Wash me in steep-down gulfs of liquid fire!—
O Desdemona! Desdemona! dead?

Dead? O! O! O!

Enter LODOVICO, MONTANO, CASSIO, carried in a Chair, and Officers, with IAGO, prisoner.

Lod. Where is this rash and most unfortunate man?
Oth. That's he, that was Othello; here I am.

Lod. Where is that viper? bring the villain forth.
Oth. 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.

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, 'tis 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?

Oth.

Why, any thing:

An honourable murderer, if you will;

For nought I did in hate, but all in honour.

Lod. This wretch hath part confess'd his villainy : Did you and he consent in Cassio's death?

Oth. Ay.

Cas. Dear general, I never gave you cause.
Oth. I do believe it, and I ask your pardon.

Will you, I pray you, demand that demi-devil,
Why he hath thus ensnar'd my soul and body?

Iago. Demand me nothing: What you know, you know:

From this time forth I never will speak word.

5

Lod. What? not to pray?

towards his feet;] To see if, according to the common opinion, his feet be cloven.

6

in the practice-] In the snare, by the stratagem.

Gra.

Oth. 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

By Roderigo.

Oth. O villain !

Cas.

Most heathenish, and most gross!

Lod. Now here's another discontented paper, Found in his pocket too; and this, it seems, Roderigo meant to have sent this damned villain : But that, belike, Iago in the interim

Came in, and satisfied him.

And he himself confess'd, but even now,

That there he dropp'd it, for a special purpose,
Which wrought to his desire.

Oth.

O fool! fool! fool!
Cas. There is, besides, in Roderigo's letter,-
How he upbraids Iago, that he made him
Brave me upon the watch; whereon it came
That I was cast: And even but now he spake,
After long seeming dead,-Iago hurt him,
Iago set him on.

Lod. You must forsake this room, and go with us;
Your power and your command is taken off,
And Cassio rules in Cyprus. For this slave,-
If there be any cunning cruelty,

That can torment him much, and hold him long,
It shall be his: You shall close prisoner rest,
Till that the nature of your fault be known
To the Venetian state:- Come, bring him away.
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,
When you shall these unlucky deeds relate,
Speak of me as I am; nothing extenuate,

Nor set down aught in malice: then must you speak
Of one, that lov'd not wisely, but too well;

Of one, not easily jealous, but, being wrought,
Perplex'd in the extreme'; of one, whose hand,
Like the base Indian, threw a pearl away,
Richer than all his tribe; of one, whose subdu'd eyes,
Albeit unused to the melting mood,

Drop tears as fast as the Arabian trees

Their medicínal gum: Set you down this:
And say, besides,-that in Aleppo once,
Where a malignant and a turban'd Turk
Beat a Venetian, and traduc'd the state,
I took by the throat the circumcised dog,
And smote him-thus.

Lod. O bloody period!

Gra.

[Stabs himself.

All that's spoke, is marr'd.

Oth. I kiss'd thee, ere I kill'd thee;-No way but

this,

[Falling upon DESDEMONA.

Killing myself to die upon a kiss.

[Dies.

Cas. This did I fear, but thought he had no weapon; For he was great of heart.

Lod.

[To IAGO.

O Spartan dog',
More fell than anguish, hunger, or the sea!
Look on the tragick loading of this bed;
This is thy work: the object poisons sight ;-
Let it be hid.-Gratiano, keep the house,
And seize upon the fortunes of the Moor,
For they succeed to you.-To you, lord governor,
Remains the censure of this hellish villain;

8

The time, the place, the torture,-O enforce it!

70 Spartan dog,] The dogs of Spartan race were reckoned among those of the most fierce and savage kind.

Myself will straight aboard; and, to the state,
This heavy act with heavy heart relate.

[Exeunt.

The beauties of this play impress themselves so strongly upon the attention of the reader, that they can draw no aid from critical illustration. The fiery openness of Othello, magnanimous, artless, and credulous, boundless in his confidence, ardent in his affection, inflexible in his resolution, and obdurate in his revenge; the cool malignity of Iago, silent in his resentment, subtle in his designs, and studious at once of his interest and his vengeance; the soft simplicity of Desdemona, confident of merit, and conscious of innocence, her artless perseverance in her suit, and her slow-ness to suspect that she can be suspected, are such proofs of Shakspeare's skill in human nature, as, I suppose, it is vain to seek in any modern writer. The gradual progress which Iago makes in the Moor's conviction, and the circumstances which he employs to enflame him, are so artfully natural, that, though it will perhaps not be said of him as he says of himself, that he is a man not easily jealous, yet we cannot but pity him, when at last we find him perplexed in the extreme.

There is always danger, lest wickedness, conjoined with abilities, should steal upon esteem, though it misses of approbation; but the character of Iago is so conducted, that he is from the first scene to the last hated and despised.

Con•

their

Even the inferior characters of this play would be very spicuous in any other piece, not only for their justness, but strength. Cassio is brave, benevolent, and honest; ruined only by his want of stubbornness to resist an insidious invitation. Roderigo's suspicious credulity, and impatient submission to the cheats which he sees practised upon him, and which by persuasion he suffers to be repeated, exhibit a strong picture of a weak mind betrayed by

unlawful desires to a false friend; and the virtue of Emilia is

such

as we often find, worn loosely, but not cast off, easy to commit small crimes, but quickened and alarmed at atrocious villanies

The scenes from the beginning to the end are busy, varied by happy interchanges, and regularly promoting the progression of the story; and the narrative in the end, though it tells but what is known already, yet is necessary to produce the death of Othello. Had the scene opened in Cyprus, and the preceding incidents been occasionally related, there had been little wanting to a drama of the most exact and scrupulous regularity. Johnson.

THE END.

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