1 I did not see you; welcome, gentle signior; [To BRABANTIO. We lack'd your counsel and your help to-night. Bra. So did I yours. Good your grace, pardon me; Is of so flood-gate and o'erbearing nature Duke. Bra. Dead? Ay, to me; She is abus'd, stol'n from me, and corrupted Being not deficient, blind, or lame of sense, Duke. Whoe'er he be that, in this foul proceeding, 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 Bra. 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. Duke and Senators. We are very sorry for't. Duke. What, in your own part, can you say to this? Bra. Nothing, but this is so. [TO OTHELLO. Oth. Most potent, grave, and reverend signiors, My very noble and approv'd good masters,- The very head and front of my offending Hath this extent, no more. Rude am I in my speech, And little of this great world can I speak, More than pertains to feats of broil and battle; In speaking for myself. Yet, by your gracious patience, I will a round unvarnish'd tale deliver Of my whole course of love; what drugs, what charms, For such proceeding I am charg'd withal, I won his daughter. Bra. Why this should be. I therefore vouch again, Duke. To vouch this is no proof; Without more wider and more overt test Did you by indirect and forced courses Oth. I do beseech you, And let her speak of me before her father: Not only take away, but let your sentence Duke. Fetch Desdemona hither. Oth. Ancient, conduct them; you best know the place. [Exeunt IAGO and Attendants. 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 Duke. Say it, Othello. Oth. Her father lov'd me; oft invited me; Still question'd me the story of my life, From year to year, the battles, sieges, fortunes, That I have pass'd. I ran it through, even from my boyish days Of hairbreadth scapes i' the imminent deadly breach; And sold to slavery; of my redemption thence, And portance in my travel'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 the process; And of the Cannibals that each other eat, The Anthropophagi, and men whose heads Do grow beneath their shoulders. This to hear But still the house affairs would draw her thence; That my youth suffer'd. My story being done, She gave me for my pains a world of sighs: She swore,in faith, 'twas strange, 'twas passing strange; 'Twas pitiful, 'twas wondrous pitiful : She wish'd she had not heard it; yet she wish'd That heaven had made her such a man: she thank'd me; And bade me, if I had a friend that lov'd her, I should but teach him how to tell my story, And I lov'd her that she did pity them. Here comes the lady; let her witness it. Enter DESDEMONA, IAGO, and Attendants. Duke. I think this tale would win my daughter too.Good Brabantio, Take up this mangled matter at the best: Men do their broken weapons rather use Bra. 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: Where most you owe obedience? Des. I do perceive here a divided duty: My noble father, 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,- To you, preferring you before her father, Bra. I here do give thee that with all my heart For thy escape would teach me tyranny, To hang clogs on them.-I have done, my lord. Duke. Let me speak like yourself; and lay a sentence, Which, as a grise 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. Is the next way to draw new mischief on. What cannot be preserv'd when fortune takes, The robb'd that smiles steals something from the thief; We lose it not so long as we can smile; He bears the sentence well that nothing bears Being strong on both sides, are equivocal: 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 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. Oth. 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 Duke. Be't at her father's. Bra. Oth. Nor I. If you please, I'll not have it so. Nor I; I would not there reside, Duke. What would you, Desdemona? Des. That I did love the Moor to live with him, My downright violence and scorn of fortunes I saw Othello's visage in his mind; |