the words we are upon, when set right, have a sublime in them that can never be enough ad-mired. The ridiculous blunder of writing instruction for induction (for so it should be read) has indeed sunk it into arraut nonsense. Othello is just going to fall iuto a swoon; and as is common for people in that circumstance, feels an nnusual mist and darkness, accompanied with borror, coming upon him. This, with vast sublimity of thought, is compared to the season of the sun's eclipse, at which time the earth becomes shadowed by the induction or bringing over of the moon between it and the sun. This being the allusion, the reasoning stands thus: "My nature could 'never be thus overshadowed, and falling, as it were, into dissolution, for no cause. There must be an induction of something: there must be a real cause. My jealousy cannot be merely imaginary. Ideas, words only, could not shake me thus, and raise` all this discorder. My jealousy, therefore, must be grounded on matter of fact.

"A dire induction am I witness 'to. "9

WARBURTON.

This is a noble conjecture, and whether right or wrong does honour to its author. Yet I am in doubt whether there is any necessity of emendation. There has always prevailed in the world an opinion, that when any great calamity happens at a distance, notice is given of it to the sufferer by some dejection or perturbation of mind, of which he discovers no external cause. This is ascribed to that general communication of one part of the universe with another, which is called sympathy and antipathy; or to the secret monition, instruc tion, and influence of a superior Being, which, superintends the order of nature and of life. Othello

says, "Nature could not bear herself in such shadowing passion without instruction. It is not. words that shake me thus. This passion, which spreads its clouds over me, is the effect of some agency more than the operation of words; it is one of those notices, which men have, of unseen cala¬ mities. JOHNSON.

However ingenious Dr. Warburton's note may be, it is certainly too forced and far-fetched. Othello alludes only to Cassio's dream, which had been invented and told him by lago. When many confused and interesting ideas pour in upon the anind all at once, and with such rapidity that it has not time to shape or digest them, if it does not relieve itself by tears (which we know it often does, whether for joy or grief) it produces stupefaction' and fainting.

Othello, in broken sentences and single words, all of which have a reference to the cause of his Jealousy, shows, that all the proofs are present at once to his mind, which so over-powers it, that he falls into a trance, the natural consequence.

SIR J. REYNOLDS. I believe, the text, as it stands, is perfectly right, and that Othello's allusion is to his present and uncommon sensations. STEEVENS.

P. So, 1. 32. Noses, ears, and lips: ] Othello is imagining to himself the familiarities which he supposes to have passed between Cassio and his wife.

If this be not the meaning, we must suppose he is meditating a cruel punishment for Desdemona aud her suspected paramour. STEEVENS.

P. 81, 1. 31. unproper beds,] Unproper, for

common. WARBURTON.

t

· P. 81, last-1. in a secure couch,] In a couch,

in which he is lulled into a false security and confidence in his wife's virtue. A Latin sense.

MALONE.

P. 82, 1. 6. Confine yourself but in a patient list. List, or lists, is barriers, bounds. Keep your temper, says lago, within the bounds of patience.

P. 82, 1. 12. Do but encave yourself,] Hide yourself in a private place. JOHNSON.

་ ་ ་ ་

-P. 82, 1. 13. 14. And mark the fleers, the gi bes, and notable scorns, That dwell in every region of his face;] Congreve might have had this passage in his memory, when he made Lady Touchwood say to Maskell "Ten thousand meanings lurk in each corner of that various face. STEEvens.

P. 82, 1. 19. Or I shall say, you are all in all in spleen, I read :

"Or shall I say, you're all in all a

spleen."

I think our author uses this expression elsewhere.

JOHNSON.

P. 83, 1. 3. his unbookish jealousy ―] Unbookish, for ignorant. WARBURTON.

P. 83, 1. 29. Oth. Do you triumph, Roman? do you triumph?] Othello calls him Roman ironically. Triumph, which was a Roman ceremony, brought Roman into his thoughts. What (says he) you are now triumphing as great as a Roman? JOHNSON.

P. 83. 1. 31. a customer!] A common woman, one that invites custom. JOHNSON.

P. 84, 1. 5. Have you scored me? Have you made my reckoning? have you settled the term of my life? The old quarto reads stored me. VOL. XX.

15

Have you disposed of me? have you laid me up? JOHNSON. To score originally meant no more than to cut a notch upon a tally, or to mark out a form by indenting it on any substance.

But it was soon figuratiyely used for setting a brand or mark of disgrace on any one.

"Let us

score their backs, says Scarus, in Antony and Cleopatra; and it is employed in the same sense on the present occasion. STEEVENS.

But in the passage before us our poet might have been thinking of the ignominious punishment of slaves. MALONE.

P. 84, 1. 26. 'Tis such another fitchew!] A polecat. POPE.

Shakspeare has in another place mentioned the lust of this animal. He tells Iago, that she is as lewd as the polecat, but of better scent, the polecat being a very stinking animal. JOHNSON. By "another place," Dr. Johnson means Lear:

King

"The fitchew, nor the soiled horse,

goes to'l

"With a more riotous appetite.

A polecat therefore was anciently one of the cant terins for a strumpet., STEEVENS.

P. 85, 1. 32. 33. my heart is turn'd to stone; I strike it, and it hurts my hand.] This thought, as often as it occurs to Shakspeare, is spre to be received, and as often counteracts his pathos. STEEVENS.

P. 86, 1. 9. of so gentle a condition!] i. e. of so sweet a disposition. So, in King Henry V: "Our tongue is rough, coz, and my condition is not smooth."

MALONE.

.P. 87, 1. 2. 3. Lod. 'Save you, worthy General!

Oth. With all my heart, Sir.] The second line does not relate to what Lodovico has just said, but is spoken by Othello while he salutes him. MALONE.

If it be urged, that "save you" only means preserve you in this world, my sense of the passage will not be much weakened; as our protection,

"Even here, upon this bank and shoal of time, ". depends on the Almighty. STEEVENS.

P. 87, 1.. 25. To atone them,] Make them one reconcile them. JOHNSON.

P. 88, 1. 8. 9. If that the earth could teem with woman's tears, Each drop she falls would prove a croco

dile: 1 If women's tears could impregnate the earth &c. By the doctrine of equivocal generation, new animals were supposed, producible by new combinations of matter. See Bacon. JOHNSON.

Shakspeare here alludes to the fabulous accounts of crocodiles. Each tear, says Othello which falls from the false Desdemona, wonld generate a crocodile, the most deceitful of all animals, and whose own tears are proverbially fallacious.

It appears from Bullokar, that a dead crocodile, "but in perfect forme," of about nine feet long, had been exhibited in London, in our poet's time." MALONE.

To fall is here a verb active. STEEVENS. P. 88, 1. 25. Proceed you in your tears.] I cannot think that the poet meant to make Othello bid Desdemona to continue weeping, which