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With his free duty, recommends you thus,
And prays you to believe him.

Duke. 'Tis certain then for Cyprus: Marcus Luccicos, Is he not here in town?

1 Sen. He's now in Florence.

Duke. Write from us, to him, poft, post-haste, dispatch. 1 Sen. Here comes Brabantio, and the valiant Moor. To them, enter Brabantio, Othello, Caffio, Iago, Rodorigo, and Officers.

Duke. Valiant Othello, we must straight employ you, Against the general enemy Ottoman.

I did not fee you; welcome, gentle fignior: [To Braban. We lack'd your counsel, and your help to-night.

Bra. So did I yours; good your grace, pardon me; Neither my place, nor aught I heard of bufinefs, Hath rais'd me from my bed; nor doth the general Take hold on me; For my particular grief Is of fo flood-gate and o'er-bearing nature, That it ingluts and fwallows other forrows, And yet is ftill itself.

Duke. Why? what's the matter ?

Bra. My daughter! oh, my daughter!
Sen. Dead?

Bra. To me;

She is abus'd, ftoll'n from me, and corrupted

By fpells and medicines, bought of mountebanks;
For nature fo prepofteroufly to err,

(Being not deficient, blind, or lame of sense,)
Sans Witchcraft could not-

Duke. Who-e'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 fense: yea, though our proper Son
Stood in your action.

Bra. Humbly I thank your grace.

Here is the man, this Moor, whom now, it seems,
Your fpecial mandate, for the State-affairs,
Hath hither brought.

All.

All. We're very forry for❜t.

Duke. What in your own part can you fay to this? [To Othel.

Bra. Nothing, but this is fo.

Oth. Moft potent, grave, and reverend figniors,
My very noble and approv'd good masters;
That I have ta'en away this old man's daughter,
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 blefs'd with the foft phrase of

peace;
For fince these arms of mine had seven years' pith,
'Till now, fome nine moons wafted, they have us’d
Their dearest action in the tented field;
And little of this great world can I speak,

More than pertains to feats of broils and battle;
And therefore little fhall I grace my cause,
In fpeaking for myfelf. Yet, by your patience,
I will a round unvarnish'd tale deliver,

Of my whole courfe of love; what drugs, what charms,
What conjuration, and what mighty magick,
(For fuch proceeding I am charg'd withal,)
I won his daughter with.

Bra. A maiden, never bold;

Of spirit fo ftill and quiet, that her motion
Blush'd at itself; and fhe, in spight of nature,
Of years, of country, credit, every thing,
To fall in love with what the fear'd to look on-
It is a judgment maim'd, and most imperfect, (13)
That will confefs, affection fo could err
Against all rules of nature; and must be driven

(13) It is a judgment maim'd and most imperfect

That will confefs, perfection fo could err

Το

Against all rules of Nature. Perfection erring, seems a contradiction in terminis, as the fchoolmen call it. Besides, Brabantio does not blazon his daughter out for a thing of abfolute perfection; he only fays, she was indued with fuch an extreme innate modefty, that for her to fall in love fo prepofteroufly, no found judgment could allow, but it must be by magical practice upon her. I have ventur'd to imagine that our Author wrote;

M 2

That

To find out practices of cunning hell,
Why this fhould be. I therefore vouch again,
That with fome mixtures powerful o'er the blood,
Or with fome dram, conjur'd to this effect,
He wrought upon her.

Duke. To vouch this, is no proof,

Without more certain and more overt teft,
Than these thin habits and poor likelyhoods
Of modern feeming do prefer against him.
1 Sen. But, Othello, speak;

Did you by indirect and forced courfes
Subdue and poison this young maid's affections?
Or came it by request, and such fair question
As foul to foul affordeth?

Oth. I beseech you,

Send for the lady to the Sagittary,

And let her speak of me before her father;
If do find me foul in her report,

you

The Truft, the Office, I do hold of

you,

Not only take away, but let your Sentence
Even fall upon my life.

Duke. Fetch Desdemona hither. [Exeunt two or three.
Oth. Ancient, conduct them, you beft know the place.

And till she come, as truly as to heav'n
I do confefs the vices of my blood,
So juftly to your grave ears I'll present
How I did thrive in this fair lady's love,
And fhe in mine.

Duke. Say it, Othello.

Oth. Her father lov'd me, oft invited me;

Still queftion'd me the ftory of my life,

[Exit Iago.

From year to year; the battles, fieges, fortunes,

That I have past.

That will confefs, affection fo could err,

&c.

This is entirely confonant to what Brabantio would fay of her; and one of the fenators, immediately after, in his examination of the Moor, thus addrefles himself to him;

Did you by indirect and forced courfes

-But, Othello, fpeak;

Subdue and poyfon this young maid's affections, &c.

I ran it through, e'en from my boyish days,
To th' very moment that he bade me tell it :
Wherein I fpoke of moft difaftrous chances,
Of moving accidents by flood and field;

Of hair-breadth 'fcapes in th' imminent deadly breach;
Of being taken by the infolent foe,

And fold to flavery; of my redemption thence,
And portance in my travel's hiftory:

Wherein of antres vaft, and defarts idle, (14)
Rough quarriers, rocks, and hills, whofe heads touch
heav'n,

It was my hint to speak; fuch was the process; (15) And

(14) Wherein of antres raft and defirts idle, &c.] Thus it is in all the old editions: but Mr. Pope has thought fit to change the epithet. Defarts idle; in the former editions; (fays he) doubtless, a corruption from wilde.-But he muft pardon me, if I do not concur in thinking this fo doubtless. I don't know whether Mr. Pope has obferv'd it, but I know that Shakespeare, especially in his descriptions, is fond of using the more uncommon word, in a poetick latitude. And idk, in feveral other paffages, he employs in these acceptations, wild, ufelefs, uncultivated, &c.

Crown'd with rank fumitar, and furrow weeds,
With hardocks, hemlock, nettles, cuckow-flow'rs,
Darnel, and all the idle weeds that grow

In our fuftaining corn.

King Lear.

i. e. wild and useless.

-The murm'ring furge,

That on th' unnumber'd idle pebbles chafes,

Cannot be heard fo high.

Ibid.

i.e. ufelefs, worthless, nullius pretii: for pebbles, conftantly wash'd and chaf'd by the surge, can't be call'd idle, i. e. to lie ftill, in a state of reft,

The even mead, that erft brought sweetly forth
The freckled cowflip, burnet, and green clover,
Wanting the fcythe, all uncorrected, rank,
Conceives by idleness.

Henry V.

i.e. by wildness, occafion'd from its lying uncultivated. And exactly with the fame liberty, if I am not mistaken, has VIRGIL twice used the word ignavus :

(15)

-Hyems ignava colono.

Et nemora evertit multos ignava per annos.
-Such was the process:

And of the canibals that each other eat,
The anthropophagi; and men whose heads

Georg. I. v. 299.

Georg. II. v. 208.

Do grow beneath their fhoulders.] This paffage Mr. Pope has

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thought

And of the Caniba's that each other eat,
The Anthropophagi; and men whofe heads

Do grow beneath their fhoulders. All these to hear
Would Defemona feriously incline;

Eut ftill the house-affairs would draw her thence,
Which ever as she could with hafte dispatch,
She'd come again, and with a greedy ear
Devour up my Difcourfe: which I obferving,
'Look once a pliant hour, and found good means
To draw from her a pray'r of earnest heart,
That I would all my pilgrimage dilate;
Whereof by parcels fhe had fomething heard,
But not diftinctively: I did confent,

And

thought fit to throw out of the text, as containing incredible matter, I prefume: but why, if he had any equality in his critical judgment, did he not as well caftrate the Tempeft of these lines?

Who would believe, that there were mountaineers

Dewlapt like bulls, whofe throats had hanging at 'em
Wallets of flesh? Or that there were fuch men,

Whole beads flood in their breafts?

I have obferv'd feveral times, in the courfe of these notes, our Author's particular defence of Sir Walter Raleigh; and both thefe paffages feem to me intended complimentally to him. Sir Walter, in his Travels, has given the following account, which I fhall fubjoin as briefly as I may. "Next unto Arvi, there are two rivers, Atoica "and Caora; and on that branch which is call'd Caora, are a nation "of a people whofe beads appear not above their boulders: which, "tho' it may be thought a meer fable, yet, for mine own part, I am "refolv'd it is true; because every child in the provinces of Arromaia "and Canuri affirm the fame. They are call'd Ervaipanomarus ; "they are reported to have their eyes in their fhoulders, and their "mouths in the middle of their breafts. It was not my chance to "hear of them, till I was come away; and if I had but spoken one "word of it while I was there, I might have brought one of them "with me, to put the matter out of doubt. Such a nation was written "of by Mandeville, whofe reports were holden for fables for many 68 years and yet fince the Eaft-Indies were difcover'd, we find his "relations true of fuch things as heretofore were held incredible. "Whether it be true, or no, the matter is not great; for mine own

part, I faw them not; but I am refolv'd, that fo many people did not "all combine, or forethink to make the report. To the west of Caroli "are diverfe nations of canibals, and of thofe Ewaipanomaws with. "out heads."

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