OTHELLO:

A TRAGEDY IN FIVE ACTS,

BY WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

THE VERSION AS PERFORMED BY

SIGNOR SALVINI

AND HIS AMERICAN COMPANY,

UNDER THE MANAGEMENT OF

C. A. CHIZZOLA,

NEW YORK:

J. J. LITTLE & CO., PRINTERS,

Nos. 10 TO 20 ASTOR PLACE.

1882.

ACT I.

SCENE I.

Venice-A Street; on one side the Palace of Brabantio, with Verona on the other.-The Hostel of the Sagistary.-Night.

ROD.

IAGO.

ROD.

LAGO.

ROD.

Enter IAGO and RODERIGO, R.

Tush, ne'er tell me, I take it much unkindly,
That thou, Iago-who hast had my purse,

As if the strings were thine,-should'st know of this.
You will not hear me:

If ever I did dream of such a matter,

Abhor me.

Thou told'st me, thou didst hold him in thy hate.
Despise me, if I do not. Three great ones of the city.
In personal suit to make me his lieutenant,
Oft capped to him; and, by the faith of man,
I know my price, I am worth no worse place :-
But he, as loving his own pride and purposes,
Evades them, with a bombaste circumstance,
Horribly stuffed with epithets of war;
And, in conclusion, nonsuits

My mediators for, certes, say he,

I have already chose my officer

And what was he?

Forsooth, a great arithmetician,
One Michael Cassio, a Florentine,

A fellow almost damned in a fair wife,
That never set a squadron in the field,

Nor the division of a battle knows

More than a spinster :

Unless the bookish theories,

Wherein the toga'd consuls can propose,

As masterly as he; mere prattle, without practice

Is all his soldiership. But he, sir, had the election,
And I, of whom his eyes had seen the proof

At Rhodes, at Cyprus and on other grounds
Christian and infidel, must be belie'd

By such a countercaster.

He, in good time, must his lieutenant be,

And I, (heaven bless the mark !) his Moorship's Ancient.

By heaven, I rather would have been his hangman.