followed by his strange loss of self-control in his dialogue with the little boy.

Act iii. sc. 2. Paulina's speech:

That thou betray'dst Polixenes, 'twas nothing;
That did but show thee, of a fool, inconstant,
And damnable ingrateful.—

Theobald reads 'soul.'

I think the original word is Shakspeare's. 1. My ear feels it to be Shakspearian; 2. The involved grammar is Shakspearian ;-show thee, being at fool naturally, to have improved thy folly by inconstancy; 3. The alteration is most flat, and unShakspearian. As to the grossness of the abuseshe calls him 'gross and foolish' a few lines below. Act iv. sc. 2. Speech of Autolycus :—

For the life to come, I sleep out the thought of it.

Fine as this is, and delicately characteristic of one who had lived and been reared in the best society, and had been precipitated from it by dice and drabbing; yet still it strikes against my feelings as a note out of tune, and as not coalescing with that pastoral tint which gives such a charm to this act. It is too Macbeth-like in the 'snapper up of unconsidered trifles.'

Ib. sc. 3. Perdita's speech :

:

From Dis's waggon! daffodils.

An epithet is wanted here, not merely or chiefly for the metre, but for the balance, for the æsthetic

And the rathe primrose that forsaken dies. Ib. Perdita's speech :—

Even here undone :

I was not much afraid; for once or twice
I was about to speak, and tell him plainly,
The self-same sun, that shines upon his court,
Hides not his visage from our cottage, but
Looks on alike. Wilt please you, Sir, be gone!
(To Florizel.)
I told you, what would come of this. Beseech you,
Of your own state take care: this dream of mine,
Being awake, I'll queen it no inch farther,

But milk my ewes, and weep.

O how more than exquisite is this whole speech! -And that profound nature of noble pride and grief venting themselves in a momentary peevishness of resentment toward Florizel:

-Wilt please you, Sir, be gone!

Ib. Speech of Autolycus :

Let me have no lying; it becomes none but tradesmen, and they often give us soldiers the lie; but we pay them for it in stamped coin, not stabbing steel;-therefore they do not give us the lie.

us.

As we pay them, they, therefore, do not give it

257

NOTES ON OTHELLO.

ACT I. sc. 1.

A

DMIRABLE is the preparation, so truly and peculiarly Shakspearian, in the introduction of Roderigo, as the dupe on whom Iago shall first exercise his art, and in so doing display his own character. Roderigo, without any fixed principle, but not without the moral notions and sympathies with honour, which his rank and connections had hung upon him, is already well fitted and predisposed for the purpose; for very want of character and strength of passion, like wind loudest in an empty house, constitute his character. The first three lines happily state the nature and foundation of the friendship between him and Iago, the purse, as also the contrast of Roderigo's intemperance of mind with Iago's coolness, the coolness of a preconceiving experimenter. The mere language of protestation

If ever I did dream of such a matter, abhor me,which falling in with the associative link, determines Roderigo's continuation of complaint

Thou told'st me, thou didst hold him in thy hate

elicits at length a true feeling of Iago's mind, the dread of contempt habitual to those, who encourage in themselves, and have their keenest pleasure in,

the expression of contempt for others. Observe Iago's high self-opinion, and the moral, that a wicked man will employ real feelings, as well as assume those most alien from his own, as instruments of his purposes::

-And, by the faith of man,

I know my place, I am worth no worse a place.

I think Tyrwhitt's reading of life' for wife'

A fellow almost damn'd in a fair wife–

the true one, as fitting to Iago's contempt for whatever did not display power, and that intellectual power. In what follows, let the reader feel how by and through the glass of two passions, disappointed vanity and envy, the very vices of which he is complaining, are made to act upon him as if they were so many excellences, and the more appropriately, because cunning is always admired and wished for by minds conscious of inward weakness;—but they act only by half, like music on an inattentive auditor, swelling the thoughts which prevent him from listening to it.

Ib.

Rod. What a full fortune does the thick-lips owe, If he can carry 't thus.

Roderigo turns off to Othello; and here comes one, if not the only, seeming justification of our blackamoor or negro Othello. Even if we supposed this an uninterrupted tradition of the theatre, and

that Shakspeare himself, from want of scenes, and the experience that nothing could be made too marked for the senses of his audience, had practically sanctioned it,—would this prove aught concerning his own intention as a poet for all ages? Can we imagine him so utterly ignorant as to make a barbarous negro plead royal birth,—at a time, too, when negroes were not known except as slaves? As for Iago's language to Brabantio, it implies merely that Othello was a Moor, that is, black. Though I think the rivalry of Roderigo sufficient to account for his wilful confusion of Moor and Negro,-yet, even if compelled to give this up, I should think it only adapted for the acting of the day, and should complain of an enormity built on a single word, in direct contradiction to Iago's Barbary horse.' Besides, if we could in good earnest believe Shakspeare ignorant of the distinction, still why should we adopt one disagreeable possibility instead of a ten times greater and more pleasing probability? It is a common error to mistake the epithets applied by the dramatis persona to each other, as truly descriptive of what the audience ought to see or know. No doubt Desdemona saw Othello's visage in his mind; yet, as we are constituted, and most surely as an English audience was disposed in the beginning of the seventeenth century, it would be something monstrous to conceive this beautiful Venetian girl falling in love with a veritable negro. It would argue a dis