"But farewell now, my coursers brave, attrap ped to the ground, "Farewell! adue all pleasures eke, with comely hauke and hounde! "Farewell ye nobles all, farewell eche marsial knight, "Farewell ye famous ladies all, in whom I did delight! "Adue my native soile, adue Arbaccus kyng, One is almost tempted to think that Shakspere had read this old play. MALONE. 456. The spirit-stirring drum, th' ear-piercing fife,] In mentioning the fife joined with the drum, Shakspere, as usual, paints from the life; those instruments accompanying each other being used in his age by the English soldiery. The fife, however, as a martial instrument, was afterwards entirely discontinued among our troops for many years, but at length revived in the war before the last. WARTON. 460. b. 6. -whose rude throats] So Milton. P. L. "From those deep-throated engines, &c." The quarto, 1622, reads-whose wide throats. 466. STEEVENS? mine eternal soul,] Perhaps the quarto, 1622, more forcibly reads: -man's eternal soul. 3 Shakspere Shakspere might have designed an opposition between man and dog. STEEVENS. 475. -abandon all remorse ;] I believe, remorse in this instance, as in many others, signifies pity. STEEVENS. 477. Do deeds to make heaven weep,] So, in Measure for Measure: "Plays such fantastick tricks before high heaven, "As make the angels weep." STEEVENS. 483. That liv'st] Thus the quarto. The foliothat lov'stSTEEVENS. 491. By the world, &c.] This speech is not in the first edition. POPE. 505. Behold her tupp'd?] A ram in Staffordshire and some other counties is called a tup. So, in the first act; -an old black ram Is tupping your white ewe. STEEVENS. 513. Were they as prime as goats-] Prime is prompt, from the Celtic or British Prim. HANMER. So, in the Vow-breaker, or the Faire Maid of Clifton, 1636: "More prime than goats or monkies in their prides." STEEVENS. 519. Give me a living reason-] The reading of the folio is smoother: Give me a living reason she's disloyal. MALONE. What Othello here demands is actual proof, arising from some positive FACT. HENLEY. 539. -a WARBURTON. 540. Othel. 'Tis a shrewd doubt, &c.] The old quarto gives this line, with the two following, to Iago; and rightly. WARBURTON. I think it more naturally spoken by Othello, who, by dwelling so long upon the proof, encouraged Iago to enforce it. JOHNSON. 544. yet, we see nothing done;] This is an oblique and secret mock at Othello's saying, Give me the ocular proof. WARBURTON. 557. Now do I see 'tis true.- -] The old quarto reads, Now do I see 'tis time. And this is Shakspere's, and has in it much more force and solemnity, and preparation for what fol. lows; as alluding to what he had said before : -No, lago! I'll see before I doubt, when I doubt, prove; This time was now come. WARBURTON. 560. thy hollow hell!] Warburton proposed to read cell. The hollow hell is the reading of the folio. The epithet hollow gives the idea of what Milton calls, 66 -the void profound "Of unessential night." STEEVENS. And, in Paradise Lost, b. I. ver. 314. the same epi thet and subject occur. "He call'd so loud that all the hollow deep 561. H.T. W. -hearted throne,] Hearted throne, is the heart on which thou wast enthroned. JOHNSON. Iago uses the same word, though with a meaning somewhat different: -My cause is hearted. STEEVENS. A passage in Twelfth Night fully supports the reading of the text, and Dr. Johnson's explanation of it: "It gives a very echo to the seat "Where Love is thron'd." MALONE. 562. swell, bosem, &c.] i. e. swell, because the fraught is of poison. WARBURTON. 567. Like to the Pontic sea, &c.] This simile is not in the first edition. POPE. When Shakspere grew acquainted with such particulars of knowledge, he made a display of them as soon as opportunity offered. He found this in the Second Book and 97th Chapter of Pliny's Nat. Hist. as translated by Philemon Holland, 1601: "And the sea Pontus evermore floweth and runneth out into Propontis, but the sea never retireth backe againe within Pontus." STEEVENS. 573. -a capable and wide revenge Like It: Capable] Ample; capacious. So, in As You “The cicatrice and capable impressure." It may, however, mean judicious. In Hamlet the word is often used in the sense of intelligent. What Othello says in another place, seems to favour this 3. latter latter interpretation : Good; good;-the justice of it pleases me. MALONE. 574. by yond' marble heaven,] In Soliman and Perseda, 1599, I find the same expression: "Now by the marble face of the welkin," &c. STEEVENS So, in Marston's Antonio and Melida, 1602: "And pleas'd the marble heavens." MALONE. 581. The execution-] The first quarto reads exSTEEVENS. cellency. 582. -let him command, And to obey, shall be in me remorse, What bloody business ever.] Thus all the old copies, to manifest depravation of the poet's sense. Mr. Pope has attempted an emendation, but with his old luck and dexterity: Not to obey, shall be in me remorse, &c. I read, with the change only of a single letter: i. e. Let your commands be ever so bloody, remorse and compassion shall not restrain me from obeying them. -Let him command, And to obey, shall be in me remorse, THEOBALD. What bloody business ever.] Thus the old copies read, but evidently wrong. Some editions read, Not to obey; on which the editor, Mr. Theobald, takes occasion to alter it to, Nor to obey; and thought he had much mended matters. But he mistook the sound Iij |