Текст книги "William Shakespeare: The Complete Works 2nd Edition"

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1.3 Enter the Duke and Senators set at a table, with lights and officers

DUKE

There is no composition in these news

That gives them credit.

FIRST SENATOR

Indeed, they are disproportioned.

My letters say a hundred and seven galleys.

DUKE

And mine a hundred-forty.

SECOND SENATOR

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 a Sailor

OFFICER

A messenger from the galleys.

DUKE Now, what’s the business?

SAILOR

The Turkish preparation makes for Rhodes.

So was I bid report here to the state

By Signor Angelo.

DUKE (to Senators) How say you by this change?

FIRST SENATOR 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,

So may he with more facile question bear it,

For that it stands not in such warlike brace,

But altogether lacks th’abilities

That Rhodes is dressed 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.

OFFICER Here is more news.

Enter a Messenger

MESSENGER

The Ottomites, reverend and gracious,

Steering with due course toward the Isle of Rhodes,

Have there injointed them with an after fleet.

FIRST SENATOR

Ay, so I thought. How many, as you guess?

MESSENGER

Of thirty sail, and now they do restem

Their backward course, bearing with frank appearance

Their purposes toward Cyprus. Signor Montano,

Your trusty and most valiant servitor,

With his free duty recommends you thus,

And prays you to believe him.

DUKE

’Tis certain then for Cyprus.

Marcus Luccicos, is not he in town?

FIRST SENATOR He’s now in Florence.

DUKE

Write from us to him post-post-haste. Dispatch.

Enter Brabanzio, Othello, Roderigo, Iago, Cassio, and officers

FIRST SENATOR

Here comes Brabanzio and the valiant Moor.

DUKE

Valiant Othello, we must straight employ you

Against the general enemy Ottoman.

(To Brabanzio) I did not see you. Welcome, gentle

signor.

We lacked your counsel and your help tonight.

BRABANZIO

So did I yours. Good your grace, pardon me.

Neither my place, nor aught I heard of business,

Hath raised me from my bed, nor doth the general

care

Take hold on me; for my particular grief

Is of so floodgate and o’erbearing nature

That it engluts and swallows other sorrows,

And it is still itself.

DUKE

Why, what’s the matter?

BRABANZIO

My daughter, O, my daughter!

SENATORS

Dead?

BRABANZIO

Ay, to me.

She is abused, stol’n from me, and corrupted

By spells and medicines bought of mountebanks.

For nature so preposterously to err,

Being not deficient, blind, or lame of sense,

Sans witchcraft could not.

DUKE

Whoe’er he be that in this foul proceeding

Hath thus beguiled 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 son

Stood in your action.

BRABANZIO

Humbly I thank your grace.

Here is the man, this Moor, whom now it seems

Your special mandate for the state affairs

Hath hither brought.

SENATORS We are very sorry for’t.

DUKE (to Othello)

What in your own part can you say to this?

BRABANZIO Nothing but this is so.

OTHELLO

Most potent, grave, and reverend signors,

My very noble and approved 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 blessed with the soft phrase of peace,

For since these arms of mine had seven years’ pith

Till now some nine moons wasted, they have used

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 shall I grace my cause

In speaking for myself. Yet, by your gracious patience,

I will a round unvarnished tale deliver

Of my whole course of love, what drugs, what charms,

What conjuration and what mighty magic—

For such proceeding I am charged withat—

I won his daughter.

BRABANZIO

A maiden never bold,

Of spirit so still and quiet that her motion

Blushed at hersetf—and she in spite of nature,

Of years, of country, credit, everything,

To fall in love with what she feared to look on!

It is a judgement maimed 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 conjured to this effect,

He wrought upon her.

DUKE

To vouch this is no proof

Without more wider and more overt test

Than these thin habits and poor likelihoods

Of modern seeming do prefer against him.

A SENATOR But Othello, speak.

Did you by indirect and forced courses

Subdue and poison this young maid’s affections,

Or came it by request and such fair question

As soul to soul affordeth?

OTHELLO

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 (to officers)

Fetch Desdemona hither.

OTHELLO

Ensign, conduct them. You best know the place.

Exit Iago with two or three officers

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.

OTHELLO

Her father loved me, oft invited me,

Still questioned me the story of my life

From year to year, the battles, sieges, fortunes

That I have passed.

I ran it through even from my boyish days

To th’ 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‘th’ imminent deadly breach,

Of being taken by the insolent foe

And sold to slavery, of my redemption thence,

And portance in my traveller’s history,

Wherein of antres vast and deserts idle,

Rough quarries, rocks, and hills whose heads touch

heaven,

It was my hint to speak. Such was my 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 dispatch

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 parcels 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 suffered. My story being done,

She gave me for my pains a world of kisses.

She swore in faith ’twas strange, ‘twas passing strange,

’Twas pitiful, ’twas wondrous pitiful.

She wished she had not heard it, yet she wished

That heaven had made her such a man. She thanked

me,

And bade me, if I had a friend that loved her,

I should but teach him how to tell my story,

And that would woo her. Upon this hint I spake.

She loved me for the dangers I had passed,

And I loved her that she did pity them.

This only is the witchcraft I have used.

Enter Desdemona, Iago, and attendants

Here comes the lady. Let her witness it.

DUKE

I think this tale would win my daughter, too.—

Good Brabanzio,

Take up this mangled matter at the best.

Men do their broken weapons rather use

Than their bare hands.

BRABANZIO

I pray you hear her speak.

If she confess that she was half the wooer,

Destruction on my head if my bad blame

Light on the man! Come hither, gentle mistress.

Do you perceive in all this noble company

Where most you owe obedience?

DESDEMONA

My noble father,

I do perceive here a divided duty.

To you I am bound for life and education.

My life and education both do learn me

How to respect you. You are the lord of duty,

I am hitherto your daughter. But here’s my husband,

And so much duty as my mother showed

To you, preferring you before her father,

So much I challenge that I may profess

Due to the Moor my lord.

BRABANZIO

God b‘wi’you, I ha’ 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 heart

I would keep from thee. (To Desdemona) For your sake,

jewel,

I am glad at soul I have no other child,

For thy escape would teach me tyranny,

To hang clogs on ’em. I have done, my lord.

DUKE

Let me speak like yourself, and lay a sentence

Which, as a grece or step, may help these lovers

Into your favour.

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 preserved when fortune takes,

Patience her injury a mockery makes.

The robbed that smiles steals something from the thief;

He robs himself that spends a bootless grief.

BRABANZIO

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,

But he bears both the sentence and the sorrow

That, to pay grief, must of poor patience borrow.

These sentences, to sugar or to gall, Being strong on both sides, are equivocal.

But words are words. I never yet did hear

That the bruised heart was pierced through the ear.

I humbly beseech you proceed to th’affairs of state.

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 more 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.

OTHELLO

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

This 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 Why, at her father’s!

BRABANZIO I will not have it so.

OTHELLO Nor I.

DESDEMONA Nor would I there reside,

To put my father in impatient thoughts

By being in his eye. Most gracious Duke,

To my unfolding lend your prosperous ear,

And let me find a charter in your voice

T’assist my simpleness.

DUKE

What would you, Desdemona?

DESDEMONA

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 rites for why I love him are bereft me,

And I a heavy interim shall support

By his dear absence. Let me go with him.

OTHELLO (to the Duke) Let her have your voice.

Vouch with me heaven, I therefor beg it not

To please the palate of my appetite,

Nor to comply with heat—the young affects

In me defunct—and proper satisfaction,

But to be free and bounteous to her mind;

And heaven defend your good souls that you think

I will your serious and great business scant

When she is with me. No, when light-winged toys

Of feathered Cupid seel with wanton dullness

My speculative and officed instruments,

That my disports corrupt and taint my business,

Let housewives make a skillet of my helm,

And all indign and base adversities

Make head against my estimation.

DUKE

Be it as you shall privately determine,

Either for her stay or going. Th’affair cries haste,

And speed must answer it.

A SENATOR (to Othello)

You must away tonight.

DESDEMONA

Tonight, my lord?

DUKE

This night.

OTHELLO

With all my heart.

DUKE

At nine i’th’ morning here we’ll meet again.

Othello, leave some officer behind,

And he shall our commission bring to you,

And such things else of quality and respect

As doth import you.

OTHELLO

So please your grace, my ensign.

A man he is of honesty and trust.

To his conveyance I assign my wife,

With what else needful your good grace shall think

To be sent after me.

DUKE

Let it be so.

Good night to everyone. (To Brabanzio) And, noble

signor,

If virtue no delighted beauty lack,

Your son-in-law is far more fair than black.

A SENATOR

Adieu, brave Moor. Use Desdemona well.

BRABANZIO

Look to her, Moor, if thou hast eyes to see.

She has deceived her father, and may thee.

Exeunt Duke, Brabanzio, Cassio, Senators, and officers

OTHELLO

My life upon her faith. Honest Iago,

My Desdemona must I leave to thee.

I prithee let thy wife attend on her,

And bring them after in the best advantage.

Come, Desdemona. I have but an hour

Of love, of worldly matter and direction

To spend with thee. We must obey the time.

Exeunt Othello and Desdemona

RODERIGO Iago.

IAGO What sayst thou, noble heart?

RODERIGO What will I do, think’st thou?

IAGO Why, go to bed and sleep.

RODERIGO I will incontinently drown myself.

IAGO If thou dost, I shall never love thee after. Why, thou silly gentleman!

RODERIGO It is silliness to live when to live is torment; and then have we a prescription to die when death is our physician.

IAGO O, villainous! I ha’ looked upon the world for four times seven years, and since I could distinguish betwixt a benefit and an injury I never found 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.

RODERIGO What should I do? I confess it is my shame to be so fond, but it is not in my 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 sterile with idleness or manured with industry, why, the power and corrigible authority of this lies in our wills. If the beam of our lives had not one scale of reason to peise 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.

RODERIGO It cannot be.

IAGO 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 thou the wars, defeat thy favour with an usurped beard. I say, put money in thy purse. It cannot be long that Desdemona should continue her love to the Moor—put money in thy purse—nor he his to her. It was a violent commencement in her, 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. 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 super-subtle Venetian be not too hard for my wits and all the tribe of hell, thou shalt enjoy her; therefore make money. A pox o’ 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.

RODERIGO 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. Let us be conjunctive in our revenge against him. If thou canst cuckold him, thou dost thyself a pleasure, 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 tomorrow. Adieu.

RODERIGO

Where shall we meet i’th’ morning?

IAGO At my lodging.

RODERIGO

I’ll be with thee betimes.

IAGO Go to, farewell—

Do you hear, Roderigo?

RODERIGO

I’ll sell all my land.

Exit

IAGO

Thus do I ever make my fool my purse—

For I mine own gained knowledge should profane

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 holds 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

In double knavery—how, how? Let’s see.

After some time to abuse Othello’s ears

That he is too familiar with his wife;

He hath a person and a smooth dispose

To be suspected, framed to make women false.

The Moor is of a free and open nature,

That thinks men honest that but seem to be so,

And will as tenderly be led by th’ nose

As asses are.

I ha’t. It is ingendered. Hell and night

Must bring this monstrous birth to the world’s light.

Exit

2.1 Enter below Montano, Governor of Cyprus; two other gentlemen ⌈above⌉

MONTANO

What from the cape can you discern at sea?

FIRST GENTLEMAN

Nothing at all. It is a high-wrought flood.

I cannot ’twixt the heaven and the main

Descry a sail.

MONTANO

Methinks the wind hath spoke aloud at land.

A fuller blast ne’er shook our battlements.

If it ha’ ruffianed so upon the sea,

What ribs of oak, when mountains melt on them,

Can hold the mortise? What shall we hear of this?

SECOND GENTLEMAN

A segregation of the Turkish fleet;

For do but stand upon the foaming shore,

The chidden billow seems to pelt the clouds,

The wind-shaked surge with high and monstrous mane

Seems to cast water on the burning Bear

And quench the guards of th’ever-fixèd Pole.

I never did like molestation view

On the enchafèd flood.

MONTANO

If that the Turkish fleet

Be not ensheltered and embayed, they are drowned.

It is impossible to bear it out.

Enter a third Gentleman

THIRD GENTLEMAN News, lads! Our wars are done.

The desperate tempest hath so banged the Turks

That their designment halts. A noble ship of Venice

Hath seen a grievous wrack and sufferance

On most part of their fleet.

MONTANO How, is this true?

THIRD GENTLEMAN The ship is here put in,

A Veronessa. Michael Cassio,

Lieutenant to the warlike Moor Othello,

Is come on shore; the Moor himself at sea,

And is in full commission here for Cyprus.

MONTANO

I am glad on’t; ’tis a worthy governor.

THIRD GENTLEMAN

But this same Cassio, though he speak of comfort

Touching the Turkish loss, yet he looks sadly,

And prays the Moor be safe, for they were parted

With foul and violent tempest.

MONTANO

Pray heavens he be,

For I have served him, and the man commands

Like a full soldier. Let’s to the sea-side, ho!—

As well to see the vessel that’s come in

As to throw out our eyes for brave Othello,

Even till we make the main and th’aerial blue

An indistinct regard.

THIRD GENTLEMAN

Come, let’s do so,

For every minute is expectancy

Of more arrivance.

Enter Cassio

CASSIO

Thanks, you the valiant of this warlike isle

That so approve the Moor! O, let the heavens

Give him defence against the elements,

For I have lost him On a dangerous sea.

MONTANO Is he well shipped?

CASSIO

His barque is stoutly timbered, and his pilot

Of very expert and approved allowance.

Therefore my hopes, not surfeited to death,

Stand in bold cure.

VOICES (within)

A sail, a sail, a sail!

CASSIO What noise?

A GENTLEMAN

The town is empty. On the brow o‘th’ sea

Stand ranks of people, and they cry ‘A sail!’

CASSIO

My hopes do shape him for the governor.

A shot

A GENTLEMAN

They do discharge their shot of courtesy—

Our friends, at least.

CASSIO I pray you, sir, go forth,

And give us truth who ’tis that is arrived.

A GENTLEMAN I shall.

Exit

MONTANO

But, good lieutenant, is your general wived?

CASSIO

Most fortunately. He hath achieved a maid

That paragons description and wild fame,

One that excels the quirks of blazoning pens,

And in th’essential vesture of creation

Does tire the engineer.

Enter Gentleman

How now, who has put in?

GENTLEMAN

’Tis one Iago, ensign to the general.

CASSIO

He’s had most favourable and happy speed.

Tempests themselves, high seas, and howling winds,

The guttered rocks and congregated sands,

Traitors ensteeped to enclog the guiltless keel,

As having sense of beauty do omit

Their mortal natures, letting go safely by

The divine Desdemona.

MONTANO

What is she?

CASSIO

She that I spake of, our great captain’s captain,

Left in the conduct of the bold Iago,

Whose footing here anticipates our thoughts

A sennight’s speed. Great Jove, Othello guard,

And swell his sail with thine own powerful breath,

That he may bless this bay with his tall ship,

Make love’s quick pants in Desdemona’s arms,

Give renewed fire to our extincted spirits,

And bring all Cyprus comfort.

Enter Desdemona, Iago, Emilia, and Roderigo

O, behold,

The riches of the ship is come on shore!

You men of Cyprus, let her have your knees.

Montano and the Gentlemen make curtsy to Desdemona

Hail to thee, lady, and the grace of heaven

Before, behind thee, and on every hand

Enwheel thee round!

DESDEMONA

I thank you, valiant Cassio.

What tidings can you tell me of my lord?

CASSIO

He is not yet arrived, nor know I aught

But that he’s well and will be shortly here.

DESDEMONA

O, but I fear—how lost you company?

CASSIO

The great contention of the sea and skies

Parted our fellowship.

VOICES (within) A sail, a sail!

CASSIO But hark, a sail.

A shot

A GENTLEMAN

They give their greeting to the citadel.

This likewise is a friend.

CASSIO

See for the news.

Exit Gentleman

Good ensign, you are welcome. (Kissing Emilia)

Welcome, mistress.

Let it not gall your patience, good Iago,

That I extend my manners. ’Tis my breeding

That gives me this bold show of courtesy.

IAGO

Sir, would she give you so much of her lips

As of her tongue she oft bestows on me,

You would have enough.

DESDEMONA Alas, she has no speech!

IAGO In faith, too much.

I find it still when I ha’ leave to sleep.

Marry, before your ladyship, I grant,

She puts her tongue a little in her heart,

And chides with thinking.

EMILIA

You ha’ little cause to say so.

IAGO

Come on, come on. You are pictures out of door,

Bells in your parlours; wildcats in your kitchens,

Saints in your injuries; devils being offended,

Players in your housewifery, and hussies in your beds.

DESDEMONA

O, fie upon thee, slanderer!

IAGO

Nay, it is true, or else I am a Turk.

You rise to play and go to bed to work.

EMILIA

You shall not write my praise.

IAGO No, let me not.

DESDEMONA

What wouldst write of me, if thou shouldst praise me?

IAGO

O, gentle lady, do not put me to’t,

For I am nothing if not critical.

DESDEMONA

Come on, essay—there’s one gone to the harbour?

IAGO Ay, madam.

DESDEMONA

I am not merry, but I do beguile

The thing I am by seeming otherwise.

Come, how wouldst thou praise me?

IAGO

I am about it, but indeed my invention

Comes from my pate as birdlime does from frieze—

It plucks out brains and all. But my muse labours,

And thus she is delivered:

If she be fair and wise, fairness and wit,

The one’s for use, the other useth it.

DESDEMONA Well praised! How if she be black and witty?

IAGO

If she be black and thereto have a wit,

She’ll find a white that shall her blackness fit.

DESDEMONA

Worse and worse.

EMILIA

How if fair and foolish?

IAGO

She never yet was foolish that was fair,

For even her folly helped her to an heir.

DESDEMONA These are old fond paradoxes, to make fools laugh i’th’ alehouse.

What miserable praise hast thou for her

That’s foul and foolish?

IAGO

There’s none so foul and foolish thereunto,

But does foul pranks which fair and wise ones do.

DESDEMONA O heavy ignorance! Thou praisest the worst best. But what praise couldst thou bestow on a deserving woman indeed—one that, in the authority of her merit, did justly put on the vouch of very malice itself?

IAGO

She that was ever fair and never proud,

Had tongue at will and yet was never loud,

Never lacked gold and yet went never gay,

Fled from her wish, and yet said ‘Now I may’;

She that, being angered, her revenge being nigh,

Bade her wrong stay and her displeasure fly;

She that in wisdom never was so frail

To change the cod’s head for the salmon’s tail;

She that could think and ne’er disclose her mind,

See suitors following, and not look behind—

She was a wight, if ever such wights were—

DESDEMONA To do what?

IAGO

To suckle fools, and chronicle small beer.

DESDEMONA O most lame and impotent conclusion! Do not learn of him, Emilia, though he be thy husband. How say you, Cassio, is he not a most profane and liberal counsellor?

CASSIO He speaks home, madam. You may relish him more in the soldier than in the scholar.

Cassio and Desdemona talk apart

IAGO (aside) He takes her by the palm. Ay, well said—whisper. With as little a web as this will I ensnare as great a fly as Cassio. Ay, smile upon her, do. I will gyve thee in thine own courtship. You say true, ‘tis so indeed. If such tricks as these strip you out of your lieutenantry, it had been better you had not kissed your three fingers so oft, which now again you are most apt to play the sir in. Very good, well kissed, an excellent curtsy, ’tis so indeed; yet again your fingers to your lips? Would they were clyster-pipes for your sake.

Trumpets within

(Aloud) The Moor—I know his trumpet.

CASSIO ’Tis truly so.

DESDEMONA

Let’s meet him and receive him.

CASSIO Lo where he comes!

Enter Othello and attendants

OTHELLO (to Desdemona)

O my fair warrior!

DESDEMONA My dear Othello.

OTHELLO

It gives me wonder great as my content

To see you here before me. O my soul’s joy,

If after every tempest come such calms,

May the winds blow till they have wakened death,

And let the labouring barque climb hills of seas

Olympus-high, and duck again as low

As hell’s from heaven. If it were now to die

’Twere now to be most happy, for I fear

My soul hath her content so absolute

That not another comfort like to this

Succeeds in unknown fate.

DESDEMONA The heavens forbid

But that our loves and comforts should increase

Even as our days do grow.

OTHELLO Amen to that, sweet powers!

I cannot speak enough of this content.

It stops me here, it is too much of joy.

And this, (they kiss) and this, the greatest discords be

That e’er our hearts shall make.

IAGO (aside) O, you are well tuned now,

But I’ll set down the pegs that make this music,

As honest as I am.

OTHELLO Come, let us to the castle.

News, friends: our wars are done, the Turks are

drowned.

How does my old acquaintance of this isle?—

Honey, you shall be well desired in Cyprus,

I have found great love amongst them. O my sweet,

I prattle out of fashion, and I dote

In mine own comforts. I prithee, good Iago,

Go to the bay and disembark my coffers.

Bring thou the master to the citadel.

He is a good one, and his worthiness

Does challenge much respect. Come, Desdemona.—

Once more, well met at Cyprus!

Exeunt Othello and Desdemona with all but lago and Roderigo

IAGO (to an attendant as he goes out) Do thou meet me presently at the harbour. (To Roderigo) Come hither. If thou beest valiant—as they say base men being in love have then a nobility in their natures more than is native to them—list me. The lieutenant tonight watches on the court of guard. First, I must tell thee this: Desdemona is directly in love with him.

RODERICO With him? Why, ’tis not possible!

IAGO Lay thy finger thus, and let thy soul be instructed. Mark me with what violence she first loved the Moor, but for bragging and telling her fantastical lies. To love him still for prating?—let not thy discreet heart think it. Her eye must be fed, and what delight shall she have to look on the devil? When the blood is made dull with the act of sport, there should be again to inflame it, and to give satiety a fresh appetite, loveliness in favour, sympathy in years, manners, and beauties, all which the Moor is defective in. Now, for want of these required conveniences, her delicate tenderness will find itself abused, begin to heave the gorge, disrelish and abhor the Moor. Very nature will instruct her in it and compel her to some second choice. Now, sir, this granted—as it is a most pregnant and unforced position—who stands so eminent in the degree of this fortune as Cassio does?—a knave very voluble, no further conscionable than in putting on the mere form of civil and humane seeming for the better compass of his salt and most hidden loose affection. Why, none; why, none—a slipper and subtle knave, a finder of occasion, that has an eye can stamp and counterfeit advantages, though true advantage never present itself, a devilish knave! Besides, the knave is handsome, young, and hath all those requisites in him that folly and green minds look after. A pestilent complete knave, and the woman hath found him already.

RODERIGO I cannot believe that in her. She’s full of most blessed condition.

IAGO Blessed fig’s end! The wine she drinks is made of grapes. If she had been blessed, she would never have loved the Moor. Blessed pudding! Didst thou not see her paddle with the palm of his hand? Didst not mark that? 255