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How do our old acquaintance of this isle?—

Honey, you shall be well desired1 in Cyprus ;

I have found great love amongst them. O my

sweet,

2

I prattle out of fashion, and I dote

In mine own comforts.-I pr'ythee, 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, Desdemona, and Attendants. Iago. Do thou meet me presently at the harbor. Come hither. If thou be'st 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 to-night watches on the court of guard. First, I must tell thee this;-Desdemona is directly in love with him.

Ro. 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: and will she 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

Much solicited by invitation.

SHAK.

XIV.

2 Without method.

P

1

with the act of sport, there should be,-again to inflame it, and to give satiety a fresh appetite,loveliness in favor; 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 1 and unforced position) who stands so eminently in the degree of this fortune as Cassio does? a knave very voluble; no farther conscionable, than in putting on the mere form of civil and humane seeming for the better compassing of his salt and most hidden loose affection? why, none; why, none: a slippery and subtle knave: a finder out of occasions; 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.

Ro. I cannot believe that in her; she is full of most blessed condition.2

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

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thou not see her paddle with the palm of his hand? didst not mark that?

Ro. Yes, that I did; but that was but courtesy. Iago. Lechery, by this hand; an index and obscure prologue to the history of lust and foul thoughts. They met so near with their lips, that their breaths embraced together. Villanous thoughts, Roderigo! when these mutualities so marshal the way, hard at hand comes the master and main exercise, the incorporate conclusion: pish!-but, sir, be you ruled by me: I have brought you from Venice. Watch you to-night; for the command, I'll lay 't upon you: Cassio knows you not;-I'll not be far from you: do you find some occasion to anger Cassio, either by speaking too loud, or tainting his discipline; or from what other course you please, which the time shall more favorably minister.

Ro. Well.

Iago. Sir, he is rash, and very sudden in choler; and, haply, with his truncheon may strike at you: provoke him, that he may; for, even out of that, will I cause these of Cyprus to mutiny; whose qualification shall come into no true taste again,1 but by the displanting of Cassio: so shall you have a shorter journey to your desires, by the means I shall then have to prefer them; and the impediment

i. e. whose resentment shall not be so qualifed or tempered, as not to retain some bitterness.'-Johnson.

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