited me; Best exertion. + Open proof. + Weak show. The sign of the fictitious creature so called.

Still question'd me the story of my life,
From year to year; the battles, sieges, for-
That I have pass'd.
[tunes,
I ran it through, even from my boyish days,
To the very moment that he bade me tell it.
Wherein I spoke of most disastrous chances,
Of moving accidents, by flood, and field;
Of hair-breadth scapes i'the imminent deadly
Of being taken by the insolent foe, [breach;
And sold to slavery; of my redemption thence,
And portance in my travel's history:
Wherein of antrest vast, and desarts idle,
Rough quarries, rocks, and hills whose heads
touch heaven,

It was my hint to speak, such was the process;
And of the Cannibals that each other eat,
The Anthropophagi, and men whose heads
Do grow beneath their shoulders. These things
to hear,
Would Desdemona seriously incline:
But still the house affairs would draw her
thence;

Which ever as she could with haste despatch,
She'd come again, and with a greedy ear
Devour up my discourse: Which I observing,
Took once a pliant hour; and found good

means

To draw from her a prayer of earnest heart,
That I would all my pilgrimage dilate,
Whereof by parcelst she had something heard,
But not intentively: I did consent;
And often did beguile her of her tears,
When I did speak of some distressful stroke,
That my youth suffer'd. My story being done,
She gave me for my pains a world of sighs:
She swore,-In faith, 'twas strange, 'twas pass-
ing strange;

'Twas pitiful, 'twas wondrous pitiful:
She wish'd, she had not heard it; yet she
wish'd

That heaven had made her such a man: she thank'd me;

And bade me, if I had a friend that lov'd her, I should but teach him how to tell my story, And that would woo her. Upon this hint, I

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So much I challenge that I may profess
Due, to the Moor my lord.

Bra. God be with you!-I have done :Please it your grace, on to the state affairs; I had rather to adopt a child, than get it. Come hither, Moor:

I here do give thee that with all my heart, Which, but thou hast already, with all my [jewel,

heart

I would keep from thee.-For your sake,
I am glad at soul I have no other child;
For thy escape would teach me tyranny,
To hang clogs on them.-I have done, my lord.
Duke. Let me speak like yourself; and lay
a sentence,
[lovers
Which as a grise, or step, may help these
Into your fayours.

When remedies are past, the griefs are ended, By seeing the worst, which late on hopes depended.

To mourn a mischief that is past and gone,
Is the next way to draw new mischief on.
What cannot be preserv'd when fortune takes,
Patience her injury a mockery makes.
The robb'd, that smiles, steals something from
the thief;

He robs himself, that spends a bootless grief.
Bra. So let the Turk of Cyprus us beguile;
We lose it not, so long as we can smile.
He bears the sentence well, that nothing bears
But the free comfort which from thence he
hears:

Duke. What would you, Desdemona ? Des. That I did love the Moor to live with him,

My downright violence and storm of fortunes May trumpet to the world; my heart's subdued

Even to the very quality of my lord:
I saw Othello's visage in his mind;
And to his honours, and his valiant parts,
Did I my soul and fortunes consecrate.
So that, dear lords, if I be left behind,
A moth of peace, and he go to the war,
The rights for which I love him, are bereft me,
And I a heavy interim shall support
By his dear absence: Let me go with him.
Oth. Your voices, lords:-'beseech you, let
her will

Have a free way.

Vouch with me, heaven; I therefore beg it not
To please the palate of my appetite;
Nor to comply with heat, the young affects,*
In my distinct and proper satisfaction;
But to be free and bounteous to her mind:
And heaven defendt your good souls, that you
think

I will your serious and great business scant,
For she is with me: No, when light-wing'd
toys

Of feather'd Cupid seels with wanton dulness
My speculative and active instruments,
That my disports corrupt and taint my business,
Let housewives make a skillet|| of my helm,¶
And all indign and base adversities
bor-Make head against my estimation!

But he bears both the sentence and the sorrow, That, to pay grief, must of poor patience

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Duke. The Turk with a most mighty preparation makes for Cyprus:-Othello, the fortitude of the place is best known to you: And though we have there a substitute of most allowed sufficiency, yet opinion, a sovereign mistress of effects, throws a more safer voice on you: you must therefore be content to slubber+ the gloss of your new fortunes with this more stubborn and boisterous expedition.

Oth. The tyrant custom, most grave senators, Hath made the flinty and steel couch of war My thrice-driven bed of down: I do agnize§ A natural and prompt alacrity, I find in hardness; and do undertake These present wars against the Ottomites. Most humbly therefore bending to your state, I crave fit disposition for my wife; Due reference of place, and exhibition.|| With such accommodation, and besort, As levels with her breeding.

Duke. If you please,

Be't at her father's.

Bra. I'll not have it so.
Oth. Nor I.

Des. Nor I; I would not there reside,
To put my father in impatient thoughts,
By being in his eye. Most gracious duke,
To my unfolding lend a gracious ear;
And let me find a charter in your voice,
To assist my simpleness.

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Duke. Be it as you shall privately determine, Either for her stay, or going: the affair crieshaste,

And speed must answer it; you must hence to-night.

Des. To-night, my lord?
Duke. This night.

Oth. With all my heart.

Duke. At nine i'the morning here we'll meet again.

Othello, leave some officer behind,
And he shall our commission bring to you;
With such things else of quality and respect,
As doth import you.

Oth. Please your grace, my ancient;
A man he is of honesty and trust:
To his conveyance I assign my wife,
With what else needful your good grace shall
To be sent after me.

[think

Duke. Let it be so.Good night to every one.-And, noble Signior, [TO BRABANTIO. If virtue no delighted beauty fack, Your son-in-law is far more fair than black. 1 Sen. Adieu, brave Moor! use Desdemona well.

Bra. Look to her, Moor; have a quick eye

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Iago. What say'st thou, noble heart?

* Affections. + Forbid * Because. Blind.

A small kettle.

1 Helmet.

Rod. What will I do, thinkest thou? lago. Why, go to bed, and sleep. Rod. I will incontinently drown myself. Iago. Well, if thou dost, I shall never love thee after it. Why, thou silly gentleman!

Rod. It is silliness to live, when to live is a torment: and then have we a prescription to die, when death is our physician.

Iago. O villanous! I have looked upon the world for four times seven years; and since I could distinguish between a benefit and an injury, I never found a man that knew how to love himself. Ere I would say, I would drown myself for the love of a Guinea-hen, I would change my humanity with a baboon.

Rod. What should I do? I confess, it is my shame to be so fond ; but it is not in virtue to

amend it.

Iago. Virtue? a fig! 'tis in ourselves, that we are thus, or thus. Our bodies are our gardens; to the which our wills are gardeners: so that if we will plant nettles, or sow lettuce; set hyssop, and weed up thyme; supply it with one gender of herbs, or distract it with many; either to have it steril with idleness, or manured with industry; why, the power and corrigible authority of this lies in our wills. If the balance of our lives had not one scale of reason to poise another of sensuality, the blood and baseness of our natures would conduct us to most preposterous conclusions: But we have reason to cool our raging motions, our carnal stings, our unbitted; lusts; whereof I take this, that you call-love, to be a sect, or scion. Rod. It cannot be.

Let us be conjunctive in our revenge against him: if thou canst cuckold him, thou dost thy. self a pleasure, and me a sport. There are many events in the womb of time, which will be delivered. Traverse; go; provide thy money. We will have more of this to-mor row. Adieu.

Rod. Where shall we meet i'the morning? lago. At my lodging.

Rod. I'll be with thee betimes.

Iago. Go to; farewell. Do you hear, Roderigo?

Rod. What say you?

Iago. No more of drowning, do you hear.
Rod. I am changed. I'll sell all my land.
Iago. Go to; farewell: put money enough
in your purse.
[Exit RODERIGO.
Thus do I ever make my fool my purse:
For I mine own gain'd knowledge should pro-
fane,

If I would time expend with such a snipe,
But for my sport and profit. I hate the Moor;
And it is thought abroad, that 'twixt my sheets
He has done my office: I know not if't be true;
But I, for mere suspicion in that kind,
Will do, as if for surety. He holdst me well;
The better shall my purpose work on him.
Cassio's a proper man: Let me see now;
To get his place, and to plume up my will;
A double knavery,-How? how?-Let me

see:

After some time, to abuse Othello's ear,
That he is too familiar with his wife:-
He hath a person, and a smooth dispose,
To be suspected; fram'd to make women false.
The Moor is of a free and open nature, [so;
That thinks men honest, that but seems to be
And will as tenderly be led by the nose,
As asses are.

I have't;-it is engender'd:-Hell and night
Must bring this monstrous birth to the world's
light.
[Exit.

ACT II.

Platform.

Enter MONTANO and Two GENTLEMEN.

Mon. What from the cape can you discern at

sea?

1 Gent. Nothing at all: it is a high-wrought flood;

lago. It is merely a lust of the blood, and a permission of the will. Come, be a man: Drown thyself? drown cats, and blind puppies. I have professed me thy friend, and I confess me knit to thy deserving with cables of perdurable toughness; I could never better stead thee than now. Put money in thy purse; follow these wars; defeat thy favour with an usurped beard; I say, put money in thy purse. It cannot be, that Desdemona should SCENE I.-A Sea-port Town in CYPRUS.-A long continue her love to the Moor,-put money in thy purse;-nor he his to her: it was a violent commencement, and thou shalt see an answerable sequestration ;-put but money in thy purse. These Moors are changeable in their wills;-fill thy purse with money: the food that to him now is as luscious as locusts, shall be to him shortly as bitter as coloquintida. She must change for youth: when she is sated with his body, she will find the error of her choice. She must have change, she must: therefore put money in thy purse.-If thou wilt needs damn thyself, do it a more delicate way than drowning. Make all the money thou canst: If sanctimony and a frail vow, betwixt an erring¶ barbarian and a supersubtle Venetian, be not too hard for my wits, and all the tribe of hell, thou shalt enjoy her; therefore make money. A pox of drowning thyself! it is clean out of the way: seek thou rather to be hanged in compassing thy joy, than to be drowned and go without her.

Rod. Wilt thou be fast to my hopes, if I depend on the issue?

Iago. Thou art sure of me;-Go, make money :-I have told thee often, and I re-tell thee again and again, I hate the Moor: My cause is hearted: thine hath no less reason: * Immediately. + Foolish. Unbridled.

A sect is what the gardeners call a cutting. Change your countenance with a false beard. ¶ Wandering.

I cannot, 'twixt the heaven and the main,
Descry a sail.

Mon. Methinks, the wind hath spoke aloud
at land:

A fuller blast ne'er shook our battlements:
If it hath ruffian'd so upon the sea, [them,
What ribs of oak, when mountains melt on
Can hold the mortise? what shall we hear of

this?

2 Gent. A segregation of the Turkish fleet: For do but stand upon the foaming shore, The chiding billow seems to pelt the clouds; The wind-shak'd surge, with high and monstrous main,

Seems to cast water on the burning bear,
And quench the guards of the ever-fixed pole :
I never did like molestation view
On th' enchafed flood.

Mon. If that the Turkish fleet
Be not inshelter'd and embay'd, they are
drown'd;

It is impossible they bear it out.

* An ancient military word of command.
+ Esteems.
↑ Separation
The constellation near the polar star.

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